One debate surrounding Derk Pereboom’s (2001, 2014) four-case argument against compatibilism focuses on whether, and why, we judge manipulated agents to be neither free nor morally responsible. In this paper, we propose a novel explanation. The four-case argument features cases where an agent is the only individual in her universe who has been manipulated. Let us call manipulation whose scope includes at least one but not all agents existential manipulation. Contrast this with universal manipulation, (...) which affects all agents within a universe. We propose that we find agents in Pereboom’s manipulation cases less free and morally responsible in part because they are the target of existential manipulation. We empirically tested this hypothesis and found that people’s free will and moral responsibility judgments were sensitive to the scope of manipulation: people judged existentially manipulated agents significantly less free and responsible than universally manipulated agents. (shrink)

Pereboom’s Four-Case Argument was once considered to be the most powerful of the manipulation arguments against compatibilism. However, because of Demetriou’s :595–617, 2010) response, Pereboom has significantly weakened his argument. Manipulation arguments in general have also been challenged by King : 65–83, 2013). In this paper, I argue that the Four-Case Argument resists both these challenges. One upshot is that Pereboom doesn’t need weaken his argument. Another is that compatibilists still need a (...) response the Four-Case Argument. And another is that we get a much better understanding of the Four-Case Argument, and of manipulation arguments more generally, than is currently available in the literature. (shrink)

Derk Pereboom's Four-Case Argument is among the most famous and resilient manipulation arguments against compatibilism. I contend that its resilience is not a function of the argument's soundness but, rather, the ill-gotten gain from an ambiguity in the description of the causal relations found in the argument's foundational case. I expose this crucial ambiguity and suggest that a dilemma faces anyone hoping to resolve it. After a thorough search for an interpretation which avoids both (...) horns of this dilemma, I conclude that none is available. Rather, every metaphysically coherent interpretation invites either a hard- or soft-line reply to Pereboom's argument. I then consider a recharacterization of the dilemma which seems to clear the way for the defence of a revised Four-Case Argument. I address this rejoinder by identifying a still more fundamental problem shared by all viable interpretations of the manipulation cases, showing that each involves a type of manipulation which undermines the victim's agency. Because this diagnosis supports a soft-line reply to every viable interpretation of the argument and can be endorsed by any compatibilist, I consider it the final piece of the Soft-line Solution to the Four-Case Argument. Finally, I suggest a new taxonomy of manipulation arguments, arguing that none that employs the suppressive variety of manipulation found in Pereboom's argument offers a threat to compatibilism. (shrink)

Hard incompatibilism is a view which asserts that determinism and free will are inconsistent and given the facts of our best sciences determinism is true; and hence, free will does not exist. Not only that, it also claims that if the world were indeterministic and our actions were caused by states or events, still we would lack free will. In this way, it denies the truth of any libertarian account of free will based on event causation. In that sense, this (...) is a hard position. Regarding moral responsibility, this hard incompatibilism claims that human agents are not morally responsible for their actions, unless they are the ultimate originators (agent-causes) of the actions in question. Derk Pereboom has offered an argument in favor of his hard incompatibilism, aka hard determinism, in which he shows four different hypothetical situations (thought experiments, indeed) each of which is aimed to prove that we are not morally responsible for what we do. The argument is, thus, known as four-case argument. In the present paper, Pereboom’s four-case argument is examined and defended. It has been shown here that Pereboom is quite correct, if we consider the true sense of the term ‘moral responsibility.’ This ‘true sense’ of the term “moral responsibility” is considered as the strong sense of moral responsibility in this paper. However, a weak sense of the term “moral responsibility” has also been proposed in this paper. This proposed weak sense of “moral responsibility” can accommodate most of the socially-approved ways of ascriptions of responsibility. And finally, it has been claimed that our general intuition that every event has a cause and we are not the ultimate sources of our actions is true from the strong sense of moral responsibility; and our commonsense intuition that as human beings we are inherently free and responsible for our actions is true from the weak sense of moral responsibility. (shrink)

This paper defends the case against (sparse) disjunctive properties by means of four Armstrongian arguments. The first of these is a logical atomist argument from truthmaking, which is, broadly speaking, ‘Armstrongian’ (Armstrong 1997). This argument is strong – although it stands or falls with the relevant notion of truthmaking, as it were. However, three arguments, which are prima facie independent of truthmaking, can be found explicitly early in Armstrong’s middle period. Two of these early arguments face (...) a serious objection put forward forcefully by Louise Antony (2003) and Alan Penczek (1997), respectively. I consider these objections and argue that they fail. Thus, even if the argument from truthmaking is indecisive, disjunctive properties should be rejected. (shrink)

A ‘lottery belief’ is a belief that a particular ticket has lost a large, fair lottery, based on nothing more than the odds against it winning. The lottery paradox brings out a tension between the idea that lottery beliefs are justified and the idea that that one can always justifiably believe the deductive consequences of things that one justifiably believes – what is sometimes called the principle of closure. Many philosophers have treated the lottery paradox as an argument against (...) the second idea – but I make a case here that it is the first idea that should be given up. As I shall show, there are a number of independent arguments for denying that lottery beliefs are justified. (shrink)

"The Manipulation Argument has recently taken center stage in the free-will debate, yet little else can be said of this newcomer that is uncontroversial. At present, even the most fundamental elements of the Manipulation Argument--its structure, conclusion, and target audience--are a matter of dispute. As such, we cannot begin, as we ideally would, with a simple and relatively uncontroversial overview of the argument. Instead, clarifying the debate over the basic structure and general conclusion of the Manipulation (...) class='Hi'>Argument will be our goal." -/- UPDATE: I now refer to an isolated objection to the counterexample step as a hardline reply, an isolated attack on the generalization step a softline reply, and an isolated response to the explanation step as an "al dente" reply. Al dente replies have been given in Mele's 2005 critique of the Four-Case Argument and my 2015 (2012) critique of Mele's Zygote Argument. I also now refer to a manipulation argument which has a generalization step that concludes to impossibilism and an explanation step which proposes an explanation for the impossibility of free will as a "Master Manipulation Argument" (examples of master manipulation arguments include Mickelson 2015 and 2019). (shrink)

There is now a burgeoning literature on evolutionary debunking arguments (EDAs) against moral beliefs, but perhaps surprisingly, a relatively small literature on EDAs against religious beliefs. There is an even smaller literature comparing the two. This essay aims to further the investigation of how the two sorts of arguments compare with each other. To begin with, I shall offer some remarks on how to best formulate these arguments, focusing on four different formulations that one can discern in the literature (...) and that can be applied to both sorts of beliefs. I shall then go on to make a series of comparisons regarding the relative vulnerabilities of moral beliefs and theistic religious beliefs to these four arguments, suggesting that there are a number of respects in which theistic religious beliefs are somewhat less liable than moral beliefs to be undercut by EDAs. (shrink)

Many philosophers have thought that aggregates of small, broadly dispersed evils don’t pose the same sort of challenge to theism that horrendous evils like the Nazi Holocaust do. But there are interesting arguments that purport to show that large enough aggregates of small evils are morally and axiologically equivalent to horrendous evils. Herein lies an intriguing and overlooked strategy for defending theism. In short: small evils, or aggregates of such evils, don’t provide decisive evidence against theism; there’s no relevant difference (...) between horrendous evils and aggregates of small evils; hence horrendous evils must not provide decisive evidence against theism, either. (shrink)

In “The Zygote Argument is Invalid: Now What?” (2015), Kristin Mickelson published an objection to the Zygote Argument that she first presented in 2012 as workshop comments on a draft of Mele's "Manipulation, Moral Responsibility, and Bullet-Biting" (2013). Assuming that the phrase "determinism precludes free will" means something like determinism-related causal factors are what prevent people from acting freely when determinism is true, Mele's original Zygote Argument was invalid. At the workshop, Mickelson presented Mele with two options (...) to address the problem, a premise-preserving option and a conclusion-preserving option. That is, Mele could change the conclusion of the original argument to the negative, non-explanatory thesis entailed by its original two premises, or find a way to add premises that would support the positive, explanatory conclusion of the original argument (which, notably, is the conclusion that Pereboom supports using best-explanation reasoning in his Four-Case Argument). Mickelson used this as an opportunity to explain the key contribution that best-explanation reasoning makes to manipulation arguments -- and why the best variant of the manipulation argument might conclude that incompatibilism is FALSE. In response to Mickelson's objection, Mele changed the conclusion of the argument before "Manipulation, Moral Responsibility, and Bullet-Biting" went to print, choosing Mickelson's proposal to change its conclusion over the suggestion to change its premises. However, Mele failed to mention Mickelson's invalidity objection in print and that he changed the conclusion of his argument as a direct response to it; nor did Mele mention the costs that Mickelson outlined for the premise-preserving solution that he adopted or the benefits of a conclusion-preserving solution. At the same time, Mele began using the term 'incompatibilism' to pick out the negative, non-explanatory claim supported by the newly revised Zygote Argument--and also started to claim (without providing evidence) that those who use the term 'incompatibilism' to denote the explanatory claim deterministic causal factors *make it the case* that no one acts freely when determinism is true" is guilty of using the term in a nonstandard and nontraditional way that he had "never had any use for"--failing to mention that he clearly used the term in this explanatory sense in his 2005 critique of the Four-Case Argument, which is to be expected give that Derk Pereboom uses the explanatory definition (as do Kadri Vihvelin, Carolina Sartorio, and *most* other contributors to the free-will literature). In THIS reply essay, Mickelson responds to an attempt by Gabriel De Marco (FSU, advisor Alfred Mele) to defend the original Zygote Argument from Mickelson's 2012/2015 critique. Unfortunately, both of De Marco's proposed "solutions" are non-starters. The first is a non-starter because De Marco merely repeats the premise-preserving solution that Mickelson offered to Mele in 2012 and that Mele adopted in print in 2013. In other words, De Marco took credit for the premise-preserving solution to the invalidity objection that Mickelson developed (although he does *redescribe* Mickelson's solution in his own idiosyncratic jargon) and Mele had already adopted in print. De Marco's second solution is a non-starter because it is constituted by a patently invalid argument. Contrary to De Marco's proposal, it's not true that the conjunction of possibilism and incompossibilism deductively entails the positive, diagnostic claim that deterministic causal factors beyond one's control preclude (destroy, undermine, is antagonistically relevant to) free will when determinism is true. *My thanks to the editors of Philosophia for publishing this reply when PhilStudies would not. (shrink)

Non-moral blame seems to be widespread and widely accepted in everyday life—tolerated at least, but often embraced. We blame athletes for poor performance, artists for bad or boring art, scientists for faulty research, and voters for flawed reasoning. This paper argues that non-moral blame is never justified—i.e. it’s never a morally permissible response to a non-moral failure. Having explained what blame is and how non-moral blame differs from moral blame, the paper presents the argument in four steps. First, (...) it argues that many (perhaps most) apparent cases of non-moral blame are actually cases of moral blame. Second, it argues that even if non-moral blame is pro tanto permissible—because its target is blameworthy for their substandard performance—it often (perhaps usually) fails to meet other permissibility conditions, such as fairness or standing. Third, it goes further and challenges the claim that non-moral blame is ever even pro tanto permissible. Finally, it considers a number of arguments in support of non-moral obligations and argues that none of them succeed. (shrink)

Many manipulation arguments against compatibilism rely on the claim that manipulation is relevantly similar to determinism. But we argue that manipulation is nothing like determinism in one relevant respect. Determinism is a "universal" phenomenon: its scope includes every feature of the universe. But manipulation arguments feature cases where an agent is the only manipulated individual in her universe. Call manipulation whose scope includes at least one but not all agents "existential manipulation." Our responsibility practices are impacted in different ways by (...) universal and existential phenomena. And this is a relevant difference, especially on Strawsonian approaches to moral responsibility, which take facts about our responsibility practices to be deeply connected to the nature of responsibility itself. We argue that Strawsonian accounts of moral responsibility are immune to manipulation arguments, and no attempt to modify the scope of manipulation or determinism featured in these arguments will help incompatibilists secure their desired conclusion. (shrink)

This article defends the Doomsday Argument, the Halfer Position in Sleeping Beauty, the Fine-Tuning Argument, and the applicability of Bayesian confirmation theory to the Everett interpretation of quantum mechanics. It will argue that all four problems have the same structure, and it gives a unified treatment that uses simple models of the cases and no controversial assumptions about confirmation or self-locating evidence. The article will argue that the troublesome feature of all these cases is not self-location but (...) selection effects. (shrink)

In his excellent book, Four-Dimensionalism: An Ontology of Persistence and Time (Sider, 2001), Theodore Sider defends a version of four-dimensionalism which he calls the ‘stage-theory’. This paper focuses on Sider's argument from vagueness and argues that, due to the problematic nature of the argument from vagueness, Sider’s case in favor of four-dimensionalism is in the end not successful.

Alfred Mele’s zygote argument for incompatibilism is based on a case involving an agent in a deterministic world whose entire life is planned by someone else. Mele’s contention is that Ernie (the agent) is unfree and that normal determined agents are relevantly similar to him with regards to free will. In this paper, I examine four different ways of understanding this argument and then criticize each interpretation. I then extend my criticism to manipulation arguments in general. (...) I conclude that the zygote argument is no threat to compatibilism. (shrink)

Opponents of abortion are often described as ‘inconsistent’ (hypocrites) in terms of their beliefs, actions and/or priorities. They are alleged to do too little to combat spontaneous abortion, they should be adopting cryopreserved embryos with greater frequency and so on. These types of arguments—which we call ‘inconsistency arguments’—conform to a common pattern. Each specifies what consistent opponents of abortion would do (or believe), asserts that they fail to act (or believe) accordingly and concludes that they are inconsistent. Here, we show (...) that inconsistency arguments fail en masse. In short, inconsistency arguments typically face four problems. First, they usually fail to account for diversity among opponents of abortion. Second, they rely on inferences about consistency based on isolated beliefs shared by some opponents of abortion (and these inferences often do not survive once we consider other beliefs opponents of abortion tend to hold). Third, inconsistency arguments usually ignore the diverse ways in which opponents of abortion might act on their beliefs. Fourth, inconsistency arguments criticise groups of people without threatening their beliefs (eg, that abortion is immoral). Setting these problems aside, even supposing inconsistency arguments are successful, they hardly matter. In fact, in the two best-case scenarios—where inconsistency arguments succeed—they either encourage millions of people to make the world a (much) worse place (from the critic’s perspective) or promote epistemically and morally irresponsible practices. We conclude that a more valuable discussion would be had by focusing on the arguments made by opponents of abortion rather than opponents themselves. (shrink)

There is a simple but powerful argument against the human practice of raising and killing animals for food (RKF for short). It goes like this: 1. RKF is extremely bad for animals. 2. RKF is only trivially good for human beings Therefore, 3. RKF should be stopped. While many consider this argument decisive, not everyone is convinced. There have been four main lines of objection to it. In this paper, I provide new responses to these four (...) objections. (shrink)

In this paper I offer a counterexample to the so called vagueness argument against restricted composition. This will be done in the lines of a recent suggestion by Trenton Merricks, namely by challenging the claim that there cannot be a sharp cut-off point in a composition sequence. It will be suggested that causal powers which emerge when composition occurs can serve as an indicator of such sharp cut-off points. The main example will be the case of a heap. (...) It seems that heaps might provide a very plausible counterexample to the vagueness argument if we accept the idea that four grains of sand is the least number required to compose a heap—the case has been supported by W. D. Hart. My purpose here is not to put forward a new theory of composition, I only wish to refute the vagueness argument and point out that we should be wary of arguments of its form. (shrink)

Hill explains that this book “is written both for non-philosophers and for students of philosophy. It is intended to say something both about philosophy, particularly applied moral philosophy, and about the argument for vegetarianism” (p. xiv). Since vegetarianism is an important topic in applied ethics, I had high expectations of this work. However, although the writing is commendably clear, and despite the fact that it is to be welcomed as the first book to bring together and discuss at some (...) length four different arguments for adopting a vegetarian diet, this book is disappointing both by philosophical and scholarly standards. (shrink)

This essay responds to four critical essays by Rosemary Kellison, Ebrahim Moosa, Joseph Winters, and Martin Kavka on the author’s recent book, Healthy Conflict in Contemporary American Society: From Enemy to Adversary (Cambridge, 2018). Parts I and II work in tandem to further develop my accounts of strategic empathy and agonistic political friendship. I defend against criticisms that my argument for moral imagination obligates oppressed people to empathize with their oppressors. I argue, further, that healthy conflict can be (...) motivated by a kind of “secular” love. This enables my position to immanently criticize and mediate the claims that one must either love (agapically) one’s opponent in order to engage them in “healthy conflict,” on one hand, or that one must vanquish, exclude, or “cancel” one’s opponent, on the other. In Part III, I demonstrate how my account mediates the challenge of an alleged standing opposition between moral imagination and socio-theoretical critique. I defend a methodologically pragmatist account of immanent prophetic criticism, resistance, and conflict transformation. Finally, I respond to one critic’s vindication of a strong enemy/adversary opposition that takes up the case of white supremacist violence in the U.S. I argue that the time horizon for healthy conflict must be simultaneously immediate and also long-term, provided that such engagements remain socio-critically self-reflexive and seek to cultivate transformational responses. (shrink)

Architecture and Deconstruction Case of Peter Eisenman and Bernard Tschumi -/- Introduction Towards deconstruction in architecture Intensive relations between philosophical deconstruction and architecture, which were present in the late 1980s and early 1990s, belong to the past and therefore may be described from a greater than before distance. Within these relations three basic variations can be distinguished: the first one, in which philosophy of deconstruction deals with architectural terms but does not interfere with real architecture, the second one, in (...) which a collaboration between Jacques Derrida and a group of architects interested in his concepts is commenced, and the third one, in which completed or only designed objects or new concepts of deconstruction created by architects gain their supremacy over philosophy. The following book analyses these three possible ways, first of all with the reference to Peter Eisenman and Bernard Tschumi. -/- Peter Eisenman -/- Misreading… and Other Errors -/- The issue of relations between Peter Eisenman’s work and philosophy of deconstruction may be referred to his activity more than ten years preceding his direct collaboration with Jacques Derrida (in 1985) and organisation of the exhibition Deconstructivist Architecture at Museum of Modern Art in New York (in 1988). As soon as at the stage of designing the first houses (House I-III, 1967-1970), which almost entirely inscribed in formalistic aesthetics of Modernism, the architect analysed the problem of architecture dependence on its assumptions. All his later designs may be treated as consequence of this initial interest in relations between practice and theory, and at the same time as an introduction to manipulations later on led at the level of metaphysics of architecture. Beginning with the issue of presence, considered in comments to House VI (1972), the number of ideas having their analogies in philosophy of deconstruction increased. The text entitled The End of the Classical: The End of the Beginning, The End of the End (1984), in which Eisenman criticised questions of representation in architecture, its delusive strive for truth and comparably unattainable attempts at ultimate definition of elementary rules, should be acclaimed the breaking point. This attitude was extended by numerous strategies disturbing architecture rules defined at metaphysical level in an essay Moving Arrows, Eros, and Other Errors: an Architecture of Absence (1986). The issue of Eisenman’s passage from formalism to deconstruction has already been much discussed in the literature (Rosalind Krauss, Thomas Patin among others), still it should be mentioned that the threads similar to Derrida’s concept included in Eisenman’s writing reveal untranslatability of architecture and philosophy. -/- Choral Works or Separate tricks -/- In 1985-1986 a series of seven disputes between Jacques Derrida and Peter Eisenman took place. The pretext for them were designs concerning Parc de la Villette in Paris. The situation of many months of collaboration between a notable philosopher of the second half of the 20th c. and an architect that already had a huge theoretical oeuvre, ended up with a publication of a large volume entitled Chora L Works and it became at the same time a vast study area for historians of contemporary architecture and philosophers. Derrida’s contribution to concept works were his considerations over the idea of chôra, the properties related to this concept were about to be reflected in shapes of the park. Therefore, Chora L Works became an example of the abilities of contemporary art, both in its capability of translation from philosophical ideas to artistic forms and its resistance to tradition of representing in architecture some phenomena and values originating outside this discipline. In the final period of their collaboration both interlocutors started to polemicise with each other more decidedly, what became a separate part of their thought exchange. The exchange of letters between Derrida and Eisenman at the turn of 1989 ended up the period of their direct contacts, nevertheless, at this time precisely a large group of experts in issues of deconstruction joined the discussion and extended the revealed in the former dispute problems into more than ten years of further considerations and publications. Except for a long text by Jeffrey Kipnis, who had participated in the meetings of the philosopher and the architect, there appeared also comments of researchers of artistic theories (K. Michael Hays, Thomas Patin), philosophers (Andrew Benjamin), and even experts in Greek literature (Maria Theodorou or Ann Bergren). Following these debates a contemporary reflection on architecture has saturated with indeed numerous concepts originating in philosophy of deconstruction. -/- Architecture which imitates mute philosophy -/- The series of Jacques Derrida and Peter Eisenman meetings, which took place in the period of 1985-1987, induced many authors to make comments. Some of them (Jeffrey Kipnis, Ann Bergren, Maria Theodorou) developed the subject of chôra which was introduced to the discussion by Derrida. The problem that was about to be solved was the question of tying up the concept of chôra with architecture, including Eisenman’s architecture and the series of meetings within frames of Chora L Works project. Kipnis on this occasion paid attention to chôra and its character of anachronia which infects any being created within chôra. In other words any event has its counterpart (analogon) in another, earlier event. He demonstrated the similarity of structure of many events and statements from the times of Derrida and Eisenman’s meetings to the almost identical behaviour of figures in Plato’s dialogue Timaeus. The loss of beginning present in this phenomenon was appropriate to both features of chôra and the effects of typical analyses of philosophy of deconstruction. Bergren’s analyses focused on accentuating gender of chôra, which, according to this author, had been neglected hitherto in discussions. She collated chôra descriptions with characteristics of women in myths, early Greek epic and philosophy and she arrived at a conclusion that chôra has features of a single woman and a married one at the same time. And yet Theodorou’s studies showed that in the Homeric epics chôra is not treated as an idea but is related with single things and events. The other part of the comments (represented by Andrew Benjamin and K. Michael Hays’ utterances) concerns Eisenman’s attitude to tradition which was treated as a variety of iteration understood philosophically. Benjamin commenced his considerations at the point of closeness between a definition of tradition and a concept of chôra understood as perpetuation (placement). A problematic issue was for him Eisenman’s complex relation to tradition based on its contest and affirmation at the same time. Overcoming the simple subordination to tradition – according to Benjamin – was based on awareness of the role of repetition in culture not known before. Hays made an attempt to explain the pleasure and torment of repetition with the support of Sigmund Freud and Roland Barthes’ concepts. According to Hays repetitions are attempts of a single being to a certain primal state perceived as free of any tension. In a similar way Rosalind Krauss explained a motif of a grate present in Modernistic art and also exceptionally frequent in Eisenman’s work. -/- Annex Architecture is still writing Balzac novels. Peter Eisenman and literature -/- Architecture’s approach to writing, script or literature, present within Peter Eisenman’s work, is an exceptional phenomenon, furthermore a complex one. The article considers four possible relations. The first one relates to Eisenman’s characteristics as a person extremely gifted with the ability to wordplay, which very ‘play’ reveals skills to create architectural images. In the second approach the attention has been paid to Eisenman’s interests – in the first period of his oeuvre – in linguistic works by Noam Chomsky and his transformational-generative grammar. The third kind of relations applied to overcoming the need for autonomy of architecture (and of modernist aesthetics at the same time) and renew interests in questions of meaning in architecture. The fourth sort of relations occurred when Eisenman started to create reflections of historic or literary narrations in architecture – ‘stone stories’ and architectural fictions of their kind. -/- Bernard Tschumi -/- From perversion to deconstruction In Bernard Tschumi’s writings from the 1970s and 1980s we can find a transposition of important threads of post-structuralist ideas deriving from Georges Bataille, Roland Barthes and Jacques Derrida’s works. The analysis of the architect’s writings also shows roots in Phillippe Sollers, Michel Foucault and Denis Hollier’s works. The analysis of borrowed elements from the beginnings of Tschumi’s theoretical activity may be helpful in explaining the contents of his later writings motre inspired by philosophy of deconstruction. The set of his earliest views was inspired by Marxism, Neo Marxism and French Structuralism, mainly by the writings of Henri Levebre and Guy Debord. From the thought of Levebre Tschumi took interest for city as not only a question of urbanistics but also a political issue. From Debord’s concepts he borrowed a conviction about the role of situational violation for changes in the society structure. Some of these beliefs were preserved in his own concepts of architecture as an event. From this period derived also his will to change conservative elements of social structure not by means of political revolution but of theoretical and creative activity. Tschumi acknowledged that the effective way of the proceedings towards achieving his aims would be accepting the role of both a critical intellectualist and architecture expert who would not hide away his left-wing orientation. The speculations defined by the architect as ‘revolting analyses’ were about to characterise contradictions which tear the society apart, penetrate architecture and constitute the basis of culture. Spreading away of the conscience of false assumptions hidden away in various disciplines could have weakened cohesion of a conservative society and influence the will to change among the elites. This way the beginnings of political revolution were rooted in philosophy of architecture. In 1977 Tschumi published his text entitled The Pleasure of Architecture inspired by Roland Barthes’s The Pleasure of the Text, it also included some concepts derived from Georges Bataille and Jacques Derrida. First of all the author used Barthes’s concept which made an assumption that literary activity is pervaded by the spirit of resistance towards social rules, and Tschudi transferred this remark onto architecture. From the ideas of Bataille, acquainted via Holier’s work, he derived his belief that two concepts of space, a conceptual one (defined as Pyramid) and a sensual one (defined as Labirynth), not losing their distinct features, they join in the concept of experienced space which exceeds contradictions. The exceeding itself was defined as the basic rule of architecture and it was referred to situations in which architecture not only negates social needs, but also disavows its own tradition. Crossing the borders applies not only to political issues or permanent rules of the very discipline but also interfering with other fields (especially literature and film). The fact that architecture is associated with organising events turned Tschumi’s attention to questions of violence that result from upsetting architectural order of a given building by its users and the one hand, and on the other from forcing the users to specific acts imposed by this very order. The analysis of the concepts used by Tschumi in his early writings indicates that they are close to definitions that would occur in his reflection in the following years influenced by philosophy of deconstruction. -/- Approaching deconstruction Tschumi in his theories developed in the 1980s presumed that the current social world had undergone a deep process of decay, and the reaction against which ought to be based on ordering-up actions, and also preserving the main outline of disintegration of the whole and its elements in the state of conflict. The statements concerning the nature of the contemporary to Tschumi social relations were applied by him to the world of architecture, this led him to coming up with designing strategies that took into consideration the destabilised character of conditions in which works of architecture were created. New ways of conduct invented by Tschumi drew their inspiration from literature and research on literature, psychoanalysis, structural linguistics, structuralism and post structuralism, and eventually also deconstruction philosophy. The proposed methods were opposed by their author both to functionalism continuity trends and postmodern architecture. Tschumi’s proposals contradicted any forms of conservatism or traditionalism in political sphere as well as in reference to tendencies in architecture. They were not simple contradictions of social or architectural rules, they intrude them from the inside, weaken or escalate the already existing incongruities, they move the boundaries between the areas. Revolutionary illusions about the possibility of radical changes were replaced with strategies which completed, tainted or test former rules in the series of formal games of permutation and combination. Quite different from avant-garde formalism Tschumi’s games were not about maintaining the autonomy of a given area, but on the contrary – polluting it with other areas’ influences. Tschumi enjoyed demonstrating illusions of architecture concerning simple relations between form and function, or between form and meaning. Making use of Freud, Lacan and Foucault’s research he introduced a category of “madness” into architecture allowing an observation that the recognised norms are nothing but merely ones of many possible principles of behaviour, and their recognised status resulted from unjustified hindering innovativeness which is crucial for architecture. To reborn architecture’s capability of changing Tschumi also made use of Barthes’s discoveries concerning rules of narration and works by writers who applied in their writing knowledge on linguistics. Making a work’s author unclear by various mechanical transformations of its elements was however apparent only, and formal rigours imposed on the process of designing liberated possibilities difficult to obtain in more traditional creative action. Another mode of acting introduced by Tschumi was combining his work of elements deriving from outside architecture; joining space records with notation of motion and events accompanying architectural objects among others. These architectural and extra-architectural elements were not unified, on the contrary their heterogenous and conflictual character was stressed. This is how shock, anxiety and instability, typical for live in great metropolises, infiltrated architecture. Taking some ideas of deconstruction philosophy as a pattern Tschumi also took into critical consideration in his essays traditional in architecture oppositions between form and figuration, or theory and practice. By combining various inspirations he eventually worked out an idea of architectural event, which he understood as a series of actions contesting its own field, redefining its sources, principles and elements. An event, understood in this way, was not so much producing works as rather creating conditions of their production and at the same time designing the society different from a hierarchic one. -/- Park of deconstruction Among numerous philosophical strategies of deconstruction most frequently used was questioning the practice of strong opposition of two reasons. In many cases Bernard Tschumi’s writings just consider functioning of the conflict juxtaposition of the ideas of structure and ornament or theory and practice in history of architecture. Violation of traditional relations between terms of this kind, both old and modern, raised Jacques Derrida’s objections, when he was induced for the first time to co-operate with architects’ milieu. During this long lasting thought exchange the philosopher eventually acknowledged Bernard Tschumi’s arguments for reasoning the encroachment of architecture’s fundamental rules. Deconstruction applied in architecture was not a simple transposition or analogy of practices that had been applied by philosophy of deconstruction. We may even say that considering architectural terms became an important formula of deconstruction. Architecture understood in philosophical way became something beyond the practice and theory of its own discipline, a sort of metaphysics of both philosophy and architecture. The deliberate encroachment of simplicity of dividing architecture into theory and practice, for the first time became a clear aim for Tschumi in his drawings and texts entitled The Manhattan Transcripts. The contents of this series of works was a record of characteristic features of this New York district in such a way that not only objects were the subject of the record but also relations between objects, people and events. The record was about to take into consideration a conflict character of elements of this representation and at the same time to avoid applying to them the rule of mimetism. The record became a form of reflection over the very record by an increased control over the ways of representation. Architecture which was considered in the The Manhattan Transcripts was not directed to fulfill the needs of inhabitation or production, it was rather related with hitherto usually marginalised liminal situations: building ostentatiously big monuments, religious cult, war etc. Architecture operating in these relations focused also the attention on the included in it continuous tendency to overpass its own restrictions, the role of violence as its not recognised factor, or the meaning of excess and shock in its operation. Architecture moving from reason towards madness became even more visible in the design of Parisian Parc de la Villette, whose pavilions were defined as folies (in French it means both small park buildings and follies). The park was supposed to be on the one hand a reflection of traditional society disintegration while on the other it questioned basic rules of producing a work of architecture. The traditional rules of designing, based on ordering up, were replaced with the strategies of dysfunction and dissociation. In Tschumi’s opinion methods of this kind may be equivalent of what Derrida named différance. Instead of aiming at mergence, any diversity, plays or variations were strengthen. Tschumi’s texts, in which he explained his attitude, were completed by Derrida’s extent statement entitled Point de folie – Maintenant l’architecture. Derrida’s article is the most significant of all his statements on architecture as a form of thinking and activity. According to the philosopher, architecture should divide space (in French defined as espacement), what enables both thinking and action – it arranges the space of an event. Tschumi’s buildings, defined as folies, in an essential way destabilise any created order, and at the same time they refresh it. Derrida’s statement suggests that architecture may become both metaphor of an order merging a language or a society but also of inner forces which deconstruct and reconstruct it. Therefore architecture is at the same time a construction, a deconstruction and a reconstruction. Parc de la Villette stands out in this system with its attempt to step beyond the scheme of an easy repetition and its heading for chances of achieving more radical otherness. -/- Conclusion Destruction as construction. Paradoxes of deconstruction in architecture -/- Scepticism about persistence and common importance of fundamental values of human culture evinced in philosophers and writers’ works as early as in Greek antiquity, nevertheless it was not expressed so strongly as in the second half of the 20th century. Especially in Heidegger’s work Being and Time (although originated in 1927, still influential in all later philosophy) the following states were characterised: the state of losing the ground (Abgrund), of being out of sight (Unheimlichkeit) and of being out of dwelling (Un-zuhause-sein) – as the basis of self-confidence of conscious being there (Dasein). The entire criticism of philosophy of home and dwelling draws the inspiration from this early writing of the German philosopher, it combines crisis of basic terms of metaphysics with social conditions which are dictated by living in large metropolis. The crisis of both metaphysical foundation and home appears to be similar to the situation of weakening the relations between a man and his dwelling in extensively expanding cities. Whereas philosophy, as well as many disciplines of social sciences, have diagnosed for a long time the destabilisation of fundamental ideas of Western culture and crucial changes in the ways of dwelling, architecture itself occurred to be “the last fortress of metaphysics” (J. Derrida). Among contemporary architects, Peter Eisenman and Bernard Tschumi were the ones who engaged most decidedly in the issues of critical analysis of architecture foundation and its social role. Both the architects noticed new formulas of contemporary social and individual existence, tremendously different from the entire history, and at the same time they affirmed lack of adequacy of architecture concepts to new situations. Both Eisenman and Tschumi used to describe the existing architecture as a tool for consolidation of highly integrated and hierarchised societies, and also as a discipline extremely uncoincidental with the current character of social life based on ideas of freedom and diversity. The means to transform architecture and make a factor of further social changes out of it, was a concept that accentuated revealing the inner contradictions of this discipline, and considering them in designing strategies. Eisenman’s activity, in regard of what has just been noticed, was focused on questioning the basic rules of traditionally comprehended architecture, especially the rule of purpose. The American architect noticed that the concept of architecture as fulfilment the need of location, hides away the fact that the location has to be constantly reconsidered, and hence it is overtaken by change (dislocation). Therefore new concept of architecture propounded architectural activity to translocate the concept of location – more than before – but also to change its status perpetually. Such comprehended architecture should claim, as its main purpose, the constant revision of this purpose and create itself anew permanently. Even Eisenman’s earliest designs of houses nos. I-IV broke with such values as the sense of safety, closeness and familiarity, and just on the contrary they accentuated senses of strangeness, homelessness and loss of confidence. The contradictions within architecture noticed by Tschumi referred to combination of intellectual and sensual values in architecture, when their non-appropriation was defeated by an additional condition, namely the way of experience based on pleasure of excess, marked by insanity. The features of folly were especially visible in his designs of gardens, where the order of planning was mixed with sensual experience introduced by particular elements (both the ones created by nature, and the buildings defined as folies). Parc de la Villette designed by the French architect in Paris put in question not only the common understanding of purpose in architecture but also the ideas of order and integrity, as its plan was based on the combination of independent layers with records of grids of points, various lines and planes. The architecture that collides inadequate elements with each other was supposed to be a kind of an event with no beginning and no end. The architecture treated as an event became a form of a space weakened articulation that maintains its diversity and lack of accordance of the elements building it up. The analyses of Eisenman and Tschumi’s theoretical writings indicate how much the aims of architecture have actually changed; instead of supporting social persistence, the architecture is rather intensifying contradictions, and instead of providing people with the sense of safety, it sublimes danger. From simple acts of defamiliarisation, increasing the distance to itself and enhancing the role of theory, through discomfort, anxiety, not feeling someone at home, weirdness, excess, shock and violence, architecture reached the edge of stability and uncertainty, only to make an attempt at penetrating what is impossible and unutterable, and recording what cannot become the subject of any records. -/- . (shrink)

Until recently, perdurantism has been considered to be incompatible with the presentist ontology of time. However, discussions about presentist theories of perdurance are now surfacing, one of the most prominent arguments for which being Berit Brogaard’s essay: “Presentist Four-Dimensionalism”. In this paper, I examine Brogaard’s argument in contrast to Ted Sider’s arguments for (an Eternalist theory of) the “Stage View”. I then argue for another (and, I think, novel) view of presentist perdurantism, which avoids the problematic consequences that (...) Brogaard’s view faces, and which also successfully solves philosophical puzzles without the difficulties that Sider’s view faces. This view, which I call “Stage View Presentism,” thus seems to be an appealing alternative for presentists who remain impartial to both the endurantist and the worm theories of persistence. (shrink)

It is a common view that arguments from analogy can only be evaluated on a case-by-case basis. However, while this reflects an important insight, I propose instead a relatively simple method for their evaluation based on just (i) their general form and (ii) four core questions. One clear advantage of this proposal is that it does not depend on any substantial (and controversial) view of similarity, unlike influential current alternative methods, such as Walton’s. Following some initial clarification (...) of the notion of analogy and similarity, I demonstrate the strength of this method by analysing and evaluating three prominent arguments from analogy. (shrink)

This thesis is an argument for the view that there are problems for Modal Reductionism, the thesis that modality can satisfactorily be defined in non-modal terms. -/- I proceed via a case study of David Lewis’s theory of concrete possible worlds. This theory is commonly regarded as the best and most influential candidate reductive theory of modality. Based on a detailed examination of its ontology, analysis and justification, I conclude that it does badly with respect to the following (...) four minimal conditions on a satisfactory reductive theory of modality: that it be (a) genuinely reductive, (b) materially adequate, (c) conceptually adequate and (d) that its justification provides good reason to think it true. -/- These problems for Lewis’s theory are not, I suggest, due to his idiosyncratic conception of possible worlds as concrete entities. Rather, because Lewis’s theory can be seen to represent an important class of structurally similar reductive theories of modality, the problems for Lewis’s theory generalise to problems for these other theories. This suggests that Modal Reductionism is unpromising. In the light of this, the alternative approach to understanding modality, Modal Primitivism, appears more attractive. (shrink)

From time to time philosophers and scientists have made sensational, provocative claims that certain things do not exist or never happen that, in everyday life, we unquestioningly take for granted as existing or happening. These claims have included denying the existence of matter, space, time, the self, free will, and other sturdy and basic elements of our common-sense or naïve world-view. Around the middle of the twentieth century an argument was developed that can be used to challenge many such (...) skeptical claims based on linguistic considerations, which came to be known as the Paradigm Case Argument ... (shrink)

This article defends a formalist interpretation of Wittgenstein’s later thought on music by comparing it with Eduard Hanslick’s musical formalism. In doing so, it returns to a disagreement I have had with Bela Szabados who, in his book Wittgenstein as a Philosophical Tone-Poet, claims that the attribution of formalism obscures the role that music played in the development of Wittgenstein’s thought. The paper scrutinizes the four arguments Szabados presents to defend his claim, pertaining to alleged differences between Wittgenstein and (...) Hanslick on their accounts of theory, beauty, rules, and the broader significance of music. I will argue that in each case the similarities between Wittgenstein’s and Hanslick’s respective views outshine possible differences. Ultimately, I will argue that instead of rendering music a marginal phenomenon suited for mere entertainment, formalism –as presented by Hanslick and Wittgenstein, whom I read as influenced by Kant’s aesthetics– underscores music’s ability to show fundamental features of reality and our relation to it. Music does this precisely by being treated as a sensuous yet structured medium that is irreducible to any conceptually determined domain. (shrink)

In light of the Special Theory of Relativity and the Minkowski creation of ‘spacetime’, the universe is taken to be a four-dimensional entity which postulates bodies as existing within a temporally extended reality. The Special Theory of Relativity’s implications liken the nature of the universe to a ‘block’ within which all events coexist equally in spacetime. Such a view strikes against the very essence of presentism, which holds that all that exists is the instantaneous state of objects in the (...) present moment. With respect to the present moment, events have a clear division into the past or future, however such regions do not exist in reality and the universe is a three-dimensional entity. The consequences of a four-dimensional universe are disturbing to say the least for our everyday human experience, with once objective facts about reality becoming dependent upon an observer’s relative motion and the debate over the extent of true free will in a Block Universe. This paper will look at arguments which seek to rescue the presentist view in light of Special Relativity so such four-dimensionalist implications do not have to be accepted. Two approaches will be considered. The first accepts that presentism is incompatible with Special Relativity, and seeks to show that the theory is ultimately false. The second holds that it is the Block Universe interpretation of Special Relativity that is wrong, and a version of presentism can be reconciled with Special Relativity. The paper will expound and critically examine both of these approaches to review whether the case for the three-dimensionalist and a fundamental passage of time can be made. (shrink)

The four case studies on chance in evolution provide a rich source for further philosophical analysis. Among the issues raised are the following: Are there different conceptions of chance at work, or is there a common underlying conception? How can a given concept of chance be distinguished from other chance concepts and from nonchance concepts? How can the occurrence of a given chance process be distinguished empirically from nonchance processes or other chance processes? What role does chance play (...) in evolutionary theory? I argue that in order to answer these questions, a careful distinction between process and outcome must be made; however, the purpose of this essay is not to answer these questions definitively, but rather to elaborate on them and to provide a starting point for further discussion. (shrink)

Christopher Johnson has put forward in this journal the view that ad hominem reasoning may be more generally reasonable than is allowed by writers such as myself, basing his view on virtue epistemology. I review his account, as well as the standard account, of ad hominem reasoning, and show how the standard account would handle the cases he sketches in defense of his own view. I then give four criticisms of his view generally: the problems of virtue conflict, vagueness, (...) conflation of speech acts, and self-defeating counsel. I then discuss four reasons why the standard account is superior: it better fits legal reality, the account of other fallacies, psychological science, and political reality. (shrink)

In The moral problem (1994), Michael Smith tries to link three conflicting theories that alone are intuitively plausible, nevertheless, they do not seem to work well together. The first proposes that moral judgments are in fact beliefs about objective matters. The second states the concept of “practicality requirement”. The third is a humean belief-desire psychology, i.e. if a moral judgment is sufficient to explain actions, then it must involve a desire. If that is the case, it cannot be simply (...) a belief. For Smith, any attempt to solve the moral problem must find a way to hold all three doctrines. I will argue that his solution rests on two false assumptions. The first, a rationalist one which supports that what we have reason to do is what we would desire to do if we were fully rational. The second is the internalist thesis about moral motivation according to which a person who believes she is morally required to do something is either necessarily motivated to do it or she is practically irrational. I will base my critics on four objections raised by Copp, Miller, Shafer-Landau, Brink and Sayre-McCord. (shrink)

Steven Hales and Jennifer Johnson—building off their (2014) work as well as Hales (2015, 2016)—have recently conducted two studies in Philosophical Psychology (2018) that show that there is a relationship between optimism and folk assessments of luck. Hales and Johnson use these results to argue that there is no such thing as luck. Instead, they claim that the concept is highly subjective and a cognitive illusion and that what we are in need of is an error theory. After reviewing Hales (...) and Johnson’s position, I levy four objections against their view. First, they ignore the fact that luck involves a chanciness condition. Second, their standards for what it means to be a useful philosophical theory are too high. Third, their view ignores the fact that there are various accounts of value in the literature and assumes a kind of relativism that few people would be willing to accept. Lastly, their error theory is not supported by the empirical evidence. Because of these problems, Hales and Johnson’s argument is not a serious threat to extant accounts of luck. (shrink)

For over a century now, American scholars (among others) have been debating the merits of “bad Samaritan” laws — laws punishing people for failing to attempt easy and safe rescues. Unfortunately, the opponents of bad Samaritan laws have mostly prevailed. In the United States, the “no-duty-to-rescue” rule dominates. Only four states have passed bad Samaritan laws, and these laws impose only the most minimal punishment — either sub-$500 fines or short-term imprisonment. -/- This Article argues that every state should (...) criminalize bad Samaritanism. There are three main reasons. First, criminalization is required by the supreme value that we place on protecting human life, a value that motivates laws against both homicide and manslaughter. Second, criminalization is recommended by the “proportionality principle” — i.e., the principle that a law’s level of punishment should be directly proportional to the moral severity of the offense. Third, criminalization would yield a number of significant benefits, including helping to minimize needless deaths and injuries and providing society with an institutional outlet for its outrage against bad Samaritans. -/- Still, many objections have been leveled against bad Samaritan laws. This Article will argue that while some of these objections — for example, the objections involving foundational criminal law principles such as the actus-reus requirement, the harm principle, and causation — are all easily refuted, five other objections are not. These five objections involve pragmatic considerations such as the difficulties with obtaining evidence against bad Samaritans and psychological considerations such as people’s understandable reasons for not wanting to “get involved.” This Article will then put these five objections into reflective equilibrium with the moral arguments for bad Samaritan laws and conclude that while bad Samaritanism should indeed be criminalized, the punishment that convicted bad Samaritans receive should be mild — certainly milder than the level of punishment recommended by the “proportionality principle.” The corollary of this conclusion is that the criminal law should sometimes abandon the proportionality principle. (shrink)

I present a cumulative case for the thesis that we only know propositions that are certain for us. I argue that this thesis can easily explain the truth of eight plausible claims about knowledge: -/- (1) There is a qualitative difference between knowledge and non-knowledge. (2) Knowledge is valuable in a way that non-knowledge is not. (3) Subjects in Gettier cases do not have knowledge. (4) If S knows that P, P is part of S’s evidence. (5) If S (...) knows that P, ~P is epistemically impossible for S. (6) If S knows that P, S can rationally act as if P. (7) If S knows that P, S can rationally stop inquiring whether P. (8) If S knows each of {P1, P2, … Pn}, and competently deduces Q from these propositions, S knows that Q. -/- I then argue that the skeptical costs of this thesis are outweighed by its explanatory power. (shrink)

The paper discusses the structure, applications, and plausibility of the much-used parallel-case argument for workplace democracy. The argument rests on an analogy between firms and states according to which the justification of democracy in the state implies its justification in the workplace. The contribution of the paper is threefold. First, the argument is illustrated by applying it to two usual objections to workplace democracy, namely, that employees lack the expertise required to run a firm and that (...) only capital suppliers should have a say over the governance of the firm. Second, the structure of the argument is unfolded. Third, two salient similarities between firms and states regarding their internal and external effects and the standing of their members are addressed in order to asses the potential and limits of the argument, as well as three relevant differences regarding the voluntariness of their membership, the narrowness of their goals, and the stiffness of the competition they face. After considering these similarities and differences, the paper contends that the the parallel-case argument provides a sound reason in favor of democracy in the workplace—a reason, however, that needs to be importantly qualified and that is only pro tanto. (shrink)

The four case studies below were designed as a workshop in a research setting. They could also be used as a lesson plan for college students. The material is divided into four case studies. One can use any of the case studies independently. One can change the order in which the case studies are used. If you want to share with me how you plan to use these case studies, communicate to me at (...) [email protected] • Case 1: Does the Bible require that marriage be limited to one man and one woman? • Case 2: Matthew Vines, a fervent believer wrestling with loneliness • Case 3: Does the Bible support the contention that marriage rules never change? • Case 4: The Emergence and Disappearance of Levirate Marriages . (shrink)

Essays on Aristotle's Sea-Battle, Lazy Argument, Argument Reaper, Diodorus' Master Argument -/- The book is devoted to the ancient logical theories, reconstruction of their semantic proprieties and possibilities of their interpretation by modern logical tools. The Ancient arguments are frequently misunderstood in modern interpretations since authors usually have tendency to ignore their historical proprieties and theoretical background what usually leads to a quite inappropriate picture of the argument’s original form and mission. Author’s primary intention was to (...) draw attention to the complexity of some historical arguments and to the theoretical context in which arguments were created, circulated, developed, and finally tuned. Four well-known ancient arguments – with a common central subject related to the future contingencies problem – are reconstructed from available historical sources: “The Sea Battle”, which is drawn from Aristotle’s treatise De Interpretatione; two arguments, usually ascribed to the Stoics, “The Lazy Argument” and “The Reaper”; “The Master Argument” of the Megarian philosopher Diodorus. Arguments are linguistically and semantically detaily analyzed, formally presented by reflecting some relevant corresponding hypotheses based on physical or logical theories of their ancient authors, and finally covered by appropriate logical tools familiar to a modern reader. Two appendices are added at the closing part of the book. One covering some assumptions relevant for understanding of rival streams in ancient theories of meaning related to the nature of names and naming; the other is devoted to the ancient understanding of logical proposition and attempts to find an adequate Latin translation of the Greek delicate philosophical term “ἀξίωμα”. (shrink)

The Operator Argument against eternalism holds that having non-vacuous tense operators in the language is incompatible with the claim that every proposition has its truth-value eternally. Assuming that (1) there are non-vacuous tense operators, (2) tense operators operate on propositions and (3) tense operators which operate on eternal entities are vacuous, it may be argued that eternalism is false. In this paper, I examine the Operator Argument. The goal is threefold. First, I want to present some aspects of (...) the debate in a more elaborate way, especially those concerning formal matters. Secondly, I will argue that eternalism can escape the Operator Argument. There are two main strategies for handling the Operator Argument. The first one is based on replacing temporal operators with object-language quantifiers. The second rejects the identification of compositional semantic value with assertoric content. My third goal is to show that none of them is as good as the strategy that adopts Timestamp Semantics (Fritz in Philosl Stud 176:2933–2959, 2019). I am going to argue that the quantificational treatment of tenses is compatible with temporalism and that the arguments for rejecting the identification of compositional semantic value with assertoric content provide, in fact, a motivation for the temporalist position. At the end, I will develop Timestamp Semantics by providing a novel formalization of it, and defend it against three potential counter-arguments. (shrink)

This paper proposes an argumentation-based procedure for legal interpretation, by reinterpreting the traditional canons of textual interpretation in terms of argumentation schemes, which are then classified, formalized, and represented through argument visualization and evaluation tools. The problem of statutory interpretation is framed as one of weighing contested interpretations as pro and con arguments. The paper builds an interpretation procedure by formulating a set of argumentation schemes that can be used to comparatively evaluate the types of arguments used in cases (...) of contested statutory interpretation in law. A simplified version of the Carneades Argumentation System is applied in a case analysis showing how the procedure works. A logical model for statutory interpretation is finally presented, covering pro-tanto and all-things-considered interpretive conclusions. -/- . (shrink)

Metaphysical theories are often counter-intuitive. But they also often are strongly supported and motivated by intuitions. One way or another, the link between intuitions and metaphysics is a strong and important one, and there is hardly any metaphysical discussion where intuitions do not play a crucial role. In this article, I will be interested in a particular kind of such intuitions, namely those that come, at least partly, from experience. There seems to be a route from experience to metaphysics, and (...) this is the core of my interest here. In order to better understand such ‘arguments from experience’ and the kind of relationship there is between this type of intuitions and metaphysical theories, I shall examine four particular cases where a kind of experience-based intuition seems to motivate or support a metaphysical theory. At the end of the day, I shall argue that this route is a treacherous one, and that in all of the four cases I shall concentrate on, phenomenological considerations are in fact orthogonal to the allegedly ‘corresponding’ metaphysical claims. An anti-realist view of metaphysics will emerge. (shrink)

Our ordinary conception of imagination takes it to be essentially a conscious phenomenon, and traditionally that’s how it had been treated in the philosophical literature. In fact, this claim had often been taken to be so obvious as not to need any argumentative support. But lately in the philosophical literature on imagination we see increasing support for the view that imagining need not occur consciously. In this paper, I examine the case for unconscious imagination. I’ll consider four different (...) arguments that we can find in the recent literature—three of which are based on cases and one that is based on considerations relating to action guidance. To my mind, none of these arguments is successful. I conclude that the case for postulating unconscious imagining has not yet been well motivated. (shrink)

A prima facie plausible and widely held view in epistemology is that the epistemic standards governing the acquisition of testimonial knowledge are stronger than the epistemic standards governing the acquisition of perceptual knowledge. Conservatives about testimony hold that we need prior justification to take speakers to be reliable but recognise that the corresponding claim about perception is practically a non-starter. The problem for conservatives is how to establish theoretically significant differences between testimony and perception that would support asymmetrical epistemic standards. (...) In this paper I defend theoretical symmetry of testimony and perception on the grounds that there are no good reasons for taking these two belief forming methods to have significant theoretical differences. I identify the four central arguments in defence of asymmetry and show that in each case either they fail to establish the difference that they purport to establish or they establish a difference that is not theoretically significant. (shrink)

Personal narratives can let us in on aspects of reality which we have not experienced for ourselves, and are thus important sources for philosophical reflection. Yet a venerable tradition in mainstream philosophy has little room for arguments which rely on personal narrative, on the grounds that narratives are particular and testimonial, whereas philosophical arguments should be systematic and transparent. I argue that narrative arguments are an important form of philosophical argument. Their testimonial aspects witness to novel facets of reality, (...) but their argumentative aspects help us to understand those facets for ourselves. My argument takes the form of a case study of the exemplary narrative argument penned by Rachel Moran, a former prostitute who uses her experiences to argue that prostitution amounts to sexual abuse. We’ll see that narrative arguments can enjoy expository Advantages over analytic ones. (shrink)

We argue that legal argumentation, as the subject matter as well as a special subfield of Argumentation Studies (AS), has to be examined by making skilled use of the full panoply of tools such as argumentation and story schemes which are at the forefront of current work in AS. In reviewing the literature, we make explicit our own methodological choices (particularly regarding the place of normative deliberation in practical reasoning) and then illustrate the implications of such an approach through the (...) analysis of a case study in the English law of evidence. We argue that a clear distinction must be drawn between practical argumentation and stories. Because of the institutional separation between legal judgment and fact-finding in common-law jury trials, we argue for the combination of argument and story-based analysis. (shrink)

In this paper I argue that Nietzsche’s rejection of egalitarianism depends on equivocation between distinct conceptions of power and equality. When these distinct views are disentangled, Nietzsche’s arguments succeed only against a narrow sense of equality as qualitative similarity (die Gleichheit as die Ähnlichkeit), and not against quantitative forms that promote equality not as similarity but as multiple, proportional resistances (die Gleichheit as die Veilheit and der Widerstand). I begin by distinguishing the two conceptions of power at play in Nietzsche’s (...) arguments, power as quantitative superiority of ability and as qualitative feeling of power (das Gefühl der Macht), an affective state that does not directly correlate with quantitative ability and, because based in resistance (der Widerstand), requires relative equality as its condition. Nietzsche presents four principal arguments against egalitarianism, each concluding that equality harms the flourishing of humanity’s highest individuals. First, equality directly promotes qualitative similarity (die Ähnlichkeit) at the expense of multiplicity (die Vielheit). Second, because material inequalities ground the ‘pathos of distance’ (the recognition of spiritual inequality), equality indirectly undermines the desire for self-development. Third, because it opposes aristocratic conditions, egalitarianism promotes a form of liberalism that removes conditions of constraint necessary to human development. Finally, equality is a less efficient means to human enhancement, which is best promoted through unequal distribution of resources to the most able individuals. I argue that in each case Nietzsche’s argument succeeds only if interpreted according to the quantitative conception of power as superiority, but fails when we also consider the qualitative conception of power as feeling. For the promotion of an individual’s qualitative power is compatible with quantitative power equality. Moreover, because power is felt only in resistance, the feeling of power requires relative equality as its precondition—an alternate sense of equality construed, not as qualitative similarity, but as quantitative resistance from proportional counter-powers. I conclude that Nietzsche’s commitment to the promotion of humanity’s highest individuals does not entail the rejection of moral egalitarianism in every form and even supports certain forms. (shrink)

In this essay for a PPR book symposium on Theodore Sider's _Four-Dimensionalism<D>, I focus on two of Sider's arguments for four-dimensionalism: (i) his argument from vagueness, and (ii) his argument from time travel. Concerning (i), I first show that Sider's argument commits him to certain strange consequences that many four-dimensionalists may not endorse, and then I discuss an objection that involves appealing to 'brutal composition', the view that there is no informative answer to Peter van (...) Inwagen's 'special composition question'. Concerning (ii), I argue that the three-dimensionalist can account for time travel scenarios in a way that is analogous to Sider's four-dimensionalist account of such scenarios. (shrink)

This paper aims to defend deliberation-compatibilism against several objections, including a recent counterexample by Yishai Cohen that involves a deliberator who believes that whichever action she performs will be the result of deterministic manipulation. It begins by offering a Moorean-style proof of deliberation-compatibilism. It then turns to the leading argument for deliberation-incompatibilism, which is based on the presumed incompatibility of causal determinism and the ‘openness’ required for rational deliberation. The paper explains why this argument fails and develops a (...) coherent account of how one can rationally deliberate and believe in causal determinism without inconsistency. The second half of the paper then takes up Cohen's proposed counterexample and his Four-Case Deliberation Argument against deliberation-compatibilism, which is meant to mirror Derk Pereboom's famous Four-Case Manipulation Argument. In response, the author defends a hard-line reply to FCDA but also argues that the notion of ‘sourcehood’ relevant to rational deliberation differs from that involved in free will. (shrink)

It is a remarkable thing to find oneself suddenly surprised by an author after having spent years analysing, interpreting, and teaching their works. And yet, that is precisely the experience of many Kant specialists in recent times, as greater attention than ever has been placed on Kant’s discussions of gender and race. Part of the disorientation for Kantians surely comes from the way in which these investigations—oriented as they are by questions of empire as opposed to say, metaphysics—are able to (...) make a body of work that has been long-familiar seem strange and new. It is in this vein that I want to use my discussion here as an opportunity to reconsider one of Kant’s most familiar texts, the Groundwork of the Metaphysics of Morals, in order to focus on the case of moral failure presented by the person who has chosen an easy path in life: one who has ‘seine Talente verrosten ließ’ (4:423; let their talents rust, 75), to use Kant’s phrase.1 With this in focus, I will identify four subsequent counter examples offered up by Kant, each meant to offer specific cases of non-Europeans in a manner that can provide further moral instruction on this point. What this approach should reveal is not only Kant’s unsurprising consistency regarding the need for self-improvement, but also the compatibility he evidently saw between engaging his readers in moral guidance, on the one hand, and identifying non-European others as counterexamples of a morally worthless existence, on the other. (shrink)

In the academic literature and elsewhere, specific relativisms are often a hotly debated topic. In this paper, I considerably up the ante by proposing an across the board universal relativism that is supported by four arguments: an inductive argument, an argument from causality, an argument from elimination, and an argument against self-refutation.

Computers may help us to better understand (not just verify) arguments. In this article we defend this claim by showcasing the application of a new, computer-assisted interpretive method to an exemplary natural-language ar- gument with strong ties to metaphysics and religion: E. J. Lowe’s modern variant of St. Anselm’s ontological argument for the existence of God. Our new method, which we call computational hermeneutics, has been particularly conceived for use in interactive-automated proof assistants. It aims at shedding light on (...) the meanings of words and sentences by framing their inferential role in a given argument. By employing automated theorem reasoning technology within interactive proof assistants, we are able to drastically reduce (by several orders of magnitude) the time needed to test the logical validity of an argu- ment’s formalization. As a result, a new approach to logical analysis, inspired by Donald Davidson’s account of radical interpretation, has been enabled. In computational hermeneutics, the utilization of automated reasoning tools ef- fectively boosts our capacity to expose the assumptions we indirectly commit ourselves to every time we engage in rational argumentation and it fosters the explicitation and revision of our concepts and commitments. (shrink)