One central question of metaethics concerns whether there are any moral facts. I argue that morality as such is characterized by a number of distinctive features, and that metaphysical naturalists should believe that there are moral facts only if there is a plausible naturalistic explanation of the existence of facts which exemplify those features. I survey three prominent (and very different) naturalistic moral theories—the reductive naturalism of Peter Railton, Frank Jackson’s analytic descriptivism, and Christine Korsgaard’s Kantianism—and argue that none of (...) them has the resources to explain the existence of genuine moral facts. (shrink)

In this paper, I argue that theists are extremely well-situated with respect to developing metaethical accounts that qualify as ‘robust’ versions of moral realism. In the first part of the essay, a number of metaethical desiderata are identified. In the second part, theistic strategies for accommodating those desiderata are explained and defended. The upshot is that, contrary to the received philosophical wisdom, there are good theoretical reasons for theistic philosophers to seek to develop metaethical accounts that ground moral facts in (...) facts about God. (shrink)

The term "human dignity" is the source of considerable confusion in contemporary bioethics. It has been used by Kantians to refer to autonomy, by others to refer to the sanctity of life, and by still others to refer—albeit obliquely—to an important but infrequently discussed set of human goods. In the first part of this article, I seek to disambiguate the notion of human dignity. The second part is a defense of the philosophical utility of such a notion; I argue that (...) there is nothing implausible about appealing to a deontological "principle of dignity" to solve bioethical problems, especially those concerning the development of new biotechnologies. There may, however, be problems associated with any attempt to use dignity as a basis for public policy. This sort of worry is explained and briefly addressed in the final section. (shrink)

Critics of theological accounts of the nature of morality have argued that such accounts must be rejected, even by theists, because such accounts (i) have the unacceptable implication that nothing is morally wrong in possible worlds in which atheism is true, (ii) render the substantive content of morality arbitrary, and (iii) make it impossible or redundant to attribute moral properties to God or God’s actions. I argue that none of these criticisms constitute good reason for theists to abandon theological accounts (...) of the nature of morality. (shrink)

ExtractThis essay is about liberal and conservative views of marriage. I'll begin by mentioning that I would really, really like to avoid use of the terms ‘liberal’ and ‘conservative’, but when push comes to shove, I know of no better labels for the positions that will be discussed in what follows. I would like to avoid these labels for a simple reason: many people strongly self-identify as liberals or as conservatives, and this can undermine our ability to investigate the topic (...) in a sane, rational way. Politics, at least in the contemporary English-speaking world, functions a lot like the world of sports. Many people have a particular team to which their allegiance has been pledged, and the team's successes and failures on the field are shared in the hearts and minds of its loyal followers. In my own case – and here, I ask for your pity – I am a fan of the National Football League's Cleveland Browns. As much as I might wish things were otherwise, I rejoice in the Browns' triumphs and suffer when they lose. I do not wait to see what happens in the game before I decide which team to cheer for; if it's an NFL game, and I see orange and brown, I know where my allegiance lies. Furthermore, I identify with my fellow Browns fans in a way that I cannot identify with followers of, say, the Pittsburgh Steelers. Clevelanders are my people. We share something, and what we share unites us in opposition to Steeler Nation. Their victories are our defeats. It is a zero-sum game: for one of us to win, the other must lose.Send article to KindleTo send this article to your Kindle, first ensure [email protected] is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about sending to your Kindle. Find out more about sending to your Kindle. Note you can select to send to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be sent to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply. Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.LIBERAL AND CONSERVATIVE VIEWS OF MARRIAGEVolume 12, Issue 34Matthew Carey JordanDOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/S1477175613000067Your Kindle email address Please provide your Kindle [email protected]@kindle.com Available formats PDF Please select a format to send. By using this service, you agree that you will only keep articles for personal use, and will not openly distribute them via Dropbox, Google Drive or other file sharing services. Please confirm that you accept the terms of use. Cancel Send ×Send article to Dropbox To send this article to your Dropbox account, please select one or more formats and confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about sending content to Dropbox. LIBERAL AND CONSERVATIVE VIEWS OF MARRIAGEVolume 12, Issue 34Matthew Carey JordanDOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/S1477175613000067Available formats PDF Please select a format to send. By using this service, you agree that you will only keep articles for personal use, and will not openly distribute them via Dropbox, Google Drive or other file sharing services. Please confirm that you accept the terms of use. Cancel Send ×Send article to Google Drive To send this article to your Google Drive account, please select one or more formats and confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about sending content to Google Drive. LIBERAL AND CONSERVATIVE VIEWS OF MARRIAGEVolume 12, Issue 34Matthew Carey JordanDOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/S1477175613000067Available formats PDF Please select a format to send. By using this service, you agree that you will only keep articles for personal use, and will not openly distribute them via Dropbox, Google Drive or other file sharing services. Please confirm that you accept the terms of use. Cancel Send ×Export citation. (shrink)

The American Journal of Bioethics, Volume 12, Issue 2, Page 49-50, February 2012.

This paper attempts to formalize the differences between two methods of analysis used by judicial opinions in common law jurisdictions to contradict holdings posited by earlier opinions: “disagreeing” with the holdings of the earlier opinions and “attributing” holdings to the prior opinions. The paper will demonstrate that it is necessary to model both methods of analysis differently to generate an accurate picture of the state of legal authority in hypothetical examples, as well as in an example based on Barry Friedman’s (...) analysis of the “stealth overruling” of Miranda v. Arizona through subsequent judicial interpretations. Because the question of whether “disagreement” and “attribution” need to be modeled separately relates to contradictions rather than to subtler interactions between holdings such as “distinguishing,” it can be answered using the simple technique of modeling holdings as propositional variables and evaluating the holdings using truth tables. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Journal of the History of Philosophy 41.2 (2003) 281-282 [Access article in PDF] Matthew B. Ostrow. Wittgenstein's Tractatus: A Dialectical Interpretation. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2002. Pp. xi + 175. Paper, $20.00. This contribution to the new readings of the early Wittgenstein presents in detail how one might read the Tractatus as a sustained attack on Frege's and Russell's philosophical and logical conceptions while at the same (...) time presuming Wittgenstein to have always been in some sense a "late Wittgensteinian," that is, already embarked on the therapeutic task of setting down "the way of release" from philosophical confusion and "ensnarement of thought" (1). Taking seriously the passage in the Tractatus (6.54) in which Wittgenstein assesses his "elucidations" as "nonsensical," Ostrow places himself among those readers who infer that straightforward theory-making was not Wittgenstein's aim, but differs from them in his original and challenging account of how the propositions of the Tractatus are nonsense.Wittgenstein, Ostrow contends, employed such (apparent) doctrines as the picture theory, the showing doctrine, the notion of tautology, and so forth dialectically, that is, as self-detonating attempts to expose philosophical nonsense in situ which were not themselves intended to be argued pro or con as philosophical assertions or theories. Wittgenstein's purpose in speaking in the Tractatus in avowedly though not patently nonsensical ways is, the author argues, to encourage us instead to see philosophical nonsensicality as "given in and through" the process of making such philosophical assertions, and in seeing how they "change their character, how they undermine their initial presentation as straightforward truth claims" (12). Thus the "central notions" and propositions in the Tractatus, according to Ostrow, "only have their life in relation to the philosophical temptations that the book aims to eradicate" (43).Such a reading involves the author (and his readers) in a task that is both detailed and delicate. Ostrow's work is detailed because he reads Wittgenstein as engaged in a systematic attempt to expose philosophical theories as nonsense case-by-particular-case, that is, by "working through philosophy from the inside, without making appeal to any kind of fixed criteria of sense and nonsense" (99). It is for this reason that Wittgenstein's articulation of the many structures in the Tractatus is necessary, and Ostrow's work, which he views as largely descriptive, must trace the same path.Ostrow's task is a delicate one because he must explore the themes in Wittgenstein's Tractatus (pictures, significant propositions, logical propositions, etc.) without appearing to contradict his position that the Tractatus offers no general doctrines meant to be taken as they stand. Thus, for instance, when Ostrow argues that for Wittgenstein pictorial form is constituted by a picture's application to reality and not an independent entity, he must remind the reader that he is not attributing to Wittgenstein a doctrine of "constitution of form" offered up as a philosophical alternative. Just as we are not to make pictorial form and its emergence in the Tractatus into a substantive theory in its own right but rather see it as having a role only in Wittgenstein's battle to expose such shibboleths (44), so too for all other parts of the Tractarian structure. Thus Wittgenstein's apparent explanation of the [End Page 281] possibility of depiction in terms of isomorphism is said to aim at showing that as an explanation, "talk of an isomorphism is empty" (39); Wittgenstein's show/say distinction is taken as a foil used to expose the logician's desire to get at essence (42), and so forth. Even the notion of tautology is, according to Ostrow, "as dialectical a move as any other," not one "put forth as a self-standing claim, an attempt to offer an overarching characterization of truth" (105).This book engages in its daunting task very ably and in fluid, confident prose. The author is clearly aware of the various challenges he is likely to meet and suggests ways of doing battle with them. To cite one case, Ostrow examines Wittgenstein's later comments on his... (shrink)

Book reviewed: Matthew B. Ostrow. Wittgenstein's Tractatus: A Dialectical Interpretation.

Arguably, the modern missionary movement’s foundational text, the ‘Great Commission’ of Matthew 28:18–20 has been criticized for its use in legitimizing colonial oppression. Focusing on reception history in South Asian polycolonial contexts, this article uses ‘Saidian’ contrapuntal reading to explore whether and for whom the commission is ‘great’? William Carey used it as a proof-text in his ‘Enquiry’ for Christians to engage in foreign mission. RS Sugirtharajah brings a postcolonial critique to Carey, but Saugata Bhaduri appreciates the (...) unintended de-colonizing consequences of Carey’s vernacular literature. Jayachitra Lalitha questions why women were absent in Matthew 28:18–20 and why Dalit women still struggle. George Soares-Prabhu’s reading alongside a Buddhist text suggests more integral mission and liberation. Despite colonialism’s distorting affect, there is historical irony in Matthew 28’s influence in South India. Contrapuntal conversations helpfully focus on the well-being of overlooked groups and recover some of the resistance implicit in Matthew’s composition. (shrink)

This book moves beyond traditional readings of Alexis de Tocqueville and his relevance to contemporary democracy by emphasizing the relationship of his life and work to modern feminist thought. Within the resurgence of political interest in Tocqueville during the past two decades, especially in the United States, there has been significant scholarly attention to the place of gender, race, and colonialism in his work. This is the first edited volume to gather together a range of this creative scholarship. It reveals (...) a tidal shift in the reception history of Tocqueville as a result of his serious engagement by feminist, gender, postcolonial, and critical race theorists. The volume highlights the expressly normative nature of Tocqueville’s project, thus providing an overdue counterweight to the conventional understanding of Tocquevillean America as an actual place in time and history. By reading Tocqueville alongside the writings of early women’s rights activists, ethnologists, critical race theorists, contemporary feminists, neoconservatives, and his French contemporaries, among others, this book produces a variety of Tocquevilles that unsettles the hegemonic view of his work. Seen as a philosophical source and a political authority for modern democracies since the publication of the twin volumes of _Democracy in America _, Tocqueville emerges from this collection as a vital interlocutor for democratic theorists confronting the power relations generated by intersections of gender, sexual, racial, class, ethnic, national, and colonial identities. In addition to the editors, the contributors are Jocelyn Boryczka, Richard Boyd, Christine Carey, Barbara Cruikshank, Laura Janara, Matthew Holbreich, Kathleen S. Sullivan, Alvin B. Tillery Jr., Lisa Pace Vetter, Dana Villa, Cheryl B. Welch, and Delba Winthrop. (shrink)

Recent debates within the autism advocacy community have raised difficult questions about who can credibly act as a representative of a particular population and what responsibilities that...

McGee argued that modus ponens was invalid for the natural language conditional ‘If…then…’. Many subsequent responses have argued that, while McGee’s examples show that modus ponens fails to preserve truth, they do not show that modus ponens fails to preserve rational full acceptance, and thus modus ponens may still be valid in the latter informational sense. I show that when we turn our attention from indicative conditionals to subjunctive conditionals, we find that modus ponens does not preserve either truth or (...) rational full acceptance, and thus is not valid in either sense. In concluding I briefly consider how we can account for these facts. (shrink)

In the burgeoning philosophical literature on conceptual engineering improving our concepts is typically portrayed as the hallmark activity of the field. However, Herman Cappelen has challenged the idea that we can know how and why conceptual changes occur well enough to actively intervene in revising our concepts; the mechanisms of conceptual change are typically inscrutable to us. If the ‘inscrutability challenge’ is correct, the practical aspect of conceptual engineering may seem to be undermined, but I argue that endorsing such pessimism (...) would be a mistake. Even if the inscrutability challenge is correct, conceptual engineers often have good reasons to try to preserve existing concepts. I examine several cases where concept preservation is important and draw lessons about this activity for conceptual engineers. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:The Role of Glass in Interior Architecture:Aesthetics, Community, and PrivacyMatthew Ziff (bio)Design education seeks to infuse students with knowledge, skills, and attitudes, regarding the design of the built environment. In the areas of knowledge and attitude, sophistication and competence are developed through both practice (largely carried out in the design studio environment), and engagement with critical analysis (largely carried out in seminar classes and traditional lecture format class environments). (...) For design students the world of design is both to be known and understood, and to be created, at their own studio desk. In order to both know and create design, students often behave like nocturnal predators, seeking what is necessary in a mode that is often unobserved, and then returning to digest their catch, to produce responsive and synthetic work. One arena in which design students find rich fields of information is that of material characteristics. Materials used in the design and construction of the built environment form a significant portion of the skeleton of a designer's body of knowledge, skills, and attitudes toward design. A current hotbed of material character and application is that of the world of glass. This essay is an exploration of some of the issues that the architectural uses of glass raise from the point of view of design student exploration.Materials evoke physical and psychological responses. Human beings are complex creatures and an individual's response to specific material applications can be unpredictable. Even so, it is reasonable to expect that there are shared attitudes that form the basis for responses to the physical character of the built environment. From delight, to confusion, materials used in the architecture of things large and small, from buildings to fountain pens, contain literal meaning, or expression of method, as well as possible symbolic and cultural meaning. The contemporary use of glass, particularly in interior architecture, presents a vivid arena for emotional and intellectual stimulation and response. [End Page 10]Glass planes that are sheer, opaque, translucent, colorful, brittle, imposing in mass, irregular in surface texture, flawlessly smooth, deformed through casting or by application of pressure and heat, are being used to create spaces that convey ambiguous relationships between private experience and public display. What is an ambiguous relationship? It is one to which a reasonable response is a high degree of uncertainty regarding the course of action one might take, or in the degree of understanding of the context one can develop. To know that the stair in the train station leads to track 4 is a condition that can be created by the use of unambiguous design; a visual connection from where one has to make a choice of paths to follow to the destination, track 4, creates a clear understanding of where track 4 is to be found. If track 4 can be seen from the position at which a choice is required, then certainty, clarity, is possible, if not probable. Visual connection is exactly what clear glass allows, and provides, yet ambiguity results because of the physical, hard barrier, transparency aside. "I can see track 4, but I cannot get there". The clarity provided by being able to see through glass, or even by being able to see light coming through translucent glass, is not sufficient to offset the uncertainty, or the mixed message, of not being able to get there, to touch what we can see.Glass in interiors offers a tactile and sensory titillation; the excitement of knowing that with a single swing of a hammer, or an umbrella handle, the beautiful sheet of curved frosted lemon ice colored tempered glass can be shattered into fragments.Windows have long been the predominant interior and exterior architectural element in which glass has played a major role. The glass used in Windows on the World, the famous restaurant atop the World Trade Center, destroyed during its collapse, and the glass used in a simple double hung window in a one story ranch house each share architectural duties of providing view from inside to outside, light transmission from outside to inside, heat gain, and acoustical isolation. Human eyes are sometimes described as "windows to the soul," which suggests the ability to... (shrink)

If you do not know the correct answer, guess.Design addresses need, of various types. A designer “designs” to address, to propose a possibility, or to meet a need. A great variety of things are designed: shoes, posters, watches, houses, televisions, keyboards, movies, washing machines, toasters, belts, and cars, to mention only some.A designer, be he or she an architect, interior designer, graphic designer, product designer, or industrial designer, nearly always provides drawings, models, written descriptions, and overarching ideas in response to (...) a need, articulated, stated, by someone. The need might be one that the designer recognizes on his or her own and decides to address, or the need might come to the... (shrink)

In the face of the Brexit vote and the election of Trump, there is serious worry about whether the liberal, democratic, and cosmopolitan values thought to underlie progressive immigration policies are in fact widely shared. In this article, I examine these worries and provide suggestions about how those who do favor just progressive immigration policies might best respond to the problems we currently face.

We are happy to announce that Libertarian Papers has been chosen for inclusion in the web archives of the Library of Congress. This means that, once archived, the complete journal will be available indefinitely both to researchers at Library facilities and by special arrangement. Of course, because Libertarian Papers uses an open-access format, the use of ….

I offer an account of truth that combines elements of deflationism and traditional correspondence theories. We need such an intermediary account, I argue, in order to adequately answer two kinds of questions: "Why do we find it obvious that 'p' is true iff p?" and "Why is it contingent that 'p' is true iff p?" If what it is for 'p' to be true is explained by simply saying that p, as the deflationist claims, it is hard to see how (...) it could be contingent that 'p' is true iff p. But if it is claimed instead that what it is for a sentence to be true is for it to correspond to a fact, we still need some explanation of why 'p's correspondence with reality insure that p, and vice versa. What we need, I claim, is to recognize a structure to truth: truth for sentences, utterances, and other non-propositional entities depends on, and is analyzable in terms of, the expression of true propositions. Propositional truth can then be treated as insubstantial, as deflationary, and truth for other entities as substantial, consisting of correspondence to a fact . ;This account of truth, which I call Weak Deflationism, anchors the dissertation. In an introductory chapter, I give a partial defense of realism about propositions and properties, later defending Platonism against attacks by David Lewis. After formulating Weak Deflationism, I examine its implications for such matters as the "absurd comparison" objection, the truthmaker project in ontology, and non-factualist theories in metaethics. In a final chapter, I provide a Kripke-inspired modification of Weak Deflationism aimed to avoid liar-like paradox. Premised on a distinction between propositions that predicatively involve truth, i.e., truth-dependent propositions, and those that do not, truth-independent propositions, I argue that truth for the latter is deflationary and that truth for the former consists in being determined by the totality of truth-independent fact. Falsity is understood as truth of the negation. Liars are then counted neither true nor false, and paradox is averted. (shrink)

It’s generally assumed that a compositional semantic theory will have to recognise a semantic category of expressions which serve simply to pick out some one object: e-type expressions. Kripke’s views about names, Kaplan’s about indexicals and demonstratives, the standard Tarskian semantics for bound variables, Heim and Kratzer’s Strawsonian view about definites, even an analysis of indefinites, assume as much. In this thesis, I argue that recent advances in the semantics of names and of quotation, and in metaphysics, give good reason (...) to doubt there is such a category. I do so in two parts. In the first part, comprising about two thirds of the thesis, I combine two recent views, one from semantics and one from metaphysics. From semantics, I take over predicativism about names, the view, as one might have guessed, that names are predicates. From metaphysics, I take over the doctrine that there are temporal parts. Putting them together, I hold that the semantic contribution of the name ’Joan’, in a sentence like ’Joan is a barrister’, is a predicate, and in particular a predicate the extension of which is Joan’s temporal parts. Names are not, as is commonly thought, e-type expressions. In the second part, building on the first, I further undermine the existence of a semantically important category of e-type expressions by arguing that a construction which might be thought to mandate such a category, namely de re attitude ascriptions, in fact, when properly analysed, does not do so. I argue this by considering the nature of transparent occurrences of expressions in opaque contexts in general, and in particular by considering the phenomenon of mixed quotation. I present a new theory of it, and show how it can be parlayed into a new Fregean theory of de re attitude ascriptions. The thesis overall, then, will provide strong evidence against the semantic importance of e-type expressions either in language, or in thought. (shrink)

The general issue addressed in this dissertation is: what do the models of formal model-theoretic semantics represent? In chapter 2, I argue that those of first-order classical logic represent meaning assignments in possible worlds. This motivates an inquiry into what the interpretations of first-order quantified model logic represent, and in Chapter 3 I argue that they represent meaning assignments in possible universes of possible worlds. A possible universe is unpacked as one way model reality might be. The problem arises here (...) as to how we are to understand the distinction between the actual and the possible as it relates to modal reality. ;Along with the development of the main arguments in Chapters 2 and 3, the dissertation assesses the status of semantic accounts or logical properties and relations. Specifically, what does the model-theoretic account of a logically possible situation add to the syntactic account ? ;Proofs of invalidity in terms of the models of formal semantics do not establish that it is possible for the premises to be true and the conclusion false, since a formal model is merely given by a consistent set of sentences. Unless there is some way to generate a non-formal model from a formal one, such proofs do not really go beyond syntactic notions. The dissertation ends by concluding that there is no way to generate a non-formal model from a formal one without relying on logical intuitions that are syntactical. ;Hence efforts to construct a semantic basis for model logic independent of syntactic commitments are misguided. However, in classical logic the independence of the semantic account from the syntactic one is grounded on the intuition that it is metaphysically possible for there to be a denumerably infinite totality of objects. (shrink)

Generativism about memory justification is the view that memory can generate epistemic justification. Generativism is gaining popularity, but process reliabilists tend to resist it. Process reliabilism explains the justification of beliefs by way of the reliability of the processes they result from. Some advocates of reliabilism deny various forms of generativism. Other reliabilists reject or remain neutral about only the more extreme forms. I argue that an extreme form of generativism follows from reliabilism. This result weakens a long-standing argument for (...) reliabilism. (shrink)

Accumulating evidence indicates that simulated natural settings can engage mechanisms that promote health. Simulations offer alternatives to actual natural settings for populations unable to travel outdoors safely; however, few studies have contrasted the effects of simulations of natural settings to their actual outdoor counterparts. We compared the impacts of simulated and actual natural settings on positive and negative affect (mood) levels using a pooled sample of participants enrolled in extant experimental studies. Relevant articles were identified from a review of research (...) published/in press by March 2020 and updated during the peer review of the current study. Of 16 articles identified, 6 met the inclusion criteria and administered a single cross-cutting, standardized instrument [the Positive and Negative Affect Schedule (PANAS)] before and after exposure. Random effects meta-analysis of pooled effects showed that positive affect increased in the actual settings but not in their simulated counterparts (Hedge's g = 0.87; 95% CI, 0.54, 1.20). We observed little difference in effects on negative affect change scores ( g = −0.28; 95% CI, −0.62, 0.06), with studies generally showing reductions in negative affect in both settings. Further research with additional populations, settings, antecedent conditions, and durations would provide a more robust understanding of differences in effects between these two ways to enhance mood by viewing nature. (shrink)

Responses to public health emergencies can entail difficult decisions about restricting individual liberties to prevent the spread of disease. The quintessential example is quarantine. While isolating sick patients tends not to provoke much concern, quarantine of healthy people who only might be infected often is controversial. In fact, as the experience with severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) shows, the vast majority of those placed under quarantine typically don't become ill. Efforts to enforce involuntary quarantine through military or police powers also (...) can backfire, stoking both panic and disease spread. Yet quarantine is part of a limited arsenal of options when effective treatment or prophylaxis is not available, and some evidence suggests it can be effective, especially when it is voluntary, home-based and accompanied by extensive outreach, communication and education efforts. Even assuming that quarantine is medically effective, however, it still must be ethically justified because it creates harms for many of those affected. Moreover, ethical principles of reciprocity, transparency, non-discrimination and accountability should guide any implementation of quarantine. (shrink)

In his unpublished freewill manuscripts, Ralph Cudworth seeks to complete the project that he begins in The True Intellectual System of the Universe (1678) by arguing for an account of human liberty that avoids the opposing poles of necessitarianism and indifferency. I argue that Cudworth’s account rests upon a crucial distinction between the will and the power of freewill. Whereas we necessarily will the greater apparent good, freewill is a more fundamental power by which we endeavour to discern the greater (...) good before willing to pursue it. Cudworth thus opposes necessitarianism by arguing for a libertarian account of freewill while nonetheless rejecting the indifferentist claim that we can will contrary to the greater apparent good. (shrink)

Putative examples of true contradictions in the social world have been given by dialetheists such as Graham Priest, Richard Routley, and Val Plumwood. However, we feel that it has not been decisively argued that these examples are in fact true contradictions rather than merely apparent. In this paper we adopt a new strategy to show that there are some true contradictions in the social world, and hence that dialetheism is correct. The strategy involves showing that a group of sincere dialetheists (...) can, given an appropriately formed institution, bootstrap contradictions into existence. We discuss objections and consider the implications of this finding for debates over logic. (shrink)

One of the liveliest debates about cognition concerns whether our cognition sometimes extends beyond our brains and bodies. One party says Yes, another No. This paper shows that debate between these parties has been epistemologically confused and requires reorienting. Both parties frequently appeal to empirical considerations and to extra-empirical theoretical virtues to support claims about where cognition is. These things should constrain their claims, but cannot do all the work hoped. This is because of the overlooked fact, uncovered in this (...) paper, that we could never distinguish the rival views empirically or by typical theoretical virtues. I show this by drawing on recent work on testing, predictive accuracy, and theoretical virtues. The recommendation to emerge is that we step back from debate about where cognition is, to the epistemology of what cognition is. (shrink)

The theoretical biology of Jakob von Uexküll has had significant conceptual and practical afterlives, in Continental philosophy, biosemiotics and elsewhere. This paper will examine the utilisation of Uexküll in twentieth-century zoo biology and its significance for relating to wildlife in hybrid environments. There is an important though rarely analysed line of inheritance from von Uexküll to Heini Hediger, the Swiss zoo director and animal psychologist. Hediger’s fundamental theoretical position began from the construction of the world from the animal’s point of (...) view, as determined by factors including species specific phylogeny, individual and group biography, and anthropogenic circumstance. He operationalised Uexküll’s approach to animal worlds in order to optimise the design of zoo enclosures, considered as both physical and psychological habitats, in which captive wildlife could flourish. This subjectivist and phenomenological perspective has often been sidelined in zoo biology by more objectivist and mechanising approaches. Nonetheless, Hediger’s work and thought, through its inheritance from Uexküll, has important implications for twenty-first century relations with wildlife. (shrink)

This paper distinguishes between two types of persuasive force arguments can have in terms of two different connections between arguments and inferences. First, borrowing from Pinto, an arguer's invitation to inference directly persuades an addressee if the addressee performs an inference that the arguer invites. This raises the question of how invited inferences are determined by an invitation to inference. Second, borrowing from Sorenson, an arguer's invitation to inference indirectly persuades an addressee if the addressee performs an inference guided by (...) the argument even though it is uninvited. This raises the question of how an invitation to inference can guide inferences that the arguer does not use the argument to invite. Focusing on belief-inducing inference, the primary aims here are to clarify what is necessary for an addressee's belief-inducing inference to be invited by an argument used as an instrument of persuasion; and to highlight the capacity of arguments to guide such inferences. The paper moves beyond Pinto's discussion by using Boghossian's Taking Condition in service of and in way that illustrates how epistemically bad arguments can rationally persuade addressees of their conclusions. (shrink)

This paper proposes a new and testable view about the nature of species and other evolving lineages, according to which they are feedback systems. On this view, it is a mistake to think gene flow, niche sharing, and trait frequency similarities between populations are among variables that interact to cause some further downstream variable that distinguishes evolving lineages from each other, some sort of “species cohesion” for example. Instead, gene flow, niche sharing, similarities between populations, and other causal variables feed (...) into each other—instances of these at earlier times help cause instances of these same variables at later times. And any lineage-identifying cohesion just is the recurrence or cycling of these feedback relations within metapopulations over generations. Such cohesion can then be represented as variable M within multi-dimensional variable spaces, where values of M vary dynamically with the frequency and magnitude of feedback relations. Related conditions for being a species or other evolving lineage are then clarified. To argue for the development and testing of this view, the paper shows how it improves upon others. (shrink)

Recent arguments over whether certain public health interventions should be mandatory raise questions about what counts as a "mandate." A mandate is not the same as a mere recommendation or the standard of practice. At minimum, a mandate should require an active opt-out and there should be some penalty for refusing to abide by it. Over-loose use of the term "mandate" and the easing of opt-out provisions could eventually pose a risk to the gains that truly mandatory public health interventions, (...) such as childhood vaccines, have provided over the last 50 years. Already, confusion about what counts as a mandate, and about what criteria should be used to determine when a public health intervention should be implemented as a mandate, has led to some inappropriate public policy decisions. For instance, by any reasonable criteria, the yearly influenza vaccine should be mandatory for health care workers. To enforce this mandate, those who refuse vaccination should be required to sign a waiver, and patients - especially those at high risk from flu - should be informed when they receive care from unvaccinated practitioners. (shrink)