The Ontology for Biomedical Investigations (OBI) is an ontology that provides terms with precisely defined meanings to describe all aspects of how investigations in the biological and medical domains are conducted. OBI re-uses ontologies that provide a representation of biomedical knowledge from the Open Biological and Biomedical Ontologies (OBO) project and adds the ability to describe how this knowledge was derived. We here describe the state of OBI and several applications that are using it, such as adding semantic expressivity to (...) existing databases, building data entry forms, and enabling interoperability between knowledge resources. OBI covers all phases of the investigation process, such as planning, execution and reporting. It represents information and material entities that participate in these processes, as well as roles and functions. Prior to OBI, it was not possible to use a single internally consistent resource that could be applied to multiple types of experiments for these applications. OBI has made this possible by creating terms for entities involved in biological and medical investigations and by importing parts of other biomedical ontologies such as GO, Chemical Entities of Biological Interest (ChEBI) and Phenotype Attribute and Trait Ontology (PATO) without altering their meaning. OBI is being used in a wide range of projects covering genomics, multi-omics, immunology, and catalogs of services. OBI has also spawned other ontologies (Information Artifact Ontology) and methods for importing parts of ontologies (Minimum information to reference an external ontology term (MIREOT)). The OBI project is an open cross-disciplinary collaborative effort, encompassing multiple research communities from around the globe. To date, OBI has created 2366 classes and 40 relations along with textual and formal definitions. The OBI Consortium maintains a web resource providing details on the people, policies, and issues being addressed in association with OBI. (shrink)

Biological ontologies are used to organize, curate, and interpret the vast quantities of data arising from biological experiments. While this works well when using a single ontology, integrating multiple ontologies can be problematic, as they are developed independently, which can lead to incompatibilities. The Open Biological and Biomedical Ontologies Foundry was created to address this by facilitating the development, harmonization, application, and sharing of ontologies, guided by a set of overarching principles. One challenge in reaching these goals was that the (...) OBO principles were not originally encoded in a precise fashion, and interpretation was subjective. Here we show how we have addressed this by formally encoding the OBO principles as operational rules and implementing a suite of automated validation checks and a dashboard for objectively evaluating each ontology’s compliance with each principle. This entailed a substantial effort to curate metadata across all ontologies and to coordinate with individual stakeholders. We have applied these checks across the full OBO suite of ontologies, revealing areas where individual ontologies require changes to conform to our principles. Our work demonstrates how a sizable federated community can be organized and evaluated on objective criteria that help improve overall quality and interoperability, which is vital for the sustenance of the OBO project and towards the overall goals of making data FAIR. Competing Interest StatementThe authors have declared no competing interest. (shrink)

J. L. Schellenberg's Philosophy of Religion argues for a specific brand of sceptical religion that takes ‘Ultimism’ – the proposition that there is a metaphysically, axiologically, and soteriologically ultimate reality – to be the object to which the sceptical religionist should assent. In this article I shall argue that Ietsism – the proposition that there is merely something transcendental worth committing ourselves to religiously – is a preferable object of assent. This is for two primary reasons. First, Ietsism is far (...) more modest than Ultimism; Ietsism, in fact, is open to the truth of Ultimism, while the converse does not hold. Second, Ietsism can fulfil the same criteria that compel Schellenberg to argue for Ultimism. (shrink)

In this paper, I explore two differing conceptions of J.G. Fichte’s Anstoß and how it relates to his Transcendental ‘I’, the ground of his Wissenschaftslehre. I argue that one should not attempt to read later interpretations of the Anstoß back into his earlier definition, but find that attempts to tread a middle way between the original and later interpretations have thus far been equally unsuccessful. Instead, I suggest a new way of interpreting the Anstoß as a constituent component of the (...) absolute I, built into his first principle of self-consciousness, and argue that this way allows the I to turn back upon itself without being externally determined. I argue that this way also avoids solipsistic and nihilistic objections by actually supporting the arguments of the proponents of earlier interpretations. I then advance to advocate the Anstoß’s importance in the wider sphere of understanding how Fichte’s theory of transzendentallogisch enables his first and rudimentary derivation of consciousness, prior to the finitely derived practical I of his later Jena writings. (shrink)

This chapter both explains the origins of emotivism in C. K. Ogden and I. A. Richards, R. B. Braithwaite, Austin Duncan-Jones, A. J. Ayer and Charles Stevenson (along with the endorsement by Frank P. Ramsey, and the summary of C. D. Broad), and looks at MacIntyre's criticisms of emotivism as the inevitable result of Moore's attack on naturalistic ethics and his ushering in the fact/value, which was a historical product of the Enlightenment.

It is commonly assumed that the non-cognitivists of the first half of the twentieth century - the emotivists – were internalists about moral motivation. It is also commonly assumed that they were prompted to choose emotivism over other cognitivist positions in ethics because of their commitment to internalism. Finally, it is also commonly assumed that they used an internalist argument to argue for emotivism. -/- In this article I argue that the connection between emotivism and internalism is far more tenuous (...) than is commonly assumed. I focus on two of the most important and influential emotivists: A. J. Ayer and Charles L. Stevenson. While it is true that Stevenson was an internalist, Ayer refused to endorse internalism. Neither of them was originally prompted to choose emotivism over cognitivist positions in ethics by internalist considerations. Finally, Ayer never used an internalist argument to argue for emotivism; Stevenson did once borrow an internalist argument from another philosopher in order to argue for emotivism, but he later abandoned it. (shrink)

The spread of misinformation and fake news raises important problems for our society and for our democracy. From the January 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol to vaccine hesitancy, from suppressing voter turnout to peddling conspiracy theories, we know that these problems are real and need to be taken seriously. While misinformation is not a new problem for democracy, it can spread more quickly and easily because of new media’s design and popularity. Given these problems, it is encouraging that some (...) technology companies are taking steps to reduce the spread of misinformation and fake news on the platforms they manage. Despite this seemingly positive development, some scholars have criticized some interventions designed to combat the spread of misinformation and fake news as paternalistic. For example, a 2019 Facebook intervention called Click-Gap aimed to reduce the amount of low-quality content (including fake news and misinformation) that users see on their NewsFeed. Click-Gap has been criticized as an instance of epistemic paternalism because it was adopted (1) with the goal of improving the epistemic status of its users and (2) irrespective of what the company believed the wishes of its users to be. If interventions like Click-Gap are problematic because paternalistic, those of us interested in the ethics of technology would face a dilemma—either endorse technology companies treating their users paternalistically or endorse their failing to act to combat the spread of misinformation and fake news on their platforms. Both options seem to me to be problematic. While paternalism may sometimes be permissible, I think we should be very hesitant to endorse a paternalistic relationship between technology companies and their users. The relationship does not seem to bear the right sort of structure to one in which paternalism might be appropriate, if it ever is. The second option seems, if anything worse: surely technology companies should not stand by and change nothing about their platforms despite the spread of misinformation and fake news in those spaces. In this paper, I argue that Click-Gap and interventions like it are not paternalistic, contrary to the conclusion of other scholars. Further, I will argue that the focus on paternalism itself is actually a red herring here. While not just any intervention or strategy that purports to reduce fake news and misinformation is permissible, we should want technology companies to take user well-being seriously and be able to take that well-being as a direct reason for action. Their doing so is not paternalistic nor even morally problematic, and it should not be criticized as such. (shrink)

According to a recent challenge to Kratzer's canonical contextualist semantics for deontic modal expressions, no contextualist view can make sense of cases in which such a modal must be information-sensitive in some way. Here I show how Kratzer's semantics is compatible with readings of the targeted sentences that fit with the data. I then outline a general account of how contexts select parameter values for modal expressions and show, in terms of that account, how the needed, contextualist-friendly readings might plausibly (...) get selected in the challenge cases. (shrink)

On Kratzer’s canonical account, modal expressions (like “might” and “must”) are represented semantically as quantifiers over possibilities. Such expressions are themselves neutral; they make a single contribution to determining the propositions expressed across a wide range of uses. What modulates the modality of the proposition expressed—as bouletic, epistemic, deontic, etc.—is context.2 This ain’t the canon for nothing. Its power lies in its ability to figure in a simple and highly unified explanation of a fairly wide range of language use. Recently, (...) though, the canon’s neat story has come under attack. The challenge cases involve the epistemic use of a modal sentence for which no single resolution of the contextual parameter appears capable of accommodating all our intuitions.3 According to these revisionaries, such cases show that the canonical story needs to be amended in some way that makes multiple bodies of information relevant to the assessment of such statements. Here I show that how the right canonical, flexibly contextualist account of modals can accommodate the full range of challenge cases. The key will be to extend Kratzer’s formal semantic account with an account of how context selects values for a modal’s.. (shrink)

What considerations place genuine constraints on an adequate semantics for normative and evaluative expressions? Linguists recognize facts about ordinary uses of such expressions and competent speakers’ judgments about which uses are appropriate. The contemporary literature reflects the widespread assumption that linguists don’t rely upon an additional source of data—competent speakers’ judgments about possible disagreement with hypothetical speech communities. We have several good reasons to think that such judgments are not probative for semantic theorizing. Therefore, we should accord these judgments no (...) probative value for the development of a semantics for our moral terms. Such judgments can no longer be presumed to put pressure on theories according to which our moral expressions share a semantics with ordinary, descriptive terms. Many rivals to pure, Descriptivist theories count among their advantages the ability to accommodate these judgments. If these judgments have no probative value, such theories lose an important source of support. (shrink)

Analysis is given of the Omega Point cosmology, an extensively peer-reviewed proof (i.e., mathematical theorem) published in leading physics journals by professor of physics and mathematics Frank J. Tipler, which demonstrates that in order for the known laws of physics to be mutually consistent, the universe must diverge to infinite computational power as it collapses into a final cosmological singularity, termed the Omega Point. The theorem is an intrinsic component of the Feynman-DeWitt-Weinberg quantum gravity/Standard Model Theory of Everything (TOE) (...) describing and unifying all the forces in physics, of which itself is also required by the known physical laws. With infinite computational resources, the dead can be resurrected--never to die again--via perfect computer emulation of the multiverse from its start at the Big Bang. Miracles are also physically allowed via electroweak quantum tunneling controlled by the Omega Point cosmological singularity. The Omega Point is a different aspect of the Big Bang cosmological singularity--the first cause--and the Omega Point has all the haecceities claimed for God in the traditional religions. -/- From this analysis, conclusions are drawn regarding the social, ethical, economic and political implications of the Omega Point cosmology. (shrink)

The problem of Divine hiddenness, or the hiddenness problem, is more and more commonly being treated as independent of the problem of evil, and as rivalling the latter in significance. Are we in error if we acquiesce in these tendencies? Only a careful investigation into relations between the hiddenness problem and the problem of evil can help us see. Such an investigation is undertaken here. What we will find is that when certain knots threatening to hamper intellectual movement are unravelled, (...) the hiddenness problem emerges as a contender in its own right—one that may generate serious difficulties for theism regardless of conclusions drawn concerning the force of the problem of evil. (shrink)

The article discusses the future of US democracy after the end of Donald J. Trump’s scandal-ridden presidency, which culminated in a violent attempted self-coup. In contrast to many observers outside the United States who appear to assume that Joe Biden’s inauguration marks the failure of the coup attempt, I argue that this view is overly optimistic. First, Trump by no means acted alone but was supported by leading figures in the Republican Party (GOP). Second, the attack on democratic norms and (...) institutions to restore and permanently cement Republican minority rule continues to move forward. The 2022 midterm elections and the 2024 presidential election set the course on whether the United States will return to liberal democracy or degrade into Hungary-style competitive authoritarianism. (shrink)

This study brings light to the concepts of State and Government in the thought of Marsilio de Padua pointing out to profoundly modern institutions present in the reflection of this medieval philosopher. We attempt to show that Marsilio de Padua reflects based on Aristotle´s categories, but proposes a State and Government conception different from that common place of medieval politics as he insists on the need of the popular consent as a criterion of political legitimacy. -/- O estudo explicita os (...) conceitos de Estado e de Governo no pensamento de Marsílio de Pádua apontando as intuições profundamente modernas presentes na reflexão desse filósofo medieval. Procuramos mostrar que Marsílio reflete com categorias aristotélicas, mas propõe uma concepção de Estado e de Governo que se distancia do lugar comum da reflexão política medieval ao insistir na necessidade do consentimento dos súditos como critério de legitimidade política. (shrink)

When brief blank fields are placed between alternating displays of an original and a modified scene, a striking failure of perception is induced: the changes become extremely difficult to notice, even when they are large, presented repeatedly, and the observer expects them to occur (Rensink, O'Regan, & Clark, 1997). To determine the mechanisms behind this induced "change blindness", four experiments examine its dependence on initial preview and on the nature of the interruptions used. Results support the proposal that representations at (...) the early stages of visual processing are highly volatile, and that focused attention is needed to stabilize them sufficiently to support the perception of change. (shrink)

The results are interpreted in terms of a deficit in initial rule learning and subsequent generalization of these rules to new stimuli. Negative feedback is adequately processed at a neural level but this information is not used to improve behaviour on subsequent trials. As learning is degraded, the process of error detection at the moment of the actual response is diminished. Therefore, the current study demonstrates that disturbed error-monitoring processes play a central role in the often reported learning deficits in (...) individuals with PP. (shrink)

It is now well-known that Newton–Cartan theory is the correct geometrical setting for modelling the quantum Hall effect. In addition, in recent years edge modes for the Newton–Cartan quantum Hall effect have been derived. However, the existence of these edge modes has, as of yet, been derived using only orthodox methodologies involving the breaking of gauge-invariance; it would be preferable to derive the existence of such edge modes in a gauge-invariant manner. In this article, we employ recent work by Donnelly (...) and Freidel in order to accomplish exactly this task. Our results agree with known physics, but afford greater conceptual insight into the existence of these edge modes: in particular, they connect them to subtle aspects of Newton–Cartan geometry and pave the way for further applications of Newton–Cartan theory in condensed matter physics. (shrink)

Over the last fifteen years, linguists and philosophers of language have reexamined the canonical, Kratzerian semantics for modal expressions, with special attention paid to their epistemic and deontic uses. This article is an overview of the literature on deontic modal expressions. Section 1 provides an overview of the canonical semantics, noting some of its main advantages. Section 2 introduces a set of desiderata that have achieved the status of fixed points in the debates about whether the canonical semantics is correct. (...) These include the observations that deontic modal sentences have both deliberative and evaluative readings and both information-sensitive and -insensitive readings. Adequate resolutions of certain puzzles in deontic logic and resolving the Frege-Geach problem for Expressivism have also achieved this status. The third section provides an opinionated overview of some of the main extant rivals to the canonical semantics, including Cariani, Kaufmann, and Kaufmann’s (2013) complex contextualism , Yalcin’s (2012) Expressivism, Willer’s (2014) dynamic semantics, and Starr’s (2016) dynamic Expressivism. Section 4 provides an assessment of each of the views discussed in terms of the desiderata introduced in section 2. Section 5 is an overview of remaining issues that require more attention in the literature. (shrink)

Achieving space situational awareness requires, at a minimum, the identification, characterization, and tracking of space objects. Leveraging the resultant space object data for purposes such as hostile threat assessment, object identification, and conjunction assessment presents major challenges. This is in part because in characterizing space objects we reference a variety of identifiers, components, subsystems, capabilities, vulnerabilities, origins, missions, orbital elements, patterns of life, operational processes, operational statuses, and so forth, which tend to be defined in highly heterogeneous and sometimes inconsistent (...) ways. The Space Domain Ontologies are designed to provide a consensus-based realist framework for formulating such characterizations in a way that is both consistent and computable. Space object data are aligned with classes and relations in a suite of ontologies built around the existing Space Object Ontology. They are stored in a dynamically updated Resource Description Framework triple store, which can be queried to support space situational awareness and the needs of spacecraft operators and analysts. This paper provides an overview of the Space Domain Ontologies and their development and use. It presents the motivation for and advantages of the Space Domain Ontologies, including the benefits they provide for enhancing and maintaining long-term space situational awareness. (shrink)

In this paper I argue that given the present state of relevant inquiry, the facts of religious diversity justify religious skepticism. Because of the diversity of religious claims, the denial of any detailed religious proposition is equivalent to a large disjunction of alternative claims. The same is true of the denial of metaphysical naturalism. And having typically acquired no detailed understanding of the whole panoply of religious views, religious believers and metaphysical naturalists are rarely in a position to judge, of (...) any such disjunction, how likely it is to be true. Now the investigative deficit here might conceivably be oversome, but the paper concludes by showing that even where it is overcome, we remain in conditions supporting religious skepticism because of the evolutionary immaturity of our species, which prevents us from being in a position to judge whether religious diversity as humans in the future – or some future species – will know it includes ideas about the Divine trumping any contrary ideas of today. (shrink)

For Machiavelli, religion is valued not by the importance of its founder, the content of its teachings, the truth of its dogmas or the significance of its rites. It is not the essence of what really matters but its function and importance for collective life. Religion teaches to recognize and respect political rules through the religious commandments. This collective norm could assume the outer coercive aspect of the military discipline as well as the inner persuasive character of civic and moral (...) education for the production of collective consensus. -/- Para Maquiavel, o que confere valor a uma religião não é a importância de seu fundador, o conteúdo dos ensinamentos, a verdade dos dogmas ou a significação dos mistérios e ritos. Importa não a essência da religião e sim sua função e importância para a vida coletiva. A religião ensina a reconhecer e a respeitar as regras políticas a partir do mandamento religioso. Essa norma coletiva pode assumir tanto o aspecto coercivo exterior da disciplina militar ou da autoridade política quanto o caráter persuasivo interior da educação moral e cívica para a produção do consenso coletivo. (shrink)

A standard line in the contemporary philosophical literature has it that physical theories are equivalent only when they agree on their empirical content, where this empirical content is often understood as being encoded in the equations of motion of those theories. In this article, we question whether it is indeed the case that the empirical content of a theory is exhausted by its equations of motion, showing that (for example) considerations of boundary conditions play a key role in the empirical (...) equivalence (or otherwise) of theories. Having argued for this, we show that philosophical claims made by Weatherall (2016) that electromagnetism in the Faraday tensor formalism is equivalent to electromagnetism in the vector potential formalism, and by Knox (2011) that general relativity is equivalent to teleparallel gravity, can both be called into question. We then show that properly considering the role of boundary conditions in theory structure can potentially restore these claims of equivalence and close with some remarks on the pragmatics of adjudications on theory identity. (shrink)

One of the Machiavelli's most famous and innovative thesis states that good laws arise from social conflicts, according to the Roman Empire example of the opposition between plebs and nobles. Conflicts are able to bring about order in virtue of the characteristic constrictive force of necessity, which prevents the ambition to prevail. Nonetheless, law does not neutralize the conflict; just give it a regulation. So, law is subjected to history, to the continuous change, which means that it is potentially corruptible. (...) On this account, Machiavelli says that a State can only maintain its authority through a continuous return to the originary moment, viz. to the revival of the experiences of "fear", "terror" and "punishment" lived in the originary event of the foundation. For that reason, in the origin of law is also the violence, whose combined function is to provide legitimacy to its exercise by the State apparatus as the only form to preserve political life from ruin.Uma das mais famosas e inovadoras teses de Maquiavel é a afirmação de que as boas leis nascem dos conflitos sociais, segundo o exemplo romano das oposições entre plebe e nobres. Os conflitos são capazes de produzir ordem por conter a força constritiva própria da necessidade, que impede a ambição de reinar. Contudo, a lei não neutraliza o conflito, mas apenas lhe dá uma ordenação. A lei está, pois, exposta à história, à contínua mudança, o que significa dizer que é potencialmente corruptível. Por causa desta possibilidade, Maquiavel afirma que um Estado somente mantém sua autoridade por meio de um retorno contínuo ao momento da origem, isto é, à revivência da experiência do "medo", do "terror" e da "punição" do acontecimento originário da fundação. Assim, na origem da lei está a violência, cuja função é proporcionar a legitimação de seu exercício pelo aparato estatal como única forma de preservar da ruína a vida política. (shrink)

Abstract: For most people, mobile phones and various forms of personal information technology (PIT) have become standard equipment for everyday life. Recent theorists such as Sherry Turkle raise psychological and philosophical questions about the impact of such technologies and practices, but deeper further philosophical work is needed. This paper takes a pragmatic approach to examining the effects of PIT practices upon experience. After reviewing several main issues with technology raised by Communication theorists, the paper looks more deeply at Turkle’s analysis (...) of technology's impacts upon solitude and conversation. Because Turkle only raises but doesn’t pursue the philosophical dimensions of these issues, the work on experience of John Dewey, William James, and John J. McDermott is utilized to provide concepts and methods by which PIT’s effects might be judged. Finally, pragmatist aesthetics is introduced and consulted as a source of constructive ideals which might guide future amelioration of PIT’s more significant drawbacks. (shrink)

We offer a critical survey of the most discussed accounts of epistemic peer disagreement that are found in the recent literature. We also sketch an alternative approach in line with a pluralist understanding of epistemic rationality.

In this chapter we consider three philosophical perspectives (including those of Stalnaker and Lewis) on the question of whether and how the principle of conditional excluded middle should figure in the logic and semantics of counterfactuals. We articulate and defend a third view that is patterned after belief revision theories offered in other areas of logic and philosophy. Unlike Lewis’ view, the belief revision perspective does not reject conditional excluded middle, and unlike Stalnaker’s, it does not embrace supervaluationism. We adduce (...) both theoretical and empirical considerations to argue that the belief revision perspective should be preferred to its alternatives. The empirical considerations are drawn from the results of four empirical studies (which we report below) of non-experts’ judgments about counterfactuals and conditional excluded middle. (shrink)

Here we focus on two questions: What is the proper semantics for deontic modal expressions in English? And what is the connection between true deontic modal statements and normative reasons? Our contribution towards thinking about the first, which makes up the bulk of our paper, considers a representative sample of recent challenges to a Kratzer-style formal semantics for modal expressions, as well as the rival views—Fabrizio Cariani’s contrastivism, John MacFarlane’s relativism, and Mark Schroeder’s ambiguity theory—those challenges are thought to motivate. (...) These include the Professor Procrastinate challenge to Inheritance (the principle that ‘If ought p and p entails q, then ought q), as well as Parfit’s miners puzzle regarding information-sensitive deontic modals. Here we argue that a Kratzer-style view is able to meet all of the challenges we’ll consider. In addition, we’ll identify challenges for each of those rival views. Our overall conclusion is that a Kratzer-style semantics remains the one to beat. With this assumption in place, we then ask how we should understand the relationship between true deontic modal statements and normative reasons. Should, for example, we hold that the truth of such a statement entails the existence of a normative reason for some agent to comply? Here we argue that, in many cases, acceptance of Kratzer’s semantics for deontic modals leaves open for substantive normative theorizing the question of whether an agent has a normative reason to comply with what she ought to do. (shrink)

In this paper, I argue that many recent interpretations of John Dewey's vision of democracy distort that vision by filtering it through the prism of contemporary deliberative democratic theories. An earlier attempt to defend Dewey's theory of moral deliberation is instructive for understanding the nature and function of this filter. In James Gouinlock's essay "Dewey's Theory of Moral Deliberation," he argues that Morton White and Charles L. Stevenson's criticisms of John Dewey's ethical theory are based upon fundamental misinterpretations of (...) Dewey's theory of moral deliberation. In the spirit of Gouinlock's 1978 essay, I show how this historical debate relates to a claim of political philosophers and political theorists that is currently in vogue, namely, that Dewey's writings contain a nascent theory of deliberative democracy. Deliberative democratic theorists contend that deliberation is the group activity that transforms individual preferences and behavior into mutual understanding, agreement, and collective action. Once Dewey's vision of democracy is identified with this theory of deliberative democracy, the strategic question for Deweyans arises: If Deweyan democracy is identified too closely with deliberative democracy, will Dewey scholars risk making Dewey's democratic vision an outmoded approach to theorizing about democracy in the wake of an expired deliberative turn? One way to see our way clear of this strategic question is to remove the deliberative democracy filter and appreciate Dewey's vision of democracy as a unique and free-standing contribution to democratic theory. (shrink)

Com esta obra, esperamos contribuir com uma pequena imagem do profícuo desenvolvimento recente da Epistemologia Social, em especial em terras brasileiras. A despeito de uma série de resistências, motivadas por fatores diversos, a uma concepção mais aplicada da Epistemologia, uma que extrapole os limites da mera análise conceitual, a Epistemologia Social tem ocupado um espaço cada vez mais significativo na Filosofia. Sua capacidade de dialogar com outras áreas da Filosofia e, principalmente, para além da Filosofia, tem se mostrado crucial para (...) sua consolidação. No Brasil, esta não é a primeira obra a reunir contribuições de relevo para a área, mas é com certeza a obra que reúne de modo mais nítido as investidas mais arrojadas de Epistemologia Social sobre problemas candentes do nosso tempo, que vão desde a importância e os limites da conversação para resolver impasses na nossa dinâmica de produção e transmissão de conhecimento até como o preconceito arraigado e a violência moldam nossos modos de vida epistêmico em comunidade, a ponto muitas vezes de anulá-los e destruí-los. Fazemos votos de que esta obra encontre leitores e leitoras animadas com os novos rumos da Filosofia, e que ela possibilite uma ampliação e uma renovação cada vez maior da Epistemologia enquanto teoria, mas também enquanto ferramenta de intervenção prática na nossa realidade. (shrink)

The norm of assertion, to be in force, is a social norm. What is the content of our social norm of assertion? Various linguistic arguments purport to show that to assert is to represent oneself as knowing. But to represent oneself as knowing does not entail that assertion is governed by a knowledge norm. At best these linguistic arguments provide indirect support for a knowledge norm. Furthermore, there are alternative, non-normative explanations for the linguistic data (as in recent work from (...) Van Elswyk). Direct arguments would rely on normative judgments about the permissibility or impermissibility of assertions with and without the speaker knowing the content asserted. John Turri's work experimental results purport to show that our norm of assertion is factive, and probably knowledge. But as a number of recent experimentalists (Kneer, Reuter and Broessel, Marsili and Wiegmann) have shown, Turri's results rely on the problemmatic use of 'should' as in 'Maria should assert that she owns a 1990 watch.' Correcting for this, these experimentalists provide strong evidence that our norm of assertion is not factive. The standard reply to evidence like this from the assertion of unlucky falsehoods is the excuse maneuver. But Marsili and Wiegmann, following Turri's protocol for testing for excuse validation, show that participants who judge that assertions unlucky falsehoods are permissible are not guilty of excuse validation. Given our current understanding of the experimental evidence, knowledge is not our norm of assertion. (shrink)

El presente ensayo se circunscribe dentro de la bioética, pues desarrolla un análisis al caso del español Ramón Sampedro, reflexionando las tensiones que se generan a partir de su deseo de muerte asistida, como mecanismo para alcanzar la muerte digna. La novedad del presente estudio radica en la utilización del principio de la alteridad y el contextual, sin acudir a los principios de Tom L. Beauchamp y James F. Childress, con el objetivo de establecer un parámetro de análisis alterno (...) a casos similares. (shrink)

It has recently become popular to suggest that questions of ontology ought be settled by determining, first, which fundamental things exist, and second, which derivative things depend on, or are grounded by, those fundamental things. This methodology typically leads to a hierarchical view of ontology according to which there are chains of entities, each dependent on the next, all the way down to a fundamental base. In this paper we defend an alternative ontological picture according to which there is no (...) ontological hierarchy. Such a picture appears counterintuitive (at least to many), in part because in the absence of a hierarchical structure to our world, there would be no structure apt to back metaphysical explanations. There are two reasons to suppose this is so. First, there would be no structure apt to back metaphysical explanations because there would be a fatal mismatch between the formal features of metaphysical explanation, on the one hand, and the structure of the world, on the other hand. Second, in the absence of an ontological hierarchy there would be no structure apt to back metaphysical explanations because the only connections that would obtain between relevant facts are mere correlational connections. But mere correlations are not the right kinds of relations to back metaphysical explanations: explanation requires something more. This paper aims to show that neither of these is a good reason to prefer a hierarchical view of ontology. (shrink)

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

Moral reasoning traditionally distinguishes two types of evil: moral and natural. The standard view is that ME is the product of human agency and so includes phenomena such as war, torture and psychological cruelty; that NE is the product of nonhuman agency, and so includes natural disasters such as earthquakes, floods, disease and famine; and finally, that more complex cases are appropriately analysed as a combination of ME and NE. Recently, as a result of developments in autonomous agents in cyberspace, (...) a new class of interesting and important examples of hybrid evil has come to light. In this paper, it is called artificial evil and a case is made for considering it to complement ME and NE to produce a more adequate taxonomy. By isolating the features that have led to the appearance of AE, cyberspace is characterised as a self-contained environment that forms the essential component in any foundation of the emerging field of Computer Ethics. It is argued that this goes some way towards providing a methodological explanation of why cyberspace is central to so many of CE’s concerns; and it is shown how notions of good and evil can be formulated in cyberspace. Of considerable interest is how the propensity for an agent’s action to be morally good or evil can be determined even in the absence of biologically sentient participants and thus allows artificial agents not only to perpetrate evil but conversely to ‘receive’ or ‘suffer from’ it. The thesis defended is that the notion of entropy structure, which encapsulates human value judgement concerning cyberspace in a formal mathematical definition, is sufficient to achieve this purpose and, moreover, that the concept of AE can be determined formally, by mathematical methods. A consequence of this approach is that the debate on whether CE should be considered unique, and hence developed as a Macroethics, may be viewed, constructively, in an alternative manner. The case is made that whilst CE issues are not uncontroversially unique, they are sufficiently novel to render inadequate the approach of standard Macroethics such as Utilitarianism and Deontologism and hence to prompt the search for a robust ethical theory that can deal with them successfully. The name Information Ethics is proposed for that theory. It is argued that the uniqueness of IE is justified by its being non-biologically biased and patient-oriented: IE is an Environmental Macroethics based on the concept of data entity rather than life. It follows that the novelty of CE issues such as AE can be appreciated properly because IE provides a new perspective. In light of the discussion provided in this paper, it is concluded that Computer Ethics is worthy of independent study because it requires its own application-specific knowledge and is capable of supporting a methodological foundation, Information Ethics. (shrink)

When do probability distribution functions (PDFs) about future climate misrepresent uncertainty? How can we recognise when such misrepresentation occurs and thus avoid it in reasoning about or communicating our uncertainty? And when we should not use a PDF, what should we do instead? In this paper we address these three questions. We start by providing a classification of types of uncertainty and using this classification to illustrate when PDFs misrepresent our uncertainty in a way that may adversely affect decisions. We (...) then discuss when it is reasonable and appropriate to use a PDF to reason about or communicate uncertainty about climate. We consider two perspectives on this issue. On one, which we argue is preferable, available theory and evidence in climate science basically excludes using PDFs to represent our uncertainty. On the other, PDFs can legitimately be provided when resting on appropriate expert judgement and recognition of associated risks. Once we have specified the border between appropriate and inappropriate uses of PDFs, we explore alternatives to their use. We briefly describe two formal alternatives, namely imprecise probabilities and possibilistic distribution functions, as well as informal possibilistic alternatives. We suggest that the possibilistic alternatives are preferable. -/- . (shrink)

Metaethical expressivism is typically characterised as the view that normative statements express desire-like attitudes instead of beliefs. However, in this paper I argue that expressivists should claim that normative statements express beliefs in normative propositions, and not merely in some deflationary sense but in a theoretically robust sense explicated by a theory of propositional attitudes. I first argue that this can be achieved by combining an interpretationist understanding of belief with a nonfactualist view of normative belief content. This results in (...) a view I call ‘interpretative expressivism’. I then argue that traditional arguments employed by expressivists that normative statements express noncognitive attitudes can just as well support the claim that normative statements express nonfactual or nonrepresentational beliefs. Finally, I argue that this view has a number of advantages to versions of expressivism that deny that normative statements express non-deflationary normative beliefs. (shrink)

This paper examines the integration and unification of the philosophy and psychology of well-being. For the most part, these disciplines investigate well-being without reference to each other. In recent years, however, with the maturing of each discipline, there have been a growing number of calls to integrate the two. While such calls are welcome, what it means to integrate well-being philosophy and psychology can vary greatly depending on one’s theoretical and practical ends. The aim of this paper is to provide (...) a novel conceptual framework for thinking about integrating well-being philosophy and psychology that systematically categorizes different kinds of integration projects. We divide existing attempts in the literature into three broad categories according to the perspective from which the integration takes place: (1) top-down meta-theoretical unification; (2) psychological integration within philosophy; and (3) philosophical integration within psychology. These categories are then broken down into various further subcategories. Our aim in providing this framework is both to facilitate the assessment and comparison of existing integration attempts and to provide a roadmap for future integration attempts. For each category, we discuss one or two representative examples of the approaches. By doing so, we hope to generate interest in the wide variety of existing integration projects, as well as to generate discussion concerning the benefits and pitfalls of different approaches. (shrink)

Symposium on Christopher Bennet's The Apology Ritual. A Philosophical Theory of Punishment [Cambridge University Press, 2008].

Observers inspected normal, high quality color displays of everyday visual scenes while their eye movements were recorded. A large display change occurred each time an eye blink occurred. Display changes could either involve "Central Interest" or "Marginal Interest" locations, as determined from descriptions obtained from independent judges in a prior pilot experiment. Visual salience, as determined by luminance, color, and position of the Central and Marginal interest changes were equalized. -/- The results obtained were very similar to those obtained in (...) prior experiments showing failure to detect changes occurring simultaneously with saccades, flicker, or “mudsplashes” in the visual scene: Many changes were very hard to detect, and Marginal Interest changes were harder to detect than Central Interest changes. -/- Analysis of eye movements showed, as expected, that the probability of detecting a change depended on the eye’s distance from the change location. However a surprising finding was that both for Central and Marginal Interest changes, evenwhen observers were directly fixating the change locations (within 1 degree),more than 40% of the time they still failed to see the changes. It seems that looking at something does not guarantee you “ see” it. (shrink)

The shape of a life hypothesis holds that the temporal sequence of good or bad times in a life can itself be a valuable feature of that life. This is generally thought to be incompatible with additivism about lifetime well-being, which holds that lifetime well-being is fully determined by momentary well-being. This paper examines Dale Dorsey’s recent argument that these views are in fact compatible. I argue that accepting the conjunction of these views requires stronger commitments than Dorsey recognizes. After (...) arguing that these commitments are problematic, I conclude that we should reject the compatibility claim. (shrink)

This chapter describes the potential far‐reaching consequences of contemplative higher education for the fields of science and medicine.

Critical notice of Guy Fletcher's 'Dear Prudence: The Nature and Normativity of Prudential Discourse' and Dale Dorsey's 'A Theory of Prudence'.

Scepticism about ought simpliciter is the view that there is no such thing as what one ought simpliciter to do. Instead, practical deliberation is governed by a plurality of normative standpoints, each authoritative from their own perspective but none authoritative simpliciter. This paper aims to resist such scepticism. After setting out the challenge in general terms, I argue that scepticism can be resisted by rejecting a key assumption in the sceptic’s argument. This is the assumption that standpoint-relative ought judgments bring (...) with them a commitment to act in accordance with those judgments. Instead, I propose an alternative account of our normative concepts according to which only ought simpliciter judgments commit one to acting in accordance with those judgments. In addition to answering the sceptical challenge, the proposal offers an independently motivated account of what makes a concept normatively authoritative. (shrink)

To improve oneself and grow professionally, career development has been found to be crucial, as it serves as a roadmap for the professional growth of employees. However, a barrier, known as the glass ceiling, hinders the progress of employees, especially those in the LGBTQIA+ community. This study explores the impact of the glass ceiling on the career development of selected LGBTQIA+ individuals, shedding light on the barriers faced by this community in the workplace. The researchers used a qualitative multiple-case study (...) and selected ten (10) LGBTQIA+ participants from large enterprises via the judgmental sampling technique. Through thematic analysis, psychological impact, workplace discomfort, lack of recognition, and career progress challenges emerged as the impacts of the glass ceiling on the participants. Strategies for overcoming glass ceiling barriers, such as resilience, self-reflection, and community support, are identified. Thus, the study found that glass ceilings are really evident in the context of businesses. With this, the proposed advocacy plan in the study suggests interventions like workplace inclusion training, mentorship networks, and seminars on employee rights. Furthermore, it emphasizes the call for ongoing research and advocacy efforts to dismantle barriers and cultivate workplaces that not only embrace diversity but also provide equitable opportunities for career growth. (shrink)