The paper investigates the type of realism that best suits the framework of decoherence taken at face value without postulating a plurality of worlds, or additional hidden variables, or non-unitary dynamical mechanisms. It is argued that this reading of decoherence leads to an extremely radical type of perspectival realism, especially when cosmological decoherence is considered.

Michael Dummett offered a semantic characterisation of a variety of realism-antirealism debates. This approach has fallen out of fashion. This has been to the detriment of metaphysics. This paper offers an accurate characterisation of Dummett’s view, often lacking in the literature, and then defends it against a range of attacks (from Devitt, Miller and Williamson). This understanding of realism debates is resilient, and if we take it seriously the philosophical terrain looks importantly different. In particular, the philosophy of language has (...) a foundational role with respect to metaphysics. (shrink)

Moral realists believe that there are objective moral truths. According to one of the most prominent arguments in favour of this view, ordinary people experience morality as realist-seeming, and we have therefore prima facie reason to believe that realism is true. Some proponents of this argument have claimed that the hypothesis that ordinary people experience morality as realist-seeming is supported by psychological research on folk metaethics. While most recent research has been thought to contradict this claim, four prominent earlier studies (...) indeed seem to suggest a tendency towards realism. My aim in this paper is to provide a detailed internal critique of these four studies. I argue that, once interpreted properly, all of them turn out in line with recent research. They suggest that most ordinary people experience morality as “pluralist-” rather than realist-seeming, i.e., that ordinary people have the intuition that realism is true with regard to some moral issues, but variants of anti-realism are true with regard to others. This result means that moral realism may be less well justified than commonly assumed. (shrink)

The theme of this year’s Spindel Conference was Social Ontologies of Race. This editorial introduction serves as both a general introduction to the topic of racial ontology and an introduction to this volume’s contributions. I will first explain some central ideas for discussions of ontology in general. I will then make some basic taxonomic distinctions common to discussions of racial ontology and suggest some clarifications. I will then go on to discuss the five contributions to this volume.

This paper examines assumptions concerning the relationship between citizenship, justice, and well-being, based on representative political philosophies, including egoism, utilitarianism, libertarianism, liberalism, and communitarianism. A previous paper raised the possibility of an inter-disciplinary framework for collaboration between psychology and political philosophy. This study picks up that thread and attempts to actualize a collaborative research effort based on a framework grounded in positive political psychology. The first part of this study reflects on the methodology situated between empirical psychology and philosophy in (...) reference to the debates caused by psychological and philosophical situationism. In response to its criticism against virtue ethics, the possibility of reconstructing it on empirical psychology has paradoxically emerged. Similarly, this study validates assumptions on political philosophies employing the psychological method concerning well-being. Accordingly, the central part examines the plausibility of the assumptions by empirical evidence obtained from two internet surveys in Japan. The relationships between citizenship, justice, and well-being are the most substantial in the communitarian assumption. The exploratory factor analysis of the two surveys illuminates that the correlations between citizenship, justice, and well-being are substantial. This relationship denies the egoism assumption. Moreover, almost all correlations between the three are higher based on virtue-related indicators than hedonic ones. These findings are not in tune with the utilitarian assumption and are most congruent to the communitarian assumption. In addition, citizenship and justice correlate more with political well-being than overall well-being. As these are more directly associated with political well-being in the communitarian assumption, this result aligns with the assumption. Furthermore, the positive relationship between disparity elimination and well-being fits the liberal rather than the libertarian assumption. Nevertheless, the substantial correlation between ethical justice and well-being is higher by virtue-related indicators than hedonic indicators, suggesting distributive justice is associated with the ethical dimension. Again, this fits the communitarian assumption rather than the liberal assumption. Thus, philosophical psychology empirically verifies the interdependence of the three conceptions and the relative plausibility of the communitarian assumption. Moreover, as the relationship between the three is essential for political philosophies, the result increases the reliability of communitarianism. (shrink)

I examine Quine’s and Davidson’s arguments to the effect that classical logic is the one and only correct logic. This conclusion is drawn from their views on radical translation and interpretation, respectively. I focus on the latter, but I first address, independently, Quine’s argument to the effect that the ‘deviant’ logician, who departs from classical logic, is merely changing the subject. Regarding logical pluralism, the question is whether there is more than one correct logic. I argue that bivalence may be (...) subject matter dependent, but that distribution and the law of excluded middle can probably not be dropped whilst maintaining the standard meanings of the connectives. In discussing the ramifications of the indeterminacy of interpretation, I ask whether it forces Davidsonian interpreters to adopt Dummett’s epistemic conception of truth vis-à-vis their interpretations. And, if so, does this cohere with their attributing a nonepistemic notion of truth to their interpretees? This would be a form of logical pluralism. In addition, I discuss Davidson’s arguments against conceptual schemes. Schemes incommensurable with our own could be construed as wholesale deviant logics, or so I argue. And, if so, their possibility would yield, in turn, the possibility of a radical logical pluralism. I also address Davidson’s application of Tarski’s definition of truth. (shrink)

ArgumentThe purpose of this paper is to provide an analysis of Giordano Bruno’s conception of mathematics. Specifically, it intends to highlight two aspects of this conception that have been neglected in previous studies. First, Bruno’s conception of mathematics changed over time and in parallel with another concept that was central to his thought: the concept of infinity. Specifically, Bruno undertook a reform of mathematics in order to accommodate the concept of the infinitely small or “minimum,” which was introduced at a (...) later stage. Second, contrary to what Héléne Védrine claimed, Bruno believed that mathematical objects were mind-dependent. To chart the parallel development of the conceptions of mathematics and infinity, a seven-year time span is considered, from the publication of Bruno’s first Italian dialogue (La cena de le ceneri,1584) to the publication of one of his last Latin works (De minimo, 1591). (shrink)

We scan Paul K. Feyerabend's work in philosophy of physics and of science more generally for insights that could be useful for the contemporary debate on the foundations of quantum mechanics. We take as our starting point what Feyerabend has actually written about quantum mechanics, but we extend our analysis to his general views on realism, objectivity, pluralism, and the relation between physics and philosophy, finding that these more general views could in fact offer many interesting insights for physicists and (...) philosophers working on quantum foundations. (shrink)

Addiction is a common condition affecting millions of people worldwide of which only a small proportion receives treatment. The development and use of healthcare services is influenced by how addiction is understood (e.g., a condition to treat, a shameful condition to stigmatize), notably with respect to how volition is impacted (e.g., addiction as a choice or a disease beyond one’s control). Through semi-structured qualitative interviews, we explore the implicit views and understandings of addiction and volition across three stakeholder groups: people (...) with lived experience of addiction, clinicians with experience treating addiction, and members of the public without lived experience of addiction. We notably examine whether three paradigms, i.e., three philosophical sets of understandings about the nature of reality and knowledge (realism, relativism, pragmatism) reflect how stakeholders envision addiction and volition in the context of addiction. The use of these paradigms allows for the characterization of different stances on addiction and volition and an assessment of the coherence of beliefs about these matters. Our findings demonstrate that few participants relied on a single epistemic paradigm when describing their views. Furthermore, there were notable differences in understandings of volition between the clinician group, who were more oriented toward pragmatism, and people with lived experience of addiction, who were less oriented toward realism. Despite its limitations, our study suggests that a greater appreciation for the complexity of views held by different stakeholders about addiction and volition could help critically assess the search for coherence expressed in academic and policy debates. (shrink)

I distinguish Local Constructivism (humans play a constitutive role in constructing some of the objects we have epistemic access to) from Global Constructivism (humans play a constitutive role in constructing all of the objects we have epistemic access to). I explicate and clarify Local Constructivism and show how the metaphysical concerns which motivate endorsing Local Constructivism about some objects (e.g. social objects, modal objects) differ from the epistemic and semantic concerns which motive endorsing Global Constructivism. I, then, examine the criticisms (...) Realists typically present against Constructivism. I argue that, although these criticisms undermine Global Constructivism, Local Constructivism is immune to them. If one has anti-Realist inclinations, but wishes to avoid the morass anti-Realism usually falls into (aka: anti-Realist Boogeyman), one should endorse Local, rather than Global, Constructivism. (shrink)