This chapter explores the opportunities and limitations of the ideal of transparency in responsible innovation, by consulting the virtual case of "The Circle", a company which appears in Dave Eggers' novel The Circle. The Circle is a high-tech company with the main purpose of being responsive to societal needs. They want to eradicate unethical behaviour in society, enhance public health and make a positive impact on the environment. The ultimate goal of The Circle is to reach 100% full transparency in (...) the world, which is impossible without any societal desirability. In first instance, it is free choice of people to accept and embrace the products and services of The Circle, who invest resources in keeping customers happy and in raising awareness about the dangers of privacy. The chapter concludes that The Circle meets the requirements regarding the outcomes of responsible innovation, at least to a certain extent, while at the same time, one feels unease about certain activities they undertake. (shrink)

I discuss Edouard Machery’s claim that philosophers and psychologists when using the term ‘concept’ are really theorizing about different things. This view is not new, but it has never been developed or defended in detail. Once spelled out, we can see that Machery is right that the psychological literature uses a different notion of concept. However, Machery fails to acknowledge that the two notions are not only compatible but complementary. This fits more with the traditional view according to which philosophers (...) and psychologists are merely interested in different aspects of the same kind. The main aim of this paper is then to show how precisely the two notions of ‘concept’ relate. Distinguishing them resolves the long-standing debate on whether concepts can be prototypes and allows me to formulate success conditions of a theory of categorization that are independent of the success conditions of a theory of concepts. (shrink)

Modal knowledge accounts like sensitivity or safety face a problem when it comes to knowing propositions that are necessarily true because the modal condition is always fulfilled no matter how random the belief forming method is. Pritchard models the anti-luck condition for knowledge in terms of the modal principle safety. Thus, his anti-luck epistemology faces the same problem when it comes to logical necessities. Any belief in a proposition that is necessarily true fulfills the anti-luck condition and, therefore, qualifies as (...) knowledge. Miščević shares Pritchard’s take on epistemic luck and acknowledges the resulting problem. In his intriguing article “Armchair Luck: Apriority, Intellection and Epistemic Luck” Miščević suggests solving the problem by supplementing safety with a virtue theoretic condition-“agent stability”-which he also spells out in modal terms. I will argue that Miščević is on the right track when he suggests adding a virtue-theoretic component to the safety condition. However, it should not be specified modally but rather in terms of performances that manifest competences. (shrink)

In this paper, I defend the heterogeneity problem for sensitivity accounts of knowledge against an objection that has been recently proposed by Wallbridge in Philosophia. I argue in, 479–496, 2015) that sensitivity accounts of knowledge face a heterogeneity problem when it comes to higher-level knowledge about the truth of one’s own beliefs. Beliefs in weaker higher-level propositions are insensitive, but beliefs in stronger higher-level propositions are sensitive. The resulting picture that we can know the stronger propositions without being in a (...) position to know the weaker propositions is too heterogeneous to be plausible. Wallbridge objects that there is no heterogeneity problem because beliefs in the weaker higher-level propositions are also sensitive. I argue against Wallbridge that the heterogeneity problem is not solved but only displaced. Only some beliefs in the weaker higher-level propositions are sensitive. I conclude that the heterogeneity problem is one of a family of instability problems that sensitivity accounts of knowledge face and that Wallbridge’s account raises a further problem of this kind. (shrink)

New technologies have the potential to severely “challenge” or “disrupt” not only our established social practices but our most fundamental concepts and distinctions like person versus object, nature versus artificial or being dead versus being alive. But does this disruption also change these concepts? Or does it merely change our operationalizations and applications of the same concepts? In this paper, I argue that instead of focusing on individual conceptual change, philosophers of socially disruptive technologies (SDTs) should think about conceptual change (...) as a change in a network of interrelated concepts. What really generates a potential social disruption are changes of inferential relations between concepts – whether or not this entails a change of the respective individual concepts. Philosophers of socially disruptive technologies are therefore in the privileged position of being able to avoid commitments regarding the individuation of individual concepts. -/- . (shrink)

Invariantists argue that the notion of concept in psychology should be reserved for knowledge that is retrieved in a context-insensitive manner. Contextualists argue that concepts are to be understood in terms of context-sensitive ad hoc constructions. I review the central empirical evidence for and against both views and show that their conclusions are based on a common mischaracterization of both theories. When the difference between contextualism and invariantism is properly understood, it becomes apparent that the way the question of stability (...) is currently investigated will not lead to a consensus. Instead of focusing directly on stability, we should turn our attention to other desiderata on a theory of concepts. In particular, I show that invariantism, but not contextualism, fails to account for compositionality and abstract concepts. (shrink)

Cartesian skepticism requires scenarios of massive deception to make its case. The inability to rule out such possibilities in which our beliefs about the external world are massively mistaken motivates the conclusion that we lack everyday knowledge. Some authors have emphasized that such scenarios are implausible. Others have instead claimed that scenarios are irrelevant to skepticism. If skepticism can make its case, they argue that scenarios of massive deception are not the way to do it. This thesis possesses a distinct (...) anti-sceptical weight. Deprived of its scenario, epistemological skepticism must find a different reason for it to be taken seriously, which might be a tall order. This paper defends the idea that scenarios do not constitute the essential element of the skeptical threat. However, it takes this result in the opposite direction. We aim to show that skepticism without scenarios constitutes a bigger and more legitimate philosophical problem than otherwise. Additionally, it also offers the possibility of achieving a unified understanding of skepticism that is so far lacking in contemporary epistemology, allowing us to better understand what can constitute a satisfactory anti-skeptical strategy. (shrink)

Cognitive Science, Volume 46, Issue 5, May 2022.

This paper provides an analysis of how concepts pertinent to legal contracts can influence certain aspects of their digital implementation through smart contracts, as inspired by recent developments in distributed ledger technology. We discuss how properties of imperative and declarative languages including the underlying architectures to support contract management and lifecycle apply to various aspects of legal contracts. We then address these properties in the context of several blockchain architectures. While imperative languages are commonly used to implement smart contracts, we (...) find that declarative languages provide more natural ways to deal with certain aspects of legal contracts and their automated management. (shrink)

This article examines the philosophical implications underlying Bacon's views on historical knowledge, paying special attention to that variety of historical knowledge described by Bacon as “natural.” More specifically, this article explores the interplay of history and fable. In the sphere of thought, fabula is the equivalent to materia in nature. Both are described by Bacon as being “versatile” and “pliant.” In Bacon's system of knowledge, philosophy, as the domain of reason, starts from historiae and fabulae, once memory and the imagination (...) have fulfilled their cognitive tasks. This means that, for Bacon, there is no such thing as a pure use of reason. He advocates a kind of reason that, precisely because it is involved with matter's inner motions, is constitutively 'impure'. The article shows how the terms historia and fabula cover key semantic areas in defining Bacon's philosophy: historia may mean “history” as well as “story,” fabula “myth” as well “story.” In both cases, we can see significant oscillations from a stronger meaning to a weaker one, as if the power of nature decreases moving from histories and myths to stories. On the other hand, there are cases in which Bacon seems to stick to a diachronic view of the meaning of fables and histories, such that the transition from myths to history, especially natural history, is described as a collective effort towards reality and enlightenment. (shrink)

This paper develops its exegetical claim by building mainly on a reconstruction of a central argument in the Critique of Pure Reason and supporting it with material from Kant’s other critical works. It argues that Kant’s philosophy does not permit us any judgment about things in themselves whatsoever. This could be called a form of ignorance, albeit a unique one. On the developed reading, Kant claims that there cannot be any objectively valid judgment about things in themselves, and since so-called (...) judgments without objective validity are actually no judgments at all, there is no judgment about things in themselves available to us – not even a negative one. The paper considers the theses and antitheses of the antinomies, analytic judgments, and the practical postulates as potential candidates for such judgments, each of which fail the objectivity test. It ends by concluding that we should read Kant’s critical writings in such a way that they do not feature any judgments about things in themselves and suggests one way to do so: putative judgments of this sort could be read as higher-order judgments about the concept of a thing in itself. (shrink)

In his logical treatises, John Mair develops a method and a set of rules for the verification of modal propositions, which is in the spirit of his predecessors Ockham and Buridan, but ultimately goes beyond them. He calls this method positio de inesse. It is also by this method that the truth conditions for divided modal propositions are set out. There is a standard interpretation of it as a form of reductionist method, and scholars have been tempted to think that (...) it was motivated by an implicit rejection of de re modal properties shared by Mair and other sixteenth- century nominalists. After presenting the background to Mair’s writings on the semantics of modal propositions, in this paper we revisit Mair's version of the method of positio de inesse. We argue that it is based on some basic semantic rules and contend that this procedure analyzes divided modal propositions into singular de re sentences referring to possible objects. Consequently, we conclude that this method does not reflect a reductionist approach to modal discourse. We instead provide an alternative interpretation. (shrink)

In his natural philosophy, John Buridan reinterprets Aristotelian conceptions of necessity using a framework derived from his logical writings. After a discussion of Buridan’s account of varieties of necessity, in this paper I shall approach some interpretative uses of that account where two natural philosophical concerns are involved. The first is connected with the relationship of modality and time in a question from the first book of his commentary to De Generatione et Corruptione addressing a consequence from possibilities of alteration (...) to possibilities of generation. The content of that question hinges on the metaphysical connection between alteration and substantial changes. In the third section, I shall explore a quasi-definition of causal necessity and contingency Buridan discusses in the second book of his commentary to the Physics. Buridan’s discussion of alternative descriptions of causal necessity and contingency in that context reveals competing pictures of the role of essences in causal explanation associated with Avicenna and Averroes respectively. (shrink)

This paper develops a new proof method for two propositional paraconsistent logics: the propositional part of Batens' weak paraconsistent logic CLuN and Schütte's maximally paraconsistent logic Φv. Proofs are de.ned as certain sequences of questions. The method is grounded in Inferential Erotetic Logic.

Davidson's 1963 essay "Actions, Reasons, and Causes" convinced most philosophers that reason explanations are a species of causal explanation. By way of argument, Davidson challenged the non-causalist to make sense of cases where the agent has more than one reason that would justify her behavior but only acts on one of these reasons. We claim that a teleological account of action explanation can answer Davidson's challenge, but we argue further that if the Davidsonian challenge is a problem for the teleologist, (...) then it is equally a problem for the causalist, and thus cannot serve as an argument for causalism. (shrink)

Knowledge based privacy policies are more declarative than traditional action based ones, because they specify only what is permitted or forbidden to know, and leave the derivation of the permitted actions to a security monitor. This inference problem is already non trivial with a static privacy policy, and becomes challenging when privacy policies can change over time. We therefore introduce a dynamic modal logic that permits not only to reason about permitted and forbidden knowledge to derive the permitted actions, but (...) also to represent explicitly the declarative privacy policies together with their dynamics. The logic can be used to check both regulatory and behavioral compliance, respectively by checking that the permissions and obligations set up by the security monitor of an organization are not in conflict with the privacy policies, and by checking that these obligations are indeed enforced. (shrink)

Concept eliminativists argue that we should eliminate the term ‘concept’ from our vocabulary in psychology because there is no single natural kind that is picked out by it. I argue that the most developed version of concept eliminativism by Edouard Machery depends on the assumption that concepts are defined as stable and context-independent bodies of information. It is this assumption that leads Machery to eliminativism and it is an assumption we have reason to reject. Another assumption that leads to the (...) eliminativist conclusion and that we have reason to reject is that the type of content represented in long-term memory is the relevant property based on which we should individuate certain natural kinds in cognitive psychology. Finally, I argue that certain pieces of information are functionally integrated enough to meet the conditions for being a natural kind. (shrink)

The DIALOG between Husserlian Phenomnnology and Analytic Philosophy is severely hampered by the fact that much of the secondary literrature on phenomenology fails to pay attention to certain subtile semantical distinctions which are basic for a clear understanding of epistemological issures. Some European Phenomenologists even take pride in their neglect of what they consider to be shallow scholastic quibbling. I hope to remedy this short-coming by outlining in this paper what I believe to be the keypoints of Husserl's theory of (...) perception and theory of meaning. My apprach will be developmental because contrary to popular belief phenomenology has not been revealed in ont instantaneous intuition; on the contrary Husserl's views developed and shifted constantly throughout his life. (shrink)

A clear understanding of the notion of phenomenological reduction is crucial for any evaluation of the claims of Husserlian phenomenology. The phenomenological reduction is said to be the distinctive step one has to take if one is to enter the realm of phenomenology proper. Husserl labored all his life to find the best way which would lead the nonphenomenologist into the new land which he thought he had discovered. Commentators have classified the ways discussed by Husserl under at least three (...) main headings: the Cartesian way, the way through psychology, and the way through ontology. In each of these ways, one is urged to perform a phenomenological reduction. But since the ways are different, the step also of the phenomenological reduction varies somewhat for each approach. Husserl and his interpreters tried hard to clarify these subtle distinctions, but up to now their ways of speaking have proven rather opaque, especially to philosophers accustomed to the standards of clarity of Analytic Philosophy. (shrink)

Um mistério revelado, entre magia, alquimia e filosofia.

IL MOSTRO E L'EROE. Quando Pomponio Algieri da Nola, all’età di soli 24 anni, viene bruciato vivo a Roma in piazza Navona, Giordano Bruno di anni ne ha appena otto. Oltre che per la giovane età del condannato, l’esecuzione è insolita anche per il luogo e il metodo scelto dall’Inquisizione: anziché le solite fascine, per alimentare il fuoco viene approntato un pentolone di pece, olio e trementina, nel quale viene immersa la povera vittima.

It is a commonly held view in contemporary epistemology that for having knowledge it is necessary to have an appropriately based belief, although numerous different views exist about when a belief’s base is appropriate. Broadly speaking, they all share the view that one can only have knowledge if the belief’s base is in some sense truth-related or tracking the truth. Baseless knowledge can then be defi ned as knowledge where the belief is acquired and sustained in a way that does (...) not track the truth. I will argue that rejecting baseless knowledge leads to controversial consequences. The problem increases if we consider contrasting persons who know because of appropriate belief forming processes but who fail to possess further epistemic virtues such as understanding. I will not argue which belief bases constitute a suffi cient condition for knowledge. Rather I will stress the point that the common assumption that an appropriate basing relation constitutes a necessary condition for knowledge has controversial consequences. (shrink)

Il fascino di un libro, tra Reuchlin e Bruno. -/- RINASCIMENTO ESOTERICO Speciale V centenario De arte cabalistica (1517-2017) -/- Nella sua rinomata libreria antiquaria, nel cuore di Firenze, Paolo Pampaloni sta sfogliando un grazioso volumetto in ottavo, rilegato in pelle scura. Si tratta di un esemplare del De incertitudine et vanitate scientiarum di Heinrich Cornelius Agrippa von Nettesheim.

Brentano hat in seinen Analysen der Wahrnehmung zwei wichtige Punkte hervorgehoben: (a) daß die innere Wahrnehmung nur ein Bewußtsein "nebenbei" sei; und (b) daß die äußere Wahrnehmung ein räumlich Ausgedehntes (und nicht eine Idee) zum Objekt habe. Er ging aber nicht weit genug, sondern blieb dem Kartesianismus verhaftet, indem er die innere Wahrnehmung immer noch ein Erkennen nannte, und andererseits vom Objekt der äußeren Wahrnehmung sagte, daß es in Wahrheit gar nicht bestehe. Wenn man aber weiter geht und zugesteht, daß (...) die sogenannte innere Wahrnehmung gar kein eigentliches Erkennen ist, und daß es im Gegenteil die äußere Wahrnehmung ist, welche die Wirklichkeit erkennt, dann wird es unmöghch, sich in der Erkenntnistheorie mit Descartes auf unmittelbare untrügliche Evidenz zu berufen. Descartes bleibt aber insofern im Recht, als es trotz allem sinnvoll bleibt, zur Rechtfertigung von Erkenntnissen auf die sogenannte innere Wahrnehmung zu verweisen. (shrink)

O presente artigo investiga a conexão entre modalidade e tempo em dois mestres de artes Parisienses ativos na primeira metade do século 14, João Buridan (c.1290-c.1361) e João de Jandun (c.1286-c.1328). Busca-se elucidar a abordagem de ambos acerca da natureza dessa relação em um conjunto de textos pouco explorados nos debates sobre a interpretação de modalidades medievais, a saber, os comentários ao fim do primeiro livro do De Caelo de Aristóteles. A interpretação da relação entre o ‘necessário’ e o que (...) ‘sempre é’ nesse texto recebera interpretações divergentes sobre a controversa assimilação de necessidade e omnitemporalidade em concepções pré-modernas das modalidades. Por meio da análise do debate em torno das passagens Aristotélicas do De Caelo, posto por ambos os filósofos pertencentes ao milieu da Faculdade de Artes em Paris, o artigo demonstra que tal assimilação não era consensual. Através do contraste entre as análises de Jandun e Buridan, conclui-se que, embora Buridan acomode a necessidade temporal pressuposta no De Caelo enquanto necessidade condicional, ele desenvolve uma crítica da validade geral dos argumentos de Aristóteles no que tange a modalidades absolutas. (shrink)

After drawing attention to the basic importance of Goodman's workThe Structure of Appearance, this paper turns to a critical analysis of Goodman's claims concerning worldmaking. It stresses that Goodman's acceptance of a multiplicity of actual worlds doesnot involve the belief in an unknowable underlying reality; but that it is due to the non-mysterious fact that constructional systems allow for a multiplicity of disagreeing, right versions. However, from the point of view of truthmaker ontology, most worlds of constructional systems are not (...) genuine worlds; and so far it hasnot been shown that there are genuine truthmaker worlds that disagree.It is suggested that the construction of systems usually involves three conflicting aims: the logical, the ontological, and the psychological. Considering the current interest in cognitive psychology and phenomenology, the implications of the psychological aim, too, deserve to be reexamined. (shrink)

It is the aim of the present study to introduce the reader to the ways of thinking of those contemporary philosophers who apply the tools of symbolic logic to classical philosophical problems. Unlike the "conti nental" reader for whom this work was originally written, the English speaking reader will be more familiar with most of the philosophers dis cussed in this book, and he will in general not be tempted to dismiss them indiscriminately as "positivists" and "nominalists". But the English (...) version of this study may help to redress the balance in another respect. In view of the present emphasis on ordinary language and the wide spread tendency to leave the mathematical logicians alone with their technicalities, it seems not without merit to revive the interest in formal ontology and the construction of formal systems. A closer look at the historical account which will be given here, may convince the reader that there are several points in the historical develop ment whose consequences have not yet been fully assessed: I mention, e. g., the shift from the traditional three-level semantics of sense and deno tation to the contemporary two-level semantics of representation; the relation of extensional structure and intensional content in the extensional systems of Wittgenstein and Carnap; the confusing changes in labelling the different kinds of analytic and apriori true sentences; etc. Among the philosophically interesting tools of symbolic logic Lesniewski's calculus of names deserves special attention. (shrink)

Neste texto, procuro encontrar as origens de um dos mais importantes conceitos de Gilles Deleuze, o conceito de Imagem-tempo. Este conceito remete-nos para os primeiros textos de Deleuze dedicados à filosofia de Espinosa e ao problema do autómato espiritual e relaciona-se directamente com o problema da passividade/actividade do espectador. Ou seja, o conceito crucial na sua filosofia do cinema, a Imagem-tempo, esconde uma importante reflexão sobre a Imagem cinematográfica como arte de massas, os (im)poderes do pensamento e o modo fascista (...) de se pensar. This text seeks to find the origins of one of the most important of Gilles Deleuze's concepts, the concept of Time-image. This concept leads us to his first texts regarding Spinoza's philosophy and the problem of the spiritual automaton, and concerns directly with the problem of passivity/activity of the film goer. That is to say that the crucial concept of his film philosophy, Time-image, hides a fundamental consideration on the cinematic image as a mass art, the (un)powers of thinking and the fascist way of thought. (shrink)

In Platons Apologie des Sokrates zeichnet sich eine auf menschliche Art weise Person durch ihre Fähigkeit aus, den epistemischen Status und den Wert ihrer Meinungen über Sachverhalte korrekt zu beurteilen. Sie weiß, ob es sich bei ihnen um Wissen oder bloß um Meinung handelt, aber auch, ob sie etwas nicht weiß. Es ist zudem eine breit geteilte Auffassung, dass intellektuelle Bescheidenheit, obwohl nicht dasselbe wie Weisheit, ein bedeutender Aspekt der Weisheit ist. Doch wenn die hier vorgestellten Überlegungen triftig sind und (...) das Spektrum der relevanten Deutungen abdecken, ist das für Sokratische Weisheit nicht haltbar. Denn die Bedingungen für korrekte Urteile über den epistemischen Status der eigenen Meinungen sind so anspruchsvoll, dass fehlbare Wesen, die ein entsprechendes Wissen zweiter Stufe beanspruchen, nicht anders als epistemisch unbescheiden sein können. Wenn Sokratische Weisheit epistemische Bescheidenheit verlangt, ist Sokrates nicht weise. (shrink)

This paper analyses two early Chinese ways of modeling the ethical significance of art using music as an example. I shall focus on the Xunzi 《荀子》 as a paradigmatic statement of Confucian views, and selected passages from the Zhuangzi 《莊子》 as an exemplary manifestation of Daoist aesthetics. I argue that the Xunzi opts for a direct ethical impact of music, while it does not rely on an independent aesthetic conception of the goodness of music. By contrast, I argue that the (...) Zhuangzi discusses music on the grounds of an independent aesthetic conception of its goodness, while music can only claim an indirect ethical significance. Both models are mutually exclusive. This gives reason to believe that the Xunzi and the Zhuangzi present us with the two systematically possible ways of modeling the ethical impact of art. (shrink)