Lower levels of news use are generally understood to be associated with less political engagement among citizens. But while some people simply have a low preference for news, others avoid the news intentionally. So far little is known about the relationship between active news avoidance and civic engagement in society, a void this study has set out to fill. Based on a four-wave general population panel survey in the Netherlands, conducted between April and July 2020 (N = 1,084) during a (...) crisis situation, this research-in-brief investigates the development of news avoidance and pro-social civic engagement over time. Results suggest that higher news topic avoidance results in higher levels of civic engagement. The study discusses different explanations for why less news can mean more engagement. (shrink)

Contents. Introduction. 1. Preliminaries. 2. Normal Form Games. 3. Extensive Games. 4. Applications of Game Theory. 5. The Methodology of Game Theory. Conclusion. Appendix. Bibliography. Index. Does game theory—the mathematical theory of strategic interaction—provide genuine explanations of human behaviour? Can game theory be used in economic consultancy or other normative contexts? Explaining Games: The Epistemic Programme in Game Theory—the first monograph on the philosophy of game theory—is an attempt to combine insights from epistemic logic and the philosophy of science to (...) investigate the applicability of game theory in such fields as economics, philosophy and strategic consultancy. I prove new mathematical theorems about the beliefs, desires and rationality principles of individual human beings, and explore in detail the logical form of game theory as it is used in explanatory and normative contexts. I argue that game theory reduces to rational choice theory if used as an explanatory device, and that game theory is nonsensical if used as a normative device. A provocative account of the history of game theory reveals that this is not bad news for all of game theory, though. Two central research programmes in game theory tried to find the ultimate characterisation of strategic interaction between rational agents. Yet, while the Nash Equilibrium Refinement Programme has done badly thanks to such research habits as overmathematisation, model-tinkering and introversion, the Epistemic Programme, I argue, has been rather successful in achieving this aim. "The 'epistemic' approach to game theory has emerged over the past twenty-five years. What is this approach? How does it differ from the conventional equilibrium-based approach to game theory? What have been its strengths and weaknesses to date? To find out, read this comprehensive and excellently written account". Adam Brandenburger, J. P. Valles Professor of Business Economics and Strategy, Stern School of Business, New York University "Reading Boudewijn de Bruin's book should be rewarding both for game theorists interested in the conceptual foundations of their discipline and for philosophers who want to learn more about formal analysis of strategic interaction. It provides an in-depth logical study of the currently dominant epistemic approaches to non-cooperative games, with an eye both to the attractions and to the serious challenges facing the Epistemic Programme". Wlodek Rabinowicz, Professor of Practical Philosophy, Department of Philosophy, Lund University . (shrink)

In this topical book, Boudewijn de Bruin examines the ethical 'blind spots' that lay at the heart of the global financial crisis. He argues that the most important moral problem in finance is not the 'greed is good' culture, but rather the epistemic shortcomings of bankers, clients, rating agencies and regulators. Drawing on insights from economics, psychology and philosophy, de Bruin develops a novel theory of epistemic virtue and applies it to racist and sexist lending practices, subprime mortgages, (...) CEO hubris, the Madoff scandal, professionalism in accountancy and regulatory outsourcing of epistemic responsibility. With its multidisciplinary reach, Ethics and the Global Financial Crisis will appeal to scholars working in philosophy, business ethics, economics, psychology and the sociology of finance. The many concrete examples and case studies mean that this book will also prove useful to policy-makers and regulators. (shrink)

Using epistemic logic, we provide a non-probabilistic way to formalise payoff uncertainty, that is, statements such as ‘player i has approximate knowledge about the utility functions of player j.’ We show that on the basis of this formalisation common knowledge of payoff uncertainty and rationality (in the sense of excluding weakly dominated strategies, due to Dekel and Fudenberg (1990)) characterises a new solution concept we have called ‘mixed iterated strict weak dominance.’.

This paper applies emerging research on epistemic virtues to business ethics. Inspired by recent work on epistemic virtues in philosophy, I develop a view in which epistemic virtues contribute to the acquisition of knowledge that is instrumentally valuable in the realisation of particular ends, business ends in particular. I propose a conception of inquiry according to which epistemic actions involve investigation, belief adoption and justification, and relate this to the traditional ‘justified true belief’ analysis of knowledge. I defend the view (...) that epistemic virtues enable and/or motivate people to perform epistemic actions. An examination of the key epistemic virtues of love of knowledge, epistemic courage, temperance, justice, generosity and humility provides some initial evidence suggesting that the way epistemic virtues enable or motivate is by countering a number of biases that have been uncovered by behavioural economics, and also indicates ways in which the instrumental epistemic value view is superior to other approaches to epistemic virtue offered in the literature. (shrink)

This paper presents an argument for the value of privacy that is based on a purely negative concept of freedom only. I show that privacy invasions may decrease a person’s negative freedom as well as a person’s knowledge about the negative freedom she possesses. I argue that not only invasions that lead to actual interference, but also invasions that lead to potential interference (many cases of identity theft) constitute actual harm to the invadee’s liberty interests, and I critically examine the (...) courts’ reliance on a principle of ‘no harm, no foul’ in recent data breach cases. Using a number of insights from the psychology of human belief, I also show that the liberal claim for protection of privacy is strengthened by the observation that often the privacy invader cannot be held responsible for the influence on the invadee’s negative freedom. (shrink)

This individual differences study examined the relationships between three executive functions (updating, shifting, and inhibition), measured as latent variables, and performance on two cognitively demanding subtests of the Adult Decision Making Competence battery: Applying Decision Rules and Consistency in Risk Perception. Structural equation modelling showed that executive functions contribute differentially to performance in these two tasks, with Applying Decision Rules being mainly related to inhibition and Consistency in Risk Perception mainly associated to shifting. The results suggest that the successful application (...) of decision rules requires the capacity to selectively focus attention and inhibit irrelevant (or no more relevant) stimuli. They also suggest that consistency in risk perception depends on the ability to shift between judgement contexts. (shrink)

Strijbos and Slors argue against what they call the “naïve common-sense” view of self-management as taking direct control over one’s mental health conditions. Their argument consists of two steps. First, they claim that self-management is often better understood as a form of facilitation, like a drover steering the herd. The drover is not in the position to directly intervene on the course the herd is taking, but instead manipulates it by exploiting her knowledge of the context-dependency of the herd’s behavior. (...) Second, even though Strijbos and Slors are critical of the “naïve common-sense” view of self-management, they do not want to throw out the proverbial baby with the bathwater. Despite the fact that... (shrink)

This paper contributes to an increasing literature strengthening the connection between epistemic logic and epistemology (Van Benthem, Hendricks). I give a survey of the most important applications of epistemic logic in epistemology. I show how it is used in the history of philosophy (Steiner's reconstruction of Descartes' sceptical argument), in solutions to Moore's paradox (Hintikka), in discussions about the relation between knowledge and belief (Lenzen) and in an alleged refutation of verificationism (Fitch) and I examine an early argument about the (...) (im)possibility of epistemic logic (Hocutt). Subsequently, I deal with interpretive questions about epistemic logic that, although implicitly, already appeared in the first section. I contend that a conception of epistemic logic as a theory of knowledge assertions is incoherent, and I argue that it does not make sense to adopt a normative interpretation of epistemic logic. Finally, I show ways to extend epistemic logic with other branches of philosophical logic so as to make it useful for some epistemological questions. Conditional logics and logics of public announcement are used to understand causal theories of knowledge and versions of reliabilism. Temporal logic helps understand some dynamic aspects of knowledge as well as the verificationist thesis. (shrink)

The global financial crisis has led to a surprising interest in professional oaths in business. Examples are the MBA Oath, the Economist’s Oath and the Dutch Banker’s Oath, which senior executives in the financial services industry in the Netherlands have been obliged to swear since 2010. This paper is among the first to consider oaths from the perspective of business ethics. A framework is presented for analysing oaths in terms of their form, their content and the specific contribution they make (...) to business ethics management: oaths may foster professionalism, facilitate moral deliberation and enhance compliance. This framework is used to analyse and evaluate the MBA Oath, the Economist’s Oath and the Banker’s Oath as well as various other similar initiatives. (shrink)

This collection of essays attempts something entirely novel: to provide a snapshot of the new work that is being conducted in political philosophy, written by up-and-coming figures in this area.

Consciousness, Reductionism and the Explanatory Gap: Investigations in Honor of Rudolf Carnap Content Type Journal Article Pages 1-3 DOI 10.1007/s11406-010-9272-7 Authors Leon de Bruin, Institut für Philosophie II, Ruhr-Universität Bochum, Universitätsstr. 150, 44801 Bochum, Germany Albert Newen, Institut für Philosophie II, Ruhr-Universität Bochum, Universitätsstr. 150, 44801 Bochum, Germany Journal Philosophia Online ISSN 1574-9274 Print ISSN 0048-3893 Journal Volume Volume 39 Journal Issue Volume 39, Number 1.

Proponents of mindshaping argue that third-person folk psychology is not primarily about "reading" mental states for the purpose of behavior prediction and explanation. Instead, they claim that third-person folk psychology is first and foremost a regulative practice -- one that "shapes" mental states in accordance with the norms of a shared folk psychological framework. This paper investigates to what extent the core assumptions behind the mindshaping hypothesis are compatible with an account of first-person folk psychology that is based on the (...) notion of "self-regulative agency.". (shrink)

We develop a logical system that captures two different interpretations of what extensive games model, and we apply this to a long-standing debate in game theory between those who defend the claim that common knowledge of rationality leads to backward induction or subgame perfect (Nash) equilibria and those who reject this claim. We show that a defense of the claim à la Aumann (1995) rests on a conception of extensive game playing as a one-shot event in combination with a principle (...) of rationality that is incompatible with it, while a rejection of the claim à la Reny (1988) assumes a temporally extended, many-moment interpretation of extensive games in combination with implausible belief revision policies. In addition, the logical system provides an original inductive and implicit axiomatization of rationality in extensive games based on relations of dominance rather than the usual direct axiomatization of rationality as maximization of expected utility. (shrink)

I argue that game theoretic explanations of human actions make implausible epistemological assumptions. A logical analysis of game theoretic explanations shows that they do not conform to the belief-desire framework of action explanation. Epistemic characterization theorems (specifying sufficient conditions for game theoretic solution concepts to obtain) are argued to be the canonical way to make game theory conform to that framework. The belief formation practices implicit in epistemic characterization theorems, however, disregard all information about players except what can be found (...) in the game itself. And such a practice of belief formation is, I show, implausible. (shrink)

Game theory is the mathematical study of strategy and conflict. It has wide applications in economics, political science, sociology, and, to some extent, in philosophy. Where rational choice theory or decision theory is concerned with individual agents facing games against nature, game theory deals with games in which all players have preference orderings over the possible outcomes of the game. This paper gives an informal introduction to the theory and a survey of applications in diverse branches of philosophy. No criticism (...) is reviewed. Game theory is shown at work in discussions about epistemological dependence, liberalism and efficiency, Hume’s concept of convention, morality and rationality, and distributive justice and egalitarianism. A guide to the literature provides hints at applications in collective intentionality, epistemology, ethics, history of philosophy, logic, philosophy of language, and political philosophy. (shrink)

In this note, I show how Christian List's modal logic of republican freedom (as published in this journal in 2006) can be extended (1) to grasp the differences between liberal freedom (noninterference) and republican freedom (non-domination) in terms of two purely logical axioms and (2) to cover a more recent definition of republican freedom in terms of `arbitrary interference' that gains popularity in the literature.

Abstract In this article, we investigate the merits of an enactive view of cognition for the contemporary debate about social cognition. If enactivism is to be a genuine alternative to classic cognitivism, it should be able to bridge the “cognitive gap”, i.e. provide us with a convincing account of those higher forms of cognition that have traditionally been the focus of its cognitivist opponents. We show that, when it comes to social cognition, current articulations of enactivism are—despite their celebrated successes (...) in explaining some cases of social interaction—not yet up to the task. This is because they (1) do not pay sufficient attention to the role of offline processing or “decoupling”, and (2) obscure the cognitive gap by overemphasizing the role of phenomenology. We argue that the main challenge for the enactive view will be to acknowledge the importance of both coupled (online) and decoupled (offline) processes for basic and advanced forms of (social) cognition. To meet this challenge, we articulate a dynamic embodied view of cognition. We illustrate the fruitfulness of this approach by recourse to recent findings on false belief understanding. Content Type Journal Article Pages 1-23 DOI 10.1007/s11097-011-9223-1 Authors Leon C. de Bruin, Department of Philosophy II, Ruhr-University Bochum, Universitätsstr. 150, 44801 Bochum, Germany Lena Kästner, Department of Philosophy II, Ruhr-University Bochum, Universitätsstr. 150, 44801 Bochum, Germany Journal Phenomenology and the Cognitive Sciences Online ISSN 1572-8676 Print ISSN 1568-7759. (shrink)

Financial incentives, learning, group consultation, and increased experimental control are among the experimental techniques economists have successfully used to deflect the behavioral challenge posed by research conducted by such scholars as Tversky and Kahneman. These techniques save the economic armchair to the extent that they align laypeople judgments with economic theory by increasing cognitive effort and reflection in experimental subjects. It is natural to hypothesize that a similar strategy might work to address the experimental or restrictionist challenge to armchair philosophy. (...) To test this hypothesis, a randomized controlled experiment was carried out, as well as two lab experiments. Three types of knowledge attribution tasks were used. No support for the hypothesis was found. The paper describes the close similarities between the economist’s response to the behavioral challenge, and the expertise defense against the experimental challenge, and presents the experiments, results, and an array of robustness checks. The upshot is that these results make the experimental challenge all the more forceful. (shrink)

Several scholars have argued that Wittgenstein held the view that the notion of number is presupposed by the notion of one-one correlation, and that therefore Hume's principle is not a sound basis for a definition of number. I offer a new interpretation of the relevant fragments on philosophy of mathematics from Wittgenstein's Nachlass, showing that if different uses of ‘presupposition’ are understood in terms of de re and de dicto knowledge, Wittgenstein's argument against the Frege-Russell definition of number turns out (...) to be valid on its own terms, even though it depends on two epistemological principles logicist philosophers of mathematics may find too ‘constructivist’. (shrink)

Background. To inform their health decisions, patients may seek narratives describing other patients' evaluations of their treatment experiences. Narratives can provide anti-treatment or pro-treatment evaluative meaning that low-numerate patients may especially struggle to derive from statistical information. Here, we examined whether anti-vaccine narratives had relatively stronger effects on the perceived informativeness and judged vaccination probabilities reported among recipients with lower numeracy. Methods. Participants from a nationally representative US internet panel were randomly assigned to an anti-vaccine or pro-vaccine narrative, as presented (...) by a patient discussing a personal experience, a physician discussing a patient's experience, or a physician discussing the experiences of 50 patients. Anti-vaccine narratives described flu experiences of patients who got the flu after getting vaccinated; pro-vaccine narratives described flu experiences of patients who got the flu after not getting vaccinated. Participants indicated their probability of getting vaccinated and rated the informativeness of the narratives. Results. Participants with lower numeracy generally perceived narratives as more informative. By comparison, participants with higher numeracy rated especially anti-vaccine narratives as less informative. Anti-vaccine narratives reduced the judged vaccination probabilities as compared with pro-vaccine narratives, especially among participants with lower numeracy. Mediation analyses suggested that low-numerate individuals' vaccination probabilities were reduced by anti-vaccine narratives - and, to a lesser extent, boosted by pro-vaccine narratives - because they perceived narratives to be more informative. These findings were similar for narratives provided by patients and physicians. Conclusions. Patients with lower numeracy may rely more on narrative information when making their decisions. These findings have implications for the development of health communications and decision AIDS. (shrink)

The mathematical tools of game theory are frequently used in the social sciences and economic consultancy. But how do they explain social phenomena and support prescriptive judgments? And is the use of game theory really necessary? I analyze the logical form of explanatory and prescriptive game theoretical statements, and argue for two claims: (1) explanatory game theory can and should be reduced to rational choice theory in all cases; and (2) prescriptive game theory gives bad advice in some cases, is (...) reducible to rational choice theory in other cases, while it makes no sense in yet other cases. (shrink)

The transition towards sustainable and just food systems is ongoing, illustrated by an increasing number of initiatives that try to address unsustainable practices and social injustices. Insights are needed into what a just transition entails in order to critically engage with plural and potentially conflicting justice conceptualisations. Researchers play an active role in food system transitions, but it is unclear which conceptualisations and principles of justice they enact when writing about food system initiatives. To fill this gap this paper investigates: (...) Which conceptualisations of justice emerge from the literature related to food system initiatives and which principles of justice do authors use? We developed an initial framework for which we drew on political philosophy literature. We then undertook an extensive review of the food system transitions literature using this framework and were able to identify a range of recognition, distributive, and procedural justice conceptualisations and associated principles of justice. Recognised as subjects of justice were those with a particular role in the food system, people who are marginalised, Indigenous communities, those with experiences of negative consequences of the food system, future generations, and nonhumans. The identified conceptualisations and the developed framework can be used by those involved in food system initiatives to reflect on how they conceptualise justice. We challenge them to be more explicit about who they do and do not recognise as subjects of justice and which principles of justice they use. Such clarity is needed to reflexively enact a just transition towards sustainable and just food systems. (shrink)

For many countries instrumental music tuition in secondary schools is a ubiquitous event that provides situated and personalized instruction in the learning of an instrument. Opportunities and methods through which teachers operate during the COVID-19 outbreak challenged music educators as to how they taught, engaged, and interacted with students across online platforms, with alarm over aerosol dispersement a major factor in maintaining online instrumental music tuition even as students returned to “normal” face to face classes. This qualitative study investigated the (...) practices employed by instrumental music educators in secondary schools in Melbourne, Australia, analyzing teacher perspectives to music tuition amidst the restriction of interaction with students remotely via online means. Thematic analysis of the interview transcripts revealed music educational approaches that fostered connection, empathy and receptiveness to relationship-building, guiding students in slower and deeper learner-centered approaches, asserting pedagogical practices that reinforced and promoted interpersonal connectedness in and through musical experience and discovery. These findings provide a framework for how music educators can facilitate connection, motivation and student autonomy generating personal meaning and commitment to music making and the learning relationship, which can translate to significant student learning and value in the learning music. Exploring teachers’ pedagogical practices and behaviors within this dyadic teacher-student relationship is a significant addition to the literature, enabling the consideration of the type of connective behaviors required to stimulate and develop long-term interest in music. (shrink)

According to the BD-model of mindreading, we primarily understand others in terms of beliefs and desires. In this article we review a number of objections against explicit versions of the BD-model, and discuss the prospects of using its implicit counterpart as an explanatory model of early emerging socio-cognitive abilities. Focusing on recent findings on so-called ‘implicit’ false belief understanding, we put forward a number of considerations against the adoption of an implicit BD-model. Finally, we explore a different way to make (...) sense of implicit false belief understanding in terms of keeping track of affordances. (shrink)

This Chapter studies legislative initiatives around sustainable finance deriving from the Action Plan: Financing Sustainable Growth (also called ‘Sustainable Finance Action Plan’, ‘Action Plan’ henceforth), published by the European Commission (‘Commission’) in 2018 (Communication 2018/97). I evaluate various instruments proposed in the Action Plan, using a reflexive law approach coupled with insights from business ethics and epistemology (De Bruin, 2013, 2015). I point to the challenges such an approach encounters, and offer suggestions how to address them. Reflexive law approaches (...) to legislation (Farber 1994, Hess 1999, Orts 1994, Farmer & Teubner 1994) acknowledge the limits of law as an instrument to realize social or political goals, and stress the need to encourage self-reflection and transparency among stakeholders through procedural rather than ‘command-and-control’ legislation. Typical reflexive law instruments involve disclosure, reporting, and labelling. Examining the Action Plan, I show that the main legislative instruments it puts forward are reflexive. I use empirical and theoretical work that challenges the effectiveness of some of these instruments. Drawing on recent work from behavioural economics I suggest that these problems may be overcome once we integrate more fully in reflexive law what it means for people ‘reflectively’ to recruit evidence and gather knowledge, and once we appreciate the value knowledge has over and above mere belief. My argument here is not so much to the effect that more interventionist regulatory tools are needed (they are dearly needed, but that is not the point here). Rather I argue that once a regulator opts for a reflexive law approach, a richer notion of information should be deployed. I call this ‘epistemic’ instead of ‘reflexive’ law. The Chapter gives some background information about the Action Plan, introduces the core ideas of reflexive law, shows how the Action Plan is reflexive law par excellence, considers the challenges, and offers a few modest suggestions. (shrink)

Cloud computing is rapidly gaining traction in business. It offers businesses online services on demand (such as Gmail, iCloud and Salesforce) and allows them to cut costs on hardware and IT support. This is the first paper in business ethics dealing with this new technology. It analyzes the informational duties of hosting companies that own and operate cloud computing datacenters (e.g., Amazon). It considers the cloud services providers leasing ‘space in the cloud’ from hosting companies (e.g, Dropbox, Salesforce). And it (...) examines the business and private ‘clouders’ using these services. The first part of the paper argues that hosting companies, services providers and clouders have mutual informational (epistemic) obligations to provide and seek information about relevant issues such as consumer privacy, reliability of services, data mining and data ownership. The concept of interlucency is developed as an epistemic virtue governing ethically effective communication. The second part considers potential forms of government restrictions on or proscriptions against the development and use of cloud computing technology. Referring to the concept of technology neutrality, it argues that interference with hosting companies and cloud services providers is hardly ever necessary or justified. It is argued, too, however, that businesses using cloud services (banks, law firms, hospitals etc. storing client data in the cloud, e.g.) will have to follow rather more stringent regulations. (shrink)

This article applies philosophical work on epistemic injustice and cognate concepts to study gender and racial disparity in financial markets. Members of disadvantaged groups often receive inferior financial services. In most jurisdictions, it is illegal to provide discriminatorily disparate treatment to groups defined by gender and skin colour. Racial disparity in financial services is generally considered to be discriminatory. The standard view among most regulators is that gender disparity is not discriminatory, though. Through an analysis of various exemplary cases, I (...) propose testimonial injustice as a candidate explanation for some of the existing forms of racial disparity found in financial services. I show how prejudices about gender and finance decrease epistemic self-confidence, and how this leads to gender disparity. And I consider particularly intractable forms of self-fulfilling testimonial injustice. (shrink)

Jacob Glazer and Ariel Rubinstein proffer an exciting new approach to analyze persuasion, using formal tools from economics to address questions that argumentation theorists, logicians, and cognitive and social psychologists have been interested in since Aristotle's Rhetoric. In this note I examine to what extent their approach is successful, and show ways to extend it.

Empirical evidence suggests that people often confabulate when they are asked about their choices or reasons for action. The implications of these studies are the topic of intense debate in philosophy and the cognitive sciences. An important question in this debate is whether the confabulation studies pose a serious threat to the possibility of self-knowledge. In this paper we are not primarily interested in the consequences of confabulation for self-knowledge. Instead, we focus on a different issue: what confabulation implies for (...) the special status of self-attributions, i.e. first-person authority. In the first part of the paper, we propose that FPA is based on a capacity for self-regulation. Accordingly, FPA depends on the extent to which we are able to bridge the gap between our sayings and doings by aligning our actions with our avowed self-ascriptions and vice versa. FPA is withheld when we fail at such re-alignment. In the second part of the paper, we contrast our view with the accounts of Scaife and Bortolotti :227–249, 2018). We claim that the apparent fact that we cannot reliably distinguish, from a first-person perspective, when we are confabulating and when we are not, does not necessarily undermine FPA. We argue that a systematic failure to align our actions with our self-ascriptions and vice-versa is a genuine threat to FPA. In the last part of the paper, we introduce the concept of self-know-how—the know-how embodied in the way one is disposed to relate to oneself in making sense of oneself with or in the face of others—and briefly explored the importance of diminished or absent self-know-how in clinical cases. (shrink)

Situationists maintain that psychological evidence (e.g., the well-known Good Samaritan experiment) challenges a key assumption of virtue ethics, namely that virtuous people display cross-situational consistency of behavior. This situationist critique is frequently thought to pose a serious threat to virtue ethics. Virtue ethicists have so far mainly put forward conceptual rather than empirical arguments against situationism. In this paper, we examine the extent to which a plausible empirical argument can be developed against situationism, and in favor of virtue ethics. We (...) note that such an argument will naturally entail empirical simplification, and consequently concessions from both sides of the debate will be required. We argue, however, that with such concessions in place, the debate between situationists and virtue ethicists can be captured by a claim about the way that virtuous behavior may change when situations change. We report the results of an experiment (conducted twice, for replication) showing how social science methods can be introduced to the situationism debate to test such a claim empirically. Our results offer tentative support for eudaemonist and agent-based varieties (but not for target-centered) versions of virtue ethics. (shrink)

What makes political freedom valuable to us? Two well-known arguments are that freedom contributes to our desire satisfaction and to our personal responsibility. Here, Boudewijn de Bruin argues that freedom is valuable when it is accompanied by knowledge. He offers an original and systematic account of the relationship between freedom and knowledge and defends two original normative ideals of known freedom and acknowledged freedom. -/- By combining psychological perspectives on choice and philosophical views on the value of knowledge, he (...) shows how known freedom is crucial to satisfy our desires and assume responsibility. Known freedom is compromised when salespeople deploy consumer-obfuscation, or when news outlets use contextual framing techniques to steer the way their audiences process information. Conversely, carefully developed consumer protection and information disclosure regulation can foster known freedom. Acknowledged freedom, from ethical and economic perspectives, offers protection and makes our freedoms more stable. It embodies an ideal of mutual recognition that underlies informed consent and the ethics of communication, and can also contribute to a flourishing corporate culture. -/- This book integrates and extends cutting-edge research from philosophy, economics, psychology, and law to reorient debates on privacy, neuromarketing, sustainable finance, corporate culture, consumer protection, media violence, and freedom of speech. -/- An original account of the relation between freedom and knowledge, integrating cutting-edge research from philosophy, economics, psychology, and law; defends the ideals of known and acknowledged freedom; offers new perspectives on debates surrounding privacy, corporate culture, consumer protection, freedom of speech, and more -/- Introduction: Why Freedom is Not Enough 1:From Choice Overload to Discrimination: Arguments for Freedom 2:From Brainwashing to Neuromarketing: Freedom of Belief 3:From the Value of Knowledge to Skills and Stereotypes: The Individual Ideal of Known Freedom 4:From Common Knowledge to the Ethics of Communication: The Social Ideal of Acknowledged Freedom 5:Sustainable Finance and Responsible Investors 6:Ethics Management and Informed Stakeholders 7:Freedom of Speech and Consumer Autonomy 8:Liberal Privacy and Legal Protection Conclusion: How Freedom Can Be Sufficient . (shrink)

We investigate what distinguishes social entrepreneurial ecosystems (SEEs) from entrepreneurial ecosystems (EEs) through appreciation of the importance of context—the multiplex of intertwined social, spatial, temporal, historical, cultural, and political influences. Community is incorporated as a key variable and hitherto overlooked dimension of the structure and influence of SEEs. We draw on extant literature and examples of a variety of SEEs to support our propositions and demonstrate why considerations of both context and community are critical to advance understanding of SEEs. We (...) contribute to the study of SEEs by presenting a new conceptual framework and theorizing SEE as an evolving composite of interdependent actors who interact and collaborate across multiple levels to collectively generate positive externalities and drive sustainable solutions to social problems. (shrink)

The paper argues that the Nash Equilibrium Refinement Programme was less successful than its competitor, the Epistemic Programme. The prime criterion of success is the extent to which the programmes were able to reach the key objective guiding non-cooperative game theory for much of the twentieth century, namely, to develop a complete characterisation of the strategic rationality of economic agents in the form of the ultimate solution concept for any normal form and extensive game. The paper explains this in terms (...) of unjustified degrees of mathematisation in Nash Equilibrium Refinement Programme. While this programme’s mathematical models were often inspired by purely mathematical concerns rather than the economic phenomena they were intended to model, the Epistemic Programme’s models were developed with a keen eye to the role beliefs and desires play in strategic interaction between rational economic agents playing games; that is, their interactive epistemology. The Epistemic Programme succeeded in developing mathematical models formalising aspects of strategic interaction that remained implicit in the Nash Equilibrium Refinement Programme owing to an unjustified degree of mathematisation. As a result, the Epistemic Programme is the more successful theory.Keywords: Epistemic Programme; Game theory; Interactive epistemology; Mathematisation; Nash equilibrium. (shrink)

Margaret Gilbert's plural subject theory defines social collectives in terms of common knowledge of expressed willingness to participate in some joint action. The author critically examines Gilbert's application of this theory to linguistic phenomena involving "we," arguing that recent work in linguistics provides the tools to develop a superior account. The author indicates that, apart from its own relevance, one should care about this critique because Gilbert's claims about the first person plural pronoun play a role in the argument in (...) favor of her recent theory of political obligation. Key Words: collective agent • Gilbert • plural subject • semantics • we. (shrink)

We explore the developmental paradox of false belief understanding. This paradox follows from the claim that young infants already have an understanding of false belief, despite the fact that they consistently fail the elicited-response false belief task. First, we argue that recent proposals to solve this paradox are unsatisfactory because they (i) try to give a full explanation of false belief understanding in terms of a single system, (ii) fail to provide psychological concepts that are sufficiently fine-grained to capture the (...) cognitive requirements for the various manifestations of false belief understanding, and (iii) ignore questions about system interaction. Second, we present a dual-system solution to the developmental paradox of false belief understanding that combines a layered model of perspective taking with an inhibition-selection-representation mechanism that operates on different levels. We discuss recent experimental findings that shed light on the interaction between these two systems, and suggest a number of directions for future research. (shrink)

I discuss the Narrative Practice Hypothesis (NPH) as a new approach to folk psychology, by highlighting some of the main differences between the NPH and so-called 'principled approaches' and elaborating on the importance of the distinction between intentional and propositional attitudes. Furthermore, I address the question whether reason explanations as understood by the NPH constitute a distinctive and autonomous kind of explanation.