The aim of this workshop was to ask potential end-users of the citizens’ information pack on legal and ethical issues around ICTs the following questions: What is your knowledge of the EU’s General Data Protection Regulation, and what actions have you taken in response to these regulations? What challenges are you experiencing in ensuring the protection and security of your project data, and compliance with the GDPR, within existing data management processes/systems? What information/tools/resources do you need to overcome these challenges? (...) What are the best formats/channels for receiving, sharing and acting upon this information? What is the most appropriate structure/format for the citizens’ information pack? (shrink)

ICTs, personal data, digital rights, the GDPR, data privacy, online security… these terms, and the concepts behind them, are increasingly common in our lives. Some of us may be familiar with them, but others are less aware of the growing role of ICTs and data in our lives - and the potential risks this creates. These risks are even more pronounced for vulnerable groups in society. People can be vulnerable in different, often overlapping, ways, which place them at a disadvantage (...) to the majority of citizens; Table 3 in this guide presents some of the many forms and causes of vulnerability. As a result, vulnerable people need greater support to navigate the digital world, and to ensure that they are able to exercise their rights. This guide explains where such support can be found, and also answers the following questions: - What are the main ethical and legal issues around ICTs for vulnerable citizens? - Who is vulnerable in Europe? - How do issues around ICTs affect vulnerable people in particular? This guide is a resource for members of vulnerable groups, people who work with vulnerable groups, and citizens more broadly. It is also useful for data controllers1 who collect data about vulnerable citizens. While focused on citizens in Europe, it may be of interest to people in other parts of the world. It forms part of the Citizens’ Information Pack produced by the PANELFIT project, and is available in English, French, German, Italian and Spanish. You are welcome to translate this guide into other languages. Please send us a link to online versions in other languages, so that we can add them to the project website. (shrink)

Much of the recent philosophical discussion about free will has been focused on whether compatibilists can adequately defend how a determined agent could exercise the type of free will that would enable the agent to be morally responsible in what has been called the basic desert sense :5–24, 1994; Fischer in Four views on free will, Wiley, Hoboken, 2007; Vargas in Four views on free will, Wiley, Hoboken, 2007; Vargas in Philos Stud, 144:45–62, 2009). While we agree with Derk Pereboom (...) and others that the compatibilist’s burden should be properly understood as providing a compelling account of how a determined agent could be morally responsible in the basic desert sense, the exact nature of this burden has been rendered somewhat unclear by the fact that there has been no definitive account given as to what the basic desert sense of moral responsibility amounts to. In Sect. 1 we set out to clarify the compatibilist’s burden by presenting our account of basic desert moral responsibility—which we call retributivist desert moral responsibility for purposes of clarity—and explain why it is of central philosophical and practical importance to the free will debate. In Sect. 2 we employ a thought experiment to illustrate the kind of difficulty that compatibilists of any stripe are likely to encounter in attempting to explain how determined agents can exercise the kind of free will needed for retributivist desert moral responsibility. (shrink)

In recent decades, with advances in the behavioral, cognitive, and neurosciences, the idea that patterns of human behavior may ultimately be due to factors beyond our conscious control has increasingly gained traction and renewed interest in the age-old problem of free will. To properly assess what, if anything, these empirical advances can tell us about free will and moral responsibility, we first need to get clear on the following questions: Is consciousness necessary for free will? If so, what role or (...) function must it play? Are agents morally responsible for actions and behaviors that are carried out automatically or without conscious control or guidance? Are they morally responsible for actions, judgments, and attitudes that are the result of implicit biases or situational features of their surroundings of which they are unaware? What about the actions of somnambulists or cases of extreme sleepwalking where consciousness is largely absent? Clarifying the relationship between consciousness and free will is imperative if we want to evaluate the various arguments for and against free will. For example, do compatibilist reasons- responsive and deep self accounts require consciousness? If so, are they threatened by recent developments in the behavior, cognitive, and neurosciences? What about libertarian accounts of free will? What powers, if any, do they impart to consciousness and are they consistent with our best scientific theories about the world? In this survey piece, I will outline and assess several distinct views on the relationship between consciousness and free will. (shrink)

As philosophical and scientific arguments for free will skepticism continue to gain traction, we are likely to see a fundamental shift in the way people think about free will and moral responsibility. Such shifts raise important practical and existential concerns: What if we came to disbelieve in free will? What would this mean for our interpersonal relationships, society, morality, meaning, and the law? What would it do to our standing as human beings? Would it cause nihilism and despair as some (...) maintain or would it rather have a humanizing effect on our practices and policies, freeing us from the negative effects of belief in free will? In this chapter we consider the practical implications of free will skepticism and argue that life without free will and basic desert moral responsibility would not be as destructive as many people believe. We argue that prospects of finding meaning in life or of sustaining good interpersonal relationships, for example, would not be threatened. On treatment of criminals, we argue that although retributivism and severe punishment, such as the death penalty, would be ruled out, preventive detention and rehabilitation programs would still be justified. While we will touch on all these issues below, our focus will be primarily on this last issue. -/- We begin in section I by considering two different routes to free will skepticism. The first denies the causal efficacy of the types of willing required for free will and receives its contemporary impetus from pioneering work in neuroscience by Benjamin Libet, Daniel Wegner, and John-Dylan Haynes. The second, which is more common in the philosophical literature, does not deny the causal efficacy of the will but instead claims that whether this causal efficacy is deterministic or indeterministic, it does not achieve the level of control to count as free will by the standards of the historical debate. We argue that while there are compelling objections to the first route—e.g., Al Mele (2009), Eddy Nahmias (2002, 2011), and Neil Levy (2005)—the second route to free will skepticism remains intact. In section II we argue that free will skepticism allows for a workable morality, and, rather than negatively impacting our personal relationships and meaning in life, may well improve our well-being and our relationships to others since it would tend to eradicate an often destructive form of moral anger. In section III we argue that free will skepticism allows for adequate ways of responding to criminal behavior—in particular, incapacitation, rehabilitation, and alternation of relevant social conditions—and that these methods are both morally justified and sufficient for good social policy. We present and defend our own preferred model for dealing with dangerous criminals, an incapacitation account built on the right to self-protection analogous to the justification for quarantine (see Pereboom 2001, 2013, 2014a; Caruso 2016a), and we respond to recent objections to it by Michael Corrado and John Lemos. (shrink)

Free will skepticism maintains that what we do, and the way we are, is ultimately the result of factors beyond our control and because of this we are never morally responsible for our actions in the basic desert sense—the sense that would make us truly deserving of praise and blame. In recent years, a number of contemporary philosophers have advanced and defended versions of free will skepticism, including Derk Pereboom (2001, 2014), Galen Strawson (2010), Neil Levy (2011), Bruce Waller (2011, (...) 2015), and myself (Caruso 2012, 2013, forthcoming). Critics, however, often complain that adopting such views would have dire consequences for ourselves, society, morality, meaning, and the law. They fear, for instance, that relinquishing belief in free will and basic desert moral responsibility would leave us unable to adequately deal with criminal behavior, increase anti-social conduct, and undermine meaning in life. -/- In response, free will skeptics argue that life without free will and basic desert moral responsibility would not be as destructive as many people believe (see, e.g., Pereboom 2001, 2014; Waller 2011, 2015; Caruso 2016, forthcoming). According to optimistic skeptics, prospects of finding meaning in life or of sustaining good interpersonal relationships, for instance, would not be threatened. And although retributivism and severe punishment, such as the death penalty, would be ruled out, incapacitation and rehabilitation programs would still be justified (see Pereboom 2001, 2013, 2014; Levy 2012; Caruso 2016; Pereboom and Caruso, forthcoming). In this paper, I attempt to extend this general optimism about the practical implications of free will skepticism to the question of creativity. -/- In Section I, I spell out the question of creativity and explain why it’s relevant to the problem of free will. In Section II, I identify three different conceptions of creativity and explain the practical concerns critics have with free will skepticism. In Section III, I distinguish between three different conceptions of moral responsibility and argue that at least two of them are consistent with free will skepticism. I further contend that forward-looking accounts of moral responsibility, which are perfectly consistent with free will skepticism, can justify calling agents to account for immoral behavior as well as providing encouragement for creative activities since these are important for moral and creative formation and development. I conclude in Section IV by arguing that relinquishing belief in free will and basic desert would not mean the death of creativity or our sense of achievement since important and realistic conceptions of both remain in place. (shrink)

In the philosophical literature, self-deception is mainly approached through the analysis of paradoxes. Yet, it is agreed that self-deception is motivated by protection from distress. In this paper, we argue, with the help of findings from cognitive neuroscience and psychology, that self-deception is a type of affective coping. First, we criticize the main solutions to the paradoxes of self-deception. We then present a new approach to self-deception. Self-deception, we argue, involves three appraisals of the distressing evidence: (a) appraisal of the (...) strength of evidence as uncertain, (b) low coping potential and (c) negative anticipation along the lines of Damasio’s somatic marker hypothesis. At the same time, desire impacts the treatment of flattering evidence via dopamine. Our main proposal is that self-deception involves emotional mechanisms provoking a preference for immediate reward despite possible long-term negative repercussions. In the last part, we use this emotional model to revisit the philosophical paradoxes. (shrink)

One of the most frequently voiced criticisms of free will skepticism is that it is unable to adequately deal with criminal behavior and that the responses it would permit as justified are insufficient for acceptable social policy. This concern is fueled by two factors. The first is that one of the most prominent justifications for punishing criminals, retributivism, is incompatible with free will skepticism. The second concern is that alternative justifications that are not ruled out by the skeptical view per (...) se face significant independent moral objections (Pereboom 2014: 153). Despite these concerns, I maintain that free will skepticism leaves intact other ways to respond to criminal behavior—in particular incapacitation, rehabilitation, and alteration of relevant social conditions—and that these methods are both morally justifiable and sufficient for good social policy. The position I defend is similar to Derk Pereboom’s (2001, 2013, 2014), taking as its starting point his quarantine analogy, but it sets out to develop the quarantine model within a broader justificatory framework drawn from public health ethics. The resulting model—which I call the public health-quarantine model (Caruso 2016, 2017a)—provides a framework for justifying quarantine and criminal sanctions that is more humane than retributivism and preferable to other non-retributive alternatives. It also provides a broader approach to criminal behavior than Pereboom’s quarantine analogy does on its own since it prioritizes prevention and social justice. -/- In Section 1, I begin by (very) briefly summarizing my arguments against free will and basic desert moral responsibility. In Section 2, I then introduce and defend my public health-quarantine model, which is a non-retributive alternative to criminal punishment that prioritizes prevention and social justice. In Sections 3 and 4, I take up and respond to two general objections to the public health-quarantine model. Since objections by Michael Corrado (2016), John Lemos (2016), Saul Smilanksy (2011, 2017), and Victor Tadros (2017) have been addressed in detail elsewhere (see Pereboom 2017a; Pereboom and Caruso 2018), I will here focus on objections that have not yet been addressed. In particular, I will respond to concerns about proportionality, human dignity, and victims’ rights. I will argue that each of these concerns can be met and that in the end the public health-quarantine model offers a superior alternative to retributive punishment and other non-retributive accounts. (shrink)

Debate on free will with Christian List, Gregg Caruso, and Cory Clark. The exchange is focused on Christian List's book Why Free Will Is Real.

Desires matter. What are desires? Many believe that desire is a motivational state: desiring is being disposed to act. This conception aligns with the functionalist approach to desire and the standard account of desire's role in explaining action. According to a second influential approach, however, desire is first and foremost an evaluation: desiring is representing something as good. After all, we seem to desire things under the guise of the good. Which understanding of desire is more accurate? Is the guise (...) of the good even right to assume? Should we adopt an alternative picture that emphasizes desire's deontic nature? What do neuroscientific studies suggest? -/- Essays in the first section of the volume are devoted to these questions, and to the puzzle of desire's essence. In the second part of the volume, essays investigate some implications that the various conceptions of desire have on a number of fundamental issues. For example, why are inconsistent desires problematic? What is desire's role in practical deliberation? How do we know what we want? -/- This volume will contribute to the emergence of a fruitful debate on a neglected, albeit crucial, dimension of the mind. (shrink)

There are a number of important links and similarities between public health and safety. In this extended essay, Gregg D. Caruso defends and expands his public health-quarantine model, which is a non-retributive alternative for addressing criminal behavior that draws on the public health framework and prioritizes prevention and social justice. In developing his account, he explores the relationship between public health and safety, focusing on how social inequalities and systemic injustices affect health outcomes and crime rates, how poverty affects (...) brain development, how offenders often have pre-existing medical conditions (especially mental health issues), how involvement in the criminal justice system itself can lead to or worsen health and cognitive problems, how treatment and rehabilitation methods can best be employed to reduce recidivism and reintegrate offenders back into society, and how a public health approach could be successfully applied within the criminal justice system. Caruso's approach draws on research from the health sciences, social sciences, public policy, law, psychiatry, medical ethics, neuroscience, and philosophy, and he delivers a set of ethically defensible and practically workable proposals for implementing the public health-quarantine model. The essay begins by discussing recent empirical findings in psychology, neuroscience, and the social sciences that provide us with an increased understanding of the social and neurological determinants of health and criminal behavior. It then turns to Caruso's public health-quarantine model and argues that the model provides the most justified, humane, and effective approach for addressing criminal behavior. Caruso concludes by proposing a capability approach to social justice grounded in six key features of human well-being. He argues that we cannot successfully address concerns over public health and safety without simultaneously addressing issues of social justice—including the social determinants of health (SDH) and the social determinants of criminal behavior (SDCB)—and he recommends eight general policy proposals consistent with his model. (shrink)

One of the most frequently voiced criticisms of free will skepticism is that it is unable to adequately deal with criminal behavior and that the responses it would permit as justified are insufficient for acceptable social policy. This concern is fueled by two factors. The first is that one of the most prominent justifications for punishing criminals, retributivism, is incompatible with free will skepticism. The second concern is that alternative justifications that are not ruled out by the skeptical view per (...) se face significant independent moral objections. Yet despite these concerns, I maintain that free will skepticism leaves intact other ways to respond to criminal behavior—in particular preventive detention, rehabilitation, and alteration of relevant social conditions—and that these methods are both morally justifiable and sufficient for good social policy. The position I defend is similar to Derk Pereboom’s, taking as its starting point his quarantine analogy, but it sets out to develop the quarantine model within a broader justificatory framework drawn from public health ethics. The resulting model—which I call the public health -quarantine model—provides a framework for justifying quarantine and criminal sanctions that is more humane than retributivism and preferable to other non-retributive alternatives. It also provides a broader approach to criminal behavior than Pereboom’s quarantine analogy does on its own. (shrink)

We discuss the mathematical structures that underlie quantum probabilities. More specifically, we explore possible connections between logic, geometry and probability theory. We propose an interpretation that generalizes the method developed by R. T. Cox to the quantum logical approach to physical theories. We stress the relevance of developing a geometrical interpretation of quantum mechanics.

Within the United States, the most prominent justification for criminal punishment is retributivism. This retributivist justification for punishment maintains that punishment of a wrongdoer is justified for the reason that she deserves something bad to happen to her just because she has knowingly done wrong—this could include pain, deprivation, or death. For the retributivist, it is the basic desert attached to the criminal’s immoral action alone that provides the justification for punishment. This means that the retributivist position is not reducible (...) to consequentialist considerations nor in justifying punishment does it appeal to wider goods such as the safety of society or the moral improvement of those being punished. A number of sentencing guidelines in the U.S. have adopted desert as their distributive principle, and it is increasingly given deference in the “purposes” section of state criminal codes, where it can be the guiding principle in the interpretation and application of the code’s provisions. Indeed, the American Law Institute recently revised the Model Penal Code so as to set desert as the official dominate principle for sentencing. And courts have identified desert as the guiding principle in a variety of contexts, as with the Supreme Court’s enthroning retributivism as the “primary justification for the death penalty.” While retributivism provides one of the main sources of justification for punishment within the criminal justice system, there are good philosophical and practical reasons for rejecting it. One such reason is that it is unclear that agents truly deserve to suffer for the wrongs they have done in the sense required by retributivism. In the first section, I explore the retributivist justification of punishment and explain why it is inconsistent with free will skepticism. In the second section, I then argue that even if one is not convinced by the arguments for free will skepticism, there remains a strong epistemic argument against causing harm on retributivist grounds that undermines both libertarian and compatibilist attempts to justify it. I maintain that this argument provides sufficient reason for rejecting the retributive justification of criminal punishment. I conclude in the third section by briefly sketching my public health-quarantine model, a non-retributive alternative for addressing criminal behavior that draws on the public health framework and prioritizes prevention and social justice. I argue that the model is not only consistent with free will skepticism and the epistemic argument against retributivism, it also provides the most justified, humane, and effective way of dealing with criminal behavior. (shrink)

The informal logic movement began as an attempt to develop – and teach – an alternative logic which can account for the real life arguing that surrounds us in our daily lives – in newspapers and the popular media, political and social commentary, advertising, and interpersonal exchange. The movement was rooted in research and discussion in Canada and especially at the University of Windsor, and has become a branch of argumentation theory which intersects with related traditions and approaches (notably formal (...) logic, rhetoric and dialectics in the form of pragma-dialectics). In this volume, some of the best known contributors to the movement discuss their views and the reasoning and argument which is informal logic’s subject matter. Many themes and issues are explored in a way that will fuel the continued evolution of the field. Federico Puppo adds an insightful essay which considers the origins and development of informal logic and whether informal logicians are properly described as a “school” of thought. In considering that proposition, Puppo introduces readers to a diverse range of essays, some of them previously published, others written specifically for this volume. (shrink)

In this work, we focus on the philosophical aspects and technical challenges that underlie the axiomatization of the non-Kolmogorovian probability framework, in connection with the problem of quantum contextuality. This fundamental feature of quantum theory has received a lot of attention recently, given that it might be connected to the speed-up of quantum computers—a phenomenon that is not fully understood. Although this problem has been extensively studied in the physics community, there are still many philosophical questions that should be properly (...) formulated. We analyzed different problems from a conceptual standpoint using the non-Kolmogorovian probability approach as a technical tool. (shrink)

While some form of loss of control is often assumed to be a common feature of the diverse manifestations of addiction, it is far from clear how loss of control should be understood. In this paper, I put forward a concept of decrease in control in addiction that aims to fill this gap and thus provide a general framework for thinking about addictive behavior. The development of this account involves two main steps. First, I present a view of degrees of (...) control as the degree to which an agent would be responsive to potential or counterfactual sufficient reasons to do otherwise. Second, I sketch an account of the relevant control-undermining factors in addiction that is consonant with my proposed view of degrees of control. Being a high-level functional property, reasons-responsiveness is particularly well suited to frame an account of control-undermining factors that is doubly pluralistic: it encompasses the contribution of factors both internal and external to the agent, and it is consistent with various proposals as to the precise nature of the anomaly taking place in the psychology of addiction. (shrink)

How are we to understand the intentionality of desire? According to the two classical views, desire is either a positive evaluation or a disposition to act. This essay examines these conceptions of desire and argues for a deontic alternative, namely the view that desiring is representing a state of affairs as what ought to be. Three lines of criticism of the classical pictures of desire are provided. The first concerns desire’s direction of fit, i.e. the intuition that the world should (...) conform to our desires. The second concerns the “death of desire” principle, i.e. the intuition that one cannot desire what one represents as actual. The last pertains to desire’s role in psychological explanations, i.e. the intuition that desires can explain motivations and be explained by evaluations. Following these criticisms, three positive arguments in favor of the deontic conception are sketched. (shrink)

One of the main libertarian arguments in support of free will is the argument from introspection. This argument places a great deal of faith in our conscious feeling of freedom and our introspective abilities. People often infer their own freedom from their introspective phenomenology of freedom. It is here argued that from the fact that I feel myself free, it does not necessarily follow that I am free. I maintain that it is our mistaken belief in the transparency and infallibility (...) of consciousness that gives the introspective argument whatever power it possesses. Once we see that consciousness is neither transparent nor infallible, the argument from introspection loses all of its force. I argue that since we do not have direct, infallible access to our own minds, to rely on introspection to infer our own freedom would be a mistake. (shrink)

This Element examines the concept of moral responsibility as it is used in contemporary philosophical debates and explores the justifiability of the moral practices associated with it, including moral praise/blame, retributive punishment, and the reactive attitudes of resentment and indignation. After identifying and discussing several different varieties of responsibility-including causal responsibility, take-charge responsibility, role responsibility, liability responsibility, and the kinds of responsibility associated with attributability, answerability, and accountability-it distinguishes between basic and non-basic desert conceptions of moral responsibility and considers a (...) number of skeptical arguments against each. It then outlines an alternative forward-looking account of moral responsibility grounded in non-desert-invoking desiderata such as protection, reconciliation, and moral formation. It concludes by addressing concerns about the practical implications of skepticism about desert-based moral responsibility and explains how optimistic skeptics can preserve most of what we care about when it comes to our interpersonal relationships, morality, and meaning in life. (shrink)

Derk Pereboom’s Free Will, Agency, and Meaning in Life provides the most lively and comprehensive defense of free will skepticism in the literature. It contains a reworked and expanded version of the view he first developed in Living without Free Will. Important objections to the early book are answered, some slight modifications are introduced, and the overall account is significantly embellished—for example, Pereboom proposes a new account of rational deliberation consistent with the belief that one’s actions are causally determined and (...) develops a forward-looking theory of moral responsibility con- sistent with free will skepticism. A significant contribution to the field, Free Will, Agency, and Meaning in Life is destined to become a classic and is essential reading for anyone interested in free will and moral responsibility. (shrink)

A restrictive view of self-control identifies exercises of self-control with synchronic intrapsychic processes, and pictures diachronic and externally-scaffolded strategies not as proper instances of self-control, but as clever ways of avoiding the need to exercise that ability. In turn, defenders of an inclusive view of self-control typically argue that we should construe self-control as more than effortful inhibition, and that, on grounds of functional equivalence, all these diverse strategies might be properly described as instances of self-control. In this paper, I (...) take a fresh look at this debate by focusing on cases of addiction. I argue that addicted agents face a paradigmatic sort of self-control challenge, which makes addiction an important test case for theories of self-control. And I discuss evidence that highlights both the unreliability of synchronic intrapsychic strategies and the crucial role that is played by diachronic and externally-scaffolded strategies in successful attempts at achieving abstinence by addicted individuals. Abstaining addicts are a paradigmatic case of agents who successfully exercise self-control, and they mostly do so by relying on diachronic and externally-scaffolded strategies. This, I argue, lends further support to an inclusive view of self-control. (shrink)

Desire has not been at the center of recent preoccupations in the philosophy of mind. Consequently, the literature settled into several dogmas. The first part of this introduction presents these dogmas and invites readers to scrutinize them. The main dogma is that desires are motivational states. This approach contrasts with the other dominant conception: desires are positive evaluations. But there are at least four other dogmas: the world should conform to our desires (world-to-mind direction of fit), desires involve a positive (...) evaluation (the “guise of the good”), we cannot desire what we think is actual (the “death of desire” principle), and, in neuroscience, the idea that the reward system is the key to understanding desire. The second part of the introduction summarizes the contributions to this volume. The hope is to contribute to the emergence of a fruitful debate on this neglected, albeit crucial, aspect of the mind. (shrink)

This article suggests that Buber's idea of the community may hint at an alternative to the more common foundations of political thought, usually grounded on notions of power or rationality. Showing how Buber's idea of the community developed from a neo-romantic form (in his early writings) to a principle informed by the dialogical dimension of human life (from I and Thou onwards), I will point out the vertical dimension of political life ensuing from Buber's discourse. A discussion of the theopolitical (...) principle as expressed in Buber's Kingship of God will lead to the conclusion that, both descriptively and normatively, politics needs an openness to transcendence. (shrink)

We study the origin of quantum probabilities as arising from non-Boolean propositional-operational structures. We apply the method developed by Cox to non distributive lattices and develop an alternative formulation of non-Kolmogorovian probability measures for quantum mechanics. By generalizing the method presented in previous works, we outline a general framework for the deduction of probabilities in general propositional structures represented by lattices (including the non-distributive case).

Intuitively, we can conceive of the existence of a conscious state as a pure activity that does not necessarily require a body (or even a brain). This idea has found new support in certain recent theories that present the possibility of a totally disconnected and disembodied consciousness. Against this hypothesis, I argue that human experience is intrinsically embodied and embedded, though in a specific way. Using Sartre’s phenomenology of the body, I first analyze the concept of consciousness as intentionality and (...) a world-disclosing activity, thus explaining how conscious activity can only be expressed through a body that is spatiotemporally related to the world. Then, I argue that bodily consciousness does not necessarily imply the actual presence of an anatomical body but, rather, a process of spatialization and temporalization (hodological space and temporal synthesis) through the “spatiotemporal body”. Finally, I test my thesis by critiquing some cases of apparent disembodied/disconnected consciousness, i.e., dreams, out-of-body experiences, and the brain-in-a-vat scenario. (shrink)

This paper addresses the problem of articulating ethics with justice, as it would seem impossible to think the practical application of one without denying the other at the same time. Indeed, as Levinas puts it, justice is violence within ethics when trying to compare the incomparable. On the contrary, ethics is an asymmetrical and irreversible relationship between two, where justice seems to have no room at all. This work seek to provide an articulation between both immeasurable dimensions by a renewed (...) attention to the issue of temporality of ethics and by including the concept of impure, taken from the work of Jean Guitton, from which it is understood that both dimensions are co-implicated from the very difference that constitute them. (shrink)

Future-bias is the preference, all else being equal, for positive states of affairs to be located in the future not the past, and for negative states of affairs to be located in the past not the future. Three explanations for future-bias have been posited: the temporal metaphysics explanation, the practical irrelevance explanation, and the three mechanisms explanation. Understanding what explains future-bias is important not only for better understanding the phenomenon itself, but also because many philosophers think that which explanation is (...) the correct one has implications for our evaluation of the normative status of future-bias. In this paper we focus on the connection between future-bias and the temporal value asymmetry. The latter refers to the fact that people tend to assign more value to a state of affairs when it is located in the future, as opposed to being equidistant in the past. All three candidate explanations offered for future-bias proceed by explaining the temporal value asymmetry, and then supposing that future-bias is simply a manifestation of that asymmetry. Recently, however, it has been argued that the conditions under which people display the temporal value asymmetry and future-bias are different, and that this is reason to doubt that the latter is a manifestation of the former. In this paper we empirically test one response to this argument against the manifestation thesis—the simulation response—according to which once we control for the degree to which people can simulate the object of their preference, we find that people display future-bias and the temporal value asymmetry in the same conditions. We find no evidence in favour of the simulation response. Moreover, our results support some previous research that suggests that the temporal value asymmetry is less robust than previously thought, and this in itself casts doubt on the idea that future bias is just a manifestation of this asymmetry. (shrink)

Metascientific criteria used for explaining or constraining physical space dimensionality and their historical relationship to prevailing causal systems are discussed. The important contributions by Aristotle, Kant and Ehrenfest to the dimensionality of space problem are considered and shown to be grounded on different causal explanations: causa materialis for Aristotle, causa efficiens for young Kant and an ingenious combination of causa efficiens and causa formalis for Ehrenfest. The prominent and growing rôle played by causa formalis in modern physical approaches to this (...) problem is emphasized. (shrink)

Following the proposal of a new kind of selective structural realism that uses as a basis the distinction between framework and interaction theories, this work discusses relevant applications in fundamental physics. An ontology for the different entities and properties of well-known theories is thus consistently built. The case of classical field theories—including general relativity as a classical theory of gravitation—is examined in detail, as well as the implications of the classification scheme for issues of realism in quantum mechanics. These applications (...) also shed light on the different range of applicability of the ontic and epistemic versions of structural realism. (shrink)

In the paper, I defend the skeptical view that no one is ever morally responsible in the basic desert sense since luck universally undermines responsibility-level control. I begin in Section 1 by defining a number of different varieties of luck and examining their relevance to moral responsibility. I then turn, in Section 2, to outlining and defending what I consider to be the best argument for the skeptical view--the luck pincer (Levy 2011). I conclude in Section 3 by addressing Robert (...) Hartman's (2017) numerous objections to the luck pincer. I argue that the luck pincer emerges unscathed and the pervasiveness of luck (still) undermines moral responsibility. (shrink)

Music can infect us. In the dominant approach, music contaminates listeners through emotional mimicry and independently of value appraisal, just like when we catch other people’s feelings. Musical contagion is thus considered fatal to the mainstream view of emotions as cognitive evaluations. This paper criticizes this line of argument and proposes a new cognitivist account: the value metaphor view. Non-cognitivism relies on a contentious model of emotion transmission. In the competing model (social appraisal), we catch people’s emotions by appraising value (...) through their emotional expressions. Social appraisal debunks the main motivation for non-cognitivism and offers fruitful insights into musical contagion. Combining it with metaphor theory, I claim that musical contagion involves experiencing the music as a metaphor for emotions and values. Just like people infect us as we appraise value through their emotional expressions, music contaminates listeners because they hear it metaphorically-as some emotional expression and hereby appraise it metaphorically-as some value. As infectious music “sounds like” emotions and values, cognitivism is safe. (shrink)

Music can contaminate us. Sometimes, listeners perceive music as expressing some emotion (say, sadness), and this elicits the same emotion in them (they feel sad). What is musical contagion? This entry presents the main theories of musical contagion that crystallize around the challenge to the leading theory of emotions as experiences of values. How and why does music contaminate us? Does musical contagion elicit garden variety emotions, such as sadness, joy, and anxiety? Does music contaminate us by simply moving us? (...) Which role does imagination play in our affective responses to music? Is musical arousal elicited by automatic mimicry? What does musical contagion teach us about emotions? Musical contagion addresses fundamental theoretical and practical issues. (shrink)

A música pode causar emoções fortes. Como havemos de compreender as respostas afetivas à música? Este artigo apresenta os principais enigmas filosóficos atinentes às emoções musicais. O problema principal diz respeito ao chamado "contágio": os ouvintes percebem a música como sendo expressiva de uma certa emoção (por exemplo, tristeza) e a música suscita neles essa mesma emoção. O contágio é desconcertante, pois entra em conflito com a principal teoria da emoção, de acordo com a qual as emoções são experiências de (...) valores (cognitivismo). Este artigo gira, sobretudo, em torno da apresentação crítica das várias respostas a este desafio ao cognitivismo. Apresenta, também, o paradoxo da música triste, isto é, a questão do motivo pelo qual apreciamos música triste. -/- Music can induce strong emotions. How are we to understand affective responses to music? This article presents the main philosophical puzzles pertaining to musical emotions. The chief problem concerns so-called "contagion": listeners perceive music as expressive of some emotion (say, sadness), and the music elicits the same emotion in them. Contagion is perplexing because it collides with the leading theory of emotion, according to which emotions are experiences of values (cognitivism). This article mostly revolves around the critical presentation of the various responses to this challenge to cognitivism. It also presents the paradox of sad music, i.e. the question of why we enjoy sad music. (shrink)

Shaun Nichols has recently argued that while the folk notion of free will is associated with error, a question still remains whether the concept of free will should be eliminated or preserved. He maintains that like other eliminativist arguments in philosophy, arguments that free will is an illusion seem to depend on substantive assumptions about reference. According to free will eliminativists, people have deeply mistaken beliefs about free will and this entails that free will does not exist. However, an alternative (...) reaction is that free will does exist, we just have some deeply mistaken beliefs about it. According to Nichols, all such debates boil down to whether or not the erroneous folk term in question successfully refers or not. Since Nichols adopts the view that reference is systematically ambiguous, he maintains that in some contexts it’s appropriate to take a restrictivist view about whether a term embedded in a false theory refers, while in other contexts it’s appropriate to take a liberal view about whether a token of the very same term refers. This, according to Nichols, affords the possibility of saying that the sentence “free will exists” is false in some contexts and true in others. In this paper I argue that even if we grant Nichols his pluralistic approach to reference, there is still good reason to prefer eliminativism to preservationism with regard to free will. My argument focuses on one important difference between the concept of “free will” and other theoretical terms embedded in false theories—i.e., the role that the phenomenology of free agency plays in reference fixing. (shrink)

This chapter outlines six distinct reasons for rejecting retributivism, not the least of which is that it’s unclear that agents possess the kind of free will and moral responsibility needed to justify it. It then sketches a novel non-retributive alternative called the public health-quarantine model. The core idea of the model is that the right to harm in self-defense and defense of others justifies incapacitating the criminally dangerous with the minimum harm required for adequate protection. The model also draws on (...) the public health framework and prioritizes prevention and social justice. It is argued that not only does the public health-quarantine model offer a stark contrast to retributivism, it also provides a more humane, holistic, and effective approach to dealing with criminal behavior, one that is superior to both retributivism and other leading non-retributive alternatives. (shrink)

In recent decades, there has been growing interest among philosophers in what the various Buddhist traditions have said, can say, and should say, in response to the traditional problem of free will. This article investigates the relationship between Buddhist philosophy and the historical problem of free will. It begins by critically examining Rick Repetti's Buddhism, Meditation, and Free Will (2019), in which he argues for a conception of “agentless agency” and defends a view he calls “Buddhist soft compatibilism.” It then (...) turns to a more wide‐ranging discussion of Buddhism and free will—one that foregrounds Buddhist ethics and takes seriously what the various Buddhist traditions have said about desert, punishment, and the reactive attitudes of resentment, indignation, and moral anger. The article aims to show that, not only is Buddhism best conceived as endorsing a kind of free will skepticism, Buddhist ethics can provide a helpful guide to living without basic desert moral responsibility and free will. (shrink)

In the Indian philosophical debate, the relationship between the structure of knowledge and external reality has been a persistent issue. This debate has been particularly prominent in Buddhism, as evidenced by the earliest Buddhist attestations in the Pāli canon, where reality is described as a perceptual defection. The world (loka) is perceived through cognition (citta), and the theme of designation (paññatti) is central to the analysis of the Abhidhamma. Buddhism can be viewed as navigating between nominalism and cognitive normativism, as (...) it deconstructs language, which is seen as an obfuscating element that separates the subject from the world. In this article, we explore these issues through a philosophical dialogue between Early Buddhism, Abhidhamma, and Madhyamaka, utilizing methodological tools from Western philosophical traditions, both ancient and modern. We engage in a clash between nihilism and absolutism, in search of the substantiality of entities, which, behind the emptiness of conventional designations, conceals a complex fractal network of pansematism. (shrink)

We discuss the relationship between logic, geometry and probability theory under the light of a novel approach to quantum probabilities which generalizes the method developed by R. T. Cox to the quantum logical approach to physical theories.

This paper explores the concept of moral expertise in the contemporary philosophical debate, with a focus on three accounts discussed across moral epistemology, bioethics, and virtue ethics: an epistemic authority account, a skilled agent account, and a hybrid model sharing key features of the two. It is argued that there are no convincing reasons to defend a monistic approach that reduces moral expertise to only one of these models. A pluralist view is outlined in the attempt to reorient the discussion (...) about moral expertise. (shrink)

According to Marshall et al. (2024), some of the patients who refuse to stay in observation after being resuscitated following an opioid overdose are likely not making an autonomous choice. While I do not intend to dispute this claim, it merits discussion what is the concept of autonomy at play in making this assessment. I contend that the concept at work is more substantive than Marshall et al. acknowledge—and more substantive, too, than the form of autonomy usually thought to underpin (...) the moral justification of the requirement of informed consent . (shrink)

Can addiction be credibly invoked as an excuse for moral harms secondary to particular decisions to use drugs? This question raises two distinct sets of issues. First, there is the question of whether addiction is the sort of consideration that could, given suitable assumptions about the details of the case, excuse or mitigate moral blameworthiness. Most discussions of addiction and moral responsibility have focused on this question, and many have argued that addiction excuses. Here I articulate what I take to (...) be the best argument for this view, based on the substantial difficulty that people with severe addiction experience in controlling drug-related behavior. This, I argue, may in some cases be sufficient to ground a mitigating excuse, given the way in which addiction undermines agents’ responsiveness to relevant moral reasons to do otherwise. Much less attention has been devoted to a second set of issues that critically affect the possibility of applying this mitigating excuse in particular cases, derived from the ambivalent nature of agential control in addiction. In order to find a fitting response to moral harm, the person with the right standing to blame must make a judgment about the extent to which the agent possessed certain morally relevant capacities at the time of the act. In practice, this will often prove tremendously difficult to assess. The ethical challenge for the person with the right standing to blame is fundamentally one of making a judgment about matters that seem underdetermined by the available evidence. (shrink)

Philosophy has always been concerned with mental health and mental disorder, and many prominent historical figures have held views that have drawn attention to these issues. In recent years, however, there has been a surge of interest in philosophical issues surrounding psychiatry. As a result, the philosophy of psychiatry has emerged as a distinct, well-established field of inquiry.

It is often assumed that, except perhaps in a few rare cases, people with addiction can be aptly held responsible for having acquired the condition. In this chapter, I consider the argument that supports this view and draw attention to a number of challenges that can be raised against it. Assuming that early decisions to use drugs were made in possession of normal-range psychological capacities, I consider the key question of whether drug users who later became addicted should have known (...) that addiction was a likely outcome of their decisions to use drugs in a way that makes them blameworthy for their lack of foresight. I focus on three different points of contention surrounding this claim: how likely the outcome to be predicted was, how tolerable risk should be weighed against the expected value of decisions to use, and how reliable the relevant predictive abilities of the average person are. Once we consider in some detail what would have to be true in order for someone to be aptly held responsible for becoming addicted, the prospects for making a convincing case to that effect look, I argue, somewhat more uncertain than they might at first appear. (shrink)