The most important thesis of "Of Miracles" has no special connection with miracles: I mean the perfectly general thesis that testimonial evidence should be evaluated by the method of balancing likelihoods, which is a relatively informal version of the calculus of changes (or of probabilities). C. S. Peirce argues that the method is radically unsuited to the assessment of historical testimony. In this paper, I do essentially two things: (1) set out both an informal and a formal account of Hume’s (...) method; and (2) collect, systematize, and discuss Peirce’s somewhat scattered animadversions upon Hume’s use of this method. As part of (2), I explore some lines of thought that Peirce suggests but does not develop. (shrink)

This paper was a comment on address at a conference whose proceedings were published by The Personalist (now the Pacific Philosophical Quarterly.) It was pure ephemera and only someone interested in the paper on which it was a comment would find this of interest. I have no copy of it remaining and have, at this distance, no memory of what I might have said.

The Great Financial Crisis that broke in 2008 and the Great Recession that followed has led many to question the very structure of contemporary economies. Some argue that the economic model of the past forty years is now broken. Criticism has also been directed at the orthodoxies of economics. For example, neoclassical equilibrium economics, the mainstream economics of the day, is accused of failing to understand some of the most basic aspects of the modern economy, of supporting policies that have (...) led to the economic breakdown, and of failing to see the crisis coming. Consequently, heterodox thinking in economics is getting a hearing as never before. Heterodox economics offers itself as the requisite radical reconstruction of the science of economics and also proposes policies for the radical reconstruction of the major economics.Yet to talk of the reconstruction of the modern market economy is at the same time to raise the ethical question: what shape ought the market economy to take? Heterodox economics may acutely analyse the inadequacies of real economies and propose plausible reforms, but as an essentially descriptive science there will be limits on its ability to state what ought to be. Rather, what is required seems to be a systematic prescriptive ethics. In other words, recent events in the world of economics have provided an opening for what ethical philosophy should be best at providing. Determining whether a specific ethical philosophy, to be identified shortly, has the capacity to address the questions raised by heterodox economics is the task of this paper. (shrink)

Legacy of Wisdom: Great Thinkers and Journalism introduces the reader to the ideas of more than 30 great philosophers, writers, and intellectuals - from Confucius and Plato, to Machiavelli and Kant, to Simone de Beauvoir and Sissela Bok - and the ways their ethical systems apply to journalism and journalists today. Author John C. Merrill provides brief sketches of each thinker as "intellectual springboards" for journalists and journalism students seeking motivation and ethical guidance in their professional lives.

In "Realism and Reason" Hilary Putnam has offered an apparently strong argument that the position of metaphysical realism provides an incoherent model of the relation of a correct scientific theory to the world. However, although Putnam's attack upon the notion of the "intended" interpretation of a scientific theory is sound, it is shown here that realism may be formulated in such a way that the realist need make no appeal to any "intended" interpretation of such a theory. Consequently, it can (...) be shown that realism is immune to Putnam's criticism and that attempts at reformulating this criticism are not likely to meet with success. (shrink)

The middle years of the nineteenth century saw two crucial develop ments in the history of modern logic: George Boole's algebraic treat ment of logic and Augustus De Morgan's formulation of the logic of relations. The former episode has been studied extensively; the latter, hardly at all. This is a pity, for the most central feature of modern logic may well be its ability to handle relational inferences. De Morgan was the first person to work out an extensive logic of (...) relations, and the purpose of this book is to study this attempt in detail. Augustus De Morgan (1806-1871) was a British mathematician and logician who was Professor of Mathematics at the University of London (now, University College) from 1828 to 1866. A prolific but not highly original mathematician, De Morgan devoted much of his energies to the rather different field of logic. In his Formal Logic (1847) and a series of papers "On the Syllogism" (1846-1862), he attempted with great ingenuity to reformulate and extend the tradi tional syllogism and to systematize modes of reasoning that lie outside its boundaries. Chief among these is the logic of relations. De Mor gan's interest in relations culminated in his important memoir, "On the Syllogism: IV and on the Logic of Relations," read in 1860. (shrink)

Since the first version of this classic work was published in 1974, major events in which American journalism has played a decisive role have cast the reporter increasingly as the subject for public examination. The newsman has become news. Though there are more serious, responsible journalists today than at any time in America, the less serious, less responsible also have great exposure. The loss of credibility of the mass media is widely acknowledged, and is a considerable concern to serious journalists. (...) For not only is American policy-making hampered by sensational journalism, but also weakened is the philosophical foundation of a free society; a society committed to maximize the freedom of well-informed choice for individual citizens in a period of massification. This book presents a philosophy of journalism that not only relates to a journalist's everyday activities, but also deals with a broad Weltanschauung for journalism which is built largely on the ideas coming out of the Age of Reason. Areas of philosophy are political philosophy and its relationship to journalism, epistemological concerns primarily journalistic objectivity and truth-seeking, and journalistic ethics. (shrink)

In this article John Merrill, a long-time observer of the journalistic scene and author/co-author of more than two-dozen books, picks the brain of Niccolo Machiavelli, who, if he had been asked, might have had some interesting observations about the ethics of journalism.

Merrill, Booker and Fivush examine the social functions associated with transmitting intergenerational narratives to adolescents and emerging adults and how these family stories affect identity formation in early adulthood. Merrill et al. observed that the intergenerational stories of parents’ transgression and proud moments told by adolescents and emerging adults operate as a way to transmit life lessons, strengthen relationships with the parent and give insights into their parents and their self.

In a series of papers over a period of several years Barry Smith andWerner Ceusters have offered a number of cogent criticisms of historical approaches to creating, maintaining, and applying biomedical terminologies and ontologies. And they have urged the adoption of what they refer to as a “realism-based” approach. Indeed, at times they insist that the realism-based approach not only offers clear advantages and a well-founded methodological basis for ontology development and evaluation, but that such a realist perspective is in (...) fact necessary for understanding and using terminologies and ontologies in science. -/- This paper explores a number of questions surrounding such claims, provides a careful characterization of the type of realism recommended by Smith and Ceusters, and evaluates the role that realism plays in the critiques and recommendations that they offer. The conclusion reached is that while Smith’s and Ceusters’ criticisms of prior practice in the treatment of ontologies and terminologies in medical informatics are often both perceptive and well founded, and while at least some of their own proposals demonstrate obvious merit and promise, none of this either follows from or requires the brand of realism that they propose. (shrink)

This book intends to make known, in a detailed but accessible way to the general public, an old idea, but which has had a renewed interest in recent years: the proposal of attributing an unconditional basic income for all. This idea, often discarded and disqualified for allegedly belonging to the mere domain of utopia, understood in a pejorative sense as something unrealizable, has been the target of the interest of many people (academics, politicians, businesspeople, activists and, of course, all citizens (...) concerned with the common good) is presented as being feasible through several concrete experiences and pilot projects. (shrink)

It is argued that Hempel's original rejection of the prediction criterion of confirmation in [8] (on the grounds that it leads to a circular definition of confirmation) was ill-conceived, and that his own approach exhibits undesirable consequences to the degree that it deviates from this criterion. A version of the prediction criterion is formulated which, in addition to being-non circular, escapes the criticisms advanced against Hempel's satisfaction criterion, offers certain clear advantages over alternative approaches, and may serve as the basis (...) for a theory of qualitative confirmation. The definition of confirmation developed here violates two of Hempel's three criteria of adequacy, and in showing why it should do so some light is shed on various issues in the debate concerning the acceptability of these criteria. (shrink)

Philosophers frequently struggle with the relation of metaphysics to the everyday world, with its practical value, and with its relation to empirical science. This paper distinguishes several different models of the relation between philosophical ontology and applied (scientific) ontology that have been advanced in the history of philosopy. Adoption of a strong participation model for the philosophical ontologist in science is urged, and requirements and consequences of the participation model are explored. This approach provides both a principled view and justification (...) of the role of the philosophical ontologist in contemporary empirical science as well as guidelines for integrating philosophers and philosophical contributions into the practice of science. (shrink)

For centuries (indeed for millennia) philosophers have complained about pseudo-philosophy being practiced by others claiming to be philosophers — and about people being taken in and suffering in one way or another from the mimicry, exploitation, and fakery of the pseudo-philosophers. But no attempt at a careful, comprehensive, and useful characterization of pseudo-philosophy has emerged. This book is a comprehensive historical, theoretical, and practical treatment of pseudo-philosophy — a concept often encountered in both formal and popular philosophy, but rarely with (...) any degree of seriousness and precision. It presents a theory of pseudo-philosophy through the use of models of the genuine philosopher and pseudo-philosopher, and then applies that theory to specific real-world cases. -/- Available on Amazon in either KIndle or paperback format. More details — as well as the complete Preface, Postscript, and References sections — available on my False Wisdom blog (falsephilosophy on blogspot: see External Links below). (shrink)

Two inscriptions, one found at Tylissos on Crete, the other found at Argos, both dated about 450, concern relations between Argos and the Cretan towns of Knossos and its smaller neighbour, Tylissos. The close relationship between the treaties of fragment A and fragment B – and therefore the interconnection among Argos, Knossos, and Tylissos – seems generally recognized by scholars. The articles of the agreement lay down a diverse and complex set of arrangements among the three parties, but as a (...) whole, the treaty has been interpreted in two ways: the three πóλεις have entered into some sort of federal union; only Argos and Knossos are signatories to the treaty, while Tylissos is a dependency of Argos. The former interpretation has gained wider acceptance than the latter, and if it is correct, just such a federal union would represent a remarkable advance in the development of Greek political institutions. In this paper we shall press a philological point based upon the information we have both from the treaty and from contemporary sources, and in so doing, we shall attempt to show that a federal union is unlikely. We shall then offer our own interpretation of the regulations governing the insular cities with regard to the formation of alliances and the declaration of friends and enemies. (shrink)

Grice proposed to investigate 'the total signification of the utterance'. One persistent criticism of Grice's taxonomy of signification is that he missed an important category of information. This content, and/or the process of providing it, goes by a variety of labels: 'generalized implicature', 'explicature', 'unarticulated constituents', 'default heuristics', 'impliciture'. In this study we first take a sample of such phenomena and, from the point of view of pure pragmatics, survey the central descriptions of the content expressed and the mechanisms that (...) might deliver these contents. We then, from the point of view of experimental pragmatics, focus on two accounts: Levinson's I-heuristic, and Bach's standardization. We find experimental evidence for the existence of such implicitures, and for the use of language specific standardizations over language neutral background information. (shrink)

'Methinks I am like a man, who having narrowly escap'd shipwreck', David Hume writes in A Treatise of Human Nature, 'has yet the temerity to put out to sea in the same leaky weather-beaten vessel, and even carries his ambition so far as to think of compassing the globe'. With these words, Hume begins a memorable depiction of the crisis of philosophy and his turn to moral and political philosophy as the path forward. In this groundbreaking work, Thomas W. (...) class='Hi'>Merrill shows how Hume's turn is the core of his thought, linking Hume's metaphysical and philosophical crisis to the moral-political inquiries of his mature thought. Merrill shows how Hume's comparison of himself to Socrates in the introduction to the Treatise illuminates the dramatic structure and argument of the book as a whole, and he traces Hume's underappreciated argument about the political role of philosophy in the Essays. (shrink)

This paper is an attempt to understand the method by which Thomas Solly (1816?1875), in his Syllabus of Logic (1839), provided a mathematical formulation of the traditional syllogism. The symbolism, in which analogues of multiplication, addition and subtraction are applied to term variables, is very puzzling at first. This paper provides a clear interpretation for this symbolism and explains why it works. It also addresses other notable features of the symbolism. The paper concludes by comparing the results which Solly obtained (...) by symbolic means with those which he obtained non?symbolically. (shrink)