Although mindfulness research has burgeoned, questions regarding the development of mindfulness remain largely unanswered. Mindfulness correlates negatively with the anxiety and avoidance dimensions of adult attachment and positively with autonomy, competence, and relatedness, the three primary psychological needs postulated by self-determination theory. It was hypothesized that secure attachment style and autonomy orientation would predict higher levels of self-reported mindfulness. After accounting for age, state self-esteem, and meditation practice, autonomy orientation predicted higher levels of self-reported mindfulness whereas secure attachment was no (...) longer related to mindfulness. State self-esteem was found to be an important variable in understanding mindfulness. Results suggest mindfulness might be an innate construct that can be developed over time and enhanced by practice. Further, autonomy orientation and high self-esteem may foster the development of mindfulness in those with little to no meditation/mindfulness practice. Additional research is needed to clarify the roles of autonomy, attachment style, and self-esteem in the development of mindfulness. (shrink)

When do people say that they are moved, and does this experience constitute a unique emotion? We review theory and empirical research on being moved across psychology and philosophy. We examine feeling labels, elicitors, valence, bodily sensations, and motivations. We find that the English lexeme being moved typically (but not always) refers to a distinct and potent emotion that results in social bonding; often includes tears, piloerection, chills, or a warm feeling in the chest; and is often described as pleasurable, (...) though sometimes as a mixed emotion. While we conclude that it is a distinct emotion, we also recommend studying it in a more comprehensive emotion framework, instead of using the ambiguous vernacular term being moved as a scientific term. (shrink)

Purpose Recently, manipulative techniques, such as dark patterns, are widely applied. However, there is a need for clarification regarding these techniques and related phenomena. In particular, there is still no clarity about the terminology and conceptual basis of consumer manipulation. This paper aims to address this shortcoming by introducing a definition and classification of consumer manipulation. Design/methodology/approach This paper takes a conceptual approach, drawing on existing literature and established theories to comprehend the phenomenon of consumer manipulation. Findings The paper proposes (...) that consumer manipulation comprises three dimensions: limited transparency, perceived restriction of autonomy and the feeling of being tricked. This paper presents a classification of different types of consumer manipulation and demonstrates how these types can lead to varying outcomes based on the source of manipulation, changeability, reasons for perception and perception timing. Based on this classification, research propositions informed by established theories and concepts are presented. Originality/value To the best of the author’s knowledge, this work represents a first attempt to address the concept of consumer manipulation through a clear definition and classification. It is relevant for academics, policymakers and practitioners since it facilitates informed discussions and analyses of this concept. It benefits companies by raising awareness of potentially overlooked consequences of manipulative tactics, while also benefiting consumers by reducing their exposure to manipulation. (shrink)

This Article deals with legal transfer during the first decades after the foundation of the Bulgarian state in 1878, starting from the premise that law is based on communicative distinction rather than separation from society. Foreign law may therefore affect not only the native law, but also the form in which the latter is related to society. Thus legal transfer can also stimulate the evolution of law. The verification of this hypothesis is the aim of a greater project of which (...) the present Article is a part. The Bulgarian state relied a great deal at first on traditional practices of self-government and partly upon the modern Ottoman law, both of which were acknowledged by the Provisional Russian Rule in Bulgaria. Subsequently, Western law was eclectically imported at the expense of local traditions. It seems, however, that the "precious cargo" of modern Western law was relegated at first to the periphery of society, and the courts, for the most part consisting of elected laymen, experienced great difficulties in dealing with it, when it came to their knowledge at all. This is evidenced by customary law, and by some examples related to legal reasoning and legal critique, which may suggest both the persistence of traditional structures and their irritation through the transfer of foreign law. (shrink)

Taking a critical book review of Eric Williams’s 1964 survey of British West Indian historiography, British Historians and the West Indies, as its point of analysis, this article looks at how the Caribbean historian Elsa Goveia pushed back against Williams’s vision for the orientation of West Indian Studies in an age of independence. It suggests that Goveia’s review symbolizes the transition of West Indian scholarship from the anti-colonial period, represented by Williams the individual, to the post-colonial period, represented by a (...) new generation of scholars who were based at the University of the West Indies. While Williams had led scholarship on the West Indies in the decades leading up to independence, he was ill-suited to the field’s collaborative nature thereafter and had become a distraction to its growth. Crucial to this argument is an analysis of gender and ego. While Williams’s chauvinism and egoism had helped him succeed in the highly performative and masculine realms of the early-twentieth-century Academy and politics, an analysis of Goveia’s review suggests that they hindered his development as a scholar and colleague in later years. (shrink)

The contingency of biological regularities—and its implications for the existence of biological laws—has long puzzled biologists and philosophers. The best argument for the contingency of biological regularities is John Beatty’s evolutionary contingency thesis, which will be re-analyzed here. First, I argue that in Beatty’s thesis there are two versions of strong contingency used as arguments against biological laws that have gone unnoticed by his commentators. Second, Beatty’s two different versions of strong contingency are analyzed in terms of two different stabilities (...) of regularities. Third, I argue that Beatty and his commentators have focused on the more ineffective trajectory stability version of the argument, whereas the constancy stability version provides a more substantial and applicable argument against the existence of biological laws. Fourth, I develop a counterexample to Beatty’s thesis. Finally, I discuss the possibility of evolution producing repeatable and general non-lawlike regularities and patterns by utilizing the notion of generative entrenchment and by criticizing the thesis of multiple realizability of biological properties. (shrink)

Organizations interested in employee ethics compliance face the problem of conflict between employee and organizational ethical standards. Socializing new employees is one way of assuring compliance. Important for longer term employees as well as new ones, however, is making those standards visible and then operable in the daily life of an organization. This study, conducted in one large organization, found that, depending on organizational level, awareness of an organization's ethical standards is predicted by managerial adherence to and organizational compliance with (...) those standards and/or discussions with peers. Regardless of level, organizational commitment was predicted most strongly by managerial adherence to organizational standards. These findings have theoretical implications for the fields of business ethics, organizational identity and organizational socialization and practical implications for the implementation of ethics policies. (shrink)

At the turn of the 21st century, Susan Leigh Anderson and Michael Anderson conceived and introduced the Machine Ethics research program, that aimed to highlight the requirements under which autonomous artificial intelligence systems could demonstrate ethical behavior guided by moral values, and at the same time to show that these values, as well as ethics in general, can be representable and computable. Today, the interaction between humans and AI entities is already part of our everyday lives; in the near (...) future it is expected to play a key role in scientific research, medical practice, public administration, education and other fields of civic life. In view of this, the debate over the ethical behavior of machines is more crucial than ever and the search for answers, directions and regulations is imperative at an academic, institutional as well as at a technical level. Our discussion with the two inspirers and originators of Machine Ethics highlights the epistemological, metaphysical and ethical questions arising by this project, as well as the realistic and pragmatic demands that dominate artificial intelligence and robotics research programs. Most of all, however, it sheds light upon the contribution of Susan and Michael Anderson regarding the introduction and undertaking of a main objective related to the creation of ethical autonomous agents, that will not be based on the “imperfect” patterns of human behavior, or on preloaded hierarchical laws and human-centric values. (shrink)

Formal ontology as a main branch of metaphysics investigates categories of being. In the formal ontological approach to metaphysics, these ontological categories are analysed by ontological forms. This analysis, which we illustrate by some category systems, provides a tool to assess the clarity, exactness and intelligibility of different category systems or formal ontologies. We discuss critically different accounts of ontological form in the literature. Of ontological form, we propose a character- neutral relational account. In this metatheory, ontological forms of entities (...) are their standings in internal relations whose holding is neutral on the character of their relata. These relations are “formal ontological relations”. Entities belong to ontological categories because they stand in the same formal ontological relations. We hold a nominalist relationalism about ontological categories and forms. We conclude by showing that our metatheory is useful for understanding categorial fundamentality/non- fundamentality, different formal ontologies, and for unifying metaphysical questions. (shrink)

Trust is often an assumed outcome of participation in Alternative Food Networks (AFNs) as they directly connect producers with consumers. It is based on this potential for trust “between producers and consumers” that AFNs have emerged as a significant field of food studies analysis as it also suggests a capacity for AFNs to foster associated embedded qualities, like ‘morality’, ‘social justice’, ‘ecology’ and ‘equity’. These positive benefits of AFNs, however, cannot be taken for granted as trust is not necessarily an (...) outcome of AFN participation. Using Chinese case studies of AFNs, which are characterised by a distinct form of trust pressure—consumers who are particularly cynical about small scale farmers, food safety and the organic credentials of producers—this paper highlights how the dynamics of trust are in constant flux between producers and consumers. I suggest that it is the careful construction of the aesthetic and multi-sensory qualities of food, which is often celebrated via social media, that human centred relations in Chinese AFNs are mediated. This leads to two key conclusions: first, that the key variable for establishing trust is satisfying the consumer's desire for safe (i.e. "fresh") food; and second, the materiality of the food and the perception of foods materiality (especially through social media), must both be actively constructed by the farmer to fit the consumer's ideal of freshness. (shrink)

According to second‐personal approaches to moral obligation, the distinctive normative features of moral obligation can only be explained in terms of second‐personal relations, i.e. the distinctive way persons relate to each other as persons. But there are important disagreements between different groups of second‐personal approaches. Most notably, they disagree about the nature of second‐personal relations, which has consequences for the nature of the obligations that they purport to explain. This article aims to distinguish these groups from each other, highlight their (...) respective advantages and disadvantages, and thereby indicate avenues for future research. (shrink)

This article advances three claims about the bindingness of duties to oneself: (1) To defend duties to oneself, one had better show that they can bind, i.e., provide normative reason to comply. (2) To salvage the bindingness of duties to oneself, one had better construe them as owed to, and waivable by, one's present self. (3) Duties owed to, and waivable by, one's present self can nevertheless bind. In advancing these claims, I partly oppose views recently developed by Daniel Muñoz (...) and Paul Schofield. My arguments at least tentatively suggest three general lessons for moral theory: (a) Bindingness is an essential feature of duties in general. (b) The long sought-after explanation of supererogation is not to be found in waivable duties to oneself. (c) The bindingness of duties is a distinctive normative phenomenon which does not crucially depend on some physical, temporal, or psychological distance between the binding and the bound self. (shrink)

When society seems to demand confidence and certainty, how much courage does it take to admit doubt, especially self-doubt? In this personal essay, one of Australia's most respected journalists argues in favour of a doubtful mind.

A questionnaire was used to assess people's attitudes toward 33 species of animals on six dimensions . A cluster analysis resulted in five groups of animals with similar ratings on these dimensions. Respondents were also asked about their attitudes toward hunting, fishing, and medical, scientific and product-testing research using animals.

In this article, a novel interpretation of one of the problems of Hume scholarship is defended: his view of Metaphysical Realism or the belief in an external world (that there are ontologically and causally perception-independent, absolutely external and continued, i.e. Real entities). According to this interpretation, Hume's attitude in the domain of philosophy should be distinguished from his view in the domain of everyday life: Hume the philosopher suspends his judgement on Realism, whereas Hume the common man firmly believes in (...) the existence of Real entities. The defended reading is thus a sceptical and Realist interpretation of Hume. As such, it belongs to the class of what can be called no-single-Hume interpretations (Richard H. Popkin, Robert J. Fogelin, Donald L. M. Baxter), by contrast to single-Hume readings, which include Realist (naturalist, New Humean) and the traditional Reid-Green interpretation (i.e. Hume believes that there are no Real entities). Hume's distinction between the domains of philosophy and everyday life, which is argued to be epistemological, is employed in order to reconcile his scepticism with his naturalism and constructive science of human nature. The article pays special attention to the too much neglected second profound argument against the senses in Part 1, Section 12 of Hume's first Enquiry and the corresponding argument in Section 4, Part 4, Book 1 of the Treatise. (shrink)

On Chang's voluntarist account of commitments, when we commit to φ, we employ the 'normative powers' of our will to give ourselves a reason to φ that we would otherwise not have had. I argue that Chang's account, by itself, does not have sufficient conceptual resources to reconcile the normative significance of commitments with their alleged fundamentally volitional character. I suggest an alternative, second-personal account of commitment, which avoids this problem. On this account, the volitional act involved in committing is (...) one of holding ourselves accountable, thus putting us under to a pro tanto obligation to ourselves. The second-personal account implies that there is an interesting link between commitment and morality. (shrink)

The Problem of Obligation is the problem of how to explain the features of moral obligations that distinguish them from other normative phenomena. Two recent accounts, the Second-Personal Account and the Relational Account, propose superficially similar solutions to this problem. Both regard obligations as based on the claims or legitimate demands that persons as such have on one another. However, unlike the Second-Personal Account, the Relational Account does not regard these claims as based in persons’ authority to address them. Advocates (...) of the Relational Account accuse the Second-Personal Account of falling prey to the Problem of Antecedence. According to this objection, the Second-Personal Account is committed to the implausible claim that we have an obligation to φ only if, and because, others demand that we φ. Since the Relational Account’s proposed solution to the Problem of Obligation does not face the Problem of Antecedence, its advocates argue that it is dialectically superior to the Second-Personal Account. In this paper, I defend the Second-Personal Account by arguing that, first, the Relational Account does not actually solve the Problem of Obligation and, second, the Second-Personal Account does not fall prey to the Problem of Antecedence. (shrink)

ABSTRACT An influential argument against the possibility of obligations to oneself states that the very notion of such obligations is incoherent: If there were such obligations, we could release ourselves from them; yet releasing oneself from an obligation is impossible. I challenge this argument by arguing against the premise that it is impossible to release oneself from an obligation. I point out that this premise assumes that if it were possible to release oneself from an obligation, it would be impossible (...) to violate that obligation. I note that there are two interpretations of this assumption, one conceptual and one psychological. I argue that, on both interpretations, the assumption is false—at least according to independently plausible accounts of obligations to oneself and of what it means to waive an obligation. My arguments paint a picture of obligations to oneself that not only challenges the argument against their coherence, but also illuminates these obligations’ relationship to other parts of the moral domain. (shrink)

There are three components to boundary objects as outlined in the original 1989 article. Interpretive flexibility, the structure of informatic and work process needs and arrangements, and, finally, the dynamic between ill-structured and more tailored uses of the objects. Much of the use of the concept has concentrated on the aspect of interpretive flexibility and has often mistaken or conflated this flexibility with the process of tacking back-and-forth between the ill-structured and well-structured aspects of the arrangements. Boundary objects are not (...) useful at just any level of scale or without full consideration of the entire model. The article discusses these aspects of the architecture of boundary objects and includes a discussion of one of the ways that boundary objects appeared as a concept in earlier work done by Star. It concludes with methodological considerations about how to study the system of boundary objects and infrastructure. (shrink)

In this paper, I elaborate on the Strong Nuclear Theory (SNT) of tropes and substances, which I have defended elsewhere, using my metatheory about formal ontology and especially fundamental ontological form. According to my metatheory, for an entity to have an ontological form is for it to be a relatum of a formal ontological relation or relations jointly in an order. The full fundamental ontological form is generically identical to a simple formal ontological relation or relations jointly in an order. (...) Regarding generic identity, I follow Fabrice Correia and Alexander Skiles, who consider it a form of generalized identity as distinguished from numerical identity. The SNT states that for any trope to have the full fundamental ontological form is for it to be a strongly rigidly or generically (existentially) dependent individual simple part. Therefore, the common dichotomous set-up of asking whether tropes are fundamentally properties rather than objects or vice versa is a non-starter to me in formal ontological terms. The elaboration of the SNT also supplies me with the resources to respond to the arguments against tropes by Douglas Ehring, Robert K. Garcia and Herbert Hochberg. Finally, I argue that non-fundamentally but necessarily, every trope is a proper part of a substance and is concrete in the SNT. (You may access the published paper via the external link below.). (shrink)

The consequences of a trend to marginalize social studies in the early grades are complex and widespread, as a new wave of novice teachers and K-6 students are receiving a message clearly implying that social studies education is unimportant. Convincing them of the value in teaching and learning social studies is progressively becoming more difficult for social studies methods instructors. The purpose of this study was to examine pre-service teachers’ observations of the extent to which social studies is being marginalized, (...) possible barriers involved, and the impact that this phenomenon has on pre-service teachers and K-6 students in the classroom. Through a mixed-method design, 88 pre-service teachers were asked to report their classroom observations. Over half observed social studies instruction. Of those who observed social studies instruction, about a third indicated that teachers taught 5–15 min per day. Pre-service teachers reported personal success in planning and teaching social studies lessons during their practicum experiences; likewise, K-6 students were motivated by pre-service teachers’ student-centered activities in the lessons. The results of this study provide one form of current documentation regarding the effects of social studies marginalization in K-6 schools. (shrink)

My elaboration of my earlier interpretation of perceptions in Hume, proposed in this paper, is, roughly, that phenomenal consciousness is an aspect of perceptions (i.e., impressions and ideas). Now, I also prefer emphasizing the point that perceptions are qualities to them being properties. Here I restrict my discussion to simple perceptions; I put complex perceptions aside. I draw on Don Ainslie's account of perceptions.

F. H. Bradley’s relation regress poses a difficult problem for metaphysics of relations. In this paper, we reconstruct this regress argument systematically and make its presuppositions explicit in order to see where the possibility of its solution or resolution lies. We show that it cannot be answered by claiming that it is not vicious. Neither is one of the most promising resolutions, the relata-specific answer adequate in its present form. It attempts to explain adherence (relating), which is a crucial component (...) of the explanandum of Bradley’s relation regress, in terms of specific adherence of a relational trope to its relata. Nevertheless, since we do not know the consequences and constituents of a trope adhering to its specific relata, it remains unclear what specific adherence is. It is left as a constitutively inexplicable primitive. The relata-specific answer only asserts against Bradley. This negative conclusion highlights the need for a metaphysical account of the constitution of the holding of adherence. (shrink)

Mullā ‘Alī Nūrī was an indispensable link in the transmission ofMullā Sadrā’s teachings and an important commentator of his works.In my article, I’ll focus on one of them – a short treatise, entitled“Basīt al-haqīqa wa wahdat al-wujūd,” which deals with the modes ofthingness and existence in general, and the socalled“illuminative relation” in particular.The most significant statements Nūrī makes in this brief work consistin the identification of thingness with existence and the “breath of theMerciful” with the “illuminative relation”. I intendto examine (...) these two important points and the employedargumentation in detail, showing how Nūrī exploited some ideas,current in the Kalām and theoretical Sufism, to the benefit of thedoctrine of Mullā Sadrā. (shrink)

This paper develops a new kind of approach to conspiracy theories – a procedural approach. This approach promises to establish that belief in conspiracy theories is rationally criticisable in general. Unlike most philosophical approaches, a procedural approach does not purport to condemn conspiracy theorists directly on the basis of features of their theories. Instead, it focuses on the patterns of thought involved in forming and sustaining belief in such theories. Yet, unlike psychological approaches, a procedural approach provides a rational critique (...) of conspiracist thought patterns. In particular, it criticises these thought patterns for failing to conform to procedures prescribed by reason. The specific procedural approach that I develop takes its cue from the Kantian notion that reason must be used self-critically. I tentatively suggest that conspiracy theorists fail to engage in the relevant sort of self-critique in at least three ways: they do not critically examine their own motivations, they avoid looking at matters from the point of view of others, and they fail to reflect on the limits of human knowledge. (shrink)

This Element considers the relationship between the traditional view of God as all-powerful, all-knowing and wholly good on the one hand, and the idea of human free will on the other. It focuses on the potential threats to human free will arising from two divine attributes: God's exhaustive foreknowledge and God's providential control of creation.

Descartes holds that ideas have or contain _objective reality_ of their objects, so that the idea of the sun is the sun itself existing in the intellect. In this paper, I examine this obscure thesis which grounds the disagreement about Descartes’ commitment to direct or indirect realism. I suggest that, importantly, both readings are correct to a certain extent. I argue that the view of objective reality Descartes develops bears the earmarks of both direct and indirect realist views but must (...) be classified as a third alternative combining some central features of both. I elaborate first on the direct realist interpretations of Descartes’ objective reality and explain their most significant shortcomings. My interpretation of objective identity comes in the form of attributing to Descartes a view about identity and persistence of objects known as _sortalism_. I argue that Descartes’ objective identity turns out to be much like the Aristotelian view of _formal identity_, yet without the forms. By way of discussing the case of Theseus’ ship, I point out how Cartesian sortalism, contrary to other versions of sortalism, allows us to analyze the puzzle as a tension between two distinct yet independently legitimate criteria of identity. It is this sortalist insight that helps to render Descartes’ account of objective identity consistent. This point also grounds my argument that we need not consider direct and indirect realism as logical complements, contrary to the received wisdom. (shrink)

Kant takes the idea of autonomy of the will to be his distinctive contribution to moral philosophy. However, this idea is more nuanced and complicated than one might think. In this chapter, I sketch the rough outlines of Kant’s idea of autonomy of the will while also highlighting contentious exegetical issues that give rise to various possible interpretations. I tentatively defend four basic claims. First, autonomy primarily features in Kant’s account of moral agency, as the condition of the possibility of (...) moral obligation. Second, autonomy amounts to a metaphysical property as well as a normative principle and a psychological capacity. Third, although there is legitimate scholarly disagreement about whether or not autonomy involves self-legislation of the moral law, there is good reason to believe it underwrites an ‘inside-out’ (as opposed to ‘outside-in’) conception of the relationship between the will and moral requirements. Fourth, persons have dignity because their autonomy makes them members in the set of beings over whom the categorical imperative requires us to universalise our maxims, not because autonomy is an independently important property. (shrink)

In “Obligations of the ‘Gift’: Reciprocity and Responsibility in Precision Medicine,” Lee rightly points out that disparities in health care access also lead to disparities in precision medi...

Name der Zeitschrift: Semiotica Jahrgang: 2016 Heft: 212 Seiten: 199-217.

The exceptional intellectual richness of seventeenth-century Safavid Iran is epitomised by the philosophical school of Isfahan, and in particular by its ostensible founder, Mir Damad (d. 1631), and his great student Mulla Sadra (aka Sadr al-Din Shirazi, d. 1636). Equally important to the school is the apophatic wisdom of Rajab 'Ali Tabrizi that followed later (d. 1669/70). However, despite these philosophers' renown, the identification of the 'philosophical school of Isfahan' was only proposed in 1956, by the celebrated French Iranologist Henry (...) Corbin, who noted the unifying Islamic Neoplatonist character of some 20 thinkers and spiritual figures; this grouping has subsequently remained unchallenged for some fifty years. In this highly original work, Janis Esots investigates the legitimacy of the term 'school', delving into the complex philosophies of these three major Shi'i figures and drawing comparisons between them. The author makes the case that Mulla Sadra's thought is independent and actually incompatible with the thoughts of Mir Damad and Rajab Ali Tabrizi. This not only presents a new way of thinking about how we understand the 'school of Isfahan', it also identifies Mir Damad and Rajab Ali Tabrizi as pioneers in their own right. (shrink)

According to Darwall’s Second-Personal Account, moral obligations constitutively involve relations of authority and accountability between persons. Darwall takes this account to lend support to Kant’s moral theory. Critics object that the Second-Personal Account abandons central tenets of Kant’s system. I respond to these critics’ three main challenges by showing that they rest on misunderstandings of the Second-Personal Account. Properly understood, this account is not only congenial to Kant’s moral theory, but also illuminates aspects of that theory which have hitherto received (...) scant attention. In particular, it motivates a fresh perspective on the relationship between respect, persons, and the law. (shrink)

According to standard trope nominalism, there are simple tropes that do not have parts or multiply distinct aspects. Douglas Ehring’s reductio ad absurdum against this standard view concludes that there are no simple tropes. In this paper, we provide a response to Ehring defending the standard view. Ehring’s argument may be refuted by (1) distinguishing the ontological form of tropes from their contribution to the ontological content of the world, and (2) construing tropes as having primitive identity. At the same (...) time, standard trope nominalism is elaborated on by distinguishing between ontological form and content, for which there are also independent reasons. (shrink)

I analyze here biological regression equations known in the literature as allometries and scaling laws. My focus is on the alleged lawlike status of these equations. In particular I argue against recent views that regard allometries and scaling laws as representing universal, non-continent, and/or strict biological laws. Although allometries and scaling laws appear to be generalizations applying to many taxa, they are neither universal nor exceptionless. In fact there appear to be exceptions to all of them. Nor are the constants (...) in allometries and scaling laws truly constant, stable, or universal in character, but vary in value across different taxa and background conditions. Moreover, these equations represent evolutionary, strongly contingent generalizations, which threatens their lawlike status. Lastly, allometries and scaling laws do not offer stable probabilities to which they hold in different backgrounds. I further suggest that many allometries and scaling laws function to elucidate explananda rather than explanantia or covering laws. (shrink)

In “Global Knowledge Frameworks and the Tasks of Cross-Cultural Philosophy,” Leigh Jenco searches for the conception of knowledge that best justifies the judgment that one can learn from non-local traditions of philosophy. Jenco considers four conceptions of knowledge, namely, in catchwords, the esoteric, Enlightenment, hermeneutic, and self- transformative conceptions of knowledge, and she defends the latter as more plausible than the former three. In this critical discussion of Jenco’s article, I provide reason to doubt the self-transformative conception, and also (...) advance a fifth, pluralist conception of knowledge that I contend best explains the prospect of learning from traditions other than one’s own. (shrink)

Title in English translation: Metametaphysics - with and without Categories. A comment paper on An Introduction to Metametaphysics by Tuomas Tahko. Ehdotan artikkelissa uutta olevan ja sen muodon välistä erottelua. Erottelun avulla voidaan antaa täsmällinen käsitys ontologisen kategorian käsitteestä ja metafysiikan tutkimuskohteesta. Argumentoin myös, että metafysiikan epistemologiaa ja semantiikkaa sekä metafyysistä selitttämistä pitää lähestyä kategorianäkökulmasta. Artikkeli on kommentti Tuomas Tahkon oppikirjaan An Introduction to Metametaphysics.

The aim of this paper is to develop ideas about robustness analyses. I introduce a form of robustness analysis that I call sufficient parameter robustness, which has been neglected in the literature. I claim that sufficient parameter robustness is different from derivational robustness, the focus of previous research. My purpose is not only to suggest a new taxonomy of robustness, but also to argue that previous authors have concentrated on a narrow sense of robustness analysis, which they have inadequately distinguished (...) from other investigations of models such as sensitivity analysis. (shrink)

This paper defends a strong link between personal integrity and morality in a way that preserves the overriding and universal authority of impartial morality. I argue that, when we are committed to a personal project or relationship, we hold ourselves accountable, from the perspective of a corresponding practical identity, for living up to the commitment. Under the right conditions, this generates an obligation to ourselves. Supposing that holding someone accountable constitutively presupposes a version of Kant’s Formula of Humanity (as Stephen (...) Darwall argues), such obligations of integrity turn out to be moral obligations. Although the picture presented here resembles Christine Korsgaard’s account of the link between integrity of morality, it has several advantages over that account. (shrink)