The project of this paper is to deliver a semantics for a broad subset of bare plural generics about racial kinds, a class which I will dub 'Type C generics.' Examples include 'Blacks are criminal' and 'Muslims are terrorists.' Type C generics have two interesting features. First, they link racial kinds with ​ socially perspectival predicates ​ (SPPs). SPPs lead interpreters to treat the relationship between kinds and predicates in generic constructions as nomic or non-accidental. Moreover, in computing their content, (...) interpreters must make implicit reference to socially privileged​ ​ perspectives which are treated as authoritative about whether a given object fits into the extension of the predicate. Such deference grants these authorities influence over both the conventional meaning of these terms and over the nature of the ​ objects ​ in the social ontology that these terms purport to describe, much the way a baseball umpire is authoritative over the meaning and metaphysics of 'strike'/​ strike ​. Second, terms like 'criminal' and 'terrorist' receive default ​ racialized ​ interpretations in which these terms conventionally token racial or ethnic identities. I show that neither of these features can be explained by Sarah-Jane Leslie's influential 'weak semantics' for generics, and show how my own 'socially perspectival semantics' fares better on both counts. Finally, I give an analysis of 'Blacks are criminal' which explores the semantic mechanisms that underlie default racialized interpretations. (shrink)

This is a long critical discussion of Frank Wilderson's Afropessimism, focusing primarily on Wilderson's claim that Blackness is equivalent to Slaveness. The article draws out some strengths of the book, but argues that the book's central arguments often rest on shaky methodological, metaphysical, epistemic, and political grounds. Along the way, we consider some complications endemic to the project of evaluating a text so clearly geared towards Black audiences from the perspective of a non-Black reader.

According to the “standard framing” of racial appeals in political speech, politicians generally rely on coded language to communicate racial messages. Yet recent years have demonstrated that politicians often express quite explicit forms of racism in mainstream political discourse. The standard framing can explain neither why these appeals work politically nor how they work semantically. This paper moves beyond the standard framing, focusing on the politics and semantics of one type of explicit appeal, candid racial communication. The linguistic vehicles of (...) CRC are neither true code words, nor slurs, but a conventionally defined class of “racialized terms.”. (shrink)

It is widely believed that philosophical pessimism is committed to fatalism about the sufferings that characterize the human condition, and that it encourages resignation and withdrawal from the political realm in response. This paper offers an explanation for and argument against this perception by distinguishing two functions that pessimism can serve. Pessimism’s skeptical mode suggests that fundamental cross-cultural constraints on the human condition bar us from the good life (however defined). These constraints are often represented as immune to political amelioration, (...) leading to the perception that pessimism is intrinsically fatalistic and resigned. Yet pessimism’s critical function emphasizes the political, economic, and cultural contingency of many sources of suffering and crisis while exhorting us to reject and reimagine the social forces that actively harm our capacity to flourish. It also offers an internal critique of skeptical pessimism’s tendency to naturalize and depoliticize the sources of our sufferings. These sometimes contradictory skeptical and critical tendencies should both be grouped under the pessimist banner, and we should see pessimism’s critical mode as especially valuable to political critique. -/- . (shrink)

It has been largely assumed from the start that truth, the first premise of the Tripartite theory of Knowledge, is necessary for a mental state of knowing. And this has intuitively made sense. Examples that demonstrate the logic of this premise are wide-spread and easily found. Yet, if one tries to establish the necessity of this condition for oneself, one may discover, a logical flaw in this premise. In theory truth is necessary, however, in practice it is not truth that (...) establishes knowledge. -/- We obtain knowledge using our perception or five senses. We accept the subjectivity of perspective, even though truth may or may not be established. We reject knowledge only when evidence of falsehood is obtained, if ever. -/- In practice, in the obtaining of knowledge of the conditional, those things we experience that could have been otherwise, truth is not established. The fundamental application of how we attain knowledge is in witnessing with our perception, our five senses, evidence for our conclusion. However, evidence provides support for our conclusion, by way of justification, but does not by itself provide truth. And therefore, it is not truth that is necessary for knowledge. It is the lack of evidence of falsehood in our conclusion that is the basis of our knowledge. And a lack of evidence of falsehood, is not the equal of truth. -/- The following thought experiment will demonstrate this flaw between theory and practice. (shrink)

J. J. OʼDonnell is one those scholars whose learning is assumed rather than displayed. As a result, his brief approach to the long-terms effects of the computer revolution onreading and higher education feels like a bracing, sophisticated exchange of ideas. Like conversation, O'Donnellʼs thesis is not terribly unified or orderly. He often makessidetracks from his focus on high technology and literacy into explaining such interestingthings as how we choose our cultural ancestry instead of merely evolving out of it, the errors (...) of current education, and perhaps more than you ever wanted to know aboutother avatars of the word such as St. Jerome, St. Augustine, and Cassiodorus. Greatcover too. (shrink)

According to traditional universalism, properties are instantiated by objects, where instantiation is a ‘tie’ that binds objects and properties into facts. I offer two arguments against this view. I then develop an alternative higher-order account which holds that properties are primitively predicated of objects yet, unlike traditional nominalism, are nevertheless genuinely real. When it’s a fact that Fo, it’s not because object o instantiates F-ness, but just that Fo – where F still exists. Against orthodox higher-order approaches, however, my arguments (...) against instantiation also serve to support a sparse conception of properties. In developing the view, I introduce an extension of ontological and ideological commitment in the form of syntactic commitment. (shrink)

Some features of Hegel’s Philosophy of History make it hardly acceptable in the 21st century. It proposes a final destination (Endzweck) of history, together with a principle of rational, dialectic necessity to take it there. In fact, these conceptions are not as absurd as they may seem to contemporary eyes. Nevertheless, the article doesn’t pretend to defend them, but aims to show that there is, behind these two, a third principle which is well worth to be defended –and which, in (...) fact, can systematically maintained without support from the other two. This we can call the “Principle of ethical asymmetry in history”. However, we also can name it by the formula Hegel himself coined: the “progress in the consciousness of liberty”. To explain this idea, the article evidences that the fundamental characteristic of all normativity is practical knowledge de se. In morality or ethics, this turns reflexive and self-determining. Liberty in Hegel’s sense effectively realizes this knowledge de se not only in a formal and abstract way, as in Kant, but concretely in history and in specific communities. However, since liberty in this process always remains linked to that normative self-comprehension which constitutes our practical self-consciousness, the processes of historical realization of liberty are normatively irreversible. Precisely for this process has an element of objective and unconditional aspect. The article concludes with some remarks as to how this principle of ethical asymmetry in history can serve as a basis of e new ethical theory which is strongly normative and, at the same time, sensitive to historic context an human finitude. (shrink)

“Dalla filosofia dell’azione alla filosofia della mente” è stato il percorso di alcuni filosofi di nazionalità varia degli anni 1980 – come Paul Churchland negli Stati Uniti o Ansgar Beckermann in Germania – che prima si sono interessati agli aspetti più teorici nella filosofia dell’azione, come il modo di funzionamento delle azioni e la loro spiegazione scientifica, e che poi, con l’arrivo e la diffusione dei personal computers e delle scienze cognitive, hanno ampliato e approfondito questo interesse di ricerca e (...) si sono dedicati alla filosofia della mente più in generale e in particolare alla spiegazione scientifica e filosofica del mentale. Sandro Nannini faceva parte di questo movimento ed è stato uno tra gli inizialmente pochi filosofi italiani che si sono occupati di questi argomenti; successivamente ne è diventato uno dei maggiori specialisti in Italia, proponendo una sua particolare versione di naturalizzazione del mentale. Subordinata agli interessi teorici è stata la sua iniziativa accademica di fondare e promuovere il primo dottorato italiano di ricerca in Scienze Cognitive. Il presente volume tratta dell’opera di Sandro Nannini in contributi che sono riflessioni più o meno specifiche sulle differenti tappe del suo percorso, affrontando temi come l’analisi dell'azione, il libero arbitrio, la discussione di Nannini di vari classici della filosofia, la tendenza del naturalismo a dissolvere la filosofia in un enciclopedismo empirico e la sfida dei qualia e della fenomenologia all’approccio naturalistico alla mente. Il volume contiene inoltre un saggio dello stesso Sandro Nannini, nel quale espone l’ultimo sviluppo della sua filosofia della mente nonché le risposte agli interventi degli altri autori: Mario De Caro, Sara Dellantonio, Rosaria Egidi, Roberta Lanfredini, Christoph Lumer, Paolo Parrini, Pietro Perconti, Claudio Pizzi, Emanuela Scribano e Giuseppe Varnier. (shrink)

A questão “por quê ser moral”, que foi formulada expressamente no contexto do debate filosófico acadêmico por Francis Herbert Bradley, divide os leitores quando buscam sua resposta em Kant. Uns acham, como Gerold Prauss, que Kant negue a possibilidade de tal resposta e diga que a moral precisa ser aceita como um fato simplesmente dado, o “fato da razão”. Contudo, como tal imediatismo ou “decisionismo transcendental” parece insatisfatório, um outro grupo defende a assim chamada “interpretação do agente racional”, onde este (...) último apresenta o valor supremo, absoluto, que fundamenta a moral e, com isso, apresenta a razão em virtude da qual devemos agir moralmente. Mas tal valor absoluto ou já é moral, mas então a resposta dada à questão “por quê ser moral” entra num círculo vicioso. Ou tal valor faz a moral depender de algo fora da moral o que, conforme Kant, destruiria toda moral. A solução do problema é a seguinte: Kant não deriva a moral de um pressuposto extramoral nem pressupõe a própria moral como simplesmente dada, mas explica o originar da moral. Ela origina da razão prática pela volta dessa razão sobre si mesma que constitui sua autonomia. Por este seu originar, a moral não é uma mera derivação de algo pressuposto, mas algo radicalmente novo, original, autónomo. Pelo outro lado, existe, sim, uma fundamentação da moral, i.e., um processo compreensível de sua constituição. Com isso, Kant evita o imediatismo: a moral não precisa ser simplesmente aceita como um fato puro, mas pode ser compreendida pela razão. (shrink)

Este ensaio pretende tatear uma hipótese relacional entre dois elementos heterogêneos: a obra de Christopher Isherwood e o poema elegíaco. Para tal, tomar-se-ão duas obras de Isherwood –“Christopher and His Kind” (1976) e “The Berlin Stories” (1945) –e a peculiar interpretação de Paul Veyne acerca do modo de escrita elegíaca. O que se defenderá, então, é que ao se construir a personagem de Sally Bowles, Isherwood descola o ente extra-textual (Jean Ross), assim como faz consigo mesmo quando escreve (...) sobre si. Como percurso para tal interpretação, este texto se divide em três partes: a primeira fará uma retomada biográfica de Christopher Isherwood, a segunda uma apresentação das duas personificações supracitadas, e a terceira uma explicação a partir do caráter elegíaco, tal como visto por Paul Veyne. (shrink)

Christopher Hookway has been influential in promoting engagement with pragmatist and naturalist perspectives from classical and contemporary American philosophy. This book reflects on Hookway’s work on the American philosophical tradition and its significance for contemporary discussions of the understanding of mind, meaning, knowledge, and value. -/- Hookway’s original and extensive studies of Charles S. Peirce have made him among the most admired and frequently referenced of Peirce’s interpreters. His work on classical American pragmatism has explored the philosophies of William (...) James, John Dewey, and Josiah Royce, and examined the influence of pragmatist ideas outside of the United States. Additionally, Hookway has participated in a number of celebrated exchanges with some of the most high-profile figures of twentieth- and twenty-first-century philosophy, including Karl-Otto Apel, Philip Pettit, Hilary Putnam, and W.V.O. Quine, through which his treatments of a large range of topics in epistemology and the philosophies of mind and language have been developed and promoted. The chapters in this book—which include contributions from several of Hookway’s former students and colleagues—include studies of Hookway’s engagement with the works of Peirce, James, and Dewey, his contributions to virtue epistemology, and his discussions of hope and pragmatist metaphysics. -/- Pragmatic Reason will be of interest to researchers and advanced students working on American philosophy, the history of analytic philosophy, and epistemology. (shrink)

Filósofos como Jonathan Kvanvig (2003) e Duncan Pritchard (2010) tem argumentado que o entendimento é um estado epistêmico distinto do conhecimento com base no argumento da sorte epistêmica. Eles alegam que dado que o entendimento é compatível com sorte epistêmica e o conhecimento não, então esses estados epistêmicos são distintos. Com base nos autores Christoph Kelp (2017) e Kenneth Boyd (2018), será argumentado que esse argumento não é o suficiente para mostrar que o entendimento e conhecimento são estados epistêmicos distintos. (...) Primeiro, o tipo de cenário que Kvanvig e Pritchard desenvolvem é um cenário em que a sorte é compatível com conhecimento. Segundo, ao desenvolverem os cenários de sorte compatível com o entendimento, eles tomam o objeto avaliativo errado do entendimento. Ao desenvolvermos um cenário com o objeto avaliativo correto para o entendimento, conclui-se que o entendimento não é compatível com sorte epistêmica. (shrink)

Against several recent interpretations, I argue in this paper that Immanuel Kant's support for enlightened absolutism was a permanent feature of his political thought that fit comfortably within his larger philosophy, though he saw such rule as part of a transition to democratic self-government initiated by the absolute monarch himself. I support these contentions with (1) a detailed exegesis of Kant’s essay "What is Enlightenment?" (2) an argument that Kantian republicanism requires not merely a separation of powers but also a (...) representative democratic legislature, and (3) a demonstration that each stage of a democratic transition can potentially be in an absolute monarch’s short-run self-interest. I conclude the paper by defending Kant's theory of democratization against charges of consequentialism and paternalism and by pointing out its similarity to other accounts of democratic transitions (for example, those of Samuel Huntington and Guillermo O'Donnell), suggesting a previously unnoticed opportunity for cross-fertilization between political philosophy and comparative politics. (shrink)

This book is a collection of all the papers published in the special issue “Philosophy and Meaning in Life Vol.4: Selected Papers from the Pretoria Conference,” Journal of Philosophy of Life, Vol.12, No.1, 2022, pp.1-115. -/- Theorizing About Meaning in Life Cheshire Calhoun -/- Is It Possible to Say ‘Yes’ to Traumatic Experiences?: A Philosophical Approach to Human Suffering Masahiro Morioka -/- Why Beauvoir Is Not a Subjectivist about Meaning in Life Kiki Berk -/- Axiological Values Grounded in Basic Motivational (...) Dispositions: How to Be a Subjectivist about Meaning in Life Frank Martela -/- Pessimism, Political Critique, and the Contingently Bad Life Patrick O’Donnell -/- Reason, Luck, and Meaning: A Critique of the Moralist View of Meaning in Life Kazuki Watanabe. (shrink)

It is difficult to advance a point beyond what Keynes himself commented about his own vision in The General Theory of Employment, Interest and Money in 1936 (hereafter TGT) in its Chapter 24. It is also difficult to express a deeper thought than what Skidelsky wrote about Chapter 24 of TGT (cf. Skidelsky, 1997). The purpose of this article is to identify whether Chapter 24 of TGT is the gist of Keynes’s legacy, having set the foundations of macroeconomics in the (...) previous 23 Chapters. Relevant topics included in Chapter 24 are the consequences of full employment, the fate of income distribution, the future of overall wealth, the socialization of investment, saving, expectations, the role of the State in economies, the future of financial markets and the interaction between economics and other disciplines. Indeed this Chapter displays Keynes’s genius as a social philosopher, following the tradition of The Economics Possibilities for our Grandchildren (1930). In Chapter 24 he was taking a glance at his product as did Phillip II when he was observing the construction of his castle El Escorial in XVII Spain. Within his vision, is this piece of work a justification of capitalism? Keynes sees the State as both the spender and the employer of last resort, thereby proposing a new role for the government (Skidelsky, 1998). He also suggests a new role for the private sector and reconsiders the interrelation between the two sectors. He is fully optimistic about this issue, which he considers as evolutionary. In addition, Keynes blurs the distinction between economics and sociology, advancing new interdisciplinary hints in his thinking. Keynes is also concerned on the epistemological role of assumptions in order to obtain defensible conclusions. Thereafter the British economist proposes new methods. He was a neo-realist and was against the inductive method. In addition, it can be stated that TGT is grounded on new psychological laws and motivations, that is, on a new vision of humankind, especially the analyzed chapter. His topics are the bypassing of Classical Economics; the destiny of macroeconomics in both theoretical and policy terms, highlighting new roles for interest rates; savers and rentiers; and the relevance of the concepts of ideas, interests and power. In all these respects Keynes is once again far ahead of his time. Finally a debatable topic dealt with by Keynes in Chapter 24 of TGT is 1 PhD in Economics, Lancaster University, UK; Professor-researcher at ISEC Universidad de Negocios, Mexico City. socialisation of investment. This is in words of Skidelsky, a shift in the balance of social power. Keynes is thus in Chapter 24 of TGT a visionary and an idealist, a reformer, and certainly a trans-generational thinker. When he talks about the passion of thriftiness and the setting of reasonable financial rewards arising from financial instruments he is advancing explications for financial crises in terms of speculation. The open conclusion is that Chapter 24 contains the gist of Keynes’s mature philosophical thinking and legacy, confirming that for him attitudes are one of the most relevant issues in life. In addition, he considers that both social and psychological elements are necessary for a thorough understanding of economic issues and their consequences, such as peace and happiness. Section 1 is an introduction. Section 2 is both a literature review and a summary of Keynes’s general philosophical insights. Section 3 is an analysis of Chapter 24 of TGT in the specific fields of Epistemology, Ethics, Ontology, and Political and Social Philosophy. Section 4 is a conclusion. References are listed at the end of the article. (shrink)

Memória e identidade são conceitos frequentemente explorados por cineastas contemporâneos, nomeadamente Christopher Nolan em Memento (EUA, 2000), filme que nos propõe o tema desta reflexão. O nosso objectivo é compreender a forma como a obra entrelaça as temáticas em epígrafe, através de movimentos cruzados de criação e interpretação, recorrendo ao esboço de espaços de natureza diversa (e.g. imagéticos, diegéticos, plásticos, mnésicos, etc.) que interpelam continuamente o espectador. O filme configura o trajecto de múltiplas inscrições – da escrita da luz (...) ao traço da escrita – e estabelece um mapa possível de compreensão da relação memória/identidade/emoção. -/- . (shrink)

Umalpas at/o umunlad na ang pag-aaral ng kasaysayan ng Pilipinas—hindi na lamang ito isang kanonikal na pamamaraan na may pagkiling at humahango sa kinagisnang positibismong pananaw. Bagama’t kumakalas na roon ang ilang mananaliksik at historyador, hindi ito nangangahulugan ng pagtalikod sa pinagmulang pananaw, bagkus isa itong kaunlarang historiograpikal na habang isinasaalang-alang pa rin nito ang faktuwal na kaalaman, nilalakipan na ito ng samot-saring multidisiplinaryo at/o interdisiplinaryong pananaw na may pagkiling sa disiplinang kinabibilangan at inaambagan ng kaalaman. Humigit kumulang 700-pahina ang (...) aklat ng historyador na si Ian Christopher Alfonso ng National Historical Commission of the Philippines (NHCP)— ang Dogs in Philippine History (DPH)—na may 28-kabanata—sa aking pagbibilang, habang ginagabayan ng 503-piraso ng plate o larawan, 3 mapa, 5 talahanayan, 920 na talahuli, at 496 na sanggunian—ay hindi lamang isang historikal ngunit tematiko rin ang pagkakasalanlan. Ito ay maari rin gawing balangkas at salalayan ng susunod pang mga pagaaral na nagkakaroon ng interes sa kalikasan at kapaligiran. (shrink)

The purpose of this paper is to analyze the structure and the defeasibility conditions of argument from analogy, addressing the issues of determining the nature of the comparison underlying the analogy and the types of inferences justifying the conclusion. In the dialectical tradition, different forms of similarity were distinguished and related to the possible inferences that can be drawn from them. The kinds of similarity can be divided into four categories, depending on whether they represent fundamental semantic features of the (...) terms of the comparison or non-semantic ones, indicating possible characteristics of the referents. Such distinct types of similarity characterize different kinds of analogical arguments, all based on a similar general structure, in which a common genus is abstracted. Depending on the nature of the abstracted common feature, different rules of inference will apply, guaranteeing the attribution of the analogical predicate to the genus and to the primary subject. This analysis of similarity and the relationship thereof with the rules of inference allows a deeper investigation of the defeasibility conditions. (shrink)

In Beyond Art (2014), Dominic Lopes proposed a new theory of art, the buck passing theory. Rather than attempting to define art in terms of exhibited or genetic featured shared by all artworks, Lopes passes the buck to theories of individual arts. He proposes that we seek theories of music, painting, poetry, and other arts. Once we have these theories, we know everything there is to know about the theory of art. This essay presents two challenges to the theory. First, (...) this essay argues that Lopes is wrong in supposing that theories of arts were developed to deal with the ‘hard cases’ – developments such as Duchamp’s readymades and conceptual art. This is a problem since Lopes holds that the buck passing theory’s capacity to deal with the hard cases is one of its virtues. Second, this essay argues that the buck passing theory has no account of which activities are arts and no account of what makes some activity an art. (shrink)

The sociobiological and socio-political aspects of human existence have been the subject of techno-rationalistic control and manipulation. The investigation of the mutual complementarity of anthropological and ontological paradigms under these circumstances is the main purpose of present publication. The comparative conceptual analysis of the bio-power and bio-politics in the mentality of the modern technological civilization is a main method of the research. The methodological and philosophical analogy of biological and social engineering allows combining them in the nature and social implications (...) as part of a High Hume technologies class. As result of the transformation of somatic foundations of the human being and his behavior, stereotypes in the object of control and management the technogenic risk reached the existential level. The rapidly growing status of biopower and biopolitics in the conceptual field of contemporary political science becomes by phenomenological expression of these processes. (shrink)

The evolution of Intelligent Tutoring System (ITS) is the result of the amount of research in the field of education and artificial intelligence in recent years. English is the third most common languages in the world and also is the internationally dominant in the telecommunications, science and trade, aviation, entertainment, radio and diplomatic language as most of the areas of work now taught in English. Therefore, the demand for learning English has increased. In this paper, we describe the design of (...) an Intelligent Tutoring System for teaching English language grammar to help students learn English grammar easily and smoothly. The system provides all topics of English grammar and generates a series of questions automatically for each topic for the students to solve. The system adapts with all the individual differences of students and begins gradually with students from easier to harder level. The intelligent tutoring system was given to a group of students of all age groups to try it and to see the impact of the system on students. The results showed a good satisfaction of the students toward the system. (shrink)

In the remainder of this article, we will disarm an important motivation for epistemic contextualism and interest-relative invariantism. We will accomplish this by presenting a stringent test of whether there is a stakes effect on ordinary knowledge ascription. Having shown that, even on a stringent way of testing, stakes fail to impact ordinary knowledge ascription, we will conclude that we should take another look at classical invariantism. Here is how we will proceed. Section 1 lays out some limitations of previous (...) research on stakes. Section 2 presents our study and concludes that there is little evidence for a substantial stakes effect. Section 3 responds to objections. The conclusion clears the way for classical invariantism. (shrink)

Em 27 de janeiro de 1937, o filósofo Ludwig Wittgenstein (1889-1951) anotou em seu diário, enquanto viajava para Skjolden, um vilarejo norueguês à beira do fiorde Sogne, onde havia construído em 1913 uma cabana para viver isolado: “Certamente sou singular em muitas coisas & por isso, muitas pessoas se comportam de maneira comum quando comparadas comigo; mas em que consiste minha singularidade?” De acordo com psiquiatras contemporâneos como Michael Fitzgerald, Christopher Gillberg e Yoshiki Ishisaka, a singularidade de Wittgenstein decorria (...) de ele ter autismo. Considerando-se o diagnóstico póstumo feito por esses especialistas em transtorno do espectro autista, este livro tem dois objetivos básicos: (1) detalhar como se refletem na obra de Wittgenstein tanto as suas particularidades comportamentais quanto as suas dificuldades cognitivas, inclusive aquelas relacionadas à linguagem, e (2) mostrar que Wittgenstein “dissolveu” em sua segunda filosofia, especialmente nas Investigações filosóficas, problemas que não são problemas para ninguém valendo-se de conhecimentos linguísticos e filosóficos básicos acumulados no Ocidente desde a Grécia Antiga que ele havia ignorado no Tractatus logico-philosophicus, livro de sua primeira filosofia. (shrink)

When looking at a scene, observers feel that they see its entire structure in great detail and can immediately notice any changes in it. However, when brief blank fields are placed between alternating displays of an original and a modified scene, a striking failure of perception is induced: identification of changes becomes extremely difficult, even when changes are large and made repeatedly. Identification is much faster when a verbal cue is provided, showing that poor visibility is not the cause of (...) this difficulty. Identification is also faster for objects mentioned in brief verbal descriptions of the scene. These results support the idea that observers never form a complete, detailed representation of their surroundings. In addition, results also indicate that attention is required to perceive change, and that in the absence of localized motion signals it is guided on the basis of high-level interest. (shrink)

We argue that knowledge is not the norm of belief given that ‘I believe’ is used to hedge. We explore the consequences of this argument for the normative relationship between belief and assertion.

Recently there is an increasing technological development in intelligent tutoring systems. This field has become interesting to many researchers. In this paper, we present an intelligent tutoring system for teaching information security. This intelligent tutoring systems target the students enrolled in Advanced Topics in Information Security in the faculty of Engineering and Information Technology at Al-Azhar University in Gaza. Through which the student will be able to study the course and solve related problems. An evaluation of the intelligent tutoring systems (...) was carried out and the results were promising. (shrink)

This article examines two questions about scientists’ search for knowledge. First, which search strategies generate discoveries effectively? Second, is it advantageous to diversify search strategies? We argue pace Weisberg and Muldoon, “Epistemic Landscapes and the Division of Cognitive Labor”, that, on the first question, a search strategy that deliberately seeks novel research approaches need not be optimal. On the second question, we argue they have not shown epistemic reasons exist for the division of cognitive labor, identifying the errors that led (...) to their conclusions. Furthermore, we generalize the epistemic landscape model, showing that one should be skeptical about the benefits of social learning in epistemically complex environments. (shrink)

In this article, we propose the Fair Priority Model for COVID-19 vaccine distribution, and emphasize three fundamental values we believe should be considered when distributing a COVID-19 vaccine among countries: Benefiting people and limiting harm, prioritizing the disadvantaged, and equal moral concern for all individuals. The Priority Model addresses these values by focusing on mitigating three types of harms caused by COVID-19: death and permanent organ damage, indirect health consequences, such as health care system strain and stress, as well as (...) economic destruction. It proposes proceeding in three phases: the first addresses premature death, the second long-term health issues and economic harms, and the third aims to contain viral transmission fully and restore pre-pandemic activity. -/- To those who may deem an ethical framework irrelevant because of the belief that many countries will pursue "vaccine nationalism," we argue such a framework still has broad relevance. Reasonable national partiality would permit countries to focus on vaccine distribution within their borders up until the rate of transmission is below 1, at which point there would not be sufficient vaccine-preventable harm to justify retaining a vaccine. When a government reaches the limit of national partiality, it should release vaccines for other countries. -/- We also argue against two other recent proposals. Distributing a vaccine proportional to a country's population mistakenly assumes that equality requires treating differently situated countries identically. Prioritizing countries according to the number of front-line health care workers, the proportion of the population over 65, and the number of people with comorbidities within each country may exacerbate disadvantage and end up giving the vaccine in large part to wealthy nations. (shrink)

In Tulving’s initial characterization, episodic memory was one of multiple memory systems. It was postulated, in pursuit of explanatory depth, as displaying proprietary operations, representations, and substrates such as to explain a range of cognitive, behavioural, and experiential phenomena. Yet the subsequent development of this research program has, paradoxically, introduced surprising doubts about the nature, and indeed existence, of episodic memory. On dominant versions of the ‘common system’ view, on which a single simulation system underlies both remembering and imagining, there (...) are no processes unique to memory to support robust generalizations with inductive potential. Eliminativism about episodic memory seems to follow from the claim that it has no dedicated neurocognitive system of its own. After identifying this under-noticed threat, we push back against modern eliminativists by surveying recent evidence that still indicates specialized mechanisms, computations, and representations that are distinctly mnemic in character. We argue that contemporary realists about episodic memory can retain lessons of the common system approach while resisting the further move to eliminativism. (shrink)

For anyone approaching the Encheiridion of Epictetus for the first time, this book provides a comprehensive guide to understanding a complex philosophical text. Including a full translation and clear explanatory commentaries, Epictetus's 'Encheiridion' introduces readers to a hugely influential work of Stoic philosophy. Scott Aikin and William O. Stephens unravel the core themes of Stoic ethics found within this ancient handbook. Focusing on the core themes of self-control, seeing things as they are, living according to nature, owning one's roles and (...) fulfilling the responsibilities that those roles entail, the authors elucidate the extremely challenging ideas in Epictetus's brisk chapters. Divided into five distinct parts, this book provides readers with: -/- - A new translation of the Encheiridion by William O. Stephens. - A new introduction to ancient Stoicism, its system of concepts, and the ancient figures who shaped it. - A fresh treatment of the notorious and counter-intuitive 'Stoic paradoxes'. - An accessible overview of the origin and historical context of the Encheiridion. - Detailed commentaries on each chapter of the Encheiridion that clarify its recurring themes and highlight their interconnections. - Careful attention to the presentation of the arguments embedded in Epictetus's aphoristic style. - A thoughtful discussion of serious criticisms of Epictetus's Stoicism and replies to these objections. -/- Written with clarity and authority, Epictetus's 'Encheiridion' provides a foundation from which readers can understand this important text and engage with the fundamental questions of Stoic philosophy and ethics. This guide will aid teachers of Epictetus, students encountering Stoicism for the first time, and readers seeking a greater understanding of Stoic ethics. (shrink)

Machine learning algorithms may radically improve our ability to diagnose and treat disease. For moral, legal, and scientific reasons, it is essential that doctors and patients be able to understand and explain the predictions of these models. Scalable, customisable, and ethical solutions can be achieved by working together with relevant stakeholders, including patients, data scientists, and policy makers.

All parties involved in researching, developing, manufacturing, and distributing COVID-19 vaccines need guidance on their ethical obligations. We focus on pharmaceutical companies' obligations because their capacities to research, develop, manufacture, and distribute vaccines make them uniquely placed for stemming the pandemic. We argue that an ethical approach to COVID-19 vaccine production and distribution should satisfy four uncontroversial principles: optimising vaccine production, including development, testing, and manufacturing; fair distribution; sustainability; and accountability. All parties' obligations should be coordinated and mutually consistent. For (...) instance, companies should not be obligated to provide host countries with additional booster shots at the expense of fulfilling bilateral contracts with countries in which there are surges. Finally, any satisfactory approach should include mechanisms for assurance that all parties are honouring their obligations. This assurance enables countries, pharmaceutical companies, global organisations, and others to verify compliance with the chosen approach and protect ethically compliant stakeholders from being unfairly exploited by unethical behaviour of others. (shrink)

Philosophy in Africa has for more than a decade now been dominated by the discussion of one compound question, namely, is there an African philosophy, and if there is, what is it? The first part of the question has generally been unhesitatingly answered in the affirmative. Dispute has been primarily over the second part of the question as various specimens of African philosophy presented do not seem to pass muster. Those of us who refuse to accept certain specimens as philosophy (...) have generally been rather illogically said also to deny an affirmative answer to the first part of the question. In a paper presented at the International Symposium in Memory of Dr William Amo, the Ghanaian philosopher who taught in German universities in the early part of the eighteenth century, Professor Odera Oruka identified four trends, perhaps more appropriately approaches, in current African philosophy. (shrink)

The sensorimotor theory of perceptual consciousness offers a form of enactivism in that it stresses patterns of interaction instead of any alleged internal representations of the environment. But how does it relate to forms of enactivism stressing the continuity between life and mind? We shall distinguish sensorimotor enactivism, which stresses perceptual capacities themselves, from autopoietic enactivism, which claims an essential connection between experience and autopoietic processes or associated background capacities. We show how autopoiesis, autonomous agency, and affective dimensions of experience (...) may fit into sensorimotor enactivism, and we identify differences between this interpretation and autopoietic enactivism. By taking artificial consciousness as a case in point, we further sharpen the distinction between sensorimotor enactivism and autopoietic enactivism. We argue that sensorimotor enactivism forms a strong default position for an enactive account of perceptual consciousness. (shrink)

The voices of children and young people have been largely neglected in discussions of the extent to which the internet takes into account their needs and concerns. This paper aims to highlight young people’s lived experiences of being online.

Many oppose the use of profile evidence against defendants at trial, even when the statistical correlations are reliable and the jury is free from prejudice. The literature has struggled to justify this opposition. We argue that admitting profile evidence is objectionable because it violates what we call “equal protection”—that is, a right of innocent defendants not to be exposed to higher ex ante risks of mistaken conviction compared to other innocent defendants facing similar charges. We also show why admitting other (...) forms of evidence, such as eyewitness, trace, and motive evidence, does not violate equal protection. (shrink)

This paper does three interrelated things. First, it argues that the universalism that forms the target of criticism and attack by decolonial theorists from the Global South is a debased form of universalism, what might be termed “ethnocentric universalism.” Second, equipped with a conceptual grip on ethnocentric universalism, it shows that the picture on which ethnocentric universalism confers some innocuous epistemic privilege to members of dominant groups is not quite accurate—ethnocentric universalism is incompatible with the epistemic flourishing of members of (...) dominant groups. And third, based on that claim, and the additional consideration that ethnocentric universalism equally undermines the epistemic flourishing of members of historically marginalized groups, it proposes an emancipatory framework for engaging with it. (shrink)

In this paper we use an experimental approach to investigate how linguistic conventions can emerge in a society without explicit agreement. As a starting point we consider the signaling game introduced by Lewis. We find that in experimental settings, small groups can quickly develop conventions of signal meaning in these games. We also investigate versions of the game where the theoretical literature indicates that meaning will be less likely to arise—when there are more than two states for actors to transfer (...) meaning about and when some states are more likely than others. In these cases, we find that actors are less likely to arrive at strategies where signals have clear conventional meaning. We conclude with a proposal for extending the use of the methodology of experimental economics in experimental philosophy. (shrink)

In this paper, we engage in dialogue with Jonathan Pugh, Hannah Maslen, and Julian Savulescu about how to best interpret the potential impacts of deep brain stimulation on the self. We consider whether ordinary people’s convictions about the true self should be interpreted in essentialist or existentialist ways. Like Pugh et al., we argue that it is useful to understand the notion of the true self as having both essentialist and existentialist components. We also consider two ideas from existentialist philosophy (...) – Jean-Paul Sartre and Simone de Beauvoir’s ideas about “bad faith” and “ambiguity” – to argue that there can be value to patients in regarding themselves as having a certain amount of freedom to choose what aspects of themselves should be considered representative of their true selves. Lastly, we consider the case of an anorexia nervosa-patient who shifts between conflicting mind-sets. We argue that mind-sets in which it is easier for the patient and his or her family to share values can plausibly be considered to be more representative of the patient’s true self, if this promotes a well-functioning relationship between the patient and the family. However, we also argue that families are well-advised to give patients room to figure out what such shared values mean to them, since it can be alienating for patients if they feel that others try to impose values on them from the outside. (shrink)

We introduce a family of rules for adjusting one's credences in response to learning the credences of others. These rules have a number of desirable features. 1. They yield the posterior credences that would result from updating by standard Bayesian conditionalization on one's peers' reported credences if one's likelihood function takes a particular simple form. 2. In the simplest form, they are symmetric among the agents in the group. 3. They map neatly onto the familiar Condorcet voting results. 4. They (...) preserve shared agreement about independence in a wide range of cases. 5. They commute with conditionalization and with multiple peer updates. Importantly, these rules have a surprising property that we call synergy - peer testimony of credences can provide mutually supporting evidence raising an individual's credence higher than any peer's initial prior report. At first, this may seem to be a strike against them. We argue, however, that synergy is actually a desirable feature and the failure of other updating rules to yield synergy is a strike against them. (shrink)

I. EXECUTIVE SUMMARY The MRCT Center Post-trial Responsibilities: Continued Access to an Investigational Medicine Framework outlines a case-based, principled, stakeholder approach to evaluate and guide ethical responsibilities to provide continued access to an investigational medicine at the conclusion of a patient’s participation in a clinical trial. The Post-trial Responsibilities (PTR) Framework includes this Guidance Document as well as the accompanying Toolkit. A 41-member international multi-stakeholder Workgroup convened by the Multi-Regional Clinical Trials Center of Brigham and Women’s Hospital and Harvard University (...) (MRCT Center) developed this Guidance and Toolkit. Project Motivation A number of international organizations have discussed the responsibilities stakeholders have to provide continued access to investigational medicines. The World Medical Association, for example, addressed post-trial access to medicines in Paragraph 34 of the Declaration of Helsinki (WMA, 2013): “In advance of a clinical trial, sponsors, researchers and host country governments should make provisions for post-trial access for all participants who still need an intervention identified as beneficial in the trial. This information must also be disclosed to participants during the informed consent process.” This paragraph and other international guidance documents converge on several consensus points: • Post-trial access (hereafter referred to as “continued access” in this Framework [for terminology clarification – see definitions]) is the responsibility of sponsors, researchers, and host country governments; • The plan for continued access should be determined before the trial begins, and before any individual gives their informed consent; • The protocol should delineate continued access plans; and • The plan should be transparent to potential participants and explained during the informed consent process. -/- However, there is no guidance on how to fulfill these responsibilities (i.e., linking specific responsibilities with specific stakeholders, conditions, and duration). To fill this gap, the MRCT Center convened a working group in September of 2014 to develop a framework to guide stakeholders with identified responsibilities. This resultant Framework sets forth applicable principles, approaches, recommendations and ethical rationales for PTR regarding continued access to investigational medicines for research participants. (shrink)

What role, if any, should our moral intuitions play in moral epistemology? We make, or are prepared to make, moral judgments about a variety of actual and hypothetical situations. Some of these moral judgments are more informed, reflective, and stable than others (call these ourconsideredmoral judgments); some we make more confidently than others; and some, though not all, are judgments about which there is substantial consensus. What bearing do our moral judgments have on philosophical ethics and the search for first (...) principles in ethics? Should these judgments constrain, or be constrained by, philosophical theorizing about morality? On the one hand, we might expect first principles to conform to our moral intuitions or at least to our considered moral judgments. After all, we begin the reflection that may lead to first principles from particular moral convictions. And some of our moral intuitions (e.g., that genocide is wrong) are more fixed and compelling than any putative first principle. If so, we might expect common moral beliefs to have an important evidential role in the construction and assessment of first principles. On the other hand, common moral beliefs often rest on poor information, reflect bias, or are otherwise mistaken. We often appeal to moral principles to justify our particular moral convictions or to resolve our disagreements. Insofar as this is true, we may expect first principles to provide a foundation on the basis of which to test common moral beliefs and, where necessary, form new moral convictions. (shrink)

An overview of the ancient philosophers and their philosophical system (divided into the fields of logic, physics, and ethics) comprising the living, organic, enduring, and evolving body of interrelated ideas identifiable as the Stoic perspective.

Social norms – rules governing which behaviours are deemed appropriate or inappropriate within a given community – are typically taken to be uniquely human. Recently, this position has been challenged by a number of philosophers, cognitive scientists, and ethologists, who have suggested that social norms may also be found in certain non-human animal communities. Such claims have elicited considerable scepticism from norm cognition researchers, who doubt that any non-human animals possess the psychological capacities necessary for normative cognition. However, there is (...) little agreement among these researchers about what these psychological prerequisites are. This makes empirical study of animal social norms difficult, since it is not clear what we are looking for and thus what should count as behavioural evidence for the presence (or absence) of social norms in animals. To break this impasse, we offer an approach that moves beyond contested psychological criteria for social norms. This approach is inspired by the animal culture research program, which has made a similar shift away from heavily psychological definitions of ‘culture’ and to become organized around a cluster of more empirically tractable concepts of culture. Here, we propose an analogous set of constructs built around the core notion of a normative regularity, which we define as a socially maintained pattern of behavioural conformity within a community. We suggest methods for studying potential normative regularities in wild and captive primates. We also discuss the broader scientific and philosophical implications of this research program with respect to questions of human uniqueness, animal welfare and conservation. (shrink)

Human behavior is an underlying cause for many of the ecological crises faced in the 21st century, and there is no escaping from the fact that widespread behavior change is necessary for socio-ecological systems to take a sustainable turn. Whilst making people and communities behave sustainably is a fundamental objective for environmental policy, behavior change interventions and policies are often implemented from a very limited non-systemic perspective. Environmental policy-makers and psychologists alike often reduce cognition ‘to the brain,’ focusing only to (...) a minor extent on how everyday environments systemically afford pro-environmental behavior. Symptomatic of this are the widely prevalent attitude–action, value–action or knowledge–action gaps, understood in this paper as the gulfs lying between sustainable thinking and behavior due to lack of affordances. I suggest that by adopting a theory of affordances as a guiding heuristic, environmental policy-makers are better equipped to promote policies that translate sustainable thinking into sustainable behavior, often self-reinforcingly, and have better conceptual tools to nudge our socio–ecological system toward a sustainable turn. Affordance theory, which studies the relations between abilities to perceive and act and environmental features, is shown to provide a systemic framework for analyzing environmental policies and the ecology of human behavior. This facilitates the location and activation of leverage points for systemic policy interventions, which can help socio–ecological systems to learn to adapt to more sustainable habits. Affordance theory is presented to be applicable and pertinent to technically all nested levels of socio–ecological systems from the studies of sustainable objects and households to sustainable urban environments, making it an immensely versatile conceptual policy tool. Finally, affordance theory is also discussed from a participatory perspective. Increasing the fit between local thinking and external behavior possibilities entails a deep understanding of tacit and explicit attitudes, values, knowledge as well as physical and social environments, best gained via inclusive and polycentric policy approaches. (shrink)