It has been argued that Hume's account of testimony is seriously inadequate: an autonomous knower of the sort Hume defends cannot, through simple inductive methods, justify accepting another's testimony as true. This conclusion is no doubt correct. But Hume does not defend the idea of an autonomous knower, nor does he defend relying upon simple inductive methods. An examination of Hume's critique of Descartes’ method of doubt shows him as a defender of what might be called the responsible knower, and (...) reveals the sophistication of the inductive methods he wishes to defend. It is shown that Hume can and does use these methods to justify accepting the testimony of others. (shrink)

Přirozený zákon je jednou z nejvýznamnějších idejí, která stojí v základech evropského filosofického, etického a právního myšlení. Předložený článek podává stručnou expozici vývoje ideje přirozeného zákona ve filosofickém myšlení s důrazem na jeho klíčové momenty a vyjádření nosných tezí, které předurčily rozumění tomuto pojmu v následujících obdobích. Jeho cílem není detailní probádání některé z jednotlivých etap či některého z autorů, ale naopak podat souhrnný a přehledný obraz vývoje této ideje. Východiskem je zde stručné načrtnutí hlavních zdrojů ideje přirozeného zákona v (...) antice, počínaje předsokratiky, následně u Platóna a Aristotela a představením hlavních rysů stoické koncepce. Další část je věnovaná scholastickému uchopení problematiky přirozeného zákona u T. Akvinského a Suaréze. Následuje přiblížení novověkých úvah u Grotia, Pufendorfa a Hobbese. Tito teoretici jsou následně kontrastováni s průřezovým přehledem myšlení positivně právního u Benthama, Austina a jejich pokračovatelů, neboť i vývoj positivistického myšlení výrazně přispěl k zformování moderní teorie přirozeného zákona, které stojí explicitně v opozici k němu. Text uzavírá přiblížení stavu přirozenoprávní diskuse u nejvýznamnějších autorů 20. století. (shrink)

I advance a novel interpretation of Kant's argument that our original representation of space must be intuitive, according to which the intuitive status of spatial representation is secured by its infinitary structure. I defend a conception of intuitive representation as what must be given to the mind in order to be thought at all. Discursive representation, as modelled on the specific division of a highest genus into species, cannot account for infinite complexity. Because we represent space as infinitely complex, the (...) spatial manifold cannot be generated discursively and must therefore be given to the mind, i.e. represented in intuition. (shrink)

How can we discover the contents of experience? I argue that neither introspection alone nor naturalistic theories of experience content are sufficient to discover these contents. I propose another method of discovery: the method of phenomenal contrast. I defend the method against skeptics who doubt that the contents of experience can be discovered, and I explain how the method may be employed even if one denies that experiences have contents.

Are objects in convex passenger-side mirrors “closer than they appear”? If one adapts to inverting goggles, does the world go back to looking the way it was before, or does the world look approximately the same throughout the course of adaptation, only losing its normative sense of wrongness? The answers to these empirical, introspective questions might help cast light on the classic philosophical debate about the degree of resemblance between our visual experience of reality and things as they are in (...) themselves. (shrink)

In the first experiment, I exhibit unreliable judgment about the primeness or divisibility of four-digit numbers, in contrast to a seeming Excel program. In the second experiment, I exhibit an imperfect memory for arbitrary-seeming three-digit number and letter combinations, in contrast to my seeming collaborator with seemingly hidden notes. In the third experiment, I seem to suffer repeated defeats at chess. In all three experiments, the most straightforward interpretation of the experiential evidence is that something exists in the universe that (...) is superior in the relevant respects – theoretical reasoning (about primes), memorial retention (for digits and letters), or practical reasoning (at chess) – to my own solipsistically-conceived self. (shrink)

In this paper we consider a puzzle concerning Hume's account of time and what he calls “steadfast unchanging objects”—that is, unchanging objects coexisting with temporal successions. On the one hand, Hume maintains that steadfast unchanging objects are temporally indivisible. On the other, he allows that such unchanging objects are capable of undergoing a determinate number of alterations in a given length of time, which seems to imply that they are at least potentially temporally divisible. After arguing that Donald Baxter's influential (...) interpretation of Hume's theory of time cannot resolve this tension, we propose that Hume offers a skeptical resolution of the difficulty. (shrink)

Over the last few decades, a number of influential philosophers, psychologists and others have invoked the notion of narrative as having a central role to play in our thinking about ethics and personal identity. More recently, a backlash against these narrative theories has developed, exemplified in work by, for instance, Galen Strawson, Peter Lamarque and John Christman. This paper defends an approach to personal identity and ethics, influenced mainly by Alasdair MacIntyre and Charles Taylor, in which narrative plays a central (...) (though not a foundational) role. In sec I, I elucidate the concept of narrative that MacIntyre introduced in After Virtue and show why this is central to thinking about the identity of persons across time. In sec II, I consider and reject various objections to this narrative account of personal identity. I hope to show that some of the prominent criticisms of narrative theory simply don’t apply to this conception, properly understood. However, I don’t want to claim that the dispute over narrative is based purely on misunderstanding, One centrally important aspect of the dispute is a first-order ethical one about the extent to which we should seek for a unity based on narrative coherence in our lives, and in secs III and IV, I will offer a defence of Taylor’s claim that an ethical life must aspire to, and to some extent achieve, narrative unity. (shrink)

In our philosophical tradition and our wider culture, we tend to think of persons as agents. This agential conception is flattering, but in this paper I will argue that it conceals a more complex truth about what persons are. In 1. I set the issues in context. In 2. I critically explore four features commonly presented as fundamental to personhood in versions of the agential conception: action, capability, choice and independence. In 3. I argue that each of these agential features (...) presupposes a non-agential feature: agency presupposes patiency, capability presupposes incapability, choice presupposes necessity and independence presupposes dependency. In 4. I argue that such non-agential features, as well as being implicit within the agential conception, are as apt to be constitutive of personhood as agential features, and in 5. I conclude. (shrink)

It is widely claimed that the second Critique’s argument for the postulate of immortality is relevantly different from the first Critique’s argument for the postulate. It is also widely claimed that after the second Critique, Kant distances himself from its particular version of the argument, and even the postulate altogether. It is the purpose of this article to challenge these claims, arguing instead that (a) there is overwhelming textual evidence showing that Kant did not abandon the postulate; (b) the second (...) Critique does not contain a substantially different argument for the postulate than how it is argued for in the first Critique; and (c) the philosophical objections levied against the second Critique’s argument, including its putative substitution of holiness for virtue, become moot once its argument is better understood. (shrink)

Pre-analytically at least some of our inductions seem to be possessed of rational justification. This comment would apply, for instance, to my present induction, ‘If that climber high on the Flatirons falls he will be killed,’ not to mention such more momentous inductions as, ‘If a full-scale nuclear war breaks out there will be greater destruction than in World War II.’ Notoriously, however, a few Humean reflections seem to strip even the most plausible of our inductions of all possible rational (...) justification, leaving them mere bare psychological faits accomplis: in effect, section V of the Enquiry's ‘Sceptical Solution of these Doubts.’. (shrink)

I reconsider the relation between love and respect in Kantian ethics, taking as my guide Iris Murdoch's view of love as the fundamental moral attitude and a kind of attention to individuals. It is widely supposed that Kantian ethics disregards individuals, since we don't respect individuals but the universal quality of personhood they instantiate. We need not draw this conclusion if we recognise that Kant and Murdoch share a view about the centrality of love to virtue. We can then see (...) that respect in the virtuous person cannot be blind to the individual, as critics of Kantian ethics contend. My approach contrasts recent efforts to assimilate Kantian respect to Murdochian love, which overlook Murdoch's distinctive claims about the singularity of moral activity. This idea is not as un-Kantian as it seems, and it should inform any Kantian ethics that aims to address the charge about individuals. (shrink)

According to strong metaphysical readings of Kant, Kant believes there are noumenal substances and causes. Proponents of these readings have shown that these readings can be reconciled with Kant’s claims about the limitations of human cognition. An important new challenge to such readings, however, has been proposed by Markus Kohl, focusing on Kant’s occasional statements about the divine or intuitive intellect. According to Kohl, how an intuitive intellect represents is a decisive measure for how noumena are for Kant, but an (...) intuitive intellect would not represent using metaphysical categories like those of substance and causation. I argue that Kohl’s argument does not succeed, since it overlooks the possibility that the intuitive intellect only indirectly represents certain noumenal facts. In addition, in response to a secondary argument Kohl suggests, I argue that Kant’s apparently anti-metaphysical statements about the content of the categories can be read as merely describing the constitution of the categories, instead of what they represent. Thus, while Kohl advances the debate by raising an under-appreciated question, his argument against the strong metaphysical reading is unsound. (shrink)

It is well known that Kant claims that causal judgments, including judgments about forces, must have an a priori basis. It is less well known that Kant claims that we can perceive the repulsive force of bodies through the sense of touch. Together, these claims present an interpretive puzzle, since they appear to commit Kant to both affirming and denying that we can have perceptions of force. My first aim is to show that both sides of the puzzle have deep (...) roots in Kant's philosophy. My second aim is to present three potential solutions to the puzzle and show that each faces problems. (shrink)

R. C. Sleigh's Leibniz and Arnauld: A Commentary on Their Correspondence is a very good book: it is detailed, clearly written, well argued and attentive to the historical background. The more I read it, the more I enjoyed it and the more I learned. Not only does it offer a wide variety of interesting points for the reader to agree and disagree with, it has, also, the virtue of pretty well forcing the reader to think about the issues involved and (...) their connection with a variety of other philosophical problems. It breaks a good deal of new ground and, as is the way with new ground-breaking, it sometimes only scratches the surface: it points out both the need for further, more detailed investigations and the way in which such investigations might fruitfully proceed. By and large, however, it does a great deal more than scratch the surface: its depth of discussion is such that only a comparably sized book could hope to discuss in all their ramifications the problems raised by Sleigh. (shrink)

In early life, the philosopher, theologian and scientist Robert Boyle wrote extensively on moral matters. One of the extant early documents written in Boyle's hand deals with the morality of our treatment of non-human animals. In this piece Boyle offered a number of arguments for extending moral concern to non-human animals. Since the later Boyle routinely vivisected or otherwise killed animals in his scientific experiments, we are left with the biographical questions, did his views change, and if so, why? as (...) well as with the philosophical questions, what were his arguments and how good are they? (shrink)

A critical analysis of Diana Fuss's Essentially Speaking: Feminism, Nature, and Difference (1989a) and Elizabeth Grosz's Sexual Subversions: Three French Feminists (1989).

A critical analysis of Diana Fuss's Essentially Speaking: Feminism, Nature, and Difference (1989a) and Elizabeth Grosz's Sexual Subversions: Three French Feminists (1989).

In one of the Theological Tractates, Boethius wrote ‘ we have found the definition of Person, viz: “The individual substance of a rational nature”’. He justifies the definition partly by a consideration of Latin and Greek etymologies and partly by stating ‘what Person cannot be affirmed of’. Person cannot be affirmed of Universals, accidents, relations, lifeless bodies, living bodies without sense , nor of ‘that which is bereft of mind and reason’.

In practice, scientists must convey data in a “representational style”. Various authors seek to explain the epistemic role of scientific visual representation in terms of formal conventions. Goodman also tends to dismiss the epistemic relevance of human cognition. My position is that visual conventions are nonarbitrary, in that they play to scientists’ cognitive abilities and limitations. My account draws on Perini's formal analysis, scientific case studies, and empirical literature on global pattern detection in neurotypicals, autistics, and dyslexics.

Powers are popularly assumed to be distinct from, and dependent upon, inert qualities, mainly because it is believed that qualities have their nature independently of other properties while powers have their nature in virtue of a relation to distinct manifestation property. George Molnar and Alexander Bird, on the other hand, characterize powers as intrinsic and relational. The difficulties of reconciling the characteristics of being intrinsic and at the same time essentially related are illustrated in this paper and it is argued (...) that the reasons for thinking of powers as essentially relational are based on misguided epistemological consideration. Finally, I present a way of thinking of fundamental properties as primitive natures that we can only understand in virtue of what they do but which we should not think of as being ontologically constituted by these doings. According to this view, properties are both qualities and powers. (shrink)

The theory of frames has recently been proposed as a universal format for knowledge representation in language, cognition and science. Frames represent categories as well as individual objects and events in terms of recursive attribute-value structures. In this paper, we would like to explore the potential ontological commitments of frame-based knowledge representations, with particular emphasis on the ontological status of the possessors of quality attributes in individual object frames. While not strictly incompatible with nominalistic, bundle- or substratum-theoretic approaches to the (...) metaphysics of particular objects, it will be argued that representing objects in terms of attribute-value structures is more in accordance with a tradition that can be traced back to Aristotle’s doctrine of physical substances. Attributes appear to describe primary potentialities of objects, which, in the Aristotelian view, are the unchangeable nature or essence, hence substance, of any separate object. (shrink)

Our ability to tell stories about ourselves has captivated many theorists, and some have taken these developments for an opportunity to answer long-standing questions about the nature of personhood. In this essay I employ two skeptical arguments to show that this move was a mistake. The first argument rests on the observation that storytelling is revisionary. The second implies that our stories about ourselves are biased in regard to our existing self-image. These arguments undercut narrative theories of identity, but they (...) leave room for a theory of narrative self-knowledge. The theory accommodates the first skeptical argument because there are event descriptions with retrospective assertibility conditions, and it accommodates the second argument by denying us epistemic privilege in regard to our own past. The result is that we do know our past through storytelling, but that it is a contingent feature of some of our stories that they are about ourselves. (shrink)

Berkeley holds that objects in the world are constituted of ideas. Some commentators argue that for Berkeley, ideas are identical to acts of perception; this is taken to proceed from his view that ideas are like pains. In this paper, I evaluate the identity claim. I argue that although it does not follow from the pain analogy, nonetheless the texts suggest that Berkeley does think ideas and acts are identical. I show how Berkeley can account for objects persisting over time (...) and being perceivable by multiple observers, even if the ideas that constitute them are intermittent and dependent on particular actors. (shrink)

Does memory only preserve epistemic justification over time, or can memory also generate it? I argue that memory can generate justification based on a certain conception of mnemonic content. According to it, our memories represent themselves as originating on past perceptions of objective facts. If this conception of mnemonic content is correct, what we may believe on the basis of memory always includes something that we were not in a position to believe before we utilised that capacity. For that reason, (...) memory can produce justification for belief through the process of remembering. This is why a subject may be justified in believing a proposition on the basis of memory even if, in the past, she was not justified in believing it through any other source. The resulting picture of memory is a picture wherein the epistemically generative role of memory turns out to be grounded on its intentionally generative role. (shrink)

Alvin Goldman has criticized the idea that, when evaluating the opinions of experts who disagree, a novice should “go by the numbers”. Although Goldman is right that this is often a bad idea, his argument involves an appeal to a principle, which I call the non-independence principle, which is not in general true. Goldman's formal argument for this principle depends on an illegitimate assumption, and the examples he uses to make it seem intuitively plausible are not convincing. The failure of (...) this principle has significant implications, not only for the issue Goldman is directly addressing, but also for the epistemology of rumors, and for our understanding of the value of epistemic independence. I conclude by using the economics literature on information cascades to highlight an important truth which Goldman's principle gestures toward, and by mounting a qualified defense of the practice of going by the numbers. (shrink)

ABSTRACTI draw attention to certain differences between how seventeenth‐century philosophers thought about knowledge and how contemporary philosophers think about it. These differences do not strike me as particularly subtle; they are gross enough that we might wonder about the extent to which seventeenthth‐century philosophers and modern philosophers are interested in the same thing. We might also wonder about the extent to which it is helpful to apply the same label—say, ‘epistemology’—to both sets of interests. I think, for example, one might (...) reasonably raise the question, Is there any epistemology, in our sense of the term, in Spinoza or Leibniz? (shrink)

Qualia inversion thought experiments are ubiquitous in contemporary philosophy of mind. The most popular kind is one or another variant of Locke's hypothetical case of.

(Expected) adverse effects of the ‘ICT Revolution’ on work and opportunities for individuals to use and develop their capacities give a new impetus to the debate on the societal implications of technology and raise questions regarding the ‘responsibility’ of research and innovation (RRI) and the possibility of achieving ‘inclusive and sustainable society’. However, missing in this debate is an examination of a possible conflict between the quest for ‘inclusive and sustainable society’ and conventional economic principles guiding capital allocation (including the (...) funding of research and innovation). We propose that such conflict can be resolved by re-examining the nature and purpose of capital, and by recognising mainstream economics’ utilitarian foundations as an unduly restrictive subset of a wider Aristotelian understanding of choice. (shrink)