In this paper I aim to clarify Hegel's objection to the use of ideals in ethical thinking by examining his opposition to Kant's ideal of perpetual peace. I explain why Hegel believes that the ideal of peace amounts to nothing more than a moral condemnation that ignores the significance for international relations of appreciating the modern nation-state as an ethical achievement. I argue, however, that Kant's proposed federation can be grounded in the concrete ethical realities Hegel accepts as compelling and (...) uses this basis to sketch a defensible understanding of the obligating force of ethical ideals against Hegel's objections. (shrink)

Michael Hardimon’s new book is a valuable study of Hegel’s social and political philosophy. Hardimon takes seriously Hegel’s intention to offer a social philosophy that can reconcile people to the modern social world. Since Hegel’s own presentation of his philosophy is motivated by a number of competing concerns, Hardimon’s admirable success at reconstructing Hegel’s view in accordance with this fundamental intention offers an important and insightful perspective on Hegel’s project. The focal points of Hardimon’s reconstruction—the aim of reconciliation and the (...) problem of alienation it is meant to overcome—are explained and interpreted with considerable clarity in a way that shows their significance to the tradition of modern political philosophy. Hardimon deliberately resists using Hegel’s technical terminology and engaging in detailed scholarly disputes in a successful effort to avoid obscurity and distraction. The result is a book that should be prized by anyone seeking an accessible presentation of Hegel’s social philosophy, particularly as a vehicle for teaching Hegel’s political thought without having to devote an entire course to the task. (shrink)

Adherence to good ethical practices is fundamental to psychologists as they navigate the multitude of ethical issues that arise in their daily professional activities. Foundational ethical principl...

This paper offers a new way to make sense of disagreement expansion from a polylogical perspective by incorporating various places in addition to players and positions into the analysis. The concepts build on prior implicit ideas about disagreement space by suggesting how to more fully account for argumentative context, and its construction, in large-scale complex controversies. As a basis for our polylogical analysis, we use a New York Times news story reporting on an oil train explosion—a significant point in the (...) broader controversy over producing oil and gas via hydraulic fracturing. (shrink)

In the course of theorising, it can be appropriate to replace one concept—a folk concept, or one drawn from an earlier stage of theorising—with a more precise counterpart. The best-known account of concept replacement is Rudolf Carnap’s ‘explication’. P.F. Strawson famously critiqued explication as a method in philosophy. As the critique is standardly construed, it amounts to the objection that explication is ‘irrelevant’, fails to be ‘illuminating’, or simply ‘changes the subject’. In this paper, I argue that this is an (...) unfair characterisation of Strawson’s critique, spelling out the critique in more detail and showing that, fully understood, it is not undermined by extant responses. In light of both the critique and extant responses, I close by making some substantive comments about what explication can, and cannot, be used to do in philosophy. (shrink)

Here reprinted from the 1902 Macmillan edition.

This international ensemble of scholars discuss Thomas Nail’s The Figure of the Migrant. These scholars represent various disciplines within the academy and divergent methodologies. One thing we share in common, though, is the opinion that the migrant needs to occupy a more significant place within our political theory and policy. Nail’s book is one of kinopolitics, that is, a politics of movement. It provides a kind of theory of social motion. According to Nail, the book offers a remedy to problems (...) in how the migrant is typically theorized, namely that the migrant is understood as a derivative figure in contrast to the stable denizen and the migrant is discussed through the lens of the state. His remedial maneuver mobilizes the potential to understand the figure of the migrant by placing the migrant in the primary position, by offering a political philosophy of the migrant. (shrink)

This paper discusses the problem of responsibility attribution raised by the use of artificial intelligence technologies. It is assumed that only humans can be responsible agents; yet this alone already raises many issues, which are discussed starting from two Aristotelian conditions for responsibility. Next to the well-known problem of many hands, the issue of “many things” is identified and the temporal dimension is emphasized when it comes to the control condition. Special attention is given to the epistemic condition, which draws (...) attention to the issues of transparency and explainability. In contrast to standard discussions, however, it is then argued that this knowledge problem regarding agents of responsibility is linked to the other side of the responsibility relation: the addressees or “patients” of responsibility, who may demand reasons for actions and decisions made by using AI. Inspired by a relational approach, responsibility as answerability thus offers an important additional, if not primary, justification for explainability based, not on agency, but on patiency. (shrink)

This paper reports an experiment designed to investigate the potential influence of prior acts of self-control on subsequent prospective memory performance. College undergraduates performed either a cognitively depleting initial task or a less resource-consuming version of that task . Subsequently, participants completed a prospective memory task that required attentionally demanding monitoring processes. The results demonstrated that prior acts of self-control do not impair the ability to execute a future intention in college-aged adults. We conceptually replicated these results in three additional (...) depletion and prospective memory experiments. This research extends a growing number of studies demonstrating the boundary conditions of the resource depletion effect in cognitive tasks. (shrink)

Political communities across the world have recently sought to tackle rising rates of vaccine hesitancy and refusal, by implementing coercive immunization programs, or by making existing immunization programs more coercive. Many academics and advocates of public health have applauded these policy developments, and they have invoked ethical reasons for implementing or strengthening vaccine mandates. Others have criticized these policies on ethical grounds, for undermining liberty, and as symptoms of broader government overreach. But such arguments often obscure or abstract away from (...) the diverse values that are relevant to the ethical justifications of particular political communities’ vaccine‐mandate policies. We argue for an expansive conception of the normative issues relevant to deciding whether and how to establish or reform vaccine mandates, and we propose a schema by which to organize our thoughts about the ways in which different kinds of vaccine‐mandate policies implicate various values. (shrink)

Typically, a refusal to provide a medical service is an instance of conscientious objection only when the medical service is legal, professionally accepted, and clinically appropriate. That is, conscientious objection typically occurs only when practitioners reject prevailing norms or practices. Insofar as refusing to provide antibiotics for a viral infection does not violate prevailing clinical norms, there is no need for the physician in Case 1 to justify his refusal to provide antibiotics by appealing to his conscience.1 By contrast, insofar (...) as emergency contraception is legal and does not violate prevailing norms of good medical practice, the physician in Case 6 cannot justify his refusal to provide EC by... (shrink)

Postphenomenology and posthermeneutics as initiated by Ihde have made important contributions to conceptualizing understanding human–technology relations. However, their focus on individual perception, artifacts, and static embodiment has its limitations when it comes to understanding the embodied use of technology as involving bodily movement, social, and taking place within, and configuring, a temporal horizon. To account for these dimensions of experience, action, and existence with technology, this paper proposes to use a conceptual framework based on performance metaphors. Drawing on metaphors from (...) three performance arts—dance, theatre, and music—and giving examples from social media and other technologies, it is shown that we can helpfully describe technology use and experience as performance involving movement, sociality, and temporality. Moreover, it is argued that these metaphors can also be used to reformulate the idea that in such uses and experiences, now understood as “technoperformances”, technology is not merely a tool but also takes on a stronger, often non-intended role: not so much as “mediator” but as choreographer, director, and conductor of what we experience and do. Performance metaphors thus allow us to recast the phenomenology and hermeneutics of technology use as moving, social, and temporal—indeed historical—affair in which technologies take on the role of organizer and structurer of our performances, and in which humans are not necessarily the ones who are fully in control of the meanings, experiences, and actions that emerge from our engagement with the world, with technology, and with each other. This promises to give us a more comprehensive view of what it means to live with technology and how our lives are increasingly organized by technology—especially by smart technologies. Finally, it is argued that this has normative implications for an ethics and politics of technology, now understood as an ethics and politics of technoperformances. (shrink)

The importance of preserving trust in physicians and in medical institutions has received widespread attention in recent years. Primarily, this is due to the threats to trust posed by managed care, but there is a general and growing recognition that trust deserves more attention than it traditionally has received in all aspects of medical ethics, law, and public policy. Trust has both intrinsic and instrumental value. Trust is intrinsically important because it is a core characteristic that affects the emotional and (...) interpersonal aspects of the physician/patient relationship. As an instrumental value, trust is widely believed to be essential for effective therapeutic encounters. It has been hypothesized or shown to affect a host of important behaviors and attitudes relating to care, including seeking care, disclosing private information, complying with treatment, and being satisfied with care. Moreover, trust may be a mediator of measurable clinical outcomes and a key factor in the mind–body interactions that underlie placebo/nocebo effects and the effectiveness of alternative medicine. It is no surprise, then, that preserving, justifying, and enhancing trust is the fundamental goal of much of medical ethics, and is a prominent objective in healthcare law and public policy. Discussions of trust and related concepts were commonplace in professionally based medical ethics prior to the 1970s. a 1 2. (shrink)

Early in my career as a neonatologist, I was called into the hospital for a newborn who would not stop crying. Screaming, really. When I entered the unit, I was greeted by a loud, shrill, distinctive cry. After hearing the history and examining the baby, I just stood there for a while, watching and listening. It took some time, but eventually, I noticed a subtle regularity, a rhythmicity. I took off my watch, placed it on the bed next to the (...) child, and found that the crying briefly grew louder about every six or seven seconds. This baby was having an atypical seizure. This preliminary diagnosis was followed by a conversation with the parents and a neurologist, transfer to the nearby academic center for an extensive evaluation, and the eventual demise of the child from a poorly understood disease. About a year later, I walked into the same unit and heard a cry I had heard only once before. I looked over to see the same mother at a newborn's bedside, with tears in her eyes, looking back at me. She knew what the coming days held for her and for her second child. That was over twenty years ago, but two images, or moments, remain with me. One is the watch on the bed next to the first baby; the other is the mother's expression of sadness the morning the second child was born. The image of the timepiece is perhaps instructive. (shrink)

Across the world, Artificial Intelligence (AI) is being used as a tool for political manipulation and totalitarian repression. Stories about AI are often stories of polarization, discrimination, surveillance, and oppression. Is democracy in danger? And can we do anything about it? In this compelling book, Mark Coeckelbergh offers a guide to the key risks posed by AI for democracy. He argues that AI, as it is currently used and developed, not only aids totalitarian regimes but also undermines the fundamental (...) principles on which liberal democracies are founded such as freedom and equality. How can we make democracy more resilient in the face of AI? And, more positively, what can AI do for democracy? Coeckelbergh advocates not only for more democratic technologies, but also for new political institutions and a renewal of education and culture to ensure that AI promotes, rather than hinders, the common good and helps us to revamp humanism for the 21st century. Why AI Undermines Democracy and What To Do About It is illuminating reading for anyone who is concerned about the fate of democracy. (shrink)

Several authors have recently attempted to provide a physicalist analysis of causation by appealing to terms from physics that characterise causal processes. Accounts based on forces, energy/momentum transfer and fundamental interactions have been suggested in the literature. In this paper, I wish to show that the former two are untenable when the effect of enclosed electromagnetic fluxes in quantum theory is considered. Furthermore, I suggest that even in the classical and non-relativistic limits, a theory of fundamental interactions should not be (...) reduced to either a theory of forces or of energy/momentum transfer, but should be understood as a classical account of mutual interactions. Causal links are therefore correctly characterised by generalised potentials. This leads to some speculation regarding the fundamental ontology of interactions and, in particular, the role of the quantum mechanical phase. (shrink)

I hold that a belief report characterizes the subject's belief not only by its truth conditions, but also by the token mental representations involved in it (based on conversational hints). To what extent does a belief report specify the mental representations required to make it true? I advance two surprising theses: (i) many reports specify representations by actually referring to them, and (ii) it is not clear that any ordinary reports simply leave open what sorts of representations are required for (...) their truth. I defend these claims from the arguments of Marga Reimer and other critics. (shrink)

The Priority of the Other provides radical reorientation of our most basic ways of making sense of the human condition. By thinking and being Otherwise, he suggests, we can become better attuned to both the world beyond us and the world within.

: In the last few years, there has been a revival of interest in the philosophy of Iris Murdoch. Despite this revival, however, certain aspects of Murdoch's views remain poorly understood, including her account of a concept that she famously described as ‘central’ to moral philosophy—i.e., love. In this paper, I argue that the concept of love is essential to any adequate understanding of Murdoch's work but that recent attempts by Kieran Setiya and David Velleman to assimilate Murdoch's account of (...) love to neo-Aristotelian or neo-Kantian theories of moral agency are misconceived. We will not understand what Murdoch is trying to do unless we understand her position as a radical alternative to such theories. Here, I present a reading of Murdoch's account of love as a form of Platonic eros directed toward two objects: the Good and the particular individual. It is in navigating the tension between these two objects that we find ourselves facing what Murdoch famously described as ‘the extremely difficult realization that something other than oneself is real’. When properly understood, Murdoch's account of love opens up conceptual space for an alternative approach to some of the central questions in contemporary moral theory. (shrink)

In the post-genome world of biomedical research, an increasingly common research strategy is to focus on large repositories of biological specimens. There are now several well-known efforts to compile vast collections of biological materials, reanalyze extant samples, collect new ones, and link the samples to medical records. The significant issues of law, ethics, and policy raised by these research activities usually are heightened when commercial enterprises play a leading role in accumulating and distributing the samples. Emerging companies are not only (...) compiling repositories for their own use, but some companies are positioning themselves to act as intermediaries, developing vast biobanks for sale to a wide range of other researchers. (shrink)

In this commentary, I advocate for strict relations between Marr's levels of analysis. Under a strict relationship, each level is exactly implemented by the subordinate level. This yields two benefits. First, it brings consistency for multilevel explanations. Second, similar to how a sculptor chisels away superfluous marble, a modeler can chisel a computational-level model by applying constraints. By sculpting the model, one restricts the set of possible algorithmic- and implementational-level theories.

: This paper develops four related claims: 1. Critical thinking should focus more on decision making, 2. the heuristics and bias literature developed by cognitive psychologists and behavioral economists provides many insights into human irrationality which can be useful in critical thinking instruction, 3. unfortunately the “rational choice” norms used by behavioral economists to identify “biased” decision making narrowly equate rational decision making with the efficient pursuit of individual satisfaction; deviations from these norms should not be treated as an irrational (...) bias, 4. a richer, procedural theory of rational decision making should be the basis for critical thinking instruction in decision making. (shrink)

Prospective developments in computer and nanotechnology suggest that there is some possibility—perhaps as early as this century—that we will have the technological means to attempt to duplicate people. For example, it has been speculated that the psychology of individuals might be emulated on a computer platform to create a personality duplicate—an “upload.” Physical duplicates might be created by advanced nanobots tasked with creating molecule-for-molecule copies of individuals. Such possibilities are discussed in the philosophical literature as (putative) cases of “fission”: one (...) person “splitting” into two. Many philosophers, perhaps most, reject the idea of fission, appealing to some form of a “no-branching” condition to rule out such possibilities. I argue, to the contrary, that there are good moral reasons to think that any account of personal identity that does not permit fission is deeply problematic, especially in connection with theorizing about criminal punishment. I discuss and reject David Lewis’ famous account of personal identity that invokes “multiple occupancy” to allow for branching. In contrast, I offer an account of personal identity that permits branching using the type/token distinction to help with such puzzling cases. (shrink)

It has been pending in Congress for twelve years, despite the support of the last two presidential Administrations and the National Institutes of Health. It has been the subject of extensive affirmative lobbying by academic medical centers, pharmaceutical and biotech companies, genetic disease advocacy groups, and civil rights organizations. It has overcome vehement objections by employers and insurers. Its final passage, however, has been thwarted by a few Congressional leaders, who have prevented enactment despite overwhelming bipartisan support in both houses (...) of Congress.Based on this legislative history, one could not help but assume that the Genetic Information Nondiscrimination Act is a revolutionary piece of legislation that, if finally enacted, would provide extensive, effective, and comprehensive protection against genetic discrimination in health insurance and employment Unfortunately, such an assessment would be incorrect. Indeed, GINA may be a case of too much ado about too little. (shrink)

For over thirty years, Robert Audi has produced important work in ethics, epistemology, and the theory of action. This volume features thirteen new critical essays on Audi by a distinguished group of authors: Fred Adams, William Alston, Laurence BonJour, Roger Crisp, Elizabeth Fricker, Bernard Gert, Thomas Hurka, Hugh McCann, Al Mele, Walter Sinnott-Armstrong, Raimo Tuomela, Candace Vogler, and Timothy Williamson. Audi's introductory essay provides a thematic overview interconnecting his views in ethics, epistemology, and philosophy of action. The volume concludes with (...) his comprehensive response essay that yields an illuminating dialog with all his critics and often extends his previous work. (shrink)

Terry McLaughlin's sudden death in 2006 deprived the academic world of a leading British philosopher of education, and the author himself of the opportunity to publish a planned synthesis of his work. This volume brings together a collection of his essays from a variety of leading journals. They have been selected by former colleagues well-acquainted with his thinking to celebrate his work and make it available in a convenient and accessible form.

Conventional wisdom and many published histories of “Green Chemistry” describe its start as being a result of governmental and/or regulatory actions at the US Environmental Protection Agency during the early 1990’s. But there were many Real World industrial examples of environmentally friendly commercial processes in the oil and commodity chemicals industries for decades prior to the 1990s. Some early examples of commercial “Green Chemistry” are briefly described in this article. The Boots/Hoechst Celanese Ibuprofen process was one of the earliest multiple-award-winning (...) examples of industrial “Green Chemistry” in the fine chemical/pharmaceutical industry. The author, who conceived the BHC Ibuprofen synthetic strategy in 1984, reveals and documents that the BHC Ibuprofen process was not primarily a result of governmental or regulatory mandates, or environmentalist or political motivations. The BHC ibuprofen process, and probably many other early industrial “green” inventions, evolved from, and their development and commercialization motivated and guided by, a long prior industrial culture of both scientific and technical evolution. The invention and commercialization of these early industrial commercialized processes, and the BHC Ibuprofen process were also guided by both competitive and economic market needs, personal human motivations, and a low waste culture of “Quality” and “Continuous Improvement” that the commodity chemical industry internally promoted in the 1980’s. The author comments on some perceptions of the status of Green Chemistry now, and directions it should consider going in the future. The author recommends that young Green Chemists and/or Green Engineers reconsider “Quality” approaches in order to genuinely lead Society toward a Greener future. (shrink)

Medicalization was the theme of the 29th European Conference on Philosophy of Medicine and Health Care that included a panel session on the DSM and mental health. Philosophical critiques of the medical model in psychiatry suffer from endemic assumptions that fail to acknowledge the real world challenges of psychiatric nosology. The descriptive model of classification of the DSM 3-5 serves a valid purpose in the absence of known etiologies for the majority of psychiatric conditions. However, a consequence of the “atheoretical” (...) approach of the DSM is rampant epistemological confusion, a shortcoming that can be ameliorated by importing perspectives from the work of Jaspers and McHugh. Finally, contemporary psychiatry’s over-reliance on neuroscience and pharmacotherapy has led to a reductionist agenda that is antagonistic to the inherently pluralistic nature of psychiatry. As a result, the field has suffered a loss of knowledge that may be difficult to recover. (shrink)

In this essay, I take as a starting point Foucault’s rejection of two different ways of thinking about the future, prophecy and utopianism, and use this rejection as a basis for the elaboration of a more detailed rejection of them, invoking complexity-based epistemic limitations in relation to thinking about the future of political society. I follow Foucault in advocating immanent political struggle, which does not seek to build a determinate vision of the future but rather focuses on negating aspects of (...) the current conjuncture. I extend this argument into an ethical register, arguing that the same arguments apply mutatis mutandis to our personal lives. I conclude by engaging with Jacques Lacan’s account of subjectivity, and the interpretation of its political import furnished by Yannis Stavrakakis, drawing from these additional supports for my position, in particular the rejection of utopianism as an attempt to avoid limitation by the real. (shrink)

Arti cial life studies computer models of the processes characteristic of complex adaptive systems|processes like self-organization, self-reproduction, adaptation, and evolution. Complex adaptive systems take many forms, each of which di ers from the others in myriad ways. By abstracting away from the diverse details, arti cial life hopes to reveal fundamental principles governing broad classes of complex adaptive systems. This hope rests on arti cial life's working hypoth-.

Humeans identify the laws of nature with universal generalizations that systematize rather than govern the particular matters of fact. Humeanism is frequently accused of circularity: laws explain their instances, but Humean laws are, in turn, grounded by those instances. Unfortunately, this argument trades on controversial assumptions about grounding and explanation that Humeans routinely reject. However, recently an ostensibly semantic circularity objection has been offered, which seeks to avoid reading such assumptions into the Humean view. This paper argues that the new (...) semantic version tacitly relies on the familiar metaphysical one and, therefore, it ultimately brings nothing new to the table. (shrink)

In this paper I argue that both Hegel's and Korsgaard's attempts to ground moral obligation in the inherent necessity of committing to being a self‐determining agent fall short of accounting for the full strength of our considered sense of moral obligation. I examine the differences between their accounts in order to show that their efforts suffer from a common inadequacy, namely, overlooking that there are two distinct ways we can value things as self‐determining agents. I maintain that accounting for the (...) actual stringency of moral judgment depends on explaining the superiority of one of these ways of valuing over the other. (shrink)

Agricultural Big Data analytics (ABDA) is being proposed to ensure better farming practices, decision-making, and a sustainable future for humankind. However, the use and adoption of these technologies may bring about potentially undesirable consequences, such as exercises of power. This paper will analyse Brey’s five distinctions of power relationships (manipulative, seductive, leadership, coercive, and forceful power) and apply them to the use agricultural Big Data. It will be shown that ABDA can be used as a form of manipulative power to (...) initiate cheap land grabs and acquisitions. Seductive power can be exercised by pressuring farmers into situations they would not have otherwise chosen (such as installing monitors around their farm and limited access to their farm and machinery). It will be shown that agricultural technology providers (ATPs) demonstrate leadership power by getting farmers to agree to use ABDA without informed consent. Coercive power is exercised when ATPs threaten farmers with the loss of ABDA if they do not abide by the policies and requirements of the ATP or are coerced to remain with the ATP because of fear of legal and economic reprisal. ATPs may use ABDA to determine willingness-to-pay rates from farmers, using this information to force farmers into precarious and vulnerable positions. Altogether, this paper will apply these five types of power to the use and implementation of ABDA to demonstrate that it is being used to exercise power in the agricultural industry. (shrink)

In the early 1970s, Congress considered enacting comprehensive privacy legislation, but it was unable to do so. In 1974, it passed the Privacy Act, applicable only to information in the possession of the federal government. In the intervening years, other information privacy laws enacted by Congress, such as the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act, have been weak and sector specific. With the explosion of information technology and the growing concerns about an absence of effective federal privacy laws, the legal (...) focus has shifted to the states. Signaling a new direction in state data privacy and consumer protection law, the California Consumer Privacy Act establishes important rights and protections for California residents with regard to the collection, use, disclosure, and sale of their personal information. The CCPA is certain to spur similar legislation and to affect national and international businesses that collect data from California's residents. Understanding the new law is important for all data‐driven industries, including health care. (shrink)

Kristján Kristjánsson is one of the most prominent neo-Aristotelian defenders of the view that flourishing is the primary aim of education. Although he supports most aspects of Aristotle’s theory, Kristjánsson argues that Aristotle failed to capture the significance of awe for human flourishing. Kristjánsson seeks to remedy this deficiency. While I find Kristjánsson’s work on awe compelling and important, I am not convinced it fits with his wider conception of flourishing. To make room for it, I shall argue, Kristjánsson must (...) either modify several other core aspects of his theory or account for the normative significance of awe in a different way. Taking the former route comes at the cost of an unfortunate amount of ad hoc theoretical bloat. Happily, though, the latter route can be satisfied in several plausible ways. We can and should emphasize the importance of awe in education, but not by claiming that awe is a necessary part of species functioning à la Aristotle. (shrink)

The methodology implicit in empirically grounded social scientific studies of religion naturally allies with forms of semantic holism. However, a well known argument which questions whether holism in general is consistent with the fact that languages are learnable can be extended into an epistemological one which questions whether holism is consistent with an empirical methodology. In other words, there is question whether holism, in fact, makes social science possible. I diagnose the assumptions on which that objection rests, pointing out that (...) they are not necessary for semantic holism per se. I argue that a form of semantic holism along the lines advocated by W. V. O. Quine and Donald Davidson can avoid the objection. Moreover, when seen in this light, it has the resources to withstand an even deeper methodological problem. In so doing, though, several important but overlooked implications for the study of religion emerge. (shrink)

This article aims to challenge the thesis of the craft origins of scientific empiricism by demonstrating how the empirical practices of early experimentalism differed in significant ways from the activities of artisans. Through a phenomenological analysis of instrumental observation and experimental demonstrations, I aim to show how experimentalism privileged modes of experience that were foreign to craft traditions and which facilitated a newfound estrangement of human subjects from the objects of their knowledge. Firstly, we will review concerns surrounding the promotion (...) of optical instruments by early experimentalists to reveal how these technologies were understood not only to amplify the senses but also to obscure contextual and relative qualities available to unaided visual perception. Secondly, we will examine the experimental practices of the early Royal Society, to see how experimental demonstrations were deliberately structured to facilitate experiences of the natural world that were divorced from practical and personal contexts. It is here that the divergence from artisanal epistemology is rendered most apparent. For in contrast to craft practices, which favored forms of experience which were personal and engaged, I will argue that the new scientific practices of the 17th century played a central role in effecting the researcher's transformation into a new kind of epistemological subject – the spectator. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Satyr Play in Plato's SymposiumM. D. UsherIn the Symposium, Socrates jokingly declares that "the satyric—nay silenic—drama" of Alcibiades' drunken panegyric was perfectly clear to the guests that evening at Agathon's house (222d3-4).1 Though this statement implies an extended treatment of a theme, discussions of silenic elements in the dialogue have rarely ventured far beyond the overt comparison of Socrates to a Silenus or Marsyas figure in Alcibiades' speech (215a4-222b7).2 (...) Yet, as Paul Zanker has observed (1995, 38), "There is surely more than one aspect to the comparison of Socrates to Silenus." In fact, the final scenes of the Symposium are riddled with satyric motifs, many of which Plato inverts or otherwise adapts, in the pointed critique of wealth, beauty, and sexual attraction that he achieves in the character of Socrates.Let me begin defending this thesis with a Platonic analogy and suggest that if we look at the big letters first, we will be able to read the smaller ones more readily: Though it has only recently, and only in passing, been adduced as a source (Clay 2000, 74), much of the scene involving Alcibiades and Socrates is modeled on the myth of King Midas' capture of the satyr Silenus.3 While the extant sources for the Midas legend are disparate and fragmentary, an investigation into its literary provenance and the uses to which it was put in antiquity (section 1 of this essay) suggests that the encounter between Midas and Silenus was something of a literary set piece that had been used as a vehicle for popular wisdom and philosophic critique long before Plato's time. Indeed, in [End Page 205] reusing the story in just this fashion in his lost dialogue, the Eudemus,4 Aristotle highlights both its popularity and antiquity, describing it as "having been carried about on the lips of men for many years now."5The finer print (section 2) involves another source never previously adduced in discussions of the Symposium, Euripides' Cyclops, where we will consider both what is particular to that play (our only complete satyr drama) and what is typical of the genre.6 Cyclops was produced in the last five years of Euripides' life,7 when an impressionable Plato, that "nursling of Attic drama,"8 was in his early twenties.An awareness of the extent of Plato's use and adaptation of satyr lore in the Symposium is essential for a full appreciation of his philosophy of love, his technique as an author, and the purpose of the dialogue. Einstein once said that the secret to creativity is hiding one's sources. In constructing the final scenes of the Symposium, Plato is deeply unoriginal in precisely this sense. It would be well to emphasize at the start, however, that the satyric motifs adduced here—as legendary and mythic material—would have had a wide currency in many media, and one need not advance or defend arguments for strictly literary dependence. Indeed, it will be seen that the way Plato incorporates silenic elements into the Symposium is suggestive and indirect, though no less compelling, important, or even intentional for that reason. That Plato's purpose in including them is as apologetic as it is literary and philosophical is discussed in a concluding section where I attempt to bring some recent readings of Plato under one head. [End Page 206]I. The Capture of SilenusSome minor variants notwithstanding,9 the basic outline of this story is as follows: Silenus is captured while sleeping by Midas' henchmen, who have tricked him by spiking a river with wine; whereupon, in exchange for his release, Silenus agrees to reveal to Midas hidden wisdom about man and the nature of the world.10 Both the apprehension of the satyr while sleeping and the conversation that follows in the myth are adapted by Plato in the part of the Symposium where Alcibiades describes his unsuccessful romantic overtures toward Socrates. Having prevailed upon Socrates to come to dinner and spend the night, Alcibiades approaches the satyr-sage in bed and asks if he is sleeping (218c3). By Plato's inversion, however, it turns out that Socrates, unlike the... (shrink)

The view (most prominently advocated by Justice Scalia) that original meaning entails the constitutionality of original practices has strong intuitive appeal and has been broadly assumed by originalists and nonoriginalists alike. But the position is mistaken. We suggest that a failure to distinguish between two different notions of meaning accounts for the position's wide currency. According to the first notion, the meaning of a term is roughly what a dictionary definition attempts to convey--the semantic or linguistic understanding necessary to use (...) the term, as opposed to nonlinguistic facts about the objects or activities to which the term applies. In contrast, according to the second, looser notion, the meaning of a term incorporates the objects or activities to which the term is applied. The first notion lies behind originalism's theoretical force; it is untenable that the meaning of the Constitution in the first sense could evolve. In sharp contrast, it is not only tenable but inevitable that changes occur over time in the class of things to which a constitutional provision is applied. Once recognized, the distinction undermines the seemingly natural move from the necessity of interpreting the Constitution in accordance with how it was originally understood to the necessity of upholding practices originally understood to be constitutional. By taking the distinction on board and rejecting the assumption, originalism can readily deflect the challenges based on unacceptable original practices; as a consequence, however, it will not be tenable for originalism, in any case challenging an original practice, simply to rule out the possibility of the practice's invalidity. (shrink)

Pragmatics is the study of the role of context in communication. This chapter discusses experimental research in pragmatics. It provides clarity on pragmatics by contrasting the role of context in communication with the role of sentence meaning. There is some disagreement about which communicative effects are due to which thing, so there is some disagreement as to where to draw the boundary between semantics and pragmatics. The chapter considers a rich experimental research project in pragmatics, which has developed primarily within (...) linguistics and psychology over the course of the last several decades in response to the boundary disputes. Finally, it talks about a more nascent experimental research project, which, building upon insights from psychology, aims towards understanding survey pragmatics. These two projects are discussed and attention is paid to the methods unique to each project and the philosophical and linguistic underpinnings they share in common. (shrink)

The theses of embodied and extended cognition are usually regarded as recherché doctrines, at odds with common sense. They are also, typically, regarded as theses that must be evaluated by way of their implications for the development of cognitive science. If they cohere with the likely trajectory of cognitive science they can be accepted. If they do not, they must be rejected. This paper argues against both these claims. At the conceptual heart of the theses of embodied and extended cognition (...) is an analysis of intentionality as revealing activity, and the theses are mundane implications of this analysis. Moreover, since the analysis is not something that can be gleaned from cognitive science or philosophical reflections on cognitive science, the theses of embodied and extended cognition are not ones that can be adjudicated by appeals to what cognitive science does or is likely to do in the future. The theses of embodied and extended cognition are philosophical theses—not theses of cognitive science—and none the worse for that. (shrink)

In this paper I argue that the large truth claims made in Pindar's gnomic language have a correspondingly large cultural function since they instantiate the capacity for unprecedented conceptual invention within a culture that lacks any master discourse in which its own self-understanding is embedded. I discuss the famous Nomos basileus fragment and its handling by Callicles in Plato's Gorgias, and by Hölderlin in his Pindar Fragments. I argue that, by using Pindar's claim as a starting point for reflections of (...) their own, these thinkers recognize its contingency, and future orientation, as vatic speech. (shrink)