Authority arguments generate support for claims by appealing to an agent’s authority status, rather than to reasons independent of it. With few exceptions, the current literature on argument schemes acknowledges two basic authority types. The _epistemic_ type grounds in knowledge, the_ deontic_ type grounds in power. We review how historically earlier scholarship acknowledged an_ attractiveness-based_ and a _majority-based_ authority type as equally basic type. Crossing these with basic speech act types thus yields authority argument sub-schemes. Focusing on the_ epistemic-assertive_ sub-scheme (...) (‘an epistemic authority _A_ _E_ asserts a proposition _P_’), we apply a meta-level approach to specifying critical questions. Results improve the evaluation of this sub-scheme and show how similar improvements are obtainable for other schemes. (shrink)

Does the practice of psychology make a significant and positive contribution to human welfare and the struggle for a good society? This book presents a reinvigorating look at psychology and its societal purpose, offering a bold new philosophical foundation from which professionals in the field can deeply examine their work.

The article argues that universals of law, i.e. the laws of nature, are the general axioms of a deductive system of all knowledge, and their deductive consequences. Universals of fact are generalisations deducible from these together with particular facts.

Psychological experirnents have repeatedly shown that in judging the likelihood of uncertain events people do not follow the principles of probability theory. A notorious example is given by the so called conjunction fallacy. In this paper I argue that this fallacy is not really a fallacy when it is analysed in the light of a dynamic theory of default reasoning. The question that immediately rises is whether the fact that this theory conforms better to the way people actually think provides (...) a reason to prefer it to probability theory. (shrink)

Turgot, Baron de l'Aulne: The future of mind.--Marquis de Condorcet: The taming of the future.--Comte de Saint-Simon: The pear is ripe.--Children of Saint-Simon: The triumph of love.--Charles Fourier: The burgeoning of instinct.--Auguste Comte: Embodiment in the great being.

A groundbreaking exploration of Heidegger and embodiment, from which a radical ethical perspective emerges.

In this introduction we present the principal themes of the special issue and highlight the main interpretive theses of the contributions.

Discussions often end before the issues that started them have been resolved. For example, in the late sixties and early seventies, a hot topic in philosophical logic was the development of an adequate semantics for the language of modal predicate logic. However, the result of this discussion was not one single system that met with general agreement, but a collection of alternative systems, each defended most ably by its proponents.

ONE way t0 defend narrow content is to produce a sentence 0f the form ‘S believes that P’, and show that this sentence is true 0f S if and 0nly if it is true 0f any duplicate from the skin in, any doppclgangcr, of S. N0toriously, this is hard to d0. Twin Earth examples are pervasivc.1 Another way to defend narrow content; is t0 show that Only 2. narrow notion can play thc causal explanatory r01c we require 0f contcnt in (...) 2. properly scicntiicm psychology 0r cognitive science. Notoriously, this is hard t0 d0. The considerations—mcthod010gicaI solipsism, the principle 0f autonomy, 0r what:cvcr—invokcd to show that a broad notion 0f content cannot.. (shrink)

Voorzover het maken van kopieën uit deze uitgave is toegestaan op grond van artikel 16B Auteurswet 1912 j0 het Besluit van 20 juni 1974, St.b. 351, zoals gewijzigd bij het Besluit van 23 augustus 1985, St.b. 471 en artikel 17 Auteurswet 1912, dient men de daarvoor wettelijk verschuldigde vergoedingen te voldoen aan de Stichting Reprorecht (Postbus 882, 1180 AW Amstelveen). Voor het overnemen van gedeelte(n) uit deze uitgave in bloemlezingen, readers en andere compilatiewerken (artikel 16 Auteurswet 1912) dient men zich (...) tot de uitgever te wenden. (shrink)

The assumption of domain specificity has been invaluable to the study of the emergence of biological thought in young children. Yet, domains of thought must be understood within a broader context that explains how those domains relate to the surrounding cultures, to different kinds of cognitive constraints, to framing effects, to abilities to evaluate knowledge and to the ways in which domain-specific knowledge in any individual mind is related to knowledge in other minds. All of these issues must come together (...) to have a full account of conceptual development in biology. (shrink)

Among modern philosophers, Immanuel Kant has few rivals for his influence over the development of contemporary philosophy as a whole. While the issue of language has become a key fulcrum of continental philosophy since the twentieth century, Kant has been overlooked as a thinker whose breadth of insight has helped to spearhead this advance. The Linguistic Dimension of Kant’s Thought remedies this historical gap by gathering new essays by distinguished Kant scholars. The chapters examine the many ways that Kant’s philosophy (...) addresses the nature of language. Although language as a formal structure of thought and expression has always been part of the philosophical tradition, the “linguistic dimension” of these essays speaks to language more broadly as a practice including communication, exchange, and dialogue. (shrink)

Nearly a decade ago, Ingrid Robeyns formulated a distributive justice doctrine known as economic limitarianism. This article posits that Robeyns’ limitarianism is a politically plausible, practically feasible and morally justifiable doctrine. The doctrine effectively addresses concerns regarding incentives, efficacy and unequal opportunities. The article identifies a problem of scope or extensity, which it refers to as an asymmetric argument. The article proposes that this issue can be resolved by fully extending limitarianism to non-democratic states. This extension is justified by the (...) relationship between surplus money and political inequality, which can be explained through various avenues, including causal and constitutive explanations, structural injustice and systemic causation. While this list of avenues is not exhaustive, it is representative of the possible avenues that can be explored. Fully extending the doctrine to non-democratic states would enhance its robustness. (shrink)

Accordingly, this book will be of great interest and benefit to anyone working in the fields of phenomenology, hermeneutics, or Heidegger studies.

Introduction -- The Complexity of Resource Curse -- Resource Curse as a Complex Case of Global Justice -- General Theory of Global Justice -- The Robustness of the General Theory -- Conclusion.

Three recent research reports by Topping and Trickey, by Fair and colleagues, and by Gorard, Siddiqui and Huat See have produced data that support the conclusion that a Philosophy for Children program of one-hour-per-week structured discussions has a marked positive impact on students. This article presents data from a follow up study done three years after the completion of the study reported in Fair et al.. The data show that the positive gains in scores on the Cognitive Abilities Test were (...) still present and had not faded after three years. Given the strength of these confirmations of the positive durable impact of the P4C program of structured discussions and given the relatively low cost of implementing the P4C program, it is recommended that it become a standard part of the school curriculum. (shrink)

In this paper Chateaubriand’s approach to solve some problems related to the nature of logic is confronted with the traditional approaches. It is shown that his hierarchy of logical types opens up new possibilities to characterize logical properties and logical truths and that it also sheds some new light on the foundations of mathematics.