Commentators on Craig Calhoun's Tanner Lecture. The Tanner Lectures are a collection of educational and scientific discussions relating to human values. Conducted by leaders in their fields, the lectures are presented at prestigious educational facilities around the world.

We present an algorithm that can anticipate tax evasion by modeling the co-evolution of tax schemes with auditing policies. Malicious tax non-compliance, or evasion, accounts for billions of lost revenue each year. Unfortunately when tax administrators change the tax laws or auditing procedures to eliminate known fraudulent schemes another potentially more profitable scheme takes it place. Modeling both the tax schemes and auditing policies within a single framework can therefore provide major advantages. In particular we can explore the likely forms (...) of tax schemes in response to changes in audit policies. This can serve as an early warning system to help focus enforcement efforts. In addition, the audit policies can be fine tuned to help improve tax scheme detection. We demonstrate our approach using the iBOB tax scheme and show it can capture the co-evolution between tax evasion and audit policy. Our experiments shows the expected oscillatory behavior of a biological co-evolving system. (shrink)

Harry C. Boyte. Craig Calhoun. Geoff Eley. Nancy Fraser. Nicholas Garnham. JürgenHabermas. Peter Hohendahl. Lloyd Kramer. Benjamin Lee. Thomas McCarthy. Moishe Postone. Mary P.Ryan. Michael Schudson. Michael Warner. David Zaret.

A symposium was held at the Centre for Research in the Arts, Social Sciences and Humanities at the University of Cambridge on June 12th 2019, ‘Rethinking Repetition in a Digital Age’, at which Geoff Stead, a leading mobile tech designer, was a keynote speaker. The focus of the Cambridge UK event was on how the potentials of digital technologies—whose harms have received widespread attention—could be redirected for the social good. For Stead, this is precisely what Babbel are doing in (...) their approach to commercial digital language learning. Stead spoke to the idea of reversing our personal relationships to mechanical affordances, and finding empowerment in understanding their designed logics. The transcript of the interview below, made in October 2021, revisits some of the main points he raised at that event. (shrink)

“What does it mean to say that we live in a secular age?” This apparently simple question opens into the massive, provocative, and complex A Secular Age, where Charles Taylor positions secularism as a defining feature of the modern world, not the mere absence of religion, and casts light on the experience of transcendence that scientistic explanations of the world tend to neglect. -/- In Varieties of Secularism in a Secular Age, a prominent and varied group of scholars chart the (...) conversations in which A Secular Age intervenes and address wider questions of secularism and secularity. The distinguished contributors include Robert Bellah, José Casanova, Nilüfer Göle, William E. Connolly, Wendy Brown, Simon During, Colin Jager, Jon Butler, Jonathan Sheehan, Akeel Bilgrami, John Milbank, and Saba Mahmood. -/- Varieties of Secularism in a Secular Age is edited by Michael Warner, Jonathan VanAntwerpen, and Craig Calhoun. (shrink)

The words we call slurs are just plain vanilla descriptions like ‘cowboy’ and ‘coat hanger’. They don't semantically convey any disparagement of their referents, whether as content, conventional implicature, presupposition, “coloring” or mode of presentation. What distinguishes 'kraut' and 'German' is metadata rather than meaning: the former is the conventional description for Germans among Germanophobes when they are speaking in that capacity, in the same way 'mad' is the conventional expression that some teenagers use as an intensifier when they’re emphasizing (...) that social identity. That is, racists don’t use slurs because they’re derogatory; slurs are derogatory because they’re the words that racists use. To use a slur is to exploit the Maxim of Manner (or Levinson’s M-Principle) to signal one’s affiliation with a group that has a disparaging attitude towards the slur’s referent. This account is sufficient to explain all the familiar properties of slurs, such as their speaker orientation and “nondetachability,” with no need of additional linguistic mechanisms. It also explains some features of slurs that are rarely if ever explored; for example the variation in tone and strength among the different slurs for a particular group, the existence of words we count as slurs, such as 'redskin', which almost all of their users consider to be respectful, and the curious absence in Standard English of any commonly used slurs—by which I mean words used to express a negative attitude toward an entire group—for Muslims and women. (shrink)

The study of ethical decision-making has made significant advances, particularly with regard to the ways in which different types of processing are implicated. In recent decades, much of this advancement has been driven by the influence of dual-process theories of cognition. Unfortunately, the wealth of findings in this context can be confusing for management scholars and practitioners who desire to know how best to encourage ethical behavior. While some studies suggest that deliberate reflection leads to more ethical behavior, other studies (...) find, in contrast, that intuitive decision-making leads to more ethical results. The goal of this integrative conceptual review is to help make sense of such apparently contradictory findings by identifying the moderating influences that lead to more versus less ethical decisions, whether they are made via intuitive or deliberative processes. Based on our integrative review of moderators from different disciplines and eras, we develop a taxonomy that can aid researchers in the task of identifying when similar constructs have been studied under different names. We organize our findings concerning these influences in accordance with four emergent moderator categories—psychological, situational, social, and physiological. This work helps us identify patterns of moderating factors across both intuitive and deliberative ethical decision-making, gaps that suggest future research directions and practical implications. (shrink)

The understanding of and adherence to professional ethics is fundamental in navigating the moral encounters and dilemmas that all psychologists face in their daily work, whether in research or professional practice. Core values and principles remain stable. However as more complex and conflicting societal contexts come into play, the individual psychologist and the professional community need support in upholding a solid moral integrity. The volume is a welcome resource for any psychologist or student wanting to foresee, prevent, and professionally manage, (...) in an ethically responsible way, the moral challenges that arise. The framework for this timely, second edition remains the Meta-code of Ethics of the European Federation of Psychologists Associations (EFPA), which is an important asset in addressing the challenges faced by the profession now and in the coming years. The discussions of the principles on the meta-code are further developed and the authors have extended the number and types of practical examples to vividly illustrate ethical challenges and dilemmas faced. Read, discuss, and evaluate your practice. (shrink)

Argument and imagination are often interdependent. The Aesthetics of Argument is concerned with how this relationship may bear on argument's concern with truth, not just persuasion, and with the enhancement of understanding such interdependence may bring. The rationality of argument, conceived as the advancement of reasons for or against a claim, is not simply a matter of deductive validity. Whether arguments are relevant, have force, or look foolish cannot always be assessed in these terms. Martin Warner presents a series (...) of case studies which explore how analogy, metaphor, narrative, image, and symbol can be used in different ways to frame one domain in terms of another, and how criteria drawn from the study of imaginative literature may have a bearing on their truth-aptness. (shrink)

Credences are mental states corresponding to degrees of confidence in propositions. Attribution of credences to Large Language Models (LLMs) is commonplace in the empirical literature on LLM evaluation. Yet the theoretical basis for LLM credence attribution is unclear. We defend three claims. First, our semantic claim is that LLM credence attributions are (at least in general) correctly interpreted literally, as expressing truth-apt beliefs on the part of scientists that purport to describe facts about LLM credences. Second, our metaphysical claim is (...) that the existence of LLM credences is at least plausible, although current evidence is inconclusive. Third, our epistemic claim is that LLM credence attributions made in the empirical literature on LLM evaluation are subject to non-trivial sceptical concerns. It is a distinct possibility that even if LLMs have credences, LLM credence attributions are generally false because the experimental techniques used to assess LLM credences are not truth-tracking. Our analysis has implications for the assessment of LLMs for properties like factuality and trustworthiness, and the broader scientific debate over the use of human cognition as a blueprint for understanding LLM behaviour. (shrink)

Derided and disregarded by many of his contemporaries, Michel Foucault is now regarded as probably the most influential thinker of the twentieth century, his work is studied across the humanities and social sciences. Reading Foucault, however, can be a challenge, as can writing about him, but in Understanding Foucault, the authors offer an entertaining and informative introduction to his thinking. They cover all the issues Foucault dealt with, including power, knowledge, subjectivity and sexuality and discuss the development of his analysis (...) throughout his work. (shrink)

Allshorn, Geoff I believe the year in which I was born to be a very important year, perhaps not surprisingly, but particularly because of other events which would ultimately become significant in my own life.

“Moral imagination” is the capacity to register that one’s perspective on a decision-making situation is limited, and to imagine alternative perspectives that reveal new considerations or approaches. We have developed a Moral Imagination approach that aims to drive a culture of responsible innovation, ethical awareness, deliberation, decision-making, and commitment in organizations developing new technologies. We here present a case study that illustrates one key aspect of our approach – the technomoral scenario – as we have applied it in our work (...) with product and engineering teams. Technomoral scenarios are fictional narratives that raise ethical issues surrounding the interaction between emerging technologies and society. Through facilitated role-playing and discussion, participants are prompted to examine their own intentions, articulate justifications for actions, and consider the impact of decisions on various stakeholders. This process helps developers to re-envision their choices and responsibilities, ultimately contributing to a culture of responsible innovation. (shrink)

This paper argues against the view that trolley cases are of little or no relevance to the ethics of automated vehicles. Four arguments for this view are outlined and rejected: the Not Going to Happen Argument, the Moral Difference Argument, the Impossible Deliberation Argument and the Wrong Question Argument. In making clear where these arguments go wrong, a positive account is developed of how trolley cases can inform the ethics of automated vehicles.

A Managerial Philosophy of Technology offers a unique combination of a review of academic work in the philosophy of technology with practical methodologies for business management of technology strategy.

Transcending Subjects: Augustine, Hegel and Theology engages the seminal figures of Hegel and Augustine around the theme of subjectivity, with consideration toward the theology and politics of freedom.

This article relates the evolving relationship between republicanism and the problem of ‘empire’ to the changing social contexts within which republican political theory emerges in the early modern period. It is argued that the initial antagonism between republicanism and empire was a politically constituted dilemma that related to the specific configuration of economic and political power characteristic of pre-capitalist societies. With the development of capitalism in England in the early modern period, the problem of empire becomes partially resolved due to (...) the way in which the separation of economic and political power under capitalism reconstitutes the nature of empire itself. This new social context — characterized by new social, economic and political relationships specific to an emerging capitalist context — laid the foundations for the resolution of the ‘republican dilemma’ of empire and the ideological establishment of the first ‘Republican Empire’ in 18th century America. (shrink)

_Television and Common Knowledge_ Edited by Jostein Gripsrud London: Routledge, 1999 ISBN 0-415-18929-2 209 pp.

With all of exciting changes happening with the Journal, we thought a joint interview of one another might be a great way to highlight the vision and mission for Philosophy in the Contemporary World moving forward. This edition is our first edition to be printed fully online, a practice we look forward to ensuring accessibility and worldwide access for subscribers. We also wish to acknowledge our appreciation of the patience of all who follow, read, and subscribe to our journal. Infrastructure (...) changes and a reprint have caused us some publication delays. However, we are very excited about the future to come here at the journal! (shrink)

The discourses of agricultural extension reveal how actors represent their scientific activities and goals. The “transfer of technology” discourse developed with the professional U.S. extension service, reproducing its expert/lay power relations. Agroecology is emerging as a systems approach to preventing agricultural pollution. Its theoreticians argue that agroecology cannot be transferred like technology but must be extended through networks of participatory social learning. In California, hundreds of actors and dozens of institutions have cocreated agroecological partnerships using this alternative extension model. They (...) have developed three alternative extension discourses to represent and explain their activities. Bruno Latour's “circulatory system of science” model provides a superior theoretical framework for interpreting the participation and discourses of diverse actors in this extension practice. (shrink)

__Rural Education in America_ provides a comprehensive framework for understanding the diversity and complexity of rural communities in the United States and for helping rural educators implement and evaluate successful place-based programs tailored for students and their families._ Written by educators who grew up in rural America and returned there to raise their children, the book illustrates how efficacy is determined by the degrees to which instruction, interventions, and programs address the needs and strengths of each unique rural community. (...) class='Hi'>Geoff and Sky Marietta weave research, compelling case studies, and personal experience to illustrate effective approaches along the P-16 pipeline. Emphasizing the value and vitality of these communities, the authors advocate for solutions that fit the sociocultural and historical reality of the community, rather than strategies that fundamentally support out-migration. They also provide tools that can be used to evaluate rural educational initiatives and implement place-based strategies that are aligned with the strengths of a particular community. _Rural Education in America_ includes examples from a range of geographic locations, including Eastern Washington, Montana, Ohio, northern Minnesota, North Carolina, Mississippi, Kentucky, and the Navajo Nation. Core chapters focus on critical issues for advancing rural education including early literacy, STEM education, and college completion while highlighting successful programs and partnerships in these areas. This book presents a vision of what rural education can be and how it can attend to the well-being of the people, places, and regions that it serves. (shrink)

Contextualism in epistemology has traditionally been understood as the view that “know” functions semantically like an indexical term, encoding different contents in contexts with different epistemic standards. But the indexical hypothesis about “know” faces a range of objections. This article explores an alternative version of contextualism on which “know” is a semantically stable term, and the truth-conditional variability in knowledge claims is a matter of pragmatic enrichment. The central idea is that in contexts with stringent epistemic standards, knowledge claims are (...) narrowed: “know” is used in such contexts to make assertions about particularly demanding types of knowledge. The resulting picture captures all of the intuitive data that motivate contextualism while sidestepping the controversial linguistic thesis at its heart. After developing the view, the article shows in detail how it avoids one influential linguistic objection to traditional contextualism concerning indirect speech reports, and then answers an objection concerning the unavailability of certain types of clarification speeches. (shrink)

This study investigated the multidimensional structure of judgements of emotional appropriateness, the degree to which an observer judges a target's emotion to conform to observer-valued expectations for emotion in that context. Participants (N=169) were shown one of two brief video clips of an actor either showing anger or neutral expressions in an anger-evoking situation of either low, medium, or high severity. Participants rated the target's emotion on the Perception of Emotion Appropriateness Rating Scale (PEARS), which taps observers’ perceptions of a (...) target's emotional appropriateness for a specific situation. We found that appropriateness ratings are comprised of three factors, assessment of Type Present (type of emotion in expression); Type Absent (missing key emotions); and Intensity (intensity with which the emotion is felt or expressed). Results are discussed in terms of the usefulness of a multidimensional conceptualisation of emotional appropriateness. (shrink)

AI-driven decisions can draw data from virtually any area of your life to make a decision about virtually any other area of your life. That creates fairness issues. Effective regulation to ensure fairness requires that AI systems be transparent. That is, regulators must have sufficient access to the factors that explain and justify the decisions. One approach to transparency is to require that systems be explainable, as that concept is understood in computer science. A system is explainable if one can (...) provide a human-understandable explanation of why it makes any particular prediction. Explainability should not be equated with transparency. To address transparency and characterize its relation to explainability, we define transparency for a regulatory purpose. A system is transparent for a regulatory purpose (r-transparent) when and only when regulators have an explanation, adequate for that purpose, of why it yields the predictions it does. Explainability remains relevant to transparency but turns out to be neither necessary nor sufficient for it. The concepts of explainability and r-transparency combine to yield four possibilities: explainable and either r-transparent or not; and not explainable and either not r-transparent or r-transparent. Combining r-transparency with ideas from the Harvard computer scientist Cynthia Dwork, we propose four requirements on AI systems. (shrink)

The Thousands of Problems for Theorem Provers (TPTP) World is a well-established infrastructure that supports research, development and deployment of automated theorem proving systems. This paper provides an overview of the logic languages of the TPTP World, from classical first-order form (FOF), through typed FOF, up to typed higher-order form, and beyond to non-classical forms. The logic languages are described in a non-technical way and are illustrated with examples using the TPTP language.

Though Rousseau is recognized to have treated the problem of self-knowledge with great sensitivity, very little is known about a centrally important aspect of that treatment—his understanding of self-deception. I reconstruct this conception, emphasizing the importance of purposive but sub-intentional processes that work to enhance agents' self-esteem. I go on to argue that Rousseau's fundamental concern about the theater is its capacity to manipulate these processes in ways that make spectators both complicit in their own falsification and vulnerable to elite (...) domination. This argument, with its focus on the pervasive and often subconscious character of self-deception, not only problematizes an influential reading of Rousseau which emphasizes the epistemic availability of the “true” or “sincere” self, but also highlights the ongoing civic and moral threat posed by self-deceptive mental states. (shrink)

When I studied the Scriptures then I did not feel as I am writing about them now. They seemed to me unworthy of comparison with the grand style of Cicero (Augustine, III, 5).As for the absurdities which used to offend me in Scripture, … I now looked for their meanings in the depth of mystery (sacramentorum) (Augustine, VI, 5).

Philosophy for Children has enabled schools to engage with what is typically thought of as an ‘academic’ discipline and has provided the opportunity to unlock a rich educational experience for children from a diverse range of backgrounds. A wide range of qualitative and quantitative studies have emerged looking at P4C in terms of the development of students at the social, academic and emotional level. However, while there have been many P4C papers that have ‘teacher’ in the title, these are often (...) about teacher training – including ‘hints and tips’ and curriculum development. Relatively few studies have looked at the effect of teaching P4C on teachers themselves. This paper considers how P4C affects teachers, in particular whether teaching P4C has led teachers to develop new pedagogical approaches, different ways of thinking critically and whether it has changed how they engage with their students, colleagues and their school. (shrink)