Peter Harrison explains the disappearance of symbolic meanings of animals from seventeenth-century works in natural history through what he calls the “literalist mentality of the reformers.” By contrast, the present article argues in favor of a different understanding of the connection between hermeneutics and Protestant natural history. Martin Luther, Philipp Melanchthon, Johannes Brenz, Johannes Oecolampadius, and Jean Calvin continued to assign moral meanings to natural particulars, and moral interpretations can still be found in the writings of Protestant (...) naturalists such as Conrad Gesner, Caspar Heldelinus, Jeremias Wilde, Thomas Penny, and Thomas Moffett. If there are differences between Protestant and Catholic interpretations of animals, then these differences derive from the reformer’s greater insistence on providing textual support for assigning symbolic meanings, their resulting greater reluctance in assigning prophetic meanings to animals, and their elimination of spiritual interpretations of animals that are in tension with central tenets of Protestant theology. These differences in hermeneutics and theology may explain some of the divergences between the symbolic interpretations of animals proposed by Protestant natural historians and their Catholic colleague, Ulisse Aldrovandi. (shrink)

During the American Civil Rights Movement, Martin Luther King’s principal arguments reasoned from theological ethics, appealing to natural law, imago Dei, and agape love. Today in the United States, with the prevailing ideal of public reason, such arguments are unacceptable in the public square. In lieu of King’s theological arguments, are there philosophical principles or values adequate to sustain the cause of racial justice, establishing both a secure rational foundation for racial justice and providing sufficient moral incentive for (...) citizens to work self-sacrificially for this cause? I assess the prospects of the major philosophical alternatives, specifically utilitarianism, Kantian ethics, virtue ethics, contractarianism, and the anti-theory option. I conclude that each of these approaches fails to provide the necessary conceptual resources to sustain the cause for racial justice. This presents a disconcerting dilemma: either we readmit theological considerations into the public square or surrender hope for the achievement of lasting racial justice in the United States. (shrink)

The writings of Martin Rakovský can be seen as a reflection of the problems, including political ones, of his time. His aim was also to offer an idea of a perfect ruler, who would bring peoples the peace and calm down the stormy events of the 16th century. The personal virtues of such a ruler should have been the guarantee of the welfare of all citizens. Given Rakovský’s religious attitude he can be regarded as a re- formation humanist standing (...) between Machiavelli and Luther. (shrink)

Luthers »Von der Freiheit eines Christenmenschen« bietet einen Einblick in sein Menschenbild. Die philosophisch-ethische Perspektive ist für den Einsatz in der Oberstufe konzipiert, wo sie auch einen Hintergrund für das Zentralabiturthema im Fach Religion bietet.

Luminaries like Martin Luther King, Jr. urge that Black Americans love even those who hate them. This can look like a rejection of anger at racial injustice. We see this rejection, too, in the growing trend of characterizing social justice movements as radical hate groups, and people who get angry at injustice as bitter and unloving. Philosophers like Martha Nussbaum argue that anger is backward-looking, status focused, and retributive. Citing the life of the Prodigal Son, the victims of (...) the Charleston Church shooting, Gandhi, and King, she claims that we should choose love instead of anger – not only in our intimate relationships but also in the political realm. Buddhist monk and scholar, Śāntideva, argued that anger is an obstacle to love. Anger leads to suffering. Love frees us from suffering. All this makes an initially compelling case against anger at racial injustice. In addition, although philosophers Jeffrie Murphy and Antti Kauppinen argue that anger communicates self-respect and valuing, respectively––they make no connection between agape love and anger. In this essay I’ll show that the love King and others have in mind––agape love––is not only compatible with anger at hateful racists and complicit others, but finds valuable expression in such anger. (shrink)

This paper makes an argument for the democratic value of distrust. It begins by analyzing distrust, since distrust is not merely the negation of trust. The account that it develops is based primarily on Martin Luther King Jr.’s work in Why We Can’t Wait. On this view, distrust is the confident belief that another individual or group of individuals or an institution will not act justly or as justice requires. It is a narrow normative account of distrust, since (...) it concerns a specific normative task. Distinctions between vertical and horizontal distrust, as well as trust and agnostic trust are also discussed. This paper argues that distrust’s democratic value lies in its ability to secure democracy by protecting political minorities from having their voices ignored. As such, distrust can be viewed as a kind of Madisonian “check and balance” that works to prevent tyranny. Distrust also works to secure democracy by forging new or alternative forms of democratic participation. The main example discussed in this paper is King’s involvement in the Birmingham Campaign during the Black Civil Rights movement in America. In this case, King and his supporters’ distrust of fellow White citizens and political institutions led to alternative forms of political expression such as non-violent protests, boycotts, and other forms of civil disobedience, all of which led to greater racial justice by working to alleviate White tyranny. (shrink)

This paper uses Martin Luther and Mao Zedong's translation strategies to philosophize anew the dialectic between the national and the global in the history of revolutions. Luther and Mao each instigated a "revolution" by translating a universal faith into a vernacular; the end product in each case was the globalization of his vernacularized faith and the export of his local revolution all over the world. By vernacularizing a universal faith, Luther and Mao respectively inaugurated a new (...) national idiom, a new national identity and, in the case of Mao, founded a new nation. The far more intriguing phenomenon which I identify – and on which I seek to make my most original contributions is: Protestantism and Maoism developed global reach not despite, but because of, their insistence on a local translation-articulation of a universalist ideology. My paper attends to both the similarities and differences between Luther and Mao. (shrink)

The recent explosion of philosophical papers on Confederate and Colonialist statues centers on a central question: When, if ever, is it permissible to admire a person? This paper contends it’s not just Confederates and slavers whose reputations are on the line, but also pacifists like Martin Luther King, Jr., and Daisy Bates whose commitments to pacifism meant they were unwilling to save others using defensive violence, including others they talked into endangering themselves for the sake of racial equality. (...) Other things being equal, that’s gravely immoral if pacifism is false, and we shouldn’t admire people guilty of grave immorality. So, it appears that we shouldn’t admire Bates or King, which is counterintuitive. To solve this problem, I explore several possibilities: that only selective traits of Bates and King are admirable, that Bates and King are admirable despite their grave immorality, and that Bates and King are admirable by virtue of their integrity. However, each of these proposals fails: the first because it inadequately captures our moral phenomenology (we admire people, not just their traits), the second because it ignores the extent to which gravely immoral commitments are constitutive of a person’s moral character, and the third because we ought not to admire people for acting on their immoral beliefs. The paper concludes, first, that either pacifists like Bates and King aren’t admirable or they are, and the latter presupposes the truth of pacifism. Second, I borrow from Vanessa Carbonell’s ratcheting-up argument from moral sainthood to argue that pacifists like Bates and King provide epistemic defeaters to the objection that pacifism is unreasonably costly. Thus, not only are pacifists admirable only if they’re right—they are right. (shrink)

The debate between natural law and positivist law has been received much attention. Ronald Dworkin exposes the limitation of positivist law through the argument of hard cases. This argument is furthered strengthened when we apply the interpretation of Martin Luther King Jr and the voluntarist natural law tradition, and Lon Fuller’s ‘procedural view’ and the application of the ‘principles of legality’.

This article makes the case for the necessity of a multi-focal conception of violence in religion and peacebuilding. I first trace the emergence and development of the analytical concepts of structural and cultural violence in peace studies, demonstrating how these lenses both draw central insights from, but also differ from and improve upon, critical theory and reflexive sociology. I argue that addressing structural and cultural forms of violence are concerns as central as addressing direct (explicit, personal) forms of violence for (...) purposes of building just and sustainable peace. Moreover, religiously informed and/or motivated peacebuilders are especially well-appointed and equipped to identify and address violence in its structural and cultural manifestations. I the examine how concepts of structural and cultural violence, in effect, centrally inform the efforts of Martin Luther King and Cornel West to cultivate just and sustainable peace in a context as putatively peaceful and prosperous as the United States. (shrink)

This article exploits a core defect in the phenomenology of sensation and self. Although phenomenology has made great strides in redeeming the body from cognitive solipisisms that often follow short-sighted readings of Descartes and Kant, it has not grappled with the specific kind of self-reflexivity that emerges in the sense of taste with the thoroughness it deserves. This path is illuminated by the works of Martin Luther, Jean-Luc Marion, and Jacques Derrida as they attempt to think through the (...) specific phenomena accessible through the lips, tongue, and mouth. Their attempts are, in turn, supplemented with detours through Walter Benjamin, Hélène Cixous, and Friedrich Nietzsche. The paper draws attention to the German distinction between Geschmack and Kosten as well as the role taste may play in relation to faith, the call to love, justice, and messianism. The messiah of love and justice will have been that one who proclaims: taste the flesh. (shrink)

Martin Luther affirms his theological position by saying “Here I stand. I can do no other.” Supposing that Luther’s claim is true, he lacks alternative possibilities at the moment of choice. Even so, many libertarians have the intuition that he is morally responsible for his action. One way to make sense of this intuition is to assert that Luther’s action is indirectly free, because his action inherits its freedom and moral responsibility from earlier actions when he (...) had alternative possibilities and those earlier directly free actions formed him into the kind of person who must refrain from recanting. Surprisingly, libertarians have not developed a full account of indirectly free actions. I provide a more developed account. First, I explain the metaphysical nature of indirectly free actions such as Luther’s. Second, I examine the kind of metaphysical and epistemic connections that must occur between past directly free actions and the indirectly free action. Third, I argue that an attractive way to understand the kind of derivative moral responsibility at issue involves affirming the existence of resultant moral luck. (shrink)

Natural theology can be defined as an attempt of proving the existence of God through the observation of the natural world and the use of reason, without appealing to divine revelation. Many theologians seem to think that early Lutheranism completely rejected the possibility of natural theology, based largely on the view of Luther himself that the human nature has been totally corrupted by sin and can only learn to know God through faith. It was, however, neither the understanding of (...) Luther nor his successors to completely dismiss natural theology. Indeed, Luther is sure that "all men naturally understand and come to the conclusion that God is some kind of beneficent divine power." Surely, the natural knowledge acquired by reason is distorted by sin and is only " legal" knowledge, but this knowledge still reveals the existence of God and leads us to look for the saving knowledge that can only be attained by faith bestowed by God. (shrink)

Martin Luther King Jr. claimed that “the salvation of the world lies in the hands of the maladjusted”. I elaborate on King’s claim by focusing on the way in which we treat and understand ‘maladjustment’ that is responsive to severe trauma (e.g. PTSD that is a result of military combat or rape). Mental healthcare and our social attitudes about mental illness and disorder will prevent us from recognizing real injustice that symptoms of mental illness can be appropriately responding (...) to, unless we recognize that many emotional states (and not just beliefs!) that constitute those symptoms are warranted by the circumstances they are responsive to. I argue that there is a failure to distinguish between PTSD symptoms that are warranted emotional responses to trauma and those that are not. This results in us focusing our attention on “fixing” the agent internally, but not on fixing the world. It is only by centering questions of warrant that we will be able to understand and expose the relationship between agents’ internal mental states and their oppression. But we also need to ask when someone’s emotional response is unwarranted by their experience (as in the case of someone who develops PTSD after a non-traumatic event). If we fail to do this—as, I claim, both our mental healthcare and the broader social world fail to do—we treat warranted and unwarranted emotions as on a par. This undermines the epistemic judgment of the agent who has warranted PTSD symptoms, resulting in her failing to trust her evaluation of whether her emotional response to her own trauma is warranted by that trauma, and thus failing to recognize her own oppression. (shrink)

Nang masakop ng Estados Unidos ang Pilipinas, dumating sa bansa ang isa pang uri ng Kristiyanismo na iba sa bitbit ng mga Espanyol-ang Protestantismo (na nagsimulang isilang noong ika-16 na dantaon sa Europa sa pamumuno nina Luther, Calvin, at Zwingli). Salaysay ni T. Valentino Sitoy (1989, iii, 7-11), 1899 unang dumating ang mga misyonerong Protestante sa Pilipinas, na kinabibilangan ng mga Presbyterian, Baptist, at Methodist. Kalaunan ay sinundan ito ng pagdating ng mga Episcopalian, Seventh-Day Adventist, United Brethren, Disciples, (...) Christian and Missionary Alliance, at iba pa. Ilan sa mga ito ay nagsama-sama upang mabuo ang Evangelical Union. Hinati nila ang Pilipinas sa iba't ibang probinsya ng mission fields (tulad ng ginawa dati ng mga Heswita, Rekoletos, Augustino, Pransiskano, at Dominikano), upang hindi sila magkaagawan sa populasyon na babahaginan ng ebanghelyo. (shrink)

This book tells the story of modern ethics, namely the story of a discourse that, after the Renaissance, went through a methodological revolution giving birth to Grotius’s and Pufendorf’s new science of natural law, leaving room for two centuries of explorations of the possible developments and implications of this new paradigm, up to the crisis of the Eighties of the eighteenth century, a crisis that carried a kind of mitosis, the act of birth of both basic paradigms of the two (...) following centuries: Kantian ethics and utilitarianism. The new science of natural law carried a fresh start for ethics, resulting from a mixture of the Old and the New. It was, as suggested by Schneewind, an attempt at rescuing the content of Scholastic and Stoic doctrines on a new methodological basis. The former was the claim of existence of objective and universal moral laws; the latter was the self-aware attempt at justifying a minimal kernel of such laws facing skeptical doubt. What Bentham and Kant did was precisely carrying this strategy further on, even if restructuring it each of them around one out of two alternative basic claims. The nineteenth- and twentieth-century critics of the Enlightenment attacked both not on their alleged failure in carrying out their own projects, but precisely on having adopted Grotius’s and Pufendorf’s project. What counter-enlightenment has been unable to spell out is which alternative project could be carried out facing the modern condition of pluralism, while on the contrary, if we takes a closer look at developments in twentieth-century ethics or at on-going discussions on practical issues, we might feel inclined to believe that Grotius’s and Pufendorf’s project is as up-to-date as ever. -/- Table of Contents -/- Preface I. Fathers of the Reformation and Schoolmen 1.1. Luther: passive justice and the good deeds; 1.2. Calvin: voluntarism and predestination; 1.3. Baroque Scholasticism; 1.4. Casuistry and Institutiones morales -/- II Neo-Platonists, neo-Stoics, neo-Sceptics 2.1. Aristotelian, neo-Platonic, neo-Epicurean and neo-Cynic Humanists; 2.2. Oeconomica and the art of living; 2.3. Neo-Stoics; 2.4. Neo-Sceptics; 2.5. Moralistic literature -/- III Neo-Augustinians 3.l. The Jansenists on natura lapsa, sufficient grace, pure love; 3.2. Nicole on the impossibility of self-knowledge; 3.3. Nicole on self-love and charity; 3.4. Nicole against civic virtue, for Christian civility; 3.5. Malebranche on general laws and necessary evil; 3.6. Malebranche on Neo-Augustinianism and Platonism. -/- IV Grotius, Pufendorf and the new moral science 4.1. Grotius against Aristotle and the sceptics; 4.2. Mersenne and Gassendi; 4.3. Descartes on ethics as the last branch of philosophy’s tree; 4.4. Hobbes on scepticism and the new moral science; 4.5. Spinoza on the new moral science as a descriptive science;4.6. Locke on voluntarism and probabilism; 4.7. Pufendorf on natural law as an exact science; 4.8. Pufendorf on physical and moral entities; 10. Pufendorf on self-preservation -/- V The empiricist version of the new moral science: from Cumberland to Paley 5.1. Cumberland against Hobbesian voluntarism; 5.2. Cumberland and theological consequentialism; 5.3. Cumberland on universal benevolence and self-love; 5.4. Shaftesbury on the moral sense; 5.5. Hutcheson on natural law and moral faculties; 5.6. Gay, Brown, Paley and theological consequentialism. -/- VI The rationalist version of the new moral science: from Cudworth to Price 6.1. The Cambridge Platonists; 6.2. Shaftesbury on the moral sense; 6.3. Butler and a third way between voluntarism and scepticism; 6.4. Price and the rational character of moral truths; -/- VII Leibniz’s compromise between the new moral science and Aristotelianism 1.Leibniz against voluntarism; 2.Leibniz against the division between the physical and the moral good; 3.Leibniz on la place d’autrui and theological consequentialism; 4.Thomasius, Wolff, Crusius -/- VIII French eighteenth-century philosophers without the new moral science 8.1. The genealogy of our ideas of virtue and vice; 8.2. Maupertuis and moral arithmetic 8.3. The philosophes and the harmony of interests; 8.4. Rousseau on corruption, self-love, and virtue; 8.5. Sade on the merits of vice -/- IX Experimental moral science: Hume and Adam Smith 9.1. Mandeville’s paradox; 9.2. Hutcheson on the law of nature and moral faculties; 9.3. Hume on experimental moral philosophy and the intermediate principles; 9.4. Hume’s Law; 9.5. Hume on the fellow-feeling; 9.6. Hume on natural and artificial virtues and disinterested pleasure for utility; 9.7. Adam Smith’s anti-realist metaethics; 9.8. Adam Smith on self-deception and the paradox of happiness; 9.9. Adam Smith on sympathy and the impartial spectator; 9.10. Adam Smith on the twofold criterion for moral judgement and its paradox; 9.11. Reid on the refutation of scepticism and the self-evidence of duty -/- X Kantian ethics 10.1. Kantian metaethics: moral epistemology; 10.2. Kantian metaethics: moral ontology; 10.3. Kantian metaethics: moral psychology; 10.4. Kantian normative ethics; 10.5. Kant on the impracticability of applied ethics; 10.6. Kantian moral anthropology; 10.7. Civilisation and moralisation; 10.8. Theology on a moral basis and the origins of evil; 10.9. Fichte and the transformation of theoretical philosophy into practical philosophy XI Bentham and utilitarianism 11.1. Bentham’s linguistic theory; 11.2. Bentham’s moral ontology, psychology, and theory of action; 11.3. The principle of greatest happiness; 11.4. The critique of religious ethics; 11.5. The new morality; 11.6. Interest and duty; 11.7. Virtues; 11.8. Private ethics and legislation -/- XII Followers of the Enlightenment: liberal Judaism and Liberal Theology 12.1. Mendelssohn; 12.2. Salomon Maimon; 12.3. Haskalā and liberal Judaism; 12.4. Liberal Theology. -/- XIII Counter-Enlighteners 13.1.Romanticism and the fulfilment of individuality as the Summum Bonum; 13.2. Hegel on history as the making of liberty; 13.3. Hegel on the unhappy consciousness and the beautiful soul; 13.4. Hegel on Morality and Sittlichkeit; 13.5. Marx on ideology, alienation, and praxis; 13.6. Schopenhauer on compassion; 13.7. Kierkegaard on faith beyond ethics. -/- XIV Followers of the Enlightenment: intuitionists and utilitarian 14.1 Whewell‘s criticism of utilitarianism; 14.2 Whewell on morality and the philosophy of morality; 14.3 Whewell on the Supreme Norm; 14.4 Whewell on the conflict between duties; 14.5 Mill and the proof of the principle of utility; 14.6 Mill’s eudemonistic utilitarianism; 14.7 Mill on rules -/- XV Followers of the Enlightenment: neo-Kantians and positivists 15.1. French spiritualism; 15.2. Neo-Kantians: the Marburg school; 15.3. Neo-Kantians: the Marburg school; 15.4. Comte’s positivism and the invention of altruism; 15.5. Social Darwinism; 15.6. Wundt and an ethic of humankind -/- XVI Post-enlighteners: Sidgwick 16.1. Criticism of intuitionism; 16.2. On ethical egoism; 16.3. Criticism of utilitarianism -/- XVII Post-enlighteners: Durkheim 17.1. Sociology as physics of customs; 17.2. Morality as physics of customs and as practical science; 17.3. On Kantian ethics and utilitarianism; 17.4. The variability of moralities;17.5. Social solidarity as end and justification of morality; 17.6. Secular morality as “sociodicy”; XVIII Post-enlighteners: Nietzsche 18.1. On the Dionysian; 18.2. On the deconstruction of the world of values 18.3 On the twofold genealogy of moralities; 18.4. On ascetics and nihilism; 18.5. Normative ethics of self-fulfilment -/- Bibliography / Index of names / Index of concepts -/- . (shrink)

After being nominated by Martin Luther King, Jr. for the Nobel Peace Prize, the “gentle and fearless” Vietnamese Buddhism monk Thich Nhat Hanh established a worldwide movement called the Order of Interbeing, which deals with major human conflicts with ancient Buddhist teachings. By drawing from original Buddhist texts, Hanh has created an authentic type of religious activism based on mindfulness of our connectedness that has real potential for peace, because of its twin focus on resolution and prevention. In (...) this paper, I discuss how the Order has come into existence, its framework, its cause, how it educates its members, and how effectively it is creating a culture of peace by examining the history of the Order, reading Hanh’s wisdom books and poetry, analyzing its structure, and interviewing a local Sangha on their mystical experiences. I argue that Thich Nhat Hanh’s engaged Buddhism has the potential to make a significant impact on mankind. (shrink)

This study argues for the historical existence of Jesus of Nazareth as a radical Jewish pacifist who angered both the orthodox religious establishment and those who advocated violent insurrection against the Romans. The author asserts that Jesus' views were based on belief in a non-retributive, omnibenevolent God, challenging not only the Mosaic Law but assumptions about eternal punishment and the divine sanction of the state and its retributive institutions of war and punishment. The volume also interprets Paul as being the (...) first Christian revisionist. As a result, orthodox Christianity, through the influence of Paul (and thus Augustine, Aquinas, Luther, and Calvin), has mistakenly promoted the "just war" and "divinely ordained state" doctrines in the name of a thinker whose conclusions were in the opposite direction. (shrink)

Moral philosophers have defended anger as an important part of our moral lives. In spite of these defenses, skeptics have nonetheless argued that it would be better all things considered to get over anger to the extent that we can. They will often point to moral exemplars like Martin Luther King, Jr. or Gandhi to show both (a) that we can successfully overcome our feelings of anger and (b) that we would be morally better off doing so. In (...) this chapter, I argue against this aspiration. Those who advocate for such an aspiration fail to recognize that getting over anger would require us to radically reshape our moral psychology. I argue that feelings of anger are more central to our moral emotional lives than skeptics realize and that they cannot be removed without altering other valuable moral commitments. (shrink)

Collected and edited by Noah Levin -/- Table of Contents: -/- UNIT ONE: INTRODUCTION TO CONTEMPORARY ETHICS: TECHNOLOGY, AFFIRMATIVE ACTION, AND IMMIGRATION 1 The “Trolley Problem” and Self-Driving Cars: Your Car’s Moral Settings (Noah Levin) 2 What is Ethics and What Makes Something a Problem for Morality? (David Svolba) 3 Letter from the Birmingham City Jail (Martin Luther King, Jr) 4 A Defense of Affirmative Action (Noah Levin) 5 The Moral Issues of Immigration (B.M. Wooldridge) 6 The Ethics (...) of our Digital Selves (Noah Levin) -/- UNIT TWO: TORTURE, DEATH, AND THE “GREATER GOOD” 7 The Ethics of Torture (Martine Berenpas) 8 What Moral Obligations do we have (or not have) to Impoverished Peoples? (B.M. Wooldridge) 9 Euthanasia, or Mercy Killing (Nathan Nobis) 10 An Argument Against Capital Punishment (Noah Levin) 11 Common Arguments about Abortion (Nathan Nobis & Kristina Grob) 12 Better (Philosophical) Arguments about Abortion (Nathan Nobis & Kristina Grob) -/- UNIT THREE: PERSONS, AUTONOMY, THE ENVIRONMENT, AND RIGHTS 13 Animal Rights (Eduardo Salazar) 14 John Rawls and the “Veil of Ignorance” (Ben Davies) 15 Environmental Ethics: Climate Change (Jonathan Spelman) 16 Rape, Date Rape, and the “Affirmative Consent” Law in California (Noah Levin) 17 The Ethics of Pornography: Deliberating on a Modern Harm (Eduardo Salazar) 18 The Social Contract (Thomas Hobbes) -/- UNIT FOUR: HAPPINESS 19 Is Pleasure all that Matters? Thoughts on the “Experience Machine” (Prabhpal Singh) 20 Utilitarianism (J.S. Mill) 21 Utilitarianism: Pros and Cons (B.M. Wooldridge) 22 Existentialism, Genetic Engineering, and the Meaning of Life: The Fifths (Noah Levin) 23 The Solitude of the Self (Elizabeth Cady Stanton) 24 Game Theory, the Nash Equilibrium, and the Prisoner’s Dilemma (Douglas E. Hill) -/- UNIT FIVE: RELIGION, LAW, AND ABSOLUTE MORALITY 25 The Myth of Gyges and The Crito (Plato) 26 God, Morality, and Religion (Kristin Seemuth Whaley) 27 The Categorical Imperative (Immanuel Kant) 28 The Virtues (Aristotle) 29 Beyond Good and Evil (Friedrich Nietzsche) 30 Other Moral Theories: Subjectivism, Relativism, Emotivism, Intuitionism, etc. (Jan F. Jacko). (shrink)

Esta edição contém a única transcrição estudantil sobrevivente das Lições de Metafísica de Kant da década de 1770. A Lição foi ministrada o mais tardar no inverno de 1779/80 e, portanto, antes mesmo da publicação da Crítica da Razão Pura (1781). Um exceção é, contudo, a parte sobre a ontologia que seguramente se remonta a uma Lição que Kant ministrou depois de 1781. Estas transcrições de Lições são de valor inestimável para a história do desenvolvimento da filosofia de Kant e, (...) em especial, para a gênese de sua Crítica da Razão Pura . Elas representam também um complemento importante para suas outras Lições, como por exemplo, as de antropologia, nas quais Kant também se ocupou com as questões da psicologia empírica e racional. É interessante observar que Kant se serve de métodos distintos, nas Lições de Antropologia e de Metafísica, para demonstrar a substancialidade e a imortalidade da alma. Embora Kant ainda leve a doutrina da alma da psicologia racional muito a sério na Metafísica-Pölitz, ele rejeitará de fato suas pretensões de conhecimento pouco tempo depois na Crítica na seção sobre os paralogismos da doutrina pura da alma. Aquele que deseja se aprofundar na filosofia de Kant e conhecer seu contexto histórico-filosófico não pode deixar de ler as Lições de Metafísica-Pölitz. Heiner F. Klemme Martin-Luther-Universität Halle-Wittenberg. (shrink)

No centro da filosofia moral de Kant está sem dúvida sua doutrina do imperativo categórico. Por esse motivo não é de se surpreender que a Fundamentação da Metafísica dos Costumes (1785), na qual Kant explica, em detalhes, essa doutrina pela primeira vez, tenha sido o foco da atenção por décadas. Mas há alguns anos é observável uma significativa mudança na literatura que é univocamente bem vinda: ao lado da pesquisa das Doutrinas da Virtude e do Direito publicadas por Kant nos (...) anos noventa do século 18, agora também são intensamente estudadas suas perspectivas filosófico-morais desenvolvidas antes de 1781. Nesse sentido assume uma posição de destaque o manuscrito estudantil de uma lição de ética ministrada no meio dos anos 70, que é publicada aqui, em língua portuguesa, pela primeira vez em uma tradução comentada. Ainda hoje, esta lição serve como uma introdução à ética de Kant, muito embora pareça divergir, em alguns aspectos, da doutrina crítica do imperativo categórico. As Lições de Ética são um „trabalho em andamento“. Por um lado, somos capazes de assistir Kant "pensando" e compreender como ele se reporta ao livro de Alexander Baumgarten sobre os Príncípios da Metafísica Prática (Initia philosophiae practicae primae, 1760). E, por outro lado, somos capazes de vivenciar como ele desenvolve suas próprias perspectivas filosófico-morais em contraste a Baumgarten. Para todos que se interessam pela filosofia moral de Kant e pela história da ética na época da Aufklärung, o estudo desse manuscrito é indispensável. -/- Heiner F. Klemme (Martin Luther Universität - Halle-Wittenberg) . (shrink)

A political philosopher dissects the duties and dilemmas of the unelected spokesperson, from Martin Luther King, Jr., to Greta Thunberg. -/- Political representation is typically assumed to be the purview of formal institutions and elected officials. But many of the people who represent us are not senators or city councilors—think of Martin Luther King, Jr., or Malala Yousafzai or even a neighbor who speaks up at a school board meeting. Informal political representatives are in fact ubiquitous, (...) often powerful, and some bear enormous responsibility. In Speaking for Others, political philosopher Wendy Salkin develops the first systematic conceptual and moral analysis of informal political representation. -/- Salkin argues that informal representation can be a political lifeline, particularly for oppressed and marginalized groups that are denied representation in formal political institutions. Yet informal political representatives exert outsized influence over the ways these groups’ interests are understood by the public, without the represented having much recourse to hold them accountable. And many informal political representatives are selected not by the groups they represent but by outsiders, sticking these groups with representatives they would not choose but cannot shake. The role of informal political representatives is therefore fraught with moral questions. What exactly are their duties and to whom are they owed? Should they be members of the groups they represent? When is informal representation permissible and when is it best avoided? -/- Informal political representation is taking place all around us. In fact, you yourself may be an informal political representative without knowing it. Speaking for Others explores the tensions central to this pervasive yet underexamined practice, bringing light to both its perils and its promise. (shrink)

"Ethical Explorations: Moral Dilemmas in a Universe of Possibilities" by Brendan Shea is an open access textbook that provides a comprehensive study of ethical philosophy. Shea makes it his task to chart the sprawling landscape of moral thought from ancient times to the present, employing a straightforward, easily accessible style. -/- In the book, each chapter addresses a distinct ethical theory. Shea discusses everything from Plato's allegorical Cave to contemporary issues in bioethics. The text features relatable narratives, clear explanations of (...) core concepts, thought-provoking questions, and handy glossaries to help readers grasp the subject matter. -/- Among the topics, you'll find the principles of utilitarianism through the adventures of a princess, an exploration of duty via a story about a golem, and a look at natural law theory through an engaging science-fiction tale. Contemporary themes also make an appearance, including discussions on Marxism, Nietzsche's radical ideas, Simone de Beauvoir's intersection of feminism and existentialism, and racial theories from W.E.B. Du Bois and Martin Luther King. -/- As an open access (CC-BY) textbook, "Ethical Explorations" is freely available to everyone, making the study of moral philosophy accessible to all. It's a tool that gives its readers the means to wrestle with ethical questions in an ever-changing world. (shrink)

In her paper "(White) Tyranny and the Democratic Value of Distrust," Meena Krishnamurthy argues that distrust has a political value that has often been overlooked by democratic theorists. She pursues this argument by developing an account of distrust from Martin Luther King Jr. and exploring the role that King's distrust played in the Black Civil Rights Movement. In this discussion note, I argue that an alternative account of distrust from recent work by Katherine Hawley can better capture distrust (...) 's democratic value, and moreover might reveal how that value is noninstrumental, in contrast with the contingent and instrumental value granted to distrust on Krishnamurthy's account. (shrink)

I argue that while moral exemplars are useful, we must be careful in our use of them. I first describe forgiveness exemplars that are often used to persuade victims to forgive such as Nelson Mandela, Martin Luther King Jr., and Jesus of Nazareth. I also explain how, for Kant, highlighting these figures as moral exemplars can be useful. I then explain two kinds of rhetorical strategies that are used when attempting to convince victims to forgive. Last, I explain (...) (a la Kant) how the use of exemplars does not empower but instead disempowers victims. My overall claim is that using exemplars to persuade victims to forgive is problematic. It is best if we rely on decisive reasons to forgive instead of focusing on people who have forgiven. (shrink)

This book’s goal is to give an intellectual context for the following manuscript. -/- Includes bibliographical references and an index. Pages 1-123. 1). Philosophy. 2). Metaphysics. 3). Philosophy, German. 4). Philosophy, German -- 18th century. 5). Philosophy, German and Greek Influences Metaphysics. I. Hegel, Georg Wilhelm Friedrich -- 1770-1831 -- Das älteste Systemprogramm des deutschen Idealismus. II. Rosenzweig, Franz, -- 1886-1929. III. Schelling, Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph von, -- 1775-1854. IV. Hölderlin, Friedrich, -- 1770-1843. V. Ferrer, Daniel Fidel, 1952-. [Translation from (...) German into English of the-- Das älteste Systemprogramm des deutschen Idealismus.]. -/- Note: the manuscript is in the handwriting of G.W.F. Hegel, but the actual authorship is disputed. No date is given. Franz Rosenzweig made up the title as it is known today. He published the text in 1917. At that time, F. Rosenzweig thought F.W.J. Schelling was the author. No one has read this book for errors. As always, any errors, mistakes or oversights etc. are mine alone. Given a couple more years, I could improve this book. This is a philosophical translation and not a philological translation. Martin Luther who did the famous early translation of the Bible into German wrote in a letter, “If anyone does not like my translation, they can ignore it… (September 15, 1530)”. There are no ‘correct’ translations. Some are just better than other translations. -/- The Oldest Systematic Program of German Idealism. The German title is: Das Älteste Systemprogramm Des Deutschen Idealismus. This title was made up by Franz Rosenzweig in 1917, when he first published the manuscript. He found the manuscript in the Royal Library in Berlin in 1913. The manuscript suggested date is around 1796 and was done by handwriting research. However, the manuscript is not dated. The Prussian State Library auctioned in March 1913 from the auction of the house Liepmannssohn in Berlin a single sheet on the front and back with Hegel's cursive handwriting. The manuscript was lost during WWII. But Dieter Henrich found it again in 1979 in the “Biblioteka Jagiellonska” in Krakow (Poland), where it is today. Address: Jagiellonian Library, Jagiellonian University, al. Mickiewicza 22, 30-059 Cracow, Poland. Later research suggests that manuscript had come from the estate of Hegel’s student Friedrich Christoph Förster (1791-1868). He was one of the editors of Hegel’s posthumous works and most likely had access to a number of Hegel’s manuscripts. This text actually being one of them. Hegel traveled around Bohemia with Marie and Friedrich Christoph Förster around the year 1820-21 (see Klaus Vieweg). -/- Philosophical mystery -- who is the author or authors of this text? -/- Take a plunge into the deep and cold waters. Maybe a quagmire or quandary, but decidedly interesting. This project is to contextualize an old handwritten manuscript which is about 225 years old. The actual author is a mystery. I offer my own assessment. You can make your own assessments. The mystery has continued to unfold since 1917. There is plenty to read. Otherwise, think about the authorship and read more of the German philosophers and authors from this period and enjoy the depth of thinking and philosophizing. On one hand, there is just the sheer fun in the puzzle of the authorship questions; and on the other hand, these are the alluring thoughts that lead to the nascent stage of German Idealism and our intellectual heritage. There is no end to the accolades for this group of philosophers. A heritage that we still hear in in our attempts to move forward into our future. -/- Do your own astute exegesis (ἐξήγησις) as all paths are still open. Let your thought take to the wings of what is called thinking with this text. Critical encounters (Auseinandersetzung, or a Gegenüberstellung) with at least: Friedrich Hölderlin (1770-1843) Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph Schelling (1775-1854), and Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (1770-1831) --- starts here! German Idealism. We are not going to study this situation endlessly, instead we make some broad strokes and provide you a general context. You are allowed to read between the lines too. Goal: to understand the overall affinity and differences between the intellectuals of this period in German history; and to come to grips with this demanding text within its large scholarly context in the last 100 years. There are no final answers. (shrink)

I examined the dance between harmony and chaos, particularly through the lens of sympathetic knowledge, the value of all experiences, and the necessity of a leap of love for true care and understanding. Drawing from the philosophies of Jane Addams and Martin Luther King Jr. This paper navigates the complex interplay between individual experiences and societal structures, showing the importance of how empathetic engagement and a commitment to understanding other perspectives are crucial for cultivating a harmonious society. The (...) discussion of the UAW strike served as a modern embodiment of these principles, showing how collective action and empathy can lead to substantial societal change. This essay has not only argued that a harmonious society is attainable but has also underscored the importance of active participation, mutual understanding and love as foundational pillars in this pursuit. By recognizing the inherent value in every individual’s experience and choosing a path of empathy and love, even in the face of adversity, we take significant steps towards dismantling systems of injustice and fostering a more equitable and harmonious world. This is not a utopian dream but a tangible goal that requires ongoing effort, understanding, and, most importantly, a leap of love. (shrink)

This paper explores the difference it makes to incorporate the multi-focal conception of violence that has emerged in peace studies over recent decades into the discourse of non-violent direct action (Galtung 1969, 1990; Uvin 2003; Springs 2015b). I argue that non-violent action can and should incorporate and deploy the distinctions between direct, cultural, and structural forms of violence. On one hand, these analytical distinctions can facilitate forms of self-reflexive critical analysis that guard against certain violent conceptual and practical implications of (...) non-violence, however inadvertent those may be. At the same time, these lenses help reconceptualise non-violent action in ways that open up an array of strategies and tools not previously prevalent among activists committed to non-violence. Non-violent action may itself be either complicit in, or might be enabled to illuminate and cut against, forms of violence that infuse social, political, and economic structures (i.e. structural violence). Appeals to non-violence and the actions with which they interweave may be complicit in, or might be enabled to illuminate and cut against, religious, ideological, aesthetic, and even scientific understandings and conceptual frames that underpin and support structural violence (i.e. cultural violence). In each case, non- violence must be critically examined with all these possibilities in mind. I first define and contextualize a multidimensional account of violence in terms of direct, structural, and cultural violence. I then consider two examples of how it challenges thinking about non-violence. (shrink)

This Guide is designed to restore the theological background that informs Kant’s treatment of grace in Religion to its rightful place. This background is essential not only to understand the nature of Kant’s overall project in this book, namely, to determine the “association” or “union” between Christianity (as a historical faith) and rational religion, but also to dispel the impression of “internal contradictions” and conundrums” that contemporary interpreters associate with Kant’s treatment of grace and moral regeneration. That impression, we argue, (...) is the result of entrenched interpretative habits that can be traced back to Karl Barth’s reading of the text. Once we realize that such a reading rests on a mistake, much of the anxiety and confusion that plague current discussions on these issues can be put to rest. (shrink)

To Shape a New World, ShelbyTommie and TerryBrandon. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2018. Pp. x + 449.

This article starts from the assumption that there is a connection between art and language and responsibility. What is it based on? It follows on from the research of the Hamburg Circle in the 1920s by Ernst Cassirer and Aby M. Warburg, and was strengthened in the 2000s by Hartmut Böhme. Their joint starting point is the emotional life of human beings. Thus, they assume that already the perception is shaped by it and can be increased in rituals. Comparably hardly (...) noticed by us, it continues to have an effect in art and language and thus influences the recipient. From this derives the demand that both the one who speaks and the one who is creatively active bears responsibility for his or her doing. With the knowledge of the effect of art and language, however, the recipient is also required to take responsibility for his actions influenced by it. The article aims to show this connection, which is deeply rooted in the nature of human beings. -/- The article was originally published in German. It has now been translated by the author with the kind permission of the Evangelical Church in Germany. Additions were made only in the notes and in the bibliography. The concept for the text goes back to a conference of the Evangelical Academy of the Martin Luther City of Wittenberg (Saxony). On this basis, the author was invited to contribute to the publication of the Evangelical Church in Germany (EKD) Mitteilungen—Zur Erneuerung evangelischer Predigtkultur (Kirche im Aufbruch 5), edited by Kathrin Oxen and Dietrich Sagert. Leipzig: Evangelische Verlagsanstalt, 2013. The selection of the text for this issue of Art Style Magazine was based on one of the fundamental ideals of Metropolis, which sees itself as democratic and based on the responsibility of each member in dealing with art and language. (shrink)

In the world of Avatar: The Last Airbender (ATLA) and The Legend of Korra (LOK) —let’s call it the Bending World—some people (“benders”) are endowed with telekinetic superpowers to maneuver surrounding objects without physical interaction, by mentally steering (“bending”) one of the four classical “elements of nature” composing the objects: air, fire, water, and earth. Perhaps, in a world where the fundamental laws of nature are radically different from those of our world, the fundamental conditions and manifestations of politics should (...) be radically different too. That, of course, is not to deny that political bodies familiar to us are depicted in ATLA and LOK: tribes, monarchies, autonomous townships, city-states, loose federations, colonial empires, and democracies. Despite those familiar depictions, however, it’s worth contemplating how the existence of supernatural power might fundamentally alter the norms and rationales of politics—and how it might in turn help us better understand our own political reality. (shrink)

In this chapter, I approach the subject of peace by way of Andrew Fiala’s pioneering, synthetic work on “practical pacifism.” One of Fiala’s articles on the subject of peace is entitled “Radical Forgiveness and Human Justice”—and if one were to replace “Radical Forgiveness” with “Peace,” this would be a fair title for my chapter. In fact, Fiala himself explicitly makes a connection in the article between radical forgiveness and peace. Also in support of my project, Fiala’s article names four of (...) the six historical figures who are central to my chapter, namely Marcus Aurelius, King, Arendt, and Nietzsche. Moreover, Fiala also insists there “forgiveness must be held in creative tension with justice,” and it is this very tension that forms the basis of my new conception of socially-just peace. To wit, I propose that socially-just peace is lovingly generous reimagining (peace) through intuitively self-overcoming tension (social justice). (shrink)

Across almost a decade, Desmond Tutu, Anglican cleric and chairman of South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission, supported a model of civil resistance against the apartheid regime based solely on religious argument. Tutu is one of what Appleby (2000) calls the “religious militants for peace”: people of faith who use religious arguments to buttress resistance against unjust regimes and to support vital political change with regard to rights and justice. Yet the employment of religious arguments to justify political action seems (...) to contradict the liberal democratic requirements of public reason, particularly the duty of liberal citizens to provide reasons that others could reasonably endorse. If “religious militants” violate their duty of civility by appealing to their comprehensive doctrines, should liberal democracy exclude this form of religiously founded dissent as being unreasonable? Or, rather, should liberal democracy embrace and support the efforts of “religious militants” to enhance and/or restore political justice? (shrink)

Nicholas of Cusa (1401-1464) was active during the Renaissance, developing adventurous ideas even while serving as a churchman. The religious issues with which he engaged – spiritual, apocalyptic and institutional – were to play out in the Reformation. These essays reflect the interests of Cusanus but also those of Gerald Christianson, who has studied church history, the Renaissance and the Reformation. The book places Nicholas into his times but also looks at his later reception. The first part addresses institutional issues, (...) including Schism, conciliarism, indulgences and the possibility of dialogue with Muslims. The second treats theological and philosophical themes, including nominalism, time, faith, religious metaphor, and prediction of the end times. (shrink)

I argue against pessimistic readings of the Buddhist tradition on which unawakened beings invariably have lives not worth living due to a preponderance of suffering (duḥkha) over well-being.

Maximize Expected Choiceworthiness (MEC) is a theory of decision-making under moral uncertainty. It says that we ought to handle moral uncertainty in the way that Expected Value Theory (EVT) handles descriptive uncertainty. MEC inherits from EVT the problem of fanaticism. Roughly, a decision theory is fanatical when it requires our decision-making to be dominated by low-probability, high-payoff options. Proponents of MEC have offered two main lines of response. The first is that MEC should simply import whatever are the best solutions (...) to fanaticism on offer in decision theory. The second is to propose statistical normalization as a novel solution on behalf of MEC. This paper argues that the first response is open to serious doubt and that the second response fails. As a result, MEC appears significantly less plausible when compared to competing accounts of decision-making under moral uncertainty, which are not fanatical. (shrink)

Non-Archimedean population axiologies – also known as lexical views – claim (i) that a sufficient number of lives at a very high positive welfare level would be better than any number of lives at a very low positive welfare level and/or (ii) that a sufficient number of lives at a very low negative welfare level would be worse than any number of lives at a very high negative welfare level. Such axiologies are popular because they can avoid the (Negative) Repugnant (...) Conclusion and satisfy the adequacy conditions given in the central impossibility result in population axiology due to Gustaf Arrhenius. I provide a novel argument against them which appeals to the way that good and bad lives can intuitively outweigh one another. (shrink)

This article considers the contemporary effective altruism (EA) movement from a classical Indian Buddhist perspective. Following barebones introductions to EA and to Buddhism (sections one and two, respectively), section three argues that core EA efforts, such as those to improve global health, end factory farming, and safeguard the long-term future of humanity, are futile on the Buddhist worldview. For regardless of the short-term welfare improvements that effective altruists impart, Buddhism teaches that all unenlightened beings will simply be reborn upon their (...) deaths back into the round of rebirth (samsāra), which is held to be undesirable due to the preponderance of duhkha (unsatisfactoriness, dis-ease, suffering) over well-being that characterizes unenlightened existence. This is the samsāric futility problem. Although Buddhists and effective altruists disagree about what ultimately helps sentient beings, section four suggests that Buddhist-EA dialogue nonetheless generates mutually-instructive insights. Buddhists – including contemporaries, such as those involved in Socially Engaged Buddhism – might take from EA a greater focus on explicit prioritization research, which seeks knowledge of how to do the most good we can, given our finite resources. EA, for its part, has at least two lessons to learn. First, effective altruists have tended to assume that the competing accounts of welfare converge in their practical implications. The Buddhist conception of the pinnacle of welfare as a state free from duhkha and, correspondingly, the Buddhist account of the path that leads to this state weigh against this assumption. Second, contrasting Buddhist with effective altruist priorities shows that descriptive matters of cosmology, ontology, and metaphysics can have decisive practical implications. If EA wants to give a comprehensive answer to its guiding question – “how can we do the most good?” – it must argue for, rather than merely assume, the truth of secular naturalism. (shrink)

This dissertation aims to revive wave theory in the philosophy of sound. Wave theory identifies sounds with compression waves. Despite its wide acceptance in the scientific community as the default position, many philosophers have rejected wave theory and opted for different versions of distal theory instead. According to this current majority view, a sound has its stationary location at its source. I argue against this and other alternative philosophical theories of sound and develop wave theory into a more defensible form. (...) Philosophers of sound tend to emphasise how sounds are experienced to be in their arguments. Most often, it is assumed that that which appears to be a distally located bearer of auditory properties in an auditory experience is a sound. Chapter 1 argues that if this distal entity is the sound source instead, many of the existing theories of sound will be severely affected. Chapter 2 discusses auditory perception and criticises the common assumption that we hear non-sound entities in virtue of hearing sounds. I show that this assumption begs the question against certain theories of sound and that the contrary view that sound sources can be directly heard is more plausible. If sound sources can be directly heard, then features commonly attributed to sounds based on auditory experiences might rather be features of sound sources. I examine eight of such features in Chapter 3. Only four of them survive. Chapters 4 and 5 review the existing theories of sound. After a taxonomy of existing theories of sound, each theory is criticised one-by-one. Some of them are problematic precisely because they rely on the implausible assumption that that which appears to be distally located in an auditory experience is a sound rather than a sound source. Lastly, Chapter 6 focuses on wave theory. It begins with two positive arguments for wave theory in general, followed by my replies to two common objections in the literature. I then move on to develop my version of wave theory. There are two core aspects of my view. The first one is a metaphysics of compression waves; the second is an account of what it is to hear compression waves. After comparing my view with a similar theory, I demonstrate the explanatory power of my view in two steps. First, the eight commonly accepted features of sounds examined in Chapter 3 are revisited. It turns out that my view can accommodate all of them. Second, explanations for four special sound-related phenomena are offered at the end of the chapter. I conclude in the last chapter with the suggestion that, as a philosopher, the best way to defend wave theory is to offer a better understanding of auditory perception which explains how compression waves are experienced. (shrink)

According to the principle of Conjunction Closure, if one has justification for believing each of a set of propositions, one has justification for believing their conjunction. The lottery and preface paradoxes can both be seen as posing challenges for Closure, but leave open familiar strategies for preserving the principle. While this is all relatively well-trodden ground, a new Closure-challenging paradox has recently emerged, in two somewhat different forms, due to Backes :3773–3787, 2019a) and Praolini :715–726, 2019). This paradox synthesises elements (...) of the lottery and the preface and is designed to close off the familiar Closure-preserving strategies. By appealing to a normic theory of justification, I will defend Closure in the face of this new paradox. Along the way I will draw more general conclusions about justification, normalcy and defeat, which bear upon what Backes :2877–2895, 2019b) has dubbed the ‘easy defeat’ problem for the normic theory. (shrink)

An ethical theory is alienating if accepting the theory inhibits the agent from fitting participation in some normative ideal, such as some ideal of integrity, friendship, or community. Many normative ideals involve non-consequentialist behavior of some form or another. If such ideals are normatively authoritative, they constitute counterexamples to consequentialism unless their authority can be explained or explained away. We address a range of attempts to avoid such counterexamples and argue that consequentialism cannot by itself account for the normative authority (...) of all plausible such ideals. At best, consequentialism can find a more modest place in an ethical theory that includes non-consequentialist principles with their own normative authority. (shrink)

Could I have been someone other than who I am? Philosophers from Williams to Nagel to Lewis have been tempted to answer 'yes', but how can we make sense of such a view? I argue that to say that it is contingent who I am is to say that it is contingent what perspective I have, in a distinctively metaphysical sense of perspective.

Recent developments in Continental philosophy have included the emergence of a school of “speculative realism,” which rejects the human-centered orientation that has long dominated Continental thought. Proponents of speculative realism differ on several issues, but many agree on the need for an object-oriented ontology. Some speculative realists identify realism with materialism, while others accord equal reality to objects that are non-material, even fictional. Several thinkers retain a focus on difference, a well-established theme in Continental thought. This paper looks at speculative (...) realism from the perspective of systems theory. Many of the tenets of speculative realism have long been features of systems metaphysics and are expressed clearly in a systems framework. However, some views of some speculative realists differ substantially from systems theoretic ideas. (shrink)

In this paper, I identify a theoretical and political role for ‘white ignorance’, present three alternative accounts of white ignorance, and assess how well each fulfils this role. On the Willful Ignorance View, white ignorance refers to white individuals’ willful ignorance about racial injustice. On the Cognitivist View, white ignorance refers to ignorance resulting from social practices that distribute faulty cognitive resources. On the Structuralist View, white ignorance refers to ignorance that (1) results as part of a social process that (...) systematically gives rise to racial injustice, and (2) is an active player in the process. I argue that, because of its greater power and flexibility, the Structuralist View better explains the patterns of ignorance that we observe, better illuminates the connection to white racial domination, and is overall better suited to the project of ameliorating racial injustice. As such, the Structuralist View should be preferred. (shrink)

This paper seeks to widen the dialogue between the “epistemology of peer disagreement” and the epistemology informed by Wittgenstein’s last notebooks, later edited as On Certainty. The paper defends the following theses: not all certainties are groundless; many of them are beliefs; and they do not have a common essence. An epistemic peer need not share all of my certainties. Which response to a disagreement over a certainty is called for, depends on the type of certainty in question. Sometimes a (...) form of relativism is the right response. Reasonable, mutually recognized peer disagreement over a certainty is possible.—The paper thus addresses both interpretative and systematic issues. It uses Wittgenstein as a resource for thinking about peer disagreement over certainties. (shrink)

I survey the philosophical literature on grounding explanation and its connection to metaphysical ground.