Most philosophers agree that causal knowledge is essential to decision-making: agents should choose from the available options those that probably cause the outcomes that they want. This book argues against this theory and in favour of evidential or Bayesian decision theory, which emphasises the symptomatic value of options over their causal role. It examines a variety of settings, including economic theory, quantum mechanics and philosophical thought-experiments, where causal knowledge seems to make a practical difference. The arguments make novel use of (...) machinery from other areas of philosophical inquiry, including first-person epistemology and the free will debate. The book also illustrates the applicability of decision theory itself to questions about the direction of time and the special epistemic status of agents. (shrink)

Evidential Decision Theory is a radical theory of rational decision-making. It recommends that instead of thinking about what your decisions *cause*, you should think about what they *reveal*. This Element explains in simple terms why thinking in this way makes a big difference, and argues that doing so makes for *better* decisions. An appendix gives an intuitive explanation of the measure-theoretic foundations of Evidential Decision Theory.

The essay presents a novel counterexample to Causal Decision Theory (CDT). Its interest is that it generates a case in which CDT violates the very principles that motivated it in the first place. The essay argues that the objection applies to all extant formulations of CDT and that the only way out for that theory is a modification of it that entails incompatibilism. The essay invites the reader to find this consequence of CDT a reason to reject it.

Causal decision theory (CDT) cares only about the effects of a contemplated act, not its causes. The article constructs a case in which CDT consequently recommends a bet that the agent is certain to lose, rather than a bet that she is certain to win. CDT is plainly giving wrong advice in this case. It therefore stands refuted. 1 The Argument2 The Argument in More Detail2.1 The betting mechanism2.2 Soft determinism2.3 The content of P 2.4 The argument again3 The Descriptive (...) Premise3.1 Causal decision theory3.2 Causal decision theory prefers A14 The Normative Premise5 Objections5.1 Table 1 and Table 2 are misleading5.2 The agency theory of causation5.3 The payment mechanism5.4 Newcomb’s problem5.5 Against the normative premise5.6 Drop soft determinism. (shrink)

This paper argues that evidential decision theory is incompatible with options having objective values. If options have objective values, then it should always be rationally permissible for an agent to choose an option if they are certain that the option uniquely maximizes objective value. But, as we show, if options have objective values and evidential decision theory is true, then it is not always rationally permissible for an agent to choose an option if they are certain that the option uniquely (...) maximizes objective value. (shrink)

This article offers the concept of `global modernity' (in the singular) as a way to understand the contemporary world. It suggests that the concept helps overcome the teleology implicit in a term such as globalization, while it also recognizes global difference and conflict, which are as much characteristics of the contemporary world as tendencies toward unity and homogenization. These differences, and the appearance of `alternative' or `multiple' modernities, it suggests, are expressions, and articulations, of the contradictions of modernity which are (...) now universalized across, as well as within, societies. If we are to speak of alternative or multiple modernities, which presently valorize the persistence of traditions and `civilizational' legacies, we need to recognize that the very language of alternatives and multiplicity is enabled historically by the presupposition of a common modernity shaped by a globalizing capitalism. (shrink)

A resolution must give “seeing it differently” a sense that makes it clear that it is seeing that one is doing differently and not something else that is going on at the same time. The Berlin school of gestalt psychology took the view that alongside the colors and shapes traditionally thought to compose the visual field was a similarly perceptible aspect of “organization”. Wittgenstein considers the possibility of a physiological explanation of aspect change. This chapter details the Wittgenstein's account that (...) it is worth making three general comments about what explaining a psychological concept involves, according to his later philosophy. It focuses on Wittgenstein's writings on sensory aspects and non-sensory aspects. Kant's proposal was that the intuition is of an a priori manifold; but perhaps what is more plausible is that the objects of synoptic vision are not themselves individuals but concepts. (shrink)

Intellectual property Rights (IPRs) is protected by different systems of laws. Journals must choose a definitive form of systems. Some Blackwell journals use copyright system and some Blackwell use license from authors. Now a days online journals are using creative common licenses. Under creative common license journals are open access, allowed to download, copy, distribute, and display derivative works with proper attribution to author or owner for noncommercial purpose at a free cost. Education on IPRs will support to comprehend ones (...) rights, professional code of conduct and the doctrine of "fair use" in publication. One cannot do anything with once writing. Researchers, academic, editors and readers must have the basic knowledge on who owns the rights in a publication and what users can do with the publication by law. (shrink)

This discussion note examines a recent argument for the principle that any counterfactual with true components is itself true. That argument rests upon two widely accepted principles of counterfactual logic to which the paper presents counterexamples. The conclusion speculates briefly upon the wider lessons that philosophers should draw from these examples for the semantics of counterfactuals.

I present an argument for the view that laws ground their instances. I then outline two important consequences that follow if we accept the conclusion of this argument. First, the claim that laws ground their instances threatens to undermine a prominent recent attempt to make sense of the explanatory power of Humean laws by distinguishing between metaphysical and scientific explanation. And second, the claim that laws ground their instances gives rise to a novel argument against the view that grounding relations (...) are metaphysically necessary. (shrink)

The best-known argument for Evidential Decision Theory (EDT) is the ‘Why ain’cha rich?’ challenge to rival Causal Decision Theory (CDT). The basis for this challenge is that in Newcomb-like situations, acts that conform to EDT may be known in advance to have the better return than acts that conform to CDT. Frank Arntzenius has recently proposed an ingenious counter argument, based on an example in which, he claims, it is predictable in advance that acts that conform to EDT will do (...) less well than acts that conform to CDT. We raise two objections to Arntzenius’s example. We argue, first, that the example is subtly incoherent, in a way that undermines its effectiveness against EDT; and, second, that the example relies on calculating the average return over an inappropriate population of acts. (shrink)

Probably many people have cyclic preferences: they prefer A to B, B to C and C to A for some objects of choice A, B and C. Recent work has resurrected the objection to cyclic preference that agents possessing them are open to exploitation by means of ‘money pumps’. The paper briefly reviews this work and proposes a general approach to problems of sequential choice that makes cyclic preference immune to exploitation by means of these new mechanisms.

The Humean argument concerning miracles says that one should always think it more likely that anyone who testifies to a miracle is lying or deluded than that the alleged miracle actually occurred, and so should always reject any single report of it. A longstanding and widely accepted objection is that even if this is right, the concurring and non-collusive testimony of many witnesses should make it rational to believe in whatever miracle they all report. I argue that on the contrary, (...) even multiple reports from non-collusive witnesses lack the sort of independence that could make trouble for Hume. (shrink)

Philosophers and scientists both ask questions about what the world is like. How do these fields interact with one another? How should they? Naturalism Beyond the Limits of Science investigates an approach to these questions called methodological naturalism. According to methodological naturalism, when coming up with theories about what the world is like, philosophers should, whenever possible, make use of the same methodology that is deployed by scientists. Although many contemporary philosophers have implicit commitments that lead straightforwardly to methodological naturalism, (...) few have a clear understanding of how widespread and disruptive methodological naturalism promises to be for the field. By way of a series of case studies involving laws of nature, composition, time and modality, and drawing on historical and contemporary scientific developments including the discovery of the neutrino, the introduction of dark energy, and the advent of relativity theory, this book demonstrates the ways in which scientists rely on extra-empirical reasoning and how that very same extra-empirical reasoning can yield surprising results when applied to philosophical debates. Along the way, Nina Emery's investigation illuminates the complex relationship between philosophy and the sciences, and makes the case that philosophers and scientists alike would benefit from a greater understanding of the connections between the two fields. (shrink)

The article focuses on issues related to the Qur'an, Orientalism and the controversial writer Christoph Luxenberg. A brief survey on studies by the Orientalist on the Qur'an is presented. It explains some critical confusions and misunderstandings by the Orientalist concerning the Qur'an especially that related to the authenticity of the Qur'an, as well as its writing and recitation tradition. The application of the philological methods used in the Biblical studies on the Qur'an is discussed. The article ends with a critical (...) analysis on Luxenberg's Die syro-aramaische Lesart des Koran: Ein Beitrag zur Entschliisselung der Koransprache. (shrink)

Der Band geht der wechselseitigen Durchdringung von visuellen Künsten und Naturwissenschaften bzw. Naturphilosophie im Kontext der europäischen Romantik nach.Die Romantik als eine geistige Bewegung entfaltete sich in Europa auf Grundlage der allgemeinen Überzeugung, dass Kunst eine Form von Wissenschaft sei und umgekehrt. Viele Dichter und Künstler sowie Naturwissenschaftler waren bestrebt, empirische und kreative Formen der Welterkundung miteinander zu verbinden. Die Aufsätze in diesem Sammelband untersuchen die Entstehung einer "romantischen Wissenschaft" und ihre Beziehung zur bildenden Kunst, worin objektive und subjektive Formen (...) der Forschung gleichgestellt wurden. (shrink)

On the brink of her sixtieth birthday, Shengold embarks on a challenge: to take the same walk along the banks of the Ashokan Reservoir, in New York's Catskill Mountain region, every day for a year and find something new every time.

У статті показано еволюцію наукових поглядів на визначення сутності поняття "інвестиції" та їхньої ролі в розвитку економіки. Розглянуто основні закономірності історичного процесу щодо формування й розвитку наукових знань про інвестиції. Визначено взаємозв'язок науково-теоретичних уявлень та їхній вплив на трансформацію економічних процесів.

Saul Kripke is one of the most important and original post-war analytic philosophers. His work has undeniably had a profound impact on the philosophy of language and the philosophy of mind. Yet his ideas are amongst the most challenging frequently encountered by students of philosophy. In this informative and accessible book, Arif Ahmed provides a clear and thorough account of Kripke's philosophy, his major works and ideas, providing an ideal guide to the important and complex thought of this key (...) philosopher. The book offers a detailed review of his two major works, Naming and Necessity and Wittgenstein on Rules and Private Language, and explores how Kripke's ideas often seem to overturn widely accepted views and even perceptions of common sense. Geared towards the specific requirements of students who need to reach a sound understanding of Kripke's thought, the book provides a cogent and reliable survey of the nature and significance of Kripke's contribution to philosophy. This is the ideal companion to the study of this most influential and challenging of philosophers. (shrink)

Much neuroethics literature concludes with a set of normative recommendations. While these recommendations can be a helpful way of summarizing a proposal for a future direction, some have recently argued that ethics scholarship has devoted insufficient attention to considerations of audience and real-world applications. To date, however, while scholars have conducted topic analyses of neuroethics literature, to our knowledge no study has evaluated who neuroethics scholarship addresses and what it recommends. The objective of the present study therefore was to provide (...) a preliminary characterization of recommendations offered in neuroethics scholarship and an assessment of their target audiences. Rather than attempting to demarcate what constitutes “neuroethics scholarship,” we analyzed text that authors’ had self-identified as being neuroethics-related: abstracts presented at the International Neuroethics Society (INS) annual meetings and published as top abstracts in AJOB Neuroscience in the last decade (2011–2020). We found that a majority of abstracts utilized conceptual methods (62.2%) and provided conceptual recommendations (68%). Roughly 77% of all abstracts did not explicitly address a target audience, yet nearly all of these were implicitly directed at other scholars. The remainder specified a target audience of scholars (12.2%), regulators (6.7%), healthcare providers (6.7%) and industry (2.6%). Only a subset of abstracts provided practical or policy recommendations (19.7%). Of those, the majority (61.5%) did not specify a target audience. Among the subset with actionable recommendations, a clarification of target audience may help increase the impact. (shrink)

De Bie et al. (2023) provide a helpful framework for understanding many of the ethical considerations regarding artificial womb technology (AWT), particularly in relation to existing reproductive t...

ABSTRACT The future development of bioethics has been discussed in a number of articles in recent years, principally with regard to the trend towards empirical studies. However, what is meant by empirical studies in this context and how it is to be used concretely have been subject to varying interpretations. The purpose of this article is to develop what we term the microethical approach as a concrete method for an empirically driven bioethics. By adopting a microethical perspective, we will illustrate (...) an analytical concept for describing and demonstrating how, as a result of contextual circumstances and forms of understanding, different individuals in their everyday life adopt different coping strategies and behavior patterns in relation to ethical values. From a deepened perspective, the complexity of human behavior becomes apparent, and knowledge is gained about how moral problems are perceived and construed by those whom they in fact affect. We intend first and foremost to develop the microethical methodology by elucidating the methods and approaches that can help in clarifying moral dilemmas on a microethical level, and how the relationship between the empirical material and the ethical analysis evolves over the course of the analysis. This is exemplified by a study of caregivers’ entrance into patients’ private lives through the provision of care and assistance in the home. (shrink)

Text and Context: Quran and Contemporary Challenges is a compilation of Arif Mohammed Khan s thought-provoking articles published in various newspapers and magazines. It is a comprehensive understanding of the Message and Spirit of Quran and Prophetic Tra.

You should rather play hide-and-seek against someone who cannot predict where you hide than against someone who can, as the article illustrates in connection with a high-stakes example. Causal Decision Theory denies this. So Causal Decision Theory is false.

I argue against the common and influential view that non-trivial chances arise only when the fundamental laws are indeterministic. The problem with this view, I claim, is not that it conflicts with some antecedently plausible metaphysics of chance or that it fails to capture our everyday use of ‘chance’ and related terms, but rather that it is unstable. Any reason for adopting the position that non-trivial chances arise only when the fundamental laws are indeterministic is also a reason for adopting (...) a much stronger, and far less attractive, position. I suggest an alternative account, according to which chances are probabilities that play a certain explanatory role: they are probabilities that explain associated frequencies. 1 Introduction2 A Paradigm Case3 The Incompatibilist’s Criterion4 Against the Incompatibilist’s Criterion5 The Explanatory Criterion6 Conclusion. (shrink)

Experience has shown that the application of ethical guidelines developed for research in developed countries to research in developing countries can be, and often is, impractical and raises a number of contentious issues. Various attempts have been made to provide guidelines more appropriate to the developing world context; however, to date these efforts have been dominated by the fields of bioscience, medical research and nutrition. There is very little advice available for those seeking to undertake collaborative social science or natural (...) science research in developing countries and what is there tends to be held within disparate sources. Charting the development of a set of ethics documentation for future use by the Ecosystem Services for Poverty Alleviation (ESPA) programme research community, this paper outlines past and present attitudes towards ethics procedures amongst this community and suggests ways in which ethics procedures might be made more relevant and user-friendly to researchers working in this area. (shrink)

Some theories of quantum mechanical phenomena endorse wave function realism, according to which the physical space we inhabit is very different from the physical space we appear to inhabit. In this paper I explore an argument against wave function realism that appeals to a type of simplicity that, although often overlooked, plays a crucial role in scientific theory choice. The type of simplicity in question is simplicity of fit between the way a theory says the world is and the way (...) the world appears to be. This argument can be understood as one way of spelling out the so-called “incredulous stare objection” that is sometimes leveled against surprising metaphysical theories. (shrink)

This paper discusses the possibility of modelling inductive inference (Gold 1967) in dynamic epistemic logic (see e.g. van Ditmarsch et al. 2007). The general purpose is to propose a semantic basis for designing a modal logic for learning in the limit. First, we analyze a variety of epistemological notions involved in identification in the limit and match it with traditional epistemic and doxastic logic approaches. Then, we provide a comparison of learning by erasing (Lange et al. 1996) and iterated epistemic (...) update (Baltag and Moss 2004) as analyzed in dynamic epistemic logic. We show that finite identification can be modelled in dynamic epistemic logic, and that the elimination process of learning by erasing can be seen as iterated belief-revision modelled in dynamic doxastic logic. Finally, we propose viewing hypothesis spaces as temporal frames and discuss possible advantages of that perspective. (shrink)

The volume documents, and makes an original contribution to, an astonishing period in twentieth-century philosophy—the progress of Arne Naess's ecophilosophy from its inception to the present. It includes Naess's most crucial polemics with leading thinkers, drawn from sources as diverse as scholarly articles, correspondence, TV interviews and unpublished exchanges. The book testifies to the skeptical and self-correcting aspects of Naess's vision, which has deepened and broadened to include third world and feminist perspectives. Philosophical Dialogues is an essential addition to the (...) literature on environmental philosophy. (shrink)

A long tradition of psychological research has explored the distinction between characteristics that are part of the self and those that lie outside of it. Recently, a surge of research has begun examining a further distinction. Even among characteristics that are internal to the self, people pick out a subset as belonging to the true self. These factors are judged as making people who they really are, deep down. In this paper, we introduce the concept of the true self and (...) identify features that distinguish people’s understanding of the true self from their understanding of the self more generally. In particular, we consider recent findings that the true self is perceived as positive and moral, and that this tendency is actor-observer invariant and cross-culturally stable. We then explore possible explanations for these findings and discuss their implications for a variety of issues in psychology. (shrink)

Published in 1953, Wittgenstein's Philosophical Investigations had a deeply unsettling effect upon our most basic philosophical ideas concerning thought, sensation and language. Its claim that philosophical questions of meaning necessitate a close analysis of the way we use language continues to influence Anglo-American philosophy today. However, its compressed and dialogic prose is not always easy to follow. This collection of essays deepens but also challenges our understanding of the work's major themes, such as the connection between meaning and use, the (...) nature of concepts, thought and intentionality, and language games. Bringing together leading philosophers and Wittgenstein scholars, it offers a genuinely critical approach and demonstrating Wittgenstein's relevance for contemporary philosophy. This volume will appeal to readers interested in the later Wittgenstein, in addition to those interested in the philosophy of language, the philosophy of mind, metaphysics and epistemology. (shrink)

This article compares the elucidation of the semantic structure and fixity of a number of key terms and concepts of the Qur'an by two contemporary scholars, Toshihiko Izutsu (1914-1993) and Syed Muhammad Naquib al-Attas (1931--), with that of al-Raghib al-Isfahani (d. ca 443/1060), the author of the celebrated Kitab al-mufradat fi gharib al-Qur'an. By 'key terms and concepts' are meant those words used by the Qur'an which play a decisive role in making up the basic conceptual structure of the Qur'anic (...) worldview. The article shows how the Qur'an profoundly changed and subsequently fixed the meaning of Arabic terms, particularly those key terms relating to religion and ethics, and it highlights the fact that the contemporary semantic analysis of the Qur'anic vocabulary has its precedent in the fifth/eleventh century. (shrink)

Actualism is the view that only actually existing things exist. Presentism is the view that only presently existing things exist. In this paper, I argue that being an actualist without also being a presentist is not as easy as many philosophers seem to think. A common objection to presentism is that there is an unavoidable conflict between presentism and relativity theory. But actualists who do not wish to be presentists cannot point to this relativity objection alone to support their position. (...) Unless they have some antecedent reason for thinking that actualism is more plausible than presentism, anyone who is moved by the relativity objection to give up presentism should be moved by a related objection to give up actualism as well. If there is a reason to be an actualist without also being a presentist, it must go beyond the relativity objection to presentism. (shrink)

Cartwright (Synthese 121(1/2):3–27, 1999a; The dappled world, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1999b) attacked the view that causal relations conform to the Markov condition by providing a counterexample in which a common cause does not screen off its effects: the prominent chemical factory. In this paper we suggest a new way to handle counterexamples to Markov causation such as the chemical factory. We argue that Cartwright’s as well as similar scenarios feature a certain kind of non-causal dependence that kicks in once (...) the common cause occurs. We then develop a representation of this specific kind of non-causal dependence that allows for modeling the problematic scenarios in such a way that the Markov condition is not violated anymore. (shrink)