Outlined here is a simulation hypothesis approach that uses an expanding (the simulation clock-rate measured in units of Planck time) 4-axis hyper-sphere and mathematical particles that oscillate between an electric wave-state and a mass (unit of Planck mass per unit of Planck time) point-state. Particles are assigned a spin axis which determines the direction in which they are pulled by this (hyper-sphere pilot wave) expansion, thus all particles travel at, and only at, the velocity of expansion (the origin of $c$), (...) however only the particle point-state has definable co-ordinates within the hyper-sphere. Photons are the mechanism of information exchange, as they lack a mass state they can only travel laterally (in hypersphere co-ordinate terms) between particles and so this hypersphere expansion cannot be directly observed, relativity then becomes the mathematics of perspective translating between the absolute (hypersphere) and the relative motion (3D space) co-ordinate systems. A discrete `pixel' lattice geometry is assigned as the gravitational space. Units of $\hbar c$ `physically' link particles into orbital pairs. As these are direct particle to particle links, a gravitational force between macro objects is not required, the gravitational orbit as the sum of these individual orbiting pairs. A 14.6 billion year old hyper-sphere (the sum of Planck black-hole units) has similar parameters to the cosmic microwave background. The Casimir force is a measure of the background radiation density. (shrink)

Defined are gravitational formulas in terms of Planck units and units of $\hbar c$. Mass is not assigned as a constant property but is instead treated as a discrete event defined by units of Planck mass with gravity as an interaction between these units, the gravitational orbit as the sum of these mass-mass interactions and the gravitational coupling constant as a measure of the frequency of these interactions and not the magnitude of the gravitational force itself. Each particle that is (...) in the mass-state (defined by a unit of Planck mass) per unit of Planck time is directly linked to every other particle also in the mass-state by a discrete unit of $m_P v^2 r = \hbar c$, the velocity of a gravitational orbit is summed from these individual $v^2$. As this approach presumes a digital time, it is suitable for use in programming Simulation Hypothesis models. As this link is responsible for the particle-particle interaction it is analogous to the graviton. Orbital angular momentum of the planetary orbits derives from the sum of the planet-sun particle-particle orbital angular momentum irrespective of the angular momentum of the sun itself and the rotational angular momentum of a planet includes particle-particle rotational angular momentum. (shrink)

Following the 26th General Conference on Weights and Measures are fixed the numerical values of the 4 physical constants ($h, c, e, k_B$). This is premised on the independence of these constants. This article discusses a model of a mathematical electron from which can be defined the Planck units as geometrical objects (mass M=1, time T=2$\pi$ ...). In this model these objects are interrelated via this electron geometry such that once we have assigned values to 2 Planck units then we (...) have fixed the values for all Planck units. As all constants can then be defined using geometrical forms (in terms of 2 fixed mathematical constants, 2 unit-specific scalars and a defined relationship between the units $kg, m, s, A$), the least precise CODATA 2014 constants ($G, h, e, m_e, k_B$...) can then be solved via the most precise ($c, \mu_0, \alpha, R_\infty$), with numerical precision limited by the precision of the fine structure constant $\alpha$. In terms of this model we now for example have 2 separate values for elementary charge, calculated from ($c, \alpha, R_\infty$) and the 2017 revision. (shrink)

The Simulation Hypothesis proposes that all of reality, including the earth and the universe, is in fact an artificial simulation, analogous to a computer simulation, and as such our reality is an illusion. In this essay I describe a method for programming mass, length, time and charge (MLTA) as geometrical objects derived from the formula for a virtual electron; $f_e = 4\pi^2r^3$ ($r = 2^6 3 \pi^2 \alpha \Omega^5$) where the fine structure constant $\alpha$ = 137.03599... and $\Omega$ = 2.00713494... (...) are mathematical constants and the MLTA geometries are; M = (1), T = ($2\pi$), L = ($2\pi^2\Omega^2$), A = ($4\pi \Omega)^3/\alpha$. As objects they are independent of any set of units and also of any numbering system, terrestrial or alien. As the geometries are interrelated according to $f_e$, we can replace designations such as ($kg, m, s, A$) with a rule set; mass = $u^{15}$, length = $u^{-13}$, time = $u^{-30}$, ampere = $u^{3}$. The formula $f_e$ is unit-less ($u^0$) and combines these geometries in the following ratio M$^9$T$^{11}$/L$^{15}$ and (AL)$^3$/T, as such these ratio are unit-less. To translate MLTA to their respective SI Planck units requires an additional 2 unit-dependent scalars. We may thereby derive the CODATA 2014 physical constants via the 2 (fixed) mathematical constants ($\alpha, \Omega$), 2 dimensioned scalars and the rule set $u$. As all constants can be defined geometrically, the least precise constants ($G, h, e, m_e, k_B$...) can also be solved via the most precise ($c, \mu_0, R_\infty, \alpha$), numerical precision then limited by the precision of the fine structure constant $\alpha$. (shrink)

The Simulation Hypothesis proposes that all of reality is in fact an artificial simulation, analogous to a computer simulation. Outlined here is a method for programming relativistic mass, space and time at the Planck level as applicable for use in Planck Universe-as-a-Simulation Hypothesis. For the virtual universe the model uses a 4-axis hyper-sphere that expands in incremental steps (the simulation clock-rate). Virtual particles that oscillate between an electric wave-state and a mass point-state are mapped within this hyper-sphere, the oscillation driven (...) by this expansion. Particles are assigned an N-S axis which determines the direction in which they are pulled along by the expansion, thus an independent particle motion may be dispensed with. Only in the mass point-state do particles have fixed hyper-sphere co-ordinates. The rate of expansion translates to the speed of light and so in terms of the hyper-sphere co-ordinates all particles (and objects) travel at the speed of light, time (as the clock-rate) and velocity (as the rate of expansion) are therefore constant, however photons, as the means of information exchange, are restricted to lateral movement across the hyper-sphere thus giving the appearance of a 3-D space. Lorentz formulas are used to translate between this 3-D space and the hyper-sphere co-ordinates, relativity resembling the mathematics of perspective. (shrink)

It is argued that whenever component parts are assembled into an integrated whole, some of the properties defining the qualitative identities of the components are lost, and therefore the components as such have ceased to exist, at least temporarily. They have been replaced by a structure, which has different properties and behaviour from its components. In the process of creating a structure some properties are lost and others are gained, so rather than saying "a whole is more than the sum (...) of its parts" it would be more accurate to say "a whole is instead of its parts". It is suggested that the visual perception of components continuing to exist intact within solid structures is illusory, a result of the way our perceptual and cognitive processes habitually operate. The relation between physical structures and consciousness is briefly discussed, in the context of the physical universe conceived as one continuous structure uniting all individual physical entities. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Comments on “Moral Complicity in Induced Pluripotent Stem Cell Research”W. Malcolm Byrnes, Ph.D. and Edward J. FurtonIn his article titled “Moral Complicity in Induced Pluripotent Stem Cell Research,” Mark T. Brown (2009) unfortunately mischaracterizes my ethical analysis of the use of induced pluripotent stem (iPS) cells for replacement therapies, or treatments (Byrnes 2008). In my paper, which Brown cites, I argue that, just as it is ethically acceptable (...) for parents to allow their children and themselves to be immunized using vaccines produced by cell lines derived from human fetuses aborted in the past, it is also acceptable for persons in the future to benefit from treatments that use iPS cells validated using human embryonic stem (ES) cell lines [End Page 202] derived in the past. The assumption I make is that iPS cells would have to be shown to be functionally equivalent to human ES cells—i.e., validated—before they could be used for cell replacement treatments. (If it turns out that this assumption is incorrect, and primate or even mouse ES cells can be used for the validation, then all residual ethical problems will disappear and there will be no ethical problems whatsoever associated with iPS cells.) I wrote:... [I]n both cases, the origin of the treatment is in a one-time event: either the one-time use of aborted fetuses to obtain cell lines (e.g., MRC-5 and WI- 38) to grow weakened virus strains for vaccine production, or the one-time destruction of human embryos to validate iPS cells, which then effectively replace embryonic stem cells. In the latter case, if no additional embryonic stem cell lines are derived, then derivation of the existing lines could be considered a “one-time” event in the past, albeit an event that extended over a several-year period(Byrnes 2008, p. 287, emphasis added).Note the phrase “if no additional embryonic stem cell lines are derived.” The derivation of ES cell lines inherently involves destruction of embryos; indeed, that is why many people, including me, are opposed to human ES cell research. In my article, I am arguing that, if no additional ES cell lines are derived, then no additional human embryos will be destroyed, and the destruction of human embryos will lie in the past. In this case, embryo destruction could be considered a past event, just as the abortion of a human fetus from which vaccine-producing cell lines were derived is a past, albeit tragic, event.In the process of building his argument that proponents of iPS cell research are morally complicit in embryo destruction, Brown (2009, p. 15) casts me as being in favor of the “derivation of new embryonic stem [cell lines].” This is the exact opposite of my position. In fact, I am opposed to further destruction of human embryos. I believe that the hundreds of ES cell lines already in existence are more than sufficient to validate iPS cells and so no additional lines need to be derived. This means that no additional human embryos will need to be destroyed.Apparently based on the misperception that I support future destruction of human embryos, Brown concludes that “Byrnes’s endorsement of ongoing iPSC validation studies would seem to implicate him and those who follow his lead in formal and material complicity in what they perceive as moral evil” (p. 16). He writes that “explicit formal complicity would attach because he [Byrnes] knowingly and intentionally recommends that embryos be killed in order to facilitate a transition to a future in which no more embryos need be destroyed” (p. 16). Additionally, my “followers” and I would be guilty of “proximate material complicity” as well as “remote material complicity” (p. 16). Unfortunately, this broad condemnation is based on a misconception of my actual position.An additional problem involves Brown’s use of a quotation he attributes to me: [End Page 203]Once embryonic stem cells are used to successfully validate iPS cells, they will no longer be needed and their association with iPS cells will lie in the past. Is there not an element of sadness and resignation in accepting something (iPS cells) associated with an unjust act (destruction of an... (shrink)

If there is a plurality of absolutely separate individual conscious existences, corresponding to individual living organisms, then the directly experienced fact that only a particular one of these consciousnesses, one's own, stands out as immediately present, can not be true absolutely, but only relative to some specific context of conditions and qualifications singling out that particular consciousness. But further consideration demonstrates that it is not possible for any such context to be specified. This implies that all conscious existences must ultimately (...) be united as, or in, some single conscious entity underlying the apparent plurality of individuals. (shrink)

This is a response to Macleod 2012's argument that the history of unjust property acquisitions requires rich libertarians to give away everything in excess of equality. At first, problematic questions are raised. How much property is usually inherited or illegitimate? Why should legitimate inheritance be affected? What of the burden of proof and court cases? A counterfactual problem is addressed. Three important cases are considered: great earned wealth; American slavery; land usurpation. All are argued to be problematic for Macleod 2012's (...) thesis. Various problems are explained concerning using the Nozickian argument to decide the alleged excess that rich libertarians own. The essay's main error is the presupposition that free markets do not help the worst-off. The majority of unjust holdings today are not the result of historical injustices but arise through continuing transfers enabled by taxation and state-regulation. More study of libertarian contributions to the social sciences and philosophy would appear to be desirable "personal behavior" among socialists. (shrink)

Comment from Author (12-17-13): Please note that the correct term for the theological attempt to resolve the problem of how evil can exist in a world ruled by a loving and all-powerful God is "theodicy," not "theodicity" as indicated in the second paragraph on the first page of the article. I apologize for the error.

Are extreme beliefs constitutive of echo chambers, or only typically caused by them? Or are many echo chambers unproblematic, amplifying relatively benign beliefs? This paper details the conceptual relations between echo chambers and extreme beliefs, showing how different conceptual choice-points in how we understand both echo chambers and extreme beliefs affects how we should evaluate, study, and engage with echo chambering groups. We also explore how our theories of extreme beliefs and echo chambers shape social scientific research and contribute in (...) a practical way when treating these phenomena, focusing on examples of climate change scepticism. (shrink)

According to non-doxastic theories of propositional faith, belief that p is not necessary for faith that p. Rather, propositional faith merely requires a ‘positive cognitive attitude’. This broad condition, however, can be satisfied by several pragmatic approaches to a domain, including fictionalism. This paper shows precisely how fictionalists can have faith given non-doxastic theory, and explains why this is problematic. It then explores one means of separating the two theories, in virtue of the fact that the truth of the propositions (...) in a discourse is of little consequence for fictionalists, whereas their truth matters deeply for the faithful. Although promising, this approach incurs several theoretical costs, hence providing a compelling reason to favour a purely doxastic account of faith. (shrink)

According to the seventh-century C.E. philosopher Kumārila Bhat.t.a, epistemic agents are warranted in taking their world-presenting experiences as veridical, if they lack defeaters. For him, these experiences are defeasibly sources of knowledge without the agent reflecting on their content or investigating their causal origins. This position is known as svatah prāmāṇya in Sanskrit (henceforth the SP principle). -/- As explicated by the eleventh-century commentator, Pārthasārathi Misŕa, this position entails that epistemic agents know things without simultaneously knowing that they know them, (...) or being in a position to know that they know. In contrast, some contemporary Anglo-analytic philosophers argue for the “knows-knows principle” (KK principle), in which if someone knows that p, then that person also knows that they know that p, or that person is in a position to know that they know p. Despite some apparent similarities, the SP principle is not a version of the KK principle, nor would Pārthasārathi’s Kumārila have held the KK principle. -/- Recently, Daniel Immerman (2018) has argued that the SP principle is a position-to-know version of the “knows-knows principle” (KK-pos principle). By examining Kumārila’s response to his Buddhist opponent, who challenges the veracity of Vedic testimony, we will see that Kumārila understands higher-order knowing as involving an independent check on one’s epistemic processes, through an epistemic instrument known as postulation (arthāpatti). This precludes him from holding the KK-pos principle. (shrink)

There has been a recent surge of research interest in videogames of moral engagement for entertainment, advocacy and education. We have seen a wealth of analysis and several theoretical models proposed, but experimental evaluation has been scarce. One of the difficulties lies in the measurement of moral engagement. How do we meaningfully measure whether players are engaging with and affected by the moral choices in the games they play? In this paper, we survey the various standard psychometric instruments from the (...) moral psychology literature and discuss how they might be applied in the evaluation of games. (shrink)

Historically the focus of moral decision-making in games has been narrow, mostly confined to challenges of moral judgement (deciding right and wrong). In this paper, we look to moral psychology to get a broader view of the skills involved in ethical behaviour and how these skills can be employed in games. Following the Four Component Model of Rest and colleagues, we identify four “lenses” – perspectives for considering moral gameplay in terms of focus, sensitivity, judgement and action – and describe (...) the design problems raised by each. To conclude, we analyse two recent games, The Walking Dead and Papers, Please, and show how the lenses give us insight into important design differences between these games. (shrink)

Historically the focus of moral decision-making in games has been narrow, mostly confined to challenges of moral judgement (deciding right and wrong). In this paper, we look to moral psychology to get a broader view of the skills involved in ethical behaviour and how they may be employed in games. Following the Four Component Model of Rest and colleagues, we identify four “lenses” – perspectives for considering moral gameplay in terms of focus, sensitivity, judgement and action – and describe the (...) design problems raised by each. To conclude, we analyse two recent games, The Walking Dead and Papers, Please, and show how the lenses give us insight into important design differences between them. (shrink)

What happens when someone acts? A familiar answer goes like this. There is something that the agent wants, and there is an action that he believes conducive to its attainment. His desire for the end, and his belief in the action as a means, justify taking the action, and they jointly cause an intention to take it, which in turn causes the corresponding movements of the agent's body. I think that the standard story is flawed in several respects. The flaw (...) that will concern me in this paper is that the story fails to include an agent-or, more precisely, fails to cast the agent in his proper role. (shrink)

Supervaluationism is often described as the most popular semantic treatment of indeterminacy. There’s little consensus, however, about how to fill out the bare-bones idea to include a characterization of logical consequence. The paper explores one methodology for choosing between the logics: pick a logic thatnorms beliefas classical consequence is standardly thought to do. The main focus of the paper considers a variant of standard supervaluational, on which we can characterizedegrees of determinacy. It applies the methodology above to focus ondegree logic. (...) This is developed first in a basic, single-premise case; and then extended to the multipremise case, and to allowdegreesof consequence. The metatheoretic properties of degree logic are set out. On the positive side, the logic is supraclassical—all classical valid sequents are degree logic valid. Strikingly, metarules such as cut and conjunction introduction fail. (shrink)

Analytic philosophers have, since the pioneering work of B.K. Matilal, emphasized the contributions of Nyāya philosophers to what contemporary philosophy considers epistemology. More recently, scholarly work demonstrates the relevance of their ideas to argumentation theory, an interdisciplinary area of study drawing on epistemology as well as logic, rhetoric, and linguistics. This paper shows how early Nyāya theorizing about argumentation, from Vātsyāyana to Jayanta Bhaṭṭa, can fruitfully be juxtaposed with the pragma-dialectic approach to argumentation pioneered by Frans van Eemeren. I illustrate (...) the implications of this analysis with a case study from Jayanta Bhaṭṭa’s satirical play, Much Ado about Religion (Āgamaḍambara). (shrink)

Criminal law theory made a significant advance roughly thirty years ago when George Fletcher popularized the important conceptual distinction between justifications and excuses. In the intervening years, however, very little progress has been made in exploring the structure and function of justification defenses. The reason for this failure, I suggest, is a widely shared misconception about their place within the criminal law’s institutional structure. Contrary to what is generally believed, it is not up to trial courts to decide ex post (...) facto what conduct is justified and what is not. This determination is made ex ante by other institutional actors such as private fiduciaries, public officials, and sometimes, ordinary citizens caught in extraordinary circumstances. The court’s role is simply to review the validity of that prior exercise of decision-making discretion. More broadly, my study is intended to serve as a reminder of the importance of institutional structure in criminal law. It is almost always misleading to address issues in criminal law by way of abstract moral theorizing, as is often done, because this leaves out the crucial question of institutional division of labor. Before addressing the substantive aspect of particular questions—what conduct should be prohibited, justified, or excused—we must first address ourselves to the institutional questions that I have called the problems of authority, discretion, and legality. These institutional questions receive their most thorough treatment in two other areas of law: the private law of fiduciaries and public administrative law. If we wish to make progress in understanding justification defenses—and the institutional structure of criminal law more generally—I argue that it is to these areas of law that we should attend. (shrink)

We argue that many recent philosophical discussions about the reference of everyday concepts of intentional states have implicitly been predicated on descriptive theories of reference. To rectify this, we attempt to demonstrate how a causal theory can be applied to intentional concepts. Specifically, we argue that some phenomena in early social de- velopment ðe.g., mimicry, gaze following, and emotional contagionÞ can serve as refer- ence fixers that enable children to track others’ intentional states and, thus, to refer to those states. (...) This allows intentional concepts to be anchored to their referents, even if folk psy- chological descriptions turn out to be false. (shrink)

Is propositional religious faith constituted by belief? Recent debate has focussed on whether faith may be constituted by a positive non-doxastic cognitive state, which can stand in place of belief. This paper sets out and defends the doxastic theory. We consider and reject three arguments commonly used in favour of non-doxastic theories of faith: (1) the argument from religious doubt; (2) the use of ‘faith’ in linguistic utterances; and (3) the possibility of pragmatic faith. We argue that belief is required (...) to maintain a distinction between genuine faith, pretend faith, and fictionalist faith. (shrink)

This special issue of Games and Culture focuses on the intersection between video games and ethics. This introduction briefly sets out the key research questions in the research field and identifies trends in the articles included in this special issue.

This paper offers an alternate explanation of cases from the doxastic wronging literature. These cases violate what I call the degree of inquiry right—a novel account of zetetic obligations to inquire when interests are at stake. The degree of inquiry right is a moral right against other epistemic agents to inquire to a certain threshold when a belief undermines one’s interests. Thus, the agents are sometimes obligated to leave inquiry open. I argue that we have relevant interests in reputation, relationships, (...) and the well-being of our social groups. These interests generate obligations against others to “do their homework” before closing inquiry. This alternate account makes better sense of puzzles that accounts of doxastic wronging fall prey to. (shrink)

This article raises a principled objection to the privatization of certain core police services. Whereas most of the literature critical of privatizing security services has focused on the negative consequences of doing so (corruption, waste, etc.), the argument here focuses squarely on the standing of private parties to perform police services. According to an important strain of liberal political theory, certain tasks are assigned to the state not because it is deemed to be more efficient at delivering those services but (...) simply because such services must be rendered by a party that acts in the name of the polity as a whole and not in the name of some narrower private interest. The author argues that all those policing functions – such as arrest, search, and detention – that require criminal law justification (because they involve conduct on the part of officers that is generally criminally prohibited) are of this nature. The article also summarizes the different dimensions of the larger privatization debate and traces the development of the debate about legitimate policing in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. (shrink)

In Indian philosophy, a pramāṇa is an epistemic instrument or doxastic practice that results in a veridical cognition (in an event of knowing). For just about all Indian thinkers, perception (pratyakṣa) and inference (anumāna) are the foundational pramāṇas, although they debated energetically over how to characterize the content of the resultant cognitions and how to explain the basis for the authority of these pramāṇas. Debate also includes the relationship of knowledge to religious liberation, the role of scripture in knowing, and (...) the possibility of omniscience. (shrink)

Epistocratic systems of government have received renewed attention, and considerable opposition, in recent political philosophy. Although they vary significantly in form, epistocracies generally reject universal suffrage. But can they maintain the advantages of universal suffrage despite rejecting it? This paper develops an argument for a significant instrumental advantage of universal suffrage: that governments must take into account the interests of all of those enfranchised in their policy decisions or else risk losing power. This is called ‘the Interests Argument’. One problem (...) for the Interests Argument is that governments are not entirely responsive to voter interests, partly because voters do not always know what is in their interests. I will show how this epistemic claim can be used to support certain forms of epistocracy, but deny that it undermines the Interests Argument. I then consider whether we can identify forms of epistocracy that preserve the benefits of the Interests Argument whilst overcoming the epistemic limitations of democracy. I propose six forms of epistocracy, and argue that two are able to maintain these benefits, hence providing an evaluation of the relative strengths of these epistocracies with respect to one of the most valuable instrumental benefits of universal suffrage. Whilst epistocracy lacks many of the advantages of democracy, this paper shows that some forms fare better than others. (shrink)

Belief-state ascription — determining what someone “knew,” “believed,” was “aware of,” etc. — is central to many areas of law. In criminal law, the distinction between knowledge and recklessness, and the use of broad jury instructions concerning other belief states, presupposes a common and stable understanding of what those belief-state terms mean. But a wealth of empirical work at the intersection of philosophy and psychology — falling under the banner of “Experimental Epistemology” — reveals how laypeople’s understandings of mens rea (...) concepts differ systematically from what scholars, courts, and perhaps legislators, have assumed. -/- As implemented, mens rea concepts are much more context-dependent and normatively evaluative than the conventional wisdom suggests, even assuming that jurors are following jury instructions to the letter. As a result, there is less difference between knowledge and recklessness than is typically assumed; jurors consistently “over”-ascribe knowledge to criminal defendants; and concepts like “belief,” “awareness,” and “conscious disregard” mean different things in different contexts, resulting in mens rea findings systematically responsive to aspects of the case traditionally considered irrelevant to the meaning of those terms. -/- This Article provides the first systematic account of the factors driving jurors’ ascriptions of the specific belief states criminal law invokes. After surveying mens rea jury instructions, introducing the Experimental Epistemology literature to the legal literature on mens rea, and examining the implications of that literature for criminal law, this Article considers ways to begin bridging the surprisingly large gap between mens rea theory and practice. (shrink)

What is the relationship between faith and evidence? It is often claimed that faith requires going beyond evidence. In this paper, I reject this claim by showing how the moral demands to have faith warrant a person in maintaining faith in the face of counter-evidence, and by showing how the moral demands to have faith, and the moral constraints of evidentialism, are in clear tension with going beyond evidence. In arguing for these views, I develop a taxonomy of different ways (...) of irrationally going beyond evidence and contrast this with rational ways of going against evidence. I then defend instances of having a moral demand to have faith, explore how this stands in tension with going beyond and against evidence, and develop an argument for the claim that faith involves a disposition to go against, but not beyond evidence. (shrink)

Religious fundamentalism remains a significant force in global politics and religion. Despite a range of problems arising from fundamentalism, the beliefs fundamentalists hold can seem quite reasonable. This paper considers whether, in fact, fundamentalist beliefs are rational by drawing on recent ideas in contemporary epistemology. The paper presents a general theory of fundamentalist beliefs in terms of their propositional content and the high credence levels attributed to them. It then explores the way these beliefs are both acquired and retained by (...) applying ideas from the social epistemology of echo chambers and group belief. The paper then considers three accounts of the rationality of belief: evidentialist, reliabilist, and virtue-theoretic. It is argued that fundamentalist beliefs can be reasonable on evidentialist standards, but are nevertheless still problematic on reliabilist and virtue standards, since they are formed in environments that are not truth-conducive and which cultivate intellectual vice. (shrink)

A common objection to Sosa’s epistemology is that it countenances, in an objectionable way, unsafe knowledge. This objection, under closer inspection, turns out to be in far worse shape than Sosa’s critics have realised. Sosa and his defenders have offered two central response types to the idea that allowing unsafe knowledge is problematic: one response type adverts to the animal/reflective knowledge distinction that is characteristic of bi-level virtue epistemology. The other less-discussed response type appeals to the threat of dream scepticism, (...) and in particular, to the idea that many of our everyday perceptual beliefs are unsafe through the nearness of the dream possibility. The latter dreaming response to the safety objection to Sosa’s virtue epistemology has largely flown under the radar in contemporary discussions of safety and knowledge. We think that, suitably articulated in view of research in the philosophy and science of dreaming, it has much more going for it than has been appreciated. This paper further develops, beyond what Sosa does himself, the dreaming argument in response to those who think safety (as traditionally understood) is a condition on knowledge and who object to Sosa’s account on the grounds that it fails this condition. The payoffs of further developing this argument will be not only a better understanding of the importance of insights about dreaming against safety as a condition on knowledge, but also some reason to think a weaker safety condition, one that is relativised to SSS (i.e., skill/shape/situation) conditions for competence exercise, gets better results all things considered as an anti-luck codicil on knowledge. (shrink)

As robots and Artificial Intelligences become more enmeshed in rich social contexts, it seems inevitable that we will have to make them into moral machines equipped with moral skills. Apart from the technical difficulties of how we could achieve this goal, we can also ask the ethical question of whether we should seek to create such Artificial Moral Agents (AMAs). Recently, several papers have argued that we have strong reasons not to develop AMAs. In response, we develop a comprehensive analysis (...) of the relevant arguments for and against creating AMAs, and we argue that all things considered we have strong reasons to continue to responsibly develop AMAs. The key contributions of this paper are threefold. First, to provide the first comprehensive response to the important arguments made against AMAs by Wynsberghe and Robbins (in “Critiquing the Reasons for Making Artificial Moral Agents”, Science and Engineering Ethics 25, 2019) and to introduce several novel lines of argument in the process. Second, to collate and thematise for the first time the key arguments for and against AMAs in a single paper. Third, to recast the debate away from blanket arguments for or against AMAs in general, to a more nuanced discussion about the use of what sort of AMAs, in what sort of contexts, and for what sort of purposes is morally appropriate. (shrink)

In this paper, I argue that policing can be defended as consistent with the equality of all before the law – but not by denying that policing occupies a special place in our legal order that is dangerously close to certain ancien régime privileges. In order to defend the special privileges of policing, it is essential to show that they are something quite different from the ancien régime privileges that they in some respects resemble. The crucial conceptual tool for making (...) that argument is the idea of public office. Policing, I argue, is a public office and like other public offices, it comes equipped with a number of special rights, privileges, powers, and immunities that are not generally possessed by all persons in their private capacity. But that situation is no challenge to the equality of all persons before the law. Those special rights do not belong to the office-holder as their private property, to do with them just as they would like. They belong, instead, to the office itself, and they may be exercised only by someone duly appointed to the office (who may also be duly removed from office) and only in pursuit of the purposes that define her office. The idea of public office is what makes possible a necessary and acceptable kind of inequality – that between individual private persons on the one hand and the collective person of the state on the other – while maintaining the kind of equality that matters, which is the equality of all persons vis-à-vis one another. (shrink)

This dialogue turns into a discussion between three people. The interlocutors are Socrates, Jeito and finally also Plato. The dimensions of Time, Space and Person are occasionally transgressed. The conclusion is that information seems to be unidirectional concerning life and death.

Sustainability science seeks to extend scientific investigation into domains characterized by a distinct problem-solving agenda, physical and social complexity, and complex moral and ethical landscapes. In this endeavor it arguably pushes scientific investigation beyond its usual comfort zones, raising fundamental issues about how best to structure such investigation. Philosophers of science have long scrutinized the structure of science and scientific practices, and the conditions under which they operate effectively. We propose a critical engagement between sustainability scientists and philosophers of science (...) with respect to how to engage in scientific activity in these complex domains. We identify specific issues philosophers of science raise concerning current sustainability science and the contributions philosophers can make to resolving them. In conclusion we reflect on the steps philosophers of science could take to advance sustainability science. (shrink)

Do we insult, offend or slight a speaker when we refuse her testimony? Do we compliment, commend or extol a speaker when we accept her testimony? I argue that the answer to both of these questions is “yes”, but only in some instances, since these respective insults and compliments track the reasons a hearer has for rejecting or accepting testimony. When disbelieving a speaker, a hearer may insult her because she judges the speaker to be either incompetent as a knower (...) or insincere as a teller. However, there are many instances where we reject testimony without making this negative evaluation of the speaker, and as such, without paying her an insult. Testimonial compliments are fewer in number, and are not constitutive of “everyday” testimonial exchanges, since, speakers who are competent as knowers and sincere as tellers are merely behaving correctly in accordance with the norms of testifying. Nevertheless, deferring to an authority on belief can be complimentary to that speaker if by doing so we judge her to have some mastery in a particular domain. Testimonial insults and compliments have important moral implications, particularly with regard to epistemic injustice and therapeutic trust. (shrink)

It is sometimes claimed that faith is a virtue. To what extent faith is a virtue depends on what faith is. One construal of faith, which has been popular in both recent and historical work on faith, is that faith is a matter of taking oneself to have been spoken to by God and of trusting this purported divine testimony. In this paper, I argue that when faith is understood in this way, for faith to be virtuous then it must (...) be accompanied by intellectual humility. I defend this view by showing how someone ought to respond to purported divine testimony if her faith is to be intellectually humble, and how, if it fails in this respect, it will instead be accompanied by the vices of either servility or arrogance. (shrink)

Abstract: Might knowledge normatively govern conversations and not just their discrete constituent thoughts and (assertoric) actions? I answer yes, at least for a restricted class of conversations I call aimed conversations. On the view defended here, aimed conversations are governed by participatory know-how - viz., knowledge how to do what each interlocutor to the conversation shares a participatory intention to do by means of that conversation. In the specific case of conversations that are in the service of joint inquiry, the (...) view defended is that interlocutors (A, B, ... n) must intentionally inquire together into whether p, by means of an aimed conversation X, only if A,B, ... n know how to use X to find out together whether p. The view is supported by considerations about instrumental rationality, shared intentionality, the epistemology of intentional action, as well as linguistic data. (shrink)

Retributive theories of punishment argue that punishing a criminal for a crime she committed is sufficient reason for a justified and morally permissible punishment. But what about when the state gets lucky in its decision to punish? I argue that retributive theories of punishment are subject to “Gettier” style cases from epistemology. Such cases demonstrate that the state needs more than to just get lucky, and as these retributive theories of punishment stand, there is no anti-luck condition. I’ll argue that (...) Gettier-style cases demonstrate an impermissible instance of punishment, even though they meet the conditions of retributive theories of punishment. Retributive theories are, therefore, too weak. The safety condition from epistemology provides the anti-luck condition needed for permissible punishment. I argue that two forms of retributivism, rights-forfeiture and what I call standard retributivism, are both subject to Gettier-style cases. Unlike the literature on standards of proof, this paper argues that safety is a condition on punishment itself, i.e., in all nearby possible worlds, the accuser must correctly accuse the convicted for the crime they actually committed. (shrink)

Understanding consciousness and its place in the natural world is one of the principal targets of contemporary philosophy of mind. Australian philosophers made seminal contributions to this project during the twentieth century which continue to shape the way philosophers and scientists think about the conceptual, metaphysical and empirical aspects of the problem. After some scene setting, I will discuss the main players and their work in the context of broader developments in the philosophy of mind.

This collection of essays explores the metaphysical thesis that the living world is not made up of substantial particles or things, as has often been assumed, but is rather constituted by processes. The biological domain is organised as an interdependent hierarchy of processes, which are stabilised and actively maintained at different timescales. Even entities that intuitively appear to be paradigms of things, such as organisms, are actually better understood as processes. Unlike previous attempts to articulate processual views of biology, which (...) have tended to use Alfred North Whitehead’s panpsychist metaphysics as a foundation, this book takes a naturalistic approach to metaphysics. It submits that the main motivations for replacing an ontology of substances with one of processes are to be found in the empirical findings of science. Biology provides compelling reasons for thinking that the living realm is fundamentally dynamic, and that the existence of things is always conditional on the existence of processes. The phenomenon of life cries out for theories that prioritise processes over things, and it suggests that the central explanandum of biology is not change but rather stability, or more precisely, stability attained through constant change. This edited volume brings together philosophers of science and metaphysicians interested in exploring the consequences of a processual philosophy of biology. The contributors draw on an extremely wide range of biological case studies, and employ a process perspective to cast new light on a number of traditional philosophical problems, such as identity, persistence, and individuality. (shrink)

For any given society, its particular technology of communication has far-reaching consequences, not merely as regards social organization, but on the epistemic level as well. Plato's name-theory of meaning represents the transition from the age of primary orality to that of literacy; Wittgenstein's use-theory of meaning stands for the transition from the age of literacy to that of a second orality (audiovisual communication, electronic information processing). On the basis of a use-theory of meaning the problem of machine consciousness, to which (...) the later Wittgenstein again and again returned, is capable of a non-essentialist solution: appropriate changes in our form of life might well entail a radically different psychological language-game. (shrink)

Religious fictionalism is the theory that it is morally and intellectually legitimate to affirm religious sentences and to engage in public and private religious practices, without believing the content of religious claims. This article discusses the main features of fictionalism, contrasts hermeneutic, and revolutionary kinds of fictionalism and explores possible historical and recent examples of religious fictionalism. Such examples are found in recent theories of faith, pragmatic approaches to religion, and mystical traditions in religious theology.

Our understanding of what exactly needs protected against in order to safeguard a plausible construal of our ‘freedom of thought’ is changing. And this is because the recent influx of cognitive offloading and outsourcing—and the fast-evolving technologies that enable this—generate radical new possibilities for freedom-of-thought violating thought manipulation. This paper does three main things. First, I briefly overview how recent thinking in the philosophy of mind and cognitive science recognises—contrary to traditional Cartesian ‘internalist’ assumptions—ways in which our cognitive faculties, and (...) even our beliefs, can be materially realised by as well as stored non-biologically and extracranially. Second, and taking brain-computer interface technologies (BCIs) and the associated possibility of ‘extended’ beliefs as a reference point, I propose and defend a sufficient condition on freedom-of-thought violating (extended) thought manipulation. On the view proposed, the right not to have one’s thoughts or opinions manipulated is violated if one is (i) caused to acquire non-autonomous propositional attitudes (acquisition manipulation) or (ii) caused to have otherwise autonomous propositional attitudes non-autonomously eradicated (eradication manipulation). The implications of this view are then illustrated through four thought experiments, which map on to four distinct ways—what I call Type 1-Type 4 manipulation—in which, and with reference to the view defended, one’s freedom of thought is plausibly violated. (shrink)

Trope theory is a leading metaphysical theory in analytic ontology. One of its classic statements is found in the work of Donald C. Williams who argued that tropes qua abstract particulars are the very alphabet of being. The concept of an abstract particular has been repeatedly attacked in the literature. Opponents and proponents of trope theory alike have levelled their criticisms at the abstractness of tropes and the associated act of abstraction. In this paper I defend the concept of a (...) trope qua abstract particular by rejecting arguments that purport to show that tropes should not be understood as abstract and by arguing that the abstractness of tropes plays an indispensable role in one of our more promising trope-theoretic analyses of universals and of concrete objects. (shrink)