We describe on-going work on IAO-Intel, an information artifact ontology developed as part of a suite of ontologies designed to support the needs of the US Army intelligence community within the framework of the Distributed Common Ground System (DCGS-A). IAO-Intel provides a controlled, structured vocabulary for the consistent formulation of metadata about documents, images, emails and other carriers of information. It will provide a resource for uniform explication of the terms used in multiple existing military dictionaries, thesauri and metadata registries, (...) thereby enhancing the degree to which the content formulated with their aid will be available to computational reasoning. (shrink)

We address the ethics of scenarios in which one party entraps, intentionally tempts or intentionally tests the virtue of another. We classify, in a new manner, three distinct types of acts that are of concern, namely acts of entrapment, of intentional temptation and of virtue testing. Our classification is, for each kind of scenario, of itself neutral concerning the question whether the agent acts permissibly. We explain why acts of entrapment are more ethically objectionable than like acts of intentional temptation (...) and why these, in turn, are more ethically objectionable than like acts of virtue testing. Along the way, we scrutinize, and eventually reject, the view that acts of entrapment are ethically unacceptable because intentional temptation is involved in entrapment. (shrink)

There is a global shortage of organs for transplantation and despite many governments making significant changes to their organ donation systems, there are not enough kidneys available to meet the demand. This has led scientists and clinicians to explore alternative means of meeting this organ shortfall. One of the alternatives to human organ transplantation is xenotransplantation, which is the transplantation of organs, tissues, or cells between different species. The resurgence of interest in xenotransplantation and recent scientific breakthroughs suggest that genetically-engineered (...) pigs may soon present a realistic alternative as sources of kidneys for clinical transplantation. It is therefore important for nurses and allied health professionals to understand what is involved in xenotransplantation and its future implications for their clinical practices. First, we explore the insufficiency of different organ donation systems to meet the kidney shortage. Second, we provide a background and a summary of the progress made so far in xenotransplantation research. Third, we discuss some of the scientific, technological, ethical, and economic issues associated with xenotransplantation. Finally, we summarise the literature on the attitudes of healthcare professionals toward xenotransplantation. (shrink)

Some legal theorists say that legal entrapment to commit a crime is incoherent. So far, there is no satisfactorily precise statement of this objection in the literature: it is obscure even as to the type of incoherence that is purportedly involved. (Perhaps consequently, substantial assessment of the objection is also absent.) We aim to provide a new statement of the objection that is more precise and more rigorous than its predecessors. We argue that the best form of the objection asserts (...) that, in attempting to entrap, law-enforcement agents lapse into a form of practical incoherence that involves the attempt simultaneously to pursue contrary ends. We then argue that the objection, in this form, encompasses all cases of legal entrapment only if it is supplemented by appeal to the premise that law-enforcement agents have an absolute duty never to create crimes. (shrink)

Formal clinical trials of pig-to-human organ transplant—known as xenotransplantation—may begin this decade, with the first trials likely to consist of either adult renal transplants or pediatric cardiac transplant patients. Xenotransplantation as a systematic scientific study only reaches back to the latter half of the 20th century, with episodic xenotransplantation events occurring prior to that. As the science of xenotransplantation has progressed in the 20th and 21st centuries, the public's knowledge of the potential therapy has also increased. With this, there have (...) been shifting ethical stances toward xenotransplantation in key areas, such as religious and public viewpoints towards xenotransplantation, animal rights, and public health concerns. This review provides a historical–ethical account of xenotransplantation and details if or how viewpoints have shifted over time. (shrink)

Our question is this: What makes an act one of entrapment? We make a standard distinction between legal entrapment, which is carried out by parties acting in their capacities as (or as deputies of) law- enforcement agents, and civil entrapment, which is not. We aim to provide a definition of entrapment that covers both and which, for reasons we explain, does not settle questions of permissibility and culpability. We explain, compare, and contrast two existing definitions of legal entrapment to commit (...) a crime that possess this neutrality. We point out some problems with the extensional correctness of these definitions and propose a new definition that resolves these problems. We then extend our definition to provide a more general definition of entrapment, encompassing both civil and legal cases. Our definition is, we believe, closer to being extensionally correct and will, we hope, provide a clearer basis for future discussions about the ethics of entrapment than do the definitions upon which it improves. (shrink)

Under a ‘dirty hands’ model of undercover policing, it inevitably involves situations where whatever the state agent does is morally problematic. Christopher Nathan argues against this model. Nathan’s criticism of the model is predicated on the contention that it entails the view, which he considers objectionable, that morally wrongful acts are central to undercover policing. We address this criticism, and some other aspects of Nathan’s discussion of the ‘dirty hands’ model, specifically in relation to state entrapment to commit a crime. (...) Using János Kis’s work on political morality, we explain three dilemmatic versions of the ‘dirty hands’ model. We show that, while two of these are inapplicable to state entrapment, the third has better prospects. We then pursue our main aim, which is to argue that, since the third model precludes Nathan’s criticism, a viable ‘dirty hands’ model of state entrapment remains an open possibility. Finally, we generalize this result, showing that the case of state entrapment is not special: the result holds good for policing practices more generally, including such routine practices as arrest, detention, and restraint. (shrink)

Benjamin Schnieder has argued that several traditional definitions of truth-functionality fail to capture a central intuition informal characterizations of the notion often capture. The intuition is that the truth-value of a sentence that employs a truth-functional operator depends upon the truth-values of the sentences upon which the operator operates. Schnieder proposes an alternative definition of truth-functionality that is designed to accommodate this intuition. We argue that one traditional definition of ‘truth-functionality’ is immune from the counterexamples that Schnieder proposes and is (...) preferable to Schnieder’s alternative. (shrink)

This review article provides a new perspective on the ethics of green nudging. We advance a new model for assessing the ethical permissibility of green nudges (GNs). On this model, which provides normative guidance for policymakers, a GN is ethically permissible when the intervention is (1) efficacious, (2) cost-effective, and (3) the advantages of the GN (i.e. reducing the environmental harm) are not outweighed by countervailing costs/harms (i.e. for nudgees). While traditional ethical objections to nudges (paternalism, etc.) remain potential normative (...) costs associated with GNs, any such costs must be weighed against the injunction to reduce environmental harm to third parties. (shrink)

Kit Fine has proposed a new solution to what he calls ‘a familiar puzzle’ concerning modality and existence. The puzzle concerns the argument from the alleged truths ‘It is necessary that Socrates is a man’ and ‘It is possible that Socrates does not exist’ to the apparent falsehood ‘It is possible that Socrates is a man and does not exist’. We discuss in detail Fine’s setting up of the ‘puzzle’ and his rejection, with which we concur, of two mooted solutions (...) to it. (One of these uses standard, Kripkean, notions, and the other rests on work done by Arthur Prior.) We set out, and reject, the philosophy of modality underlying Fine’s new solution, and we defend an alternative response to the alleged puzzle. Our solution follows the work of David Wiggins in distinguishing between the sentential operator ‘It is necessary that’ and the predicate modifier ‘necessarily’. We briefly provide this distinction with a possible- world semantics on which it is neither a necessary truth, in some sense, that Socrates exists nor true, in some sense, that Socrates necessarily exists. (shrink)

Despite the frequency of stillbirths, the subsequent implications are overlooked and underappreciated. We present findings from comprehensive, systematic literature reviews, and new analyses of published and unpublished data, to establish the effect of stillbirth on parents, families, health-care providers, and societies worldwide. Data for direct costs of this event are sparse but suggest that a stillbirth needs more resources than a livebirth, both in the perinatal period and in additional surveillance during subsequent pregnancies. Indirect and intangible costs of stillbirth are (...) extensive and are usually met by families alone. This issue is particularly onerous for those with few resources. Negative effects, particularly on parental mental health, might be moderated by empathic attitudes of care providers and tailored interventions. The value of the baby, as well as the associated costs for parents, families, care providers, communities, and society, should be considered to prevent stillbirths and reduce associated morbidity. (shrink)

Throughout the biological and biomedical sciences there is a growing need for, prescriptive ‘minimum information’ (MI) checklists specifying the key information to include when reporting experimental results are beginning to find favor with experimentalists, analysts, publishers and funders alike. Such checklists aim to ensure that methods, data, analyses and results are described to a level sufficient to support the unambiguous interpretation, sophisticated search, reanalysis and experimental corroboration and reuse of data sets, facilitating the extraction of maximum value from data sets (...) them. However, such ‘minimum information’ MI checklists are usually developed independently by groups working within representatives of particular biologically- or technologically-delineated domains. Consequently, an overview of the full range of checklists can be difficult to establish without intensive searching, and even tracking thetheir individual evolution of single checklists may be a non-trivial exercise. Checklists are also inevitably partially redundant when measured one against another, and where they overlap is far from straightforward. Furthermore, conflicts in scope and arbitrary decisions on wording and sub-structuring make integration difficult. This presents inhibit their use in combination. Overall, these issues present significant difficulties for the users of checklists, especially those in areas such as systems biology, who routinely combine information from multiple biological domains and technology platforms. To address all of the above, we present MIBBI (Minimum Information for Biological and Biomedical Investigations); a web-based communal resource for such checklists, designed to act as a ‘one-stop shop’ for those exploring the range of extant checklist projects, and to foster collaborative, integrative development and ultimately promote gradual integration of checklists. (shrink)

This article explores the law and ethics of lobbying. The legal discussion examines disclosure regulations, employment restrictions,bribery laws, and anti-fraud provisions as each applies to the lobbying context. The analysis demonstrates that given the social value placed on the First Amendment, federal law generally affords lobbyists wide latitude in determining who, what, when, where, and how to lobby.The article then turns to ethics. Lobbying involves deliberate attempts to effect changes in the law. An argument is advanced that because law implicates (...) the use of force and because law ideally reflects the values of a democratic society, seeking to slant the law to serve a client’s narrow interests cannot provide an adequate ethical end for a lobbyist. On the contrary, a lobbyist has an affirmative moral duty to seek reasonably balanced and just laws. The article examines, refines, and defends this proposition in a number of settings. (shrink)

Many commentators lament that American democracy is in crisis. It is becoming a system of minority rule, wherein a party with a minority of the nationwide vote can control the national government. Partisan gerrymandering in the House of Representatives fuels this crisis, as does the equal representation of small and large states in the Senate. But altering these features of the legislature would not end minority rule. Indeed, it has long been held that majority rule cannot be guaranteed within any (...) district system, as a minority of voters nationwide can be efficiently distributed such that a minority party wins a majority of districts by narrow margins. -/- This Article offers a way to save majority rule. Since the way a party can gain control of the legislature with a minority of the vote is to win a majority of districts by narrow margins of victory and lose a minority of districts by large margins of victory, the solution is to make margins matter. Hence, this Article proposes that we preserve electoral districts in which the candidate with the most votes wins, while making the weight of their vote in the legislature (a representative’s “legislative power”) a function of margins of victory. The first goal of this Article is to outline how this proposal, which I call “weighted voting by margin of victory” (WVMV), retains the democratic virtues of district systems while ending minority rule. This is the first basis for the democratic imperative to make margins matter. -/- There is, however, a second basis for that same imperative, which turns on the political equality of voters. The U.S. Supreme Court has long held that the democratic equality should be understood in terms of equal voting power (one person, one vote). But when margins of victory don’t matter, the power of a vote lies exclusively in its potential decisiveness. A vote that changes the margin of victory without changing the victor is “wasted”. But it is an electoral reality that votes in competitive districts are more likely to be decisive, and votes in uncompetitive districts are more likely to be wasted; as a result, candidates and parties are more responsive to some voters than others. So voters are not political equals. They do not have equal voting power, except in an empty formalistic sense. By contrast, WVMV gives votes a second type of power. The power of a vote is to potentially decide who wins and to actually change the legislative power of the victor. Each vote, in effect, transfers a unit of political power to a democratic representative. This “transference” power can be meaningfully equalized between voters. A voter in an uncompetitive district is far less likely to change who wins, but is equally able to change the margin of victory, such that their vote is no longer wasted. This gives candidates and parties a strong reason to be more equally responsive to all voters who can change the margins. Hence, there is a democratic imperative to make margins matter, in order to give voters a meaningfully equal form of voting power. -/- The final goal of this Article is to explain how we can implement WMVM in modern democracies, focusing on three particularly challenging cases: the U.S. Senate, the Parliament of the United Kingdom, and the U.S. House of Representatives. These cases are challenging for several reasons, the most pertinent of which turn on the ways we should understand margins of victory when electorates are of unequal sizes (as in the U.S. Senate) or are contested by more than two parties (as in the U.K.) or are conducted under different voting procedures (as in many districts in the U.S. House). I argue that WVMV should be considered feasible in such contexts, and hence offers a practical, rather than purely theoretical, alternative to the status quo. (shrink)

David Lewis rejected consequentialism in ethics. However, two aspects of his meta-ethical views make it a challenge to see how consequentialism could be resisted. Lewis endorses a maximising conception of rationality, where to be rational is to maximise value of a certain sort; he appears to think it is possible to be both rational and moral; and yet he rejects conceptions of moral action as acting to maximise moral value. The second tension in Lewis's views arises from his meta-ethics. Lewis's (...) naturalisation of morality is in terms of a naturalised account of value, including moral value. Insofar as he offers a motivational story for moral judgements, it is one that goes via a motivational connection to value. Yet his anti-consequentialism seems to commit him to rejecting a story of moral action entirely in terms of pursuit of moral value. In both cases there are things to be said about how to weave these strands of Lewis's thought together. After setting out these two apparent tensions in Lewis's thought about ethics, the paper discusses what a Lewisian could best say about these puzzles. Lewisians do have a number of plausible options for dealing with the first challenge. While there are things a Lewisian could attempt to extend Lewis's moral naturalism in a way that could deal with the second challenge, it is harder to see how to do this in a satisfying way. Attention then turns to what Lewis said in his letters on these topics: on that basis, perhaps Lewis was close to being an agent-relative consequentialist after all. (shrink)

V tomto článku se zamýšlím nad možností „správné“ (objektivní, adekvátní) interpretace Dao De Jingu (DDJ). Zamyšlení nad „komunikační situací“ vede k rozlišení několika základních prvků (autor, text, interpret, adresát). K jednotlivým prvkům stručně shrnuji současný stav interpretačního úsilí odborníků na DDJ (opíraje se především o článek A. Chana). Kontroverzní povaha výsledků současného bádání nás nemá vést ke skepticismu „integrativní hermeneutiky“, která na adekvátní interpretaci rezignuje. Je možné se i nadále držet principů „rekonstruktivní hermeneutiky“, která spatřuje adekvátní interpretaci jakožto svůj cíl.

Causal determinism is the view that all events in the universe are predetermined and that the laws of nature causally necessitate these events. In the debates on free will, there are two different positions called incompatibilism and compatibilism. Accordingly, compatibilist accounts claim that free will and causal determinism can be compatible and coexist. On the contrary, incompatibilist accounts defend that compatibilist accounts are problematic and claim that free will cannot exist in a universe where causal determinism holds. The main approach (...) that we will consider in this work will be the incompatibilist approach of the American philosopher Peter van Inwagen, which he defends in free will debates. The arguments put forward by Peter van Inwagen as the basis of incompatibilism can be summarized as the consequence argument and the Mind argument. The consequence argument, hypothetically takes into account a world in which causally deterministic and claiming that free will doesn't exist in such a world. Peter van Inwagen's Mind argument, on the other hand, claims that agent-causation cannot be sufficient for a definite possession of free will because a person who represents oneself as an agent in every event s/he is involved in, cannot be sure whether the consequences of these events are due to chance. In both arguments, Peter van Inwagen refers to philosophical moves that affirm incompatibilism is consistent for free will debate. Therefore in my dissertation, I argue that incompatibilism is actually a sufficient step towards solving the free will and causal determinism dilemma in a theoretical sense. This work also deals with Peter van Inwagen's views on philosophy of action and philosophy of religion in general. Additionally, in order to draw the relational framework between causal determinism and free will, the concepts of 'event', 'causal powers' and 'states of affairs' are used methodologically. Instead of just having an ethical discussion of free will, I took care to stay within the boundaries of the metaphysics of free will. (shrink)

Everyday media consumption leaves no doubt that the perception of moving images from various media is characterized by experience and understanding. Corresponding research in this field has shown that the stimulus patterns flooding in on us are not only processed mentally, but also bodily. Building on this, the following study argues that incoming stimuli are processed not only visually, but multimodally, with all senses, and moreover affectively. The classical binding of a sensory organ to a medium, on whose delimitation the (...) common understanding of multimodality is based, is thus abolished. Can arguments for this assumption be found? Building on the research of cultural anthropologist Ernst Cassirer and his successors, the two American philosophers Susanne K. Langer and John M. Krois, and supported by research from the life sciences in which, in parallel, the arts also play an important role in understanding image formation, as in the work of Heinz Werner and, following on from this, in the more recent research of the child psychologist Daniel N. Stern in collaboration with mirror neuron research by the group of neuroscientists around Giacomo Rizzolatti in Parma, justifications for this will be provided. What the multimodal processing of film images is concretely based on will finally be made clear by means of an exemplary analysis of a video film by the Swiss artist Pipilotti Rist. It aims to prove, that the prerequisites for the thesis can only lie in the fact, that both the modes of perception (visual, tactile, auditory, olfactory, gustatory) as well as the medially conditioned modes of image formation are based on non-discursive, formal-abstract structures that are also processed affectively. At the same time, the analysis thus shows how the selection and composition of the vital experienced forms can provide information about the socio-culturally shaped self-image of the producer and the viewer. (shrink)

The form of an action has a strong influence on the interaction between humans. According to their mood, people may perform the same gesture in different ways, such as gently or rudely. These aspects of social communication are named vitality forms by Daniel Stern, represent a mean to establish a direct and immediate connection with others. Indeed, the expression of different vitality forms enables us to communicate our affective states and at the same time the perception of these vitality (...) forms enables people around us to understand how we feel in that moment. In the last years of research, different fMRI studies have been carried out to investigate the neural correlates of vitality forms recognition and execution. Moreover, recent psychophysics studies conducted from our research group have demonstrated the presence of an affective contagion effect, during which vitality forms expressed by an agent affect the action perception and the motor response of the receiver. This means that vitality forms expressed by others can influence our mood positively or negatively, modulating as consequence our behavior. Note that vitality forms pervade our lives in a continuous manner and thus they are not expressed and perceived only during social interactions. For example, when we observe an artistic representation at the theatre, the dynamic postures of dancers, together with an alternation of acceleration and deceleration in their movements, communicate to us different affective states. Also when we are in a museum in front of a painting, lines, colors and shapes used by the artist can elicit in us different sensations and modify our attitude. In this view, with the aim to extend the concept of vitality forms from neuroscience and psychology to other disciplines of study, we dedicate part of this review to discuss how art, in all its forms, can be considered a pure expression of vitality forms. (shrink)

There is no doubt that custard apple diseases are among the important reasons that destroy the Custard Apple plant and its agricultural crops. This leads to obvious damage to these plants and they become inedible. Discovering these diseases is a good step to provide the appropriate and correct treatment. Determining the treatment with high accuracy depends on the method used to correctly diagnose the disease, expert systems can greatly help in avoiding damage to these plants. The expert system correctly diagnoses (...) Custard Apple disease to make it easier for farmers to find the right treatment based on the appropriate diagnosis. Objectives: A specialized syllable language system was established for the diagnosis of Custard Apple plant disease. (shrink)

Moral debunking arguments are meant to show that, by realist lights, moral beliefs are not explained by moral facts, which in turn is meant to show that they lack some significant counterfactual connection to the moral facts (e.g., safety, sensitivity, reliability). The dominant, “minimalist” response to the arguments—sometimes defended under the heading of “third-factors” or “pre-established harmonies”—involves affirming that moral beliefs enjoy the relevant counterfactual connection while granting that these beliefs are not explained by the moral facts. We show that (...) the minimalist gambit rests on a controversial thesis about epistemic priority: that explanatory concessions derive their epistemic import from what they reveal about counterfactual connections. We then challenge this epistemic priority thesis, which undermines the minimalist response to debunking arguments (in ethics and elsewhere). (shrink)

Public discussions of political and social issues are often characterized by deep and persistent polarization. In social psychology, it’s standard to treat belief polarization as the product of epistemic irrationality. In contrast, we argue that the persistent disagreement that grounds political and social polarization can be produced by epistemically rational agents, when those agents have limited cognitive resources. Using an agent-based model of group deliberation, we show that groups of deliberating agents using coherence-based strategies for managing their limited resources tend (...) to polarize into different subgroups. We argue that using that strategy is epistemically rational for limited agents. So even though group polarization looks like it must be the product of human irrationality, polarization can be the result of fully rational deliberation with natural human limitations. (shrink)

It is commonly said that some standards, such as morality, are ‘normatively authoritative’ in a way that other standards, such as etiquette, are not; standards like etiquette are said to be ‘not really normative’. Skeptics deny the very possibility of normative authority, and take claims like ‘etiquette is not really normative’ to be either empty or confused. I offer a different route to defeat skeptics about authority: instead of focusing on what makes standards like morality special, we should focus on (...) what makes standards like etiquette ‘not really normative’. I defend a fictionalist theory on which etiquette is ‘not really normative’ in roughly the same way that Sherlock is ‘not really a detective’, and show that fictionalism about some normative standards helps us explain the possibility of normative authority. (shrink)

Conversational exculpature is a pragmatic process whereby information is subtracted from, rather than added to, what the speaker literally says. This pragmatic content subtraction explains why we can say “Rob is six feet tall” without implying that Rob is between 5'0.99" and 6'0.01" tall, and why we can say “Ellen has a hat like the one Sherlock Holmes always wears” without implying Holmes exists or has a hat. This article presents a simple formalism for understanding this pragmatic mechanism, specifying how, (...) in context, the result of such subtractions is determined. And it shows how the resulting theory of conversational exculpature accounts for a varied range of linguistic phenomena. A distinctive feature of the approach is the crucial role played by the question under discussion in determining the result of a given exculpature. (shrink)

This chapter proposes a radically enactive account of remembering that casts it as creative, dynamic, and wide-reaching. It paints a picture of remembering that no longer conceives of it as involving passive recollections – always occurring wholly and solely inside heads. Integrating empirical findings from various sources, the chapter puts pressure on familiar cognitivist visions of remembering. Pivotally, it is argued, that we achieve a stronger and more elegant account of remembering by abandoning the widely held assumption that it is (...) rooted in the retrieval of stored information or content in order to represent past events. We demonstrate how a radically enactive account of the roots of remembering can successfully handle classic cases discussed in the extended memory literature while, at same time, accommodating experientially rich forms of episodic memory. (shrink)

We defend a functionalist approach to emotion that begins by focusing on emotions as central states with causal connections to behavior and to other cognitive states. The approach brackets the conscious experience of emotion, lists plausible features that emotions exhibit, and argues that alternative schemes are unpromising candidates. We conclude with the benefits of our approach: one can study emotions in animals; one can look in the brain for the implementation of specific features; and one ends up with an architecture (...) of the mind in which emotions are fully accommodated through their relations to the rest of cognition. Our article focuses on arguing for this general approach; as such, it is an essay in the philosophy of emotion rather than in the psychology or neuroscience of emotion. (shrink)

This paper explores a special kind of loop of grounding: cosmic loops. A cosmic loop is a loop that intuitively requires us to go "around" the entire universe to come back to the original ground. After describing several kinds of cosmic loop scenarios, I will discuss what we can learn from these scenarios about constraints on grounding; the conceivability of cosmic loops; the possibility of cosmic loops; and the prospects for salvaging local reflexivity, asymmetry and transitivity of grounding in a (...) world containing a cosmic loop of ground. The considerations raised in this paper also bear on what we should think about relations that are meant to support grounding relations: in particular, revisions to theories of the part-whole relation are discussed. (shrink)

Radical enactive and embodied approaches to cognitive science oppose the received view in the sciences of the mind in denying that cognition fundamentally involves contentful mental representation. This paper argues that the fate of representationalism in cognitive science matters significantly to how best to understand the extent of cognition. It seeks to establish that any move away from representationalism toward pure, empirical functionalism fails to provide a substantive “mark of the cognitive” and is bereft of other adequate means for individuating (...) cognitive activity. It also argues that giving proper attention to the way the folk use their psychological concepts requires questioning the legitimacy of commonsense functionalism. In place of extended functionalism—empirical or commonsensical—we promote the fortunes of extensive enactivism, clarifying in which ways it is distinct from notions of extended mind and distributed cognition. (shrink)

It is commonly argued that a serious right to life is grounded only in actual, relatively advanced psychological capacities a being has acquired. The moral permissibility of abortion is frequently argued for on these grounds. Increasingly it is being argued that such accounts also entail the permissibility of infanticide, with several proponents of these theories accepting this consequence. We show, however, that these accounts imply the permissibility of even more unpalatable acts than infanticide performed on infants: organ harvesting, live experimentation, (...) sexual interference, and discriminatory killing. The stronger intuitions against the permissibility of these ‘pre-personal acts’ allow us to re-establish a comprehensive and persuasive reductio against psychological accounts of persons. (shrink)

Well-being measurements are frequently used to support conclusions about a range of philosophically important issues. This is a problem, because we know too little about the intervals of the relevant scales. I argue that it is plausible that well-being measurements are non-linear, and that common beliefs that they are linear are not truth-tracking, so we are not justified in believing that well-being scales are linear. I then argue that this undermines common appeals to both hypothetical and actual well-being measurements; I (...) first focus on the philosophical literature on prioritarianism and then discuss Kahneman’s Peak-End Rule as a systematic bias. Finally, I discuss general implications for research on well-being, and suggest a better way of representing scales. (shrink)

What is commonly referred to as the Adoption Problem is a challenge to the idea that the principles of logic can be rationally revised. The argument is based on a reconstruction of unpublished work by Saul Kripke. As the reconstruction has it, Kripke extends the scope of Willard van Orman Quine's regress argument against conventionalism to the possibility of adopting new logical principles. In this paper we want to discuss the scope of this challenge. Are all revisions of logic subject (...) to the Adoption Problem? If not, are there significant cases of logical revision that are subject to the Adoption Problem? We will argue that both questions should be answered negatively. (shrink)

The U.S. election in November 2016 raised and amplified doubts about first-past-the-post (“plurality rule”) electoral systems. Arguments against plurality rule and for alternatives like preferential voting tend to be consequentialist: it is argued that systems like preferential voting produce different, better outcomes. After briefly noting why the consequentialist case against plurality rule is more complex and contentious than it first appears, I offer an expressive alternative: plurality rule produces actual or apparent dilemmas for voters in ways that are morally objectionable, (...) and avoidable under preferential voting systems. This expressive case against plurality rule is both simpler and more ecumenical than its consequentialist counterpart, and it provides strong reasons to prefer alternatives to plurality rule. Moreover, it suggests a distinct way of evaluating different alternatives like preferential voting. (shrink)

This paper draws attention to a fundamental problem for a version of the tracing strategy defended by a number of theorists in the current literature (Rosen 2004, Fischer and Tognazzini 2009). I argue that versions of the tracing strategy that require reasonable foreseeability are in tension with the view that blameless ignorance excuses. A stronger version of the tracing strategy is consistent with the view that blameless ignorance excuses and is therefore preferable for those tracing theorists who wish to continue (...) maintaining that it does. (shrink)

This paper defends Priorianism, a theory in the philosophy of time which combines three theses: first, that there is a metaphysical distinction between the present time and non-present times; second, that there are temporary propositions, that is, propositions that change in truth-value simpliciter over time; and third, that there is change over time only if there are temporary propositions. Priorianism is accepted by many Presentists, Growing Block Theorists, and Moving Spotlight Theorists. However, it is difficult to defend the view without (...) appealing to premises that those who reject the view find controversial. My aim in this paper is to defend Priorianism in a way that largely avoids appealing to such premises. I do three things: first (Section 1), I describe the component theses of Priorianism and the relations between them. Next (Section 2), I show how Priorians can respond to the argument that the B-theory implies that there are temporary propositions, and therefore satisfies the Priorian condition for there being change over time. Finally (Section 3), I defend the Priorian thesis that there is change over time only if there are temporary propositions against an alternative principle of change defended by Ross Cameron (The Moving Spotlight, 2015). (shrink)

We distinguish and discuss two different accounts of the subject matter of theories of reference, meta-externalism and meta-internalism. We argue that a form of the meta- internalist view, “moderate meta-internalism”, is the most plausible account of the subject matter of theories of reference. In the second part of the paper we explain how this account also helps to answer the questions of what kind of concept reference is, and what role intuitions have in the study of the reference relation.

Our approach to emotion emphasized three key ingredients. We do not yet have a mature science of emotion, or even a consensus view—in this respect we are more hesitant than Sander, Grandjean, and Scherer or Luiz Pessoa. Relatedly, a science of emotion needs to be highly interdisciplinary, including ecology, psychology, neuroscience, and philosophy. We recommend a functionalist view that brackets conscious experiences and that essentially treats emotions as latent variables inferred from a number of measures. But our version of functionalism (...) is not definitional or ontological. It is resolutely methodological, in good part because it is too early to attempt definitions. (shrink)

This article considers the question of the responsibility that present day generations bear as a result of the actions of their ancestors. Is it morally significant that we share a national identity with those responsible for the perpetration of historic injustice? The article argues that we can be guilty of wrongdoing stemming from past wrongdoing if we are members of nations that are responsible for an ongoing failure to fulfil rectificatory duties. This rests upon three claims: that the failure to (...) fulfil rectificatory duties is unjust; that nations can bear collective responsibility for the actions of their leaders; and that nations are comprised of overlapping generations rather than successive generations. The claim that present day parties should apologise for historic injustice is then considered, and it is argued that such an apology is best understood in relation to an ongoing failure to fulfil rectificatory duties. (shrink)

I examine the epistemic import of collaborative research in science. I develop and defend a functional explanation for its growing importance. Collaborative research is becoming more popular in the natural sciences, and to a lesser degree in the social sciences, because contemporary research in these fields frequently requires access to abundant resources, for which there is great competition. Scientists involved in collaborative research have been very successful in accessing these resources, which has in turn enabled them to realize the epistemic (...) goals of science more effectively than other scientists, thus creating a research environment in which collaboration is now the norm. (shrink)

In our article (Zawadzki and Adamczyk 2021), we analyzed threats that novel memory modifying interventions may pose in the future. More specifically, we discussed how optogenetics’ potential for reversible erasure/deactivation of memory “may impact authenticity by producing changes at different levels of personality.” Our article has received many thoughtful open peer commentaries for which we would like to express our great appreciation. We have identified two main threads of objections. They are related to the potential applicability of optogenetics as a (...) therapeutic memory modification technology (MMT) in humans—applicability thread, and the normative value of authenticity, that is, the assumption that preserving authenticity is valuable (either in general or in the particular approach we adopted)—normative thread. Both of these threads concern fundamental issues: The former deals with the scientific credibility of the case vignette on which our discussion is based, and the latter deals with the normative weight of our considerations. We think that addressing both of them can be instructive in a broader context as they reflect a more general disagreement among neuroethicists about the very purpose and method of our discipline. (shrink)

Optogenetics is an invasive neuromodulation technology involving the use of light to control the activity of individual neurons. Even though optogenetics is a relatively new neuromodulation tool whose various implications have not yet been scrutinized, it has already been approved for its first clinical trials in humans. As optogenetics is being intensively investigated in animal models with the aim of developing novel brain stimulation treatments for various neurological and psychiatric disorders, it appears crucial to consider both the opportunities and dangers (...) such therapies may offer. In this review, we focus on the memory-modifying potential of optogenetics, investigating what it is capable of and how it differs from other memory modification technologies. We then outline the safety challenges that need to be addressed before optogenetics can be used in humans. Finally, we re-examine crucial neuroethical concerns expressed in regard to other MMTs in the light of optogenetics and address those that appear to be unique to the memory-modifying potential of optogenetic technology. (shrink)

The expressivist advances a view about how we explain the meaning of a fragment of language, such as claims about what we morally ought to do. Critics evaluate expressivism on those terms. This is a serious mistake. We don’t just use that fragment of language in isolation. We make claims about what we morally, legally, rationally, and prudentially ought to do. To account for this linguistic phenomenon, the expressivist owes us an account not just of each fragment of language, but (...) of how they weave together into a broader tapestry. I argue that expressivists face a dilemma in doing so: either they fail to explain the univocality of terms like 'ought', or they fail to explain when normative statements are and aren't inconsistent. (shrink)

We argue that generic generalizations about racial groups are pernicious in what they communicate (both to members of that racial group and to members of other racial groups), and may be central to the construction of social categories like racial groups. We then consider how we should change and challenge uses of generic generalizations about racial groups.

In this paper, I outline a heuristic for thinking about the relation between explanation and understanding that can be used to capture various levels of “intimacy”, between them. I argue that the level of complexity in the structure of explanation is inversely proportional to the level of intimacy between explanation and understanding, i.e. the more complexity the less intimacy. I further argue that the level of complexity in the structure of explanation also affects the explanatory depth in a similar way (...) to intimacy between explanation and understanding, i.e. the less complexity the greater explanatory depth and vice versa. (shrink)

English translation of Kant's Beantwortung der Frage: Was ist Aufklärung? (Königsberg in Prussia, 30 September 1784).

What do normative terms like “obligation” mean in legal contexts? On one view, which H.L.A. Hart may have endorsed, “obligation” is ambiguous in moral and legal contexts. On another, which is dominant in jurisprudence, “obligation” has a distinctively moralized meaning in legal contexts. On a third view, which is often endorsed in philosophy of language, “obligation” has a generic meaning in moral and legal con- texts. After making the nature of and disagreements between these views precise, I show how linguistic (...) data militates against both rivals to the generic meaning view, and argue that this has significant implications for jurisprudence. (shrink)

The counterfactual mental state of negligent criminal activity invites skepticism from those who see mental states as essential to responsibility. Here, I offer a revision of the mental state of criminal negligence, one where the mental state at issue is actual and not merely counterfactual. This revision dissolves the worry raised by the skeptic and helps to explain negligence’s comparatively reduced culpability.

Paul Feyerabend once made a remark to the effect that his pragmatic theory of observation can be traced back to proposals put forward by leading Logical Empiricists during the height of the protocol sentence debate. In this paper I want to vindicate the systematic side of Feyerabend’s remark and show that a pragmatic theory of observation can in fact be found in Rudolf Carnap’s writings of 1932. I first proceed to dispel a misunderstanding concerning the term “pragmatic” raised by Thomas (...) Oberdan. Following Morris’ and Carnap’s documented usage, I show that the intended meaning of “pragmatic” refers to a specific semiotic relation between users of a language and their environment describable by empirical means. I reconstruct such a pragmatic theory in terms of a detector model that interprets observation sentences as bodily dispositions indicating physical events in the surroundings of the detector. I then proceed to show how Feyerabend’s later theory of observation picks up central features of Carnap’s account and also shares some of the motivations. I conclude by noting how an empirical theory of observation sentences offers a bootstrapping solution to the “basis problem”. (shrink)