This article summarizes the moderate revisionist position I put forth in Four Views on Free Will and responds to objections to it from Robert Kane, John Martin Fischer, Derk Pereboom, and Michael McKenna. Among the principle topics of the article are (1) motivations for revisionism, what it is, and how it is different from compatibilism and hard incompatibilism, (2) an objection to the distinctiveness of semicompatibilism against conventional forms of compatibilism, and (3) whether moderate revisionism is committed to realism about (...) moral responsibility. (shrink)

Volume 24, Issue 7, July 2024, Page 6-12.

Challenges the picture according to which Islamic culture during the European middle ages served as a passive conduit of ancient Greek sources to the Latin West, along with the conjoined conception that the Islamic achievement in science was a mere reflection, and perhaps a dim one, of earlier Greek achievements. Against this view, this article argues for the "naturalization" of science in the classical Islamic context in a way that allowed for distinctive achievements in their own right.

A paper by Andorno and colleagues, recently published in Trends in Biotechnology, condemns support for heritable human genome editing (HHGE) that is claimed to be premature and to have occurred without sufficient public consultation. The general message of the paper is welcome in its emphasis on the importance of gaining broader perspectives on the uses and regulation of HHGE before calls for clinical use are made. However, some problematic arguments for their position lead them to seemingly condemn not only current (...) premature calls for clinical use of HHGE but also any analysis of the ways in which it might be appropriately regulated in the future. (shrink)

One puzzling feature of talk about properties, propositions and natural numbers is that statements that are explicitly about them can be introduced apparently without change of truth conditions from statements that don't mention them at all. Thus it seems that the existence of numbers, properties and propositions can be established`from nothing'. This metaphysical puzzle is tied to a series of syntactic and semantic puzzles about the relationship between ordinary, metaphysically innocent statements and their metaphysically loaded counterparts, statements that explicitly mention (...) numbers, properties and propositions, but nonetheless appear to be equivalent to the former. I argue that the standard solutions to the metaphysical puzzles make a mistaken assumption about the semantics of the loaded counterparts. Instead I propose a solution to the syntactic and semantic puzzles, and argue that this solution also gives us a new solution to the metaphysical puzzle. I argue that instead of containing more semantically singular terms that aim to refer to extra entities, the loaded counterparts are focus constructions. Their syntactic structure is in the service of presenting information with a focus, but not to refer to new entities. This will allow us to spell out Frege's metaphor of content carving. (shrink)

Name der Zeitschrift: Cognitive Linguistics Jahrgang: 26 Heft: 4 Seiten: 633-656.

A possible person’s conditional expected well-being is what the quality of their prospects would be if they were to come into existence. This paper examines the role that this form of expected well-being should play in distributing benefits among prospective people and in deciding who to bring into existence. It argues for a novel egalitarian view on which it is important to ensure equality in people’s life prospects, not merely between actual individuals, but also between all individuals who, given our (...) choices, have a chance of coming into existence. The paper argues that such egalitarianism for prospective people springs from equal concern for each person and has plausible implications. It further shows that it has a rationale in respect for both the unity of the individual and the separateness of persons. Finally, it defends this view against a key objection and shows it is superior to a rival view. (shrink)

Summary Principles Timely support for patients and people close to them, and effective, sensitive communication are essential. Decisions must be based on the individual patient's circumstances and reviewed regularly. Sensitive advance discussion should always be encouraged, but not forced. Information about CPR and the chances of a successful outcome needs to be realistic. Practical matters Information about CPR policies should be displayed for patients and staff. Leaflets should be available for patients and people close to them explaining about CPR, how (...) decisions are made and their involvement in decisions. Decisions about attempting CPR must be communicated effectively to relevant health professionals. In emergencies If no advance decision has been made or is known, CPR should be attempted unless: the patient has refused CPR; the patient is clearly in the terminal phase of illness; or the burdens of the treatment outweigh the benefits. Advance decision making Competent patients should be involved in discussions about attempting CPR unless they indicate that they do not want to be. Where patients lack competence to participate, people close to them can be helpful in reflecting their views. Legal issues Patients' rights under the Human Rights Act must be taken into account in decision making. Neither patients nor relatives can demand treatment which the health care team judges to be inappropriate, but all efforts will be made to accommodate wishes and preferences. In England, Wales and Northern Ireland relatives and people close to the patient are not entitled in law to take health care decisions for the patient. In Scotland, adults may appoint a health care proxy to give consent to medical treatment. Health professionals need to be aware of the law in relation to decision making for children and young people.IntroductionWhy policies are neededCardiopulmonary resuscitation can be attempted on any person whose cardiac or respiratory functions cease. Failure of these functions is part of dying and thus …. (shrink)

The chief problem for the theory of mind is that of presence. In this paper I offer an explanation of this claim, and I indicate how my own “enactive” approach to mind has tried to address this problem. I also argue that other approaches, such as that undertaken by Hutto and Myin, have side-stepped the problem, instead of addressing it; their position opts for reductionism and eliminativism. This essay has two parts. The first is an exposition of the enactive approach, (...) as I understand it, and the second is a critical evaluation of Hutto and Myin. (shrink)

How nursing as a profession is valued may be changing and needs to be explored and understood in a global context. We draw on data from two empirical studies to illustrate our argument. The first study explored the value of nursing globally, the second investigated the experiences of overseas trained nurses recruited to work in a migrant capacity in the UK health care workforce. The indications are that nurses perceive themselves as devalued socially, and that other health care professionals do (...) not give nursing the same status as other, socially more prestigious professions, such as medicine. Organizational and management structures within the NHS and the independent care home sector devalue overseas nurses and the contribution they make to health care. Our conclusions lead us to question the accepted sociocultural value of the global nursing workforce and its perceived contribution to global health care, and to consider two ethical frameworks from which these issues could be discussed further. (shrink)

Joseph Raz has introduced an interesting class of statements —detached statements— into the philosophical lexicon. In brief, such statements are normative statements, yet the speaker does not, in so uttering them, express or convey acceptance of the point of view of the hearer to whom they are addressed. I propose to offer a novel analysis of such statements. In brief, such statements will be analysed as wide-scope normative conditionals.

In the book of Acts, the Apostle Paul provides examples of leadership and displays significant leadership skills. In the speech to church leaders from Ephesus in Acts 20, he is presented as giving an account of his approach, detailing all the challenges involved. This article analyses how the Paul of Acts understood his own leadership role, in particular, the need for integrity, emotional involvement in the process and ceaseless effort. The article also examines Paul’s emphasis on the necessity for leaders (...) to exemplify or embody in a perceptible way the values which they convey to others and demand of them. (shrink)

The Common Rule requires institutional review boards (IRBs) to determine whether “(r)isks to subjects are reasonable in relation to anticipated benefits, if any, to subjects, and the importance of...

This article discuses the unexpectedly firm stance professed by John Paul II on the provision of artificial nutrition and hydration to patients who are in a persistent vegetative state, and its implications on previously held standards of judging medical treatments. The traditional ordinary/extraordinary care distinction is assessed in light of complexities of the recent allocution as well as its impact on Catholic individuals and in Catholic health care facilities. Shannon concludes that the papal allocution infers that the average Catholic patient (...) is incapable of making proper judgments about their own care. Shannon sees the preservation of life at all costs as at least highly troubling, if not as a radical move against the Catholic medical ethics tradition. (shrink)

Volume 25, Issue 2, February 2025, Page 67-70.

Let us now consider the third class of statements, those completely nonrestrictive. For example, "Something exists." Since this is the pure contradictory of the wholly restrictive, "Nothing exists," which we have found reason to regard as impossible, and since the contradictory of an impossible statement is necessary, we should expect "Something exists" to be necessarily true, a statement valid a priori. And we see that it excludes nothing from existence, except bare "nothing" itself. But the existence of bare (...) nothing is no existence. Further, "Something exists" is in no conceivable circumstances falsifiable, since the falsifying experience would have to exist, and it would also have to be the experience of something existing--at least if, as I should maintain, experience is essentially a relative term, requiring that to which it is relative, or of which it is the experience. But though "Something exists" is unfalsifiable, it is verified every moment. Could the verifiable but in any conceivable world absolutely unfalsifiable be false? I hold that the necessarily true must be knowable as true and only as true, and that, conversely, whatever is in principle verifiable though not falsifiable is thereby shown to be necessarily true. (shrink)

This text presents and comments on 80 exemplary ethics statements from leading corporations and organizations worldwide. It offers these seven principles to follow in developing such statements: write it; tailor it; communicate it; promote it; revise it; live it; and enforce/reinforce it.

Informal statements of Gödel's Second Incompleteness Theorem, referred to here as Informal Second Incompleteness, are simple and dramatic. However, current versions of Formal Second Incompleteness are complicated and awkward. We present new versions of Formal Second Incompleteness that are simple, and informally imply Informal Second Incompleteness. These results rest on the isolation of simple formal properties shared by consistency statements. Here we do not address any issues concerning proofs of Second Incompleteness.

Yinshun is regarded as one of the most eminent monks in twentieth-century Chinese Buddhism. Previous research has argued that Yinshun especially undertook the mission of writing new commentaries on Madhyamaka texts. His efforts provoked a revival of interest towards the Madhyamaka school among contemporary Chinese Buddhists, and a re-assessment of the position of the writings of N?g?rjuna within the history of Chinese Buddhism. This article focuses on Yinshun’s restatement of the nature of the M?lamadhyamakak?rik?, a text that has always been (...) regarded as fundamental in the Madhyamaka/San-lun tradition in China. The first part analyzes Yinshun’s textual study of the M?lamadhyamakak?rik?, examining his approach to the text, and how he came to terms with previous Chinese traditional textual scholarship and canonical scriptures. The second part discusses Yinshun’s interpretation of the text by moving away from the micro-context of Chinese San-lun scholarship, and addressing the macro-context of the modern Chinese understanding of the Mah?y?na. (shrink)

While robotics has benefited from inspiration gained from biology, the opposite is not the case: there are few if any cases in which robotic models have lead to genuine insight into biology. We analyze the reasons why biorobotics has been essentially a one-way street. We argue that the development of better tools is essential for progress in this field.

Over the past four decades, I have been asked many questions regarding the substance and methodology of my essay “Person and Community in African Thought”. I cannot in the space of these pages retrieve or reframe the content and implications of these several questions and it would be fool-hardy to attempt an answer to all of them here. But that is no reason not to try to say a few things, by way of additional commentary, on the occasion of this (...) retrospective on the essay. It would be helpful to proceed by concentrating on a few issues which have been of some concern, or interest, to readers over the years, adding a response, however brief, as I go along. Keywords: Community, Personhood, Descriptive Metaphysics Africa Philosophy Human Person. (shrink)

Facing the possibility of a surge of COVID-19-infected patients requiring ventilatory support in Intensive Care Units, the Singapore Hospice Council and the Chapter of Palliative Medicine Physicians forward its position on the guiding principles that ought to drive the allocation of ICU beds and its role in care of these patients and their families.