The excellent quality and depth of the various essays make [the book] an invaluable resource....It is likely to become essential reading in its field.—CHOICE.

Relatively little is known about those who consistently produce the valid response to Modus Tollens (MT) problems. In two studies, people who responded correctly to MT problems indicated how “convinced” they were by proofs of conditional reasoning conclusions. The first experiment showed that MT competent reasoners found accurate proofs of MT reasoning more convincing than similar “proofs” of invalid reasoning. Similarly, there was a tendency for MT competent reasoners to find an initial counterfactual supposition more convincing than did people who (...) were less competent in MT. The second experiment showed that when individuals produced the correct MT response, and found correct MT proofs to be more convincing than “bogus” proofs, they were also less likely to find the conclusions to Denying the Antecedent, or Affirming the Consequent problems valid, compared to individuals who could not discriminate between valid and bogus MT proofs. These findings are discussed in terms of both their implications for the mental logic and mental models positions, and individual differences in System 1 and System 2 reasoning. (shrink)

Two experiments examined the role of conditional reasoning in the logical deduction game, Mastermind . An analysis suggested that Modus Tollens (MT) reasoning could be used to determine the code structure, for example, in determining if any of the colours in the code are repeated. Consistent with this analysis, Experiment 1 showed that only MT errors are correlated with the number of hypotheses advanced in Mastermind . A subsequent analysis showed that conditional reasoning such as Affirming the Consequent (AC) and (...) Denying the Antecedent (DA) could lead to particularly damaging inferences only when the code was four different colours. When that was known before play, Experiment 2 showed that AC errors, but not MT errors, were significantly correlated with Mastermind hypotheses advanced. A stepwise multiple regression analysis supported these findings: When the solvers knew they were playing a four-colour code, there was a slight diminution in the variance explained by MT errors, and a significant increase in the variance explained by AC errors. An analysis of the number of different possible codes that could be consistent with hypotheses actually played showed that the number of such codes is far fewer when the code consists of four different colours than when its structure is not known. This analysis suggests that reasoners are therefore unlikely to discover many alternative causes for the feedback given when the code consists of four different colours, and it is under these conditions that humans are most likely to engage in AC reasoning. (shrink)

What does it mean to "trust?" What makes us feel secure enough to place our confidence—even at times our welfare—in the hands of other people? Is it possible to "trust" an institution? What exactly do people mean when they claim to "distrust" their governments? As difficult as it may be to define, trust is essential to the formation and maintenance of a civil society. In Trust and Trustworthiness political scientist Russell Hardin addresses the standard theories of trust and articulates (...) his own new and compelling idea: that much of what we call trust can be best described as "encapsulated interest." Research into the roles of trust in our society has offered a broad range of often conflicting theories. Some theorists maintain that trust is a social virtue that cannot be reduced to strategic self-interest; others claim that trusting another person is ultimately a rational calculation based on information about that person and his or her incentives and motivations. Hardin argues that we place our trust in persons whom we believe to have strong reasons to act in our best interests. He claims that we are correct when we assume that the main incentive of those whom we trust is to maintain a relationship with us—whether it be for reasons of economic benefit or for love and friendship. Hardin articulates his theory using examples from a broad array of personal and social relationships, paying particular attention to explanations of the development of trusting relationships. He also examines trustworthiness and seeks to understand why people may behave in ways that violate their own self-interest in order to honor commitments they have made to others. The book also draws important distinctions between vernacular uses of "trust" and "trustworthiness," contrasting, for example, the type of trust (or distrust) we place in individuals with the trust we place in institutions Trust and Trustworthiness represents the culmination of important new research into the roles of trust in our society; it offers a challenging new voice in the current discourse about the origins of cooperative behavior and its consequences for social and civic life. A Volume in the Russell Sage Foundation Series on Trust. (shrink)

The book is a defence of scientific realism. Its primary aim is to argue that it is possible to establish scientific realism without Inference to the Best Explanation. The idea that plays the central role in the book is an "Eddington-inference". Arthur Eddington once considered a hypothetical ichthyologist who concluded from the fact that his net contained no fish smaller than the holes in his net that there were in the sea no fish smaller than the holes in his (...) net. Although Eddington himself defended the inference, the author of the present volume argues on probabilistic grounds that it is likely such an inference is flawed. He generalises the argument to develop a probabilistic justification for scientific realist claims about the existence of unobservable entities. (shrink)

The no-miracles argument for realism and the pessimistic meta-induction for anti-realism pull in opposite directions. Structural Realism---the position that the mathematical structure of mature science reflects reality---relieves this tension.

The Prisoner's Dilemma and Kenneth Arrow's General Possibility Theorem, are two of the most simple, yet far-reaching concepts in social science. The first captures in an easily understood paradox how individually rational acts that benefit individual people can combine to produce a result that is of less benefit to everyone. The Arrow Theorem shows that there is no formula for ranking the preferences of many people into a rational aggregate. This book is a collection of the best work done (...) on these two ideas. It is an ideal introduction for students or sourcebook for professionals. `...it presents the traditional works addressing the problems of rationality in social and political theory...the anthology represents a much nee. (shrink)

(Tye 2006) presents us with the following scenario: John and Jane are both stan- dard human visual perceivers (according to the Ishihara test or the Farnsworth test, for example) viewing the same surface of Munsell chip 527 in standard conditions of visual observation. The surface of the chip looks “true blue” to John (i.e., it looks blue not tinged with any other colour to John), and blue tinged with green to Jane.¹ Tye then in effect poses a (...) multiple choice question. (shrink)

Controversies about optimality models and adaptationist methodologies have animated the discussions of evolutionary theory in recent years. The sociobiologists, following the lead of E. O. Wilson, have argued that if Darwinian natural selection can be reliably expected to produce the best possible type of organism - one that optimizes the value of its genetic contribution to future generations - then evolution becomes a powerfully predictive theory as well as an explanatory one. The enthusiastic claims of the sociobiologists for the (...) predictability and applicability that the optimalist approach engenders have been met with severe criticism by Richard C. Lewontin, Stephen Jay Gould, and other biologists and philosophers of biology. These original essays take up both sides of the controversy over the role of optimality models in evolutionary biology, providing a refreshingly insightful and balanced discussion of optimality issues by an interdisciplinary group of leading philosophers of biology, biologists, psychologists, anthropologists, and an economist. They focus on the current state of adaptationist and optimalist methodology in evolutionary theory, and on the possibility of extending such methodology to the human sciences, especially those of psychology and anthropology. Introduction / John Dupre -- Part 1. Methodological questions. Simple models of complex phenomena: the case of cultural evolution / Peter J. Richerson and Robert Boyd -- Natural selection and the null hypothesis / John Beatty -- Why not the best? / Philip Kitcher -- Part 2. Evolution and optimality. What is adaptationism? / Elliot Sober -- How to model evolution / John Maynard Smith -- Comments on Maynard Smith’s "How to Model Evolution" / Elliot Sober -- Reply to Sober / John Maynard Smith -- The shape of optimality / Richard C. Lewontin -- Part 3. Applications. Evolutionary ecology and the optimality assumption / John M. Emlen -- Optimality theory and behavior / John E.R. Staddon -- Part 4. Applications to human behavior. Optimization theory in anthropology: applications and critiques / Eric Alden Smith -- Evolution of a mesh between principles of the mind and regularities of the world / Roger N. Shepard -- From evolution to behavior: evolutionary psychology as the missing link / Leda Cosmides and John Tooby -- On the emotions as guarantors of threats and promises / Jack Hirschleifer -- Human kinds / John Dupre. (shrink)

It can happen that a single surface S, viewed in normal conditions, looks pure blue (“true blue”) to observer John but looks blue tinged with green to a second observer, Jane, even though both are normal in the sense that they pass the standard psychophysical tests for color vision. Tye (2006a) finds this situation prima facie puzzling, and then offers two different “solutions” to the puzzle.1 The first is that at least one observer misrepresents S’s color because, though normal (...) in the sense explained, she is not a Normal color observer: her color detection system is not operating in the current condition in the way that Mother Nature intended it to operate. His second solution involves the idea that Mother Nature designed our color detection systems to be reliable with respect to the detection of coarse-grained colors (e.g., blue, green, yellow, orange), but our capacity to represent the fine-grained colors (e.g., true blue, blue tinged with green) is an undesigned spandrel. On this second solution, it is consistent with the variation between John and Jane that both represent the color of S in a way that complies with Mother Nature’s intentions: both represent S as exemplifying the coarse-grained color blue, and since (we may assume) S is in fact blue, both represent it veridically. Of course, they also represent fine-grained colors of S, and, according to Tye, at most one of these representations is veridical (Tye says that only God knows which). But at the level of representation for which Mother Nature designed our color detection systems, both John and Jane (qua Normal observers) are reliable detectors. (shrink)

John Evelyn (1620-1706) is best remembered for Sylva - his magnum opus - and his Diary . Alongside Pepys' diary, Evelyn's is as well known now as anything else written in their time. A connoisseur of architecture, painting, music, coins, and sermons, Evelyn was renowned for his practical knowledge on horticulture and arboriculture, and he was one of the original Fellows of the Royal Society. His Diary begins with an account of his early life and travels in Europe. (...) In addition to his own jottings of events, Evelyn drew on contemporary newspapers and pamphlets. (shrink)

Excerpt from John Dewey: His Thought and Influence Any valid appraisal and criticism Of a man's thought, however, must well up from intellectual charity (sympathy, if you will) and not from either resentment fed by hearsay, or at best, superficial study, nor from partisanship. NO true understanding of a man's thought can be had unless we learn by critical and historical study to see how he came to put his questions in the way he did and give the (...) answers he gave to them. You need to go on and see how far a man's theory will really take you, and how much truth can be got out Of it, and just where and Why it breaks down. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works. (shrink)

Although best known as a scientific instrument maker, John Rowley extended his sphere of activity very considerably as Master of Mechanics to George I and as a hydraulic engineer at the Offices of Ordnance and Works. Re-examined and untapped sources provide fresh evidence of these aspects of his work and highlight his predilection for the arts and the virtuosity of his artefacts. The findings also have implications for studies of the instrument-making trade in the early eighteenth century.

Several contemporary Confucian philosophers have posited differing hybrid views fusing meritocracy to democracy. There is a good deal of interest in a meritocracy in contemporary Confucian thought, and such a view perhaps should receive more serious consideration in liberal democratic thought since it may make for a stronger form of government when appended to democracy. In this paper, four contemporary hybrid theorists who combine elements of a meritocracy with a democracy are critically analyzed concerning an ability for their views to (...) be instantiated in liberal democracies for the legislative branch only. Finally, I provide a modified hybrid view for the legislature that I believe is the best fit for current liberal democracies. (shrink)

John Dewey’s pragmatism and naturalism are grounded on metaphysical tenets describing how mind’s intelligence is thoroughly natural in its activity and productivity. His worldview is best classified as Organic Realism, since it descended from the German organicism and Naturphilosophie of Herder, Schelling, and Hegel which shaped the major influences on his early thought. Never departing from its tenets, his later philosophy starting with Experience and Nature elaborated a philosophical organon about science, culture, and ethics to fulfill his particular (...) version of Organic Realism. (shrink)

The dynamic mother-daughter relationship can be loving and supportive at best as well as contentious and tragic. It is a relationship predicated on maternal instinct which can provide direction and support for deep insight into notions of womanhood, personal and political philosophies. However, in providing this guidance, ironically this same maternal guidance can act to stifle the growth of an adolescent daughter as she transitions into womanhood. Jamaica Kincaid’s ‘Annie John’ can be seen as an exemplar of this (...) transition. Annie has to contend with not only her mother’s maternal pressure on her to conform, but she must also adhere to cultural expectations of a creolized culture predicated on both Africana and British understandings of femininity, social expectations, womanhood, and etiquette. This challenges Annie’s own emerging philosophy and desire for independence and self-definition. As discussed in this paper, success can be achieved outside and beyond the mother-daughter dynamic once a daughter has had the opportunity to consider, realize, defy the hypocrisy of being encouraged to be independent whilst being forced to follow one’s mother’s notion of womanhood. In a valiant attempt to avoid the tragedy of replicating her mother’s own flaws, Annie John’s personal growth was no easy feat and created at times a contentious dynamic. However, this journey not only facilitated her success and independence so that she could travel beyond the shores of Antigua, it demonstrated an independence of thought that African Caribbean creolized women must experience in order to realize their own success. (shrink)

What exactly is a genetic disease? For a phrase one hears on a daily basis, there has been surprisingly little analysis of the underlying concept. Medical doctors seem perfectly willing to admit that the etiology of disease is typically complex, with a great many factors interacting to bring about a given condition. On such a view, descriptions of diseases like cancer as genetic seem at best highly simplistic, and at worst philosophically indefensible. On the other hand, there is clearly (...) some practical value to be had by classifying diseases according to their predominant cause when this can be accomplished in a theoretically satisfactory manner. The question therefore becomes exactly how one should go about selecting a single causal factor among many to explain the presence of disease. When an attempt to defend such causal selection is made at all, the standard accounts offered (Koch's postulates, Hill's epidemiological criteria, manipulability) are all clearly inadequate. I propose, however, an epidemiological account of disease causation which walks the fine line between practical applicability and theoretical considerations of causal complexity and attempts to compromise between patientcentered and population-centered concepts of disease. The epidemiological account is the most basic framework consistent with our strongly held intuitions about the causal classification of disease, yet it avoids the difficulties encountered by its competitors. (shrink)

The change in shape of the C. elegans embryo from an ovoid ball of cells into a worm-shaped larva is driven by three events within the cells of the hypodermis (epidermis): (1) intercalation of two rows of dorsal cells, (2) enclosure of the ventral surface by hypodermis, and (3) elongation of the embryo. While the behavior of the hypodermal cells involved in each of these processes differs dramatically, it is clear that F-actin and microtubules have essential functions in each of (...) these processes, whereas contraction of actomyosin structures appears to be involved specifically in elongation. Molecular analysis of these processes is revealing components specific to C. elegans as well as components found in other systems. Since C. elegans hypodermal cells demonstrate dramatically different behaviors during intercalation, enclosure and elongation, the study of cytoskeletal dynamics in these processes may reveal both unique and conserved activities during distinct epithelial morphogenetic movements. BioEssays 23:12–23, 2001. © 2001 John Wiley & Sons, Inc. (shrink)

Sir John Hicks is one of the highest-regarded contemporary economists, and it is fitting that the new series of _Critical Assessments of Contemporary Economists_ should commence with his work. Awarded the Nobel Prize for Economics in 1972, Sir John Hicks’ work is extremely wide-ranging, with the list of topics reading almost like an agenda for the whole of modern economics: general equilibrium theory, welfare economics, problems of index numbers, trade cycles, wages and many others. He may, however, be (...) best known to present day economists for having introduced IS-LM curves, now a standard means of Keynesian analysis. A comprehensive, scholarly work, this four-volume set gives students of economics and economic thought immediate access to Sir John Hicks' contributions and shows how his work has been received and modified by others. (shrink)

My title is taken from the frontispiece to Ogilby's translation of Aesop ; since every Renaissance poet believed the statement to be true, let me start with my own example. John Denham's only play, The Sophy, published in August 1642, is a tale about the perils of jealousy. The good prince Mirza, after a miraculous victory over the Turks, returns in glory to his father's court, but leaves it shortly thereafter. In his absense, Haly, the evil courtier, follows a (...) friend's advice to " work on [the king's] fears, till fear hath made him cruel"1 and poisons the king's mind with jealousy against his son. Mirza returns only to be brutally blinded and killed, and the emperor soon dies stricken with remorse. Now it happens that Parliament justified all its actions in the months preceding the civil war on the grounds of the "fears and jealousies" that the king had inspired. Charles was incensed by the slogan and claimed angrily that he, if anyone, had the most cause for fears and jealousies.2 Denham obviously decided that here was the all-consuming topic around which a predominantly royalist drama could be written. He followed what I believe was the standard practice - the method that Fulke Greville said Sidney used and that Congreve repeated at the end of the century when he declared of The Double Dealer that "I design'd the Moral first, and to that Moral I invented the Fable."3 He found a plot in Thomas Herbert's Travels into Diverse Parts of Asia that recorded some terrible cruelties and catastrophes caused by jealousy, and he added the point that the emperor's mind had been wrought upon by his counselor. There is no evidence that the play was ever acted, but the most casual reader would have said to himself, "Yes, history reminds us that states destroy themselves through fears and jealousies, and we should abate our own before it is too late." · 1. Sir John Denham, The Poetical Works, ed. Theodore Howard Banks, 2d ed. , p.245. The references to fear and jealousy are so ubiquitous in the play that they need not be listed here.· 2. On March 1, 1642, in the angriest of his replies to Parliament so far, Charles exclaimed, "You speake of Jealousies and Feares: Lay your hands to your hearts, and aske your selves whether I may not likewise be disturbed with Feares and Jealousies: And if so, I assure you this Message hath nothing lessened them" . Although phrases like "distempers and jealousies" had been used earlier, Clarendon on two occasions is quite specific that "fears and jealousies" were "the new words which served to justify all indispositions and to excuse all disorders" in January 1642 . Taken with other evidence, Clarendon's remarks strongly suggest that The Sophy was written after Coopers Hill, and during seven months preceding its publication in August 1642.· 3. William Congreve, The Complete Plays, ed. Herbert Davis , p. 119. And compare John Donne in Sermons, ed. Evelyn M. Simpson are George R. Potter , 9:274: "All wayes of teaching are Rule and Example: and though ordinarily the Rule be first placed, yet the Rule it selfe is made of Examples...for, Example in matter of Doctrine, is as Assimiliation in matter of Nourishment; The Example makes that that is proposed for our learning and farther instruction, like something which we knew before, as Assimilation makes that meat, which we have received and digested, like those parts which are in our bodies before."John M. Wallace, author of Destiny His Choice: The Loyalism of Andrew Marvell and articles on Milton, Dryden Denham, Traherne, and Arnold, is professor of English at the University of Chicago. (shrink)

The paper picks up from the widespread use by politicians and some educational theorists of maximising notions about those being educated such as ‘reach their full potential’ or ‘make the best of themselves’ or ‘develop their talents to the full’. The paper discusses then puts some of these ideas on one side to focus on the injunction that school students should be encouraged to do their best. It puts forward a number of objections to this injunction as well (...) as answers to possible counter-arguments. Its final two main sections discuss links with maximising ideas in moral theory, especially utilitarianism; and Michael Slote’s case for satisficing rather than maximising as a guide to personal flourishing. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Seeing the Best of MeJohn ScheumannHi I am John, I am 21 and live in Northern California. I was diagnosed with a brain tumor in March 2005. When I was diagnosed I was 13–year–old, in 7th grade, the school year was nearing its end. I was just starting to hit my stride with my youthful independence. Skipping forward to post surgery: right after, the effects from the (...) surgery were severe. My whole body was weak, I was temporarily paralyzed on the left side of my of my body, I could hardly speak or see. My recovery has been hard, relearning how to do many things again.Now eight years after, I have recovered very well (although it doesn’t always seem like that to me). My “disabilities” are physical and cognitive. My physical issues are that I have very poor balance. My coordination is also poor (especially on my left side). I get fatigued more easily, then that triggers the issues with my balance and coordination even more. Also when I’m fatigued my left arm, leg, and hand can get shaky (which is also know as ataxia). My cognitive issues are that I process information slower, have a bad memory, have trouble finding the right words to say, organizing thoughts, etc.To me I am disabled, I have things that happened to me that effected my body and impaired me in different ways. I am disabled but that’s not all I am, I am still a young growing adult who does things that most people my age do.There are times though were the term disability does not do me justice. The things that happened to me affect me everyday but I act and do things that most people my age do, I go to the gym, walk my dog, hang out with friend, watch sports, etc..... On the surface I appear to be an average able bodied person, my “disabilities” aren’t always visible sometimes till someone gets to know me or see me interact for a while. So people will sometimes not treat me in the way I would like to be treated because of their unknowing. People sometimes expect me or want me to do things I’m not capable of and that can be awkward and upsetting.Other times people see me as your average person my age and I’ll tell them I have a disability they don’t understand the complexity of it and that certain things are difficult for me and only in certain situations, not all the time. They don’t understand the disability is individual to me and one issue is not the same for everyone across the board. This can also be awkward and upsetting at times.Saying all this I understand people will misjudge me and most often people are not being ignorant they are acting the best way they know how and that given the chance they can see the best of me and truly understand who I am and forget the label “disabled.” [End Page E8]Copyright © 2013 The Johns Hopkins University Press... (shrink)

Reams of empirical studies and a century or two of social theory have noticed that modernity produces increasingly shallow and instrumental relationships. Where bonds of mutuality, based on face-to-face connection, once survived, we now tend to exist in a depthless, dematerialized technoculture. This is the trajectory of industrial mass society: not transcending itself through technology, but instead becoming ever more fully realized. In this context, it is striking to note that the original usage of “virtual” was as the adjectival form (...) of “virtue.” Virtual reality (VR) is not only the creation of a narcissistic subculture; it represents a much wider…. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Making the Best of Things: Character Skepticism and Cross-Cultural PhilosophyJohn M. Doris (bio)With your spirit settled, accumulate practice day by day, and hour by hour.—Miyamoto MusashiLike many of my colleagues in moral psychology, I’ve focused almost exclusively on Western philosophy, so I was pleasantly surprised when practitioners of cross-cultural and comparative philosophy responded to character skepticism with resources drawn from Eastern traditions.1 [End Page 571]As a reminder: the (...) character skeptic asserts a descriptive claim, to the effect that traditional conceptions of character are empirically inadequate, accompanied by a prescriptive claim to the effect that, as a result of this inadequacy, traditional notions of character should receive considerably diminished emphasis in ethical thought (e.g., Doris 2022, p. 2).2 The antiskeptic rejects both claims: a suitably nuanced conception of character has nothing to fear from empirical moral psychology and may safely retain its focal role in ethical thought.Near as I can see, cross-cultural philosophers commenting on the issues have generally been anti-skeptical. This anti-skepticism might be either contrastive or complementary in tenor. In a contrastive approach, Eastern conceptions of character, while bearing some affinities to Western conceptions (if there are no affinities, we’d have a change of subject), are supposed to be substantially different than Western notions, so defending the West by way of the East marks a departure from the Western characterological tradition. In a complementary approach, the Eastern and Western conceptions are substantially similar, so defending the West by way of the East is fundamentally a continuation of the Western characterological tradition. (Though continuation can’t be quite the right word, since the referenced Eastern traditions are often older than the Western.)While this dichotomy, like most dichotomies, oversimplifies, my sense is that cross-cultural philosophy’s contributions have tended to be complementary: consideration of Eastern traditions, often times Confucian, is said to illuminate what’s valuable in Western, frequently Aristotelian, traditions.3 This circumstance is both surprising to, and convenient for, me. Surprising, for my reading of the one Eastern text I have studied closely,4 over my thirty-five-year avocation as a martial artist, the legendary swordsman Miyamoto Musashi’s Book of Five Rings (Musashi/Harris 1974), suggests a contrastive reading: courage seems nearly invisible in Musashi’s treatment of success in combat, while martial valor is central to Aristotle’s understanding of courage. In any case, that those with vastly more scholarly credibility than I have favored complementary projects is a welcome convenience for me, since it allows me to enter discussion of cross-cultural philosophy and character along my usual pathways in contemporary Western moral psychology.Paul Condon, Seth Robertson, and Matthew Spencer, the gracious and insightful commentators for this symposium on my essay collection, Character Trouble (2022), seem generally to favor a complementary approach: while careful to note the existence of differences, they find in Eastern traditions resources to blunt the force of character skepticism as applied to its usual target, virtue ethics in a broadly Aristotelian tradition.5 Quite expectedly, in my responses, I’ll beg to differ. The essays in question span over twenty years, and on the main points of character skepticism, I’ve failed to change my mind in the face of (sometimes strident) criticism, so it’s [End Page 572] unlikely I would do so now, despite my commentators’ astute recommendations. In fact, I’m now more convinced of character skepticism than when I started, or at least have better arguments for it (more on this below). Nevertheless, my commentators have done much to enrich the issues; in this unavoidably and regrettably incomplete response, I’ll attempt to enrich things a bit more.Framing the Rhetorical SpaceI take it my commentators and I are united in thinking that the kind of empirical moral psychology embodied in character skepticism and celebrated in Character Trouble (CT) has important implications for how philosophers and psychologists should think about character and virtue.6 This makes refreshing contrast with early responses to character skepticism from the 2000s, which often insisted that things could go on pretty much as they had before interdisciplinary moral psychologists set to work... (shrink)

Sir John Hicks is one of the most important and influential economists of the twentieth century. Awarded the Nobel Prize for economics in 1972, he has made contributions across a wide range of economic theory, writing some twenty books. Arguably the most important of these, _Value and Capital_, is seen as the roots of modern microeconomics and general equilibrium theory. Hicks possessed an unusual ability to synthesize the ideas of other economists – something that is evident in his invention (...) of the ‘IS-LM’ diagram to expound Keynes’ General Theory, and is perhaps what he is best known to present day economists for. This two volume set is the second collection on Hicks in this series and includes new assessments of his contributions, covering the last fifteen years. With a new introduction by the editor, this comprehensive and scholarly collection provides students and scholars immediate access to Sir John Hicks’ contributions. (shrink)

The transitive closure of a binary relation R can be thought of as the best possible approximation of R "from above" by a transitive relation. We consider the question of approximating a relation from below by transitive relations. Our main result is that every thick relation (a relation whose complement contains no infinite chain) on a countable set has a transitive thick subrelation. This allows for a solution to a problem arising from previous work by the author and Alan (...) Taylor. We also exhibit a thick relation on an uncountable set with no transitive thick subrelation. (shrink)

John J. McDermott's anthology, The Philosophy of John Dewey, provides the best general selection available of the writings of America's most distinguished philosopher and social critic. This comprehensive collection, ideal for use in the classroom and indispensable for anyone interested in the wide scope of Dewey's thought and works, affords great insight into his role in the history of ideas and the basic integrity of his philosophy. This edition combines in one book the two volumes previously published (...) separately. Volume 1, "The Structure of Experience," contains essays on metaphysics, the logic of inquiry, the problem of knowledge, and value theory. In volume 2, "The Lived Experience," Dewey's writings on pedagogy, ethics, the aesthetics of the "live creature," politics, and the philosophy of culture are presented. McDermott has prefaced each essay with a helpful explanatory note and has written an excellent general introduction to the anthology. (shrink)

The debate over compensation packages for top executives is discussed. Particular emphasis is placed on the decoupling of CEO pay and organizational performance. A contrast is drawn between firms that are owner-controlled and those that are manager-controlled. Owner-controlled firms tend to be more market-driven. In manager-controlled firms, however, ownership can become diluted to the point where decisions may not always be in the best interest of shareholders. The process of determining CEO compensation packages is examined, and special attention is (...) given to the handling of stock options. In order to stem the threat of increased government intervention, suggestions are made for increasing the leverage of compensation committees and of shareholders in general. (shrink)

David Lewis's best-system analysis of laws of nature is perhaps the best known sophisticated regularity theory of laws. Its strengths are widely recognized, even by some of its ablest critics. Yet it suffers from what appears to be a glaring weakness: It seems to grant an arbitrary privilege to the standards of our own scientific culture. I argue that by reformulating, or reinterpreting, Lewis's exposition of the best-system analysis, we arrive at a view that is free of (...) this weakness. The resulting theory of laws has the surprising consequence that the term "law of nature" is indexical. (shrink)

August 16, 1997 David Lewis2 has long defended an account of scientific law acceptable even to an empiricist with significant metaphysical scruples. On this account, the laws are defined to be the consequences of the best system for axiomitizing all occurrent fact. Here "best system" means the set of sentences which yields the best combination of strength of descriptive content 3 with simplicity of exposition. And occurrent facts, the facts to be systematized, are roughly the particular facts (...) about a localized space-time region that are non-modal, non-dispositional, and non-causal. Scientists providing or attempting to provide laws are plausibly seen as giving general principles that unify a body of data. Thus they organize or systematize the arrangement of occurrences. For this reason, Lewis's account has the important merits of providing contact with actual scientific practice while making sense of the standard philosophical conception that laws should be general but more than mere accidental generalizations. However, Lewis has long known about a potential problem with this account, a problem involving chance and credence.4 In a recent series of articles he, Michael Thau, and Ned Hall have developed a new formulation of the relationship between chance and credence which solves the problem. However, I will argue that these articles leave untouched and even exacerbate a closely related and more fundamental problem with the best system account, the problem of nomic necessity. Laws are supposed to be more than true; in some sense they must be true. Yet a principle's membership in the best systematization for one world seems to say nothing about its necessity, i.e., its truth at other worlds. I close by briefly describing how an alternative empiricist account may remove both problems. (shrink)

This paper is an introduction to a teaching series entitled, “Teaching Philosophers to Teach.” The series addresses graduate student teaching methods. The introduction outlines pedagogical goals and practices of the graduate curriculum of the Syracuse Program. The Program addresses the unequal distribution between high intellectual performance and good teaching amongst graduate students. Instead of focusing on graduate student values and beliefs on teaching, the Program curriculum addresses the particular institutional practices that shape student teaching. Some of the suggested changes, which (...) aim to reaffirm the link between philosophical thinking and teaching, include changing the duration of teaching training, assigning a faculty teaching mentorship to students at the beginning of their graduate studies, and emphasizing best practices in teaching assistantships. The papers in this series address teaching-related issues ranging from classroom pedagogy to graduate student training. (shrink)

We can observe in the progression of the work of Thomas Hobbes through David Hume to John Rawls a development from a focus on severe disorder to order under law and then to concern with distribution. This striking development is not due simply to changes of normative views, but is in large part about the technical or virtually technological capacities of government. There are also non-normative theoretical and significant developments in their theories. Hence, much of the difference between these (...) philosophers, who superficially appear to disagree deeply, is essentially social scientific. If so, they should all be willing to revise conclusions to fit better social science. This is not the whole story, perhaps, or if it is, then we have to conclude that all of them make big scientific mistakes that vitiate their theories. On this view, Hume comes closest to having the theory right in his time and his account is more compelling as a social scientific account of our issues than are the accounts of Hobbes or Rawls. Key Words: Hobbes • Hume • Rawls • social science • order • justice • technology. (shrink)