Articolo divulgativo pubblicato su Immoderati il 10 novembre 2021. Inizio analizzando i criteri di legittimità dell'eutanasia normalmente accettati nella discussione etica filosofica. Passo quindi alle argomentazioni teologiche contro l'eutanasia e il suicidio (dalla Summa di Tommaso), e sottolineo come la morte non possa mai essere detta migliore della vita. Mostro però l'esistenza di varie eccezioni, e come invece la dottrina del doppio effetto possa legittimare l'eutanasia. Concludo che, anche se il cristiano può voler rifiutare ogni possibilità d'eutanasia, ciò non implica (...) l'opposizione ad una legislazione in merito, che al contrario è coerente con l'insegnamento dei padri. (shrink)

Articolo divulgativo pubblicato su L'Indiscreto il 21 dicembre 2022. Immaginiamo che i diversi numeri sull'asse delle ascisse rappresentino diverse domande alle quali posso rispondere. I diversi numeri sull'asse delle ordinate, quindi, rappresenteranno diverse possibili risposte ad una certa domanda. Un punto, con le sue due coordinate, rappresenta una certa risposta ad una certa domanda. Una religione può allora essere rappresentata come un insieme di punti. Diverse religioni potrebbero entrare in contrasto dando risposte diverse ad una stessa domanda; potrebbero però anche (...) rispondere a domande diverse, o dare le stesse risposte alle medesime domande. Supponiamo che una religione sia caratterizzata dai punti {a, b, c}, e un'altra dai punti {b, d, e}: cosa impedisce ad un credete di sposare entrambe le religioni, credendo nel sistema {a, b, c, d, e}? In effetti, nulla. Nel presente articolo, sottolineo le somiglianze tra diverse religioni, suggerendo che gli approcci mistici (anziché quelli dogmatici) spingono ad una naturale unità. (shrink)

Questo articolo divulgativo è stato pubblicato il 24 marzo 2021 sulla rivista l'Indiscreto. Le waifu sono personaggi di opere di finzione, per lo più anime, verso i quali molti giovani maschi provano una forta attrazione, fino all'ossessione. Perché delle opere di fantasia suscitano tali sentimenti, che sembrano presupporre il trattare gli eventi osservati come se fosser reali? Questo è il paradosso della fiction. In un certo senso, la teoria della controparte di D. K. Lewis potrebbe essere utilizzato per affermare che, (...) in effetti, i personaggi delle opere di finzione sono reali. Alla fine, però, rifiuto tale interpretazione, sostenendo, invece, che i personaggi di finzione sono versioni alternative di persone reali, e che i sentimenti che si provano sono rivolti a tali persone reali, o comunque a chi può aver realmente vissuto eventi analoghi. (shrink)

In spite of the many efforts made to clarify von Neumann’s methodology of science, one crucial point seems to have been disregarded in recent literature: his closeness to Hilbert’s spirit. In this paper I shall claim that the scientific methodology adopted by von Neumann in his later foundational reflections originates in the attempt to revaluate Hilbert’s axiomatics in the light of Gödel’s incompleteness theorems. Indeed, axiomatics continues to be pursued by the Hungarian mathematician in the spirit of Hilbert’s school. I (...) shall argue this point by examining four basic ideas embraced by von Neumann in his foundational considerations: a) the conservative attitude to assume in mathematics; b) the role that mathematics and the axiomatic approach have to play in all that is science; c) the notion of success as an alternative methodological criterion to follow in scientific research; d) the empirical and, at the same time, abstract nature of mathematical thought. Once these four basic ideas have been accepted, Hilbert’s spirit in von Neumann’s methodology of science will become clear. (shrink)

Articolo divulgativo pubblicato su L'Indiscreto il 13 aprile 2022. Le opere d'arte sono analizzabili semioticamente: sono qualcosa che sta per qualcos'altro, oggetti che comunicano del significato. Analizzando le loro proprietà, concludo che le opere d'arte, per definizione, sono a metà via tra le icone e i simboli, e sono caratterizzate da un doppio rimando: l'oggetto artistico rimanda ad una qualche entità, che a sua volta viene reinterpreata e usata per comunicare qualcosa di universale. Si discute quindi l'aspetto cognitivo dell'opera d'arte: (...) posto davanti all'opera, il fruitore accede a reti di concetti che costituiscono la sua esperienza estetica. Poiché quali reti di concetti il fruitore esperirà dipende essenzialmente dalle caratteristiche proprie del fruitore stesso, ne consegue che la critica dovrebbe concentrarsi, non sulle caratteristiche delle opere, ma sui modi in cui tali caratteristiche possono interagire con diverse tipologie di fruitori. (shrink)

Tradução para o português do livro "Ensaios sobre Strawson", de Carlos Caorsi. Editora da unijuí, 2014. Sumário: Apresentação; A teoria da verdade em Strawson, Mauricio Beuchot; Réplica a Mauricio Beuchot, Peter F. Strawson; Strawson: entre a lógica tradicional e a lógica clássica, Robert Calabria; Réplica a Robert Clabria, Peter F. Strawson; Referência e termos singulares, Carlos E. Caorsi; Réplica a Carlos E. Caorsi, Peter F. Strawson; Strawson e a metafísica, Juan C. D’Alessio; Réplica a Juan C. D’Alessio, Peter F. Strawson; (...) A meta-metafísica de Strawson: identificação versus individuação, Jorge J. E. Gracia; Réplica a Jorge J. E. Gracia, Peter F. Strawson; Algumas distinções sobre a noção de indivíduo, Jesús Mosterín; Réplica a Jesús Mosterín, Peter F. Strawson; Sobre a percepção e seus objetos em Strawson, Ernest Sosa; Réplica a Ernest Sosa, Peter F. Strawson; Limitações ao exercício da perplexidade, Teresa de Jesús Zavalía; Réplica a Tereza de Jesús Zavalía, Peter F. Strawson; Publicações de P. F. Strawson . (shrink)

Practical wisdom is the intellectual virtue that enables a person to make reliably good decisions about how, all-things-considered, to live. As such, it is a lofty and important ideal to strive for. It is precisely this loftiness and importance that gives rise to important questions about wisdom: Can real people develop it? If so, how? What is the nature of wisdom as it manifests itself in real people? I argue that we can make headway answering these questions by modeling wisdom (...) on expert skill. Presenting the main argument for this expert skill model of wisdom is the focus of this paper. More specifically, I’ll argue that wisdom is primarily the same kind of epistemic achievement as expert decision-making skill in areas such as firefighting. Acknowledging this helps us see that, and how, real people can develop wisdom. It also helps to resolve philosophical debates about the nature of wisdom. For example, philosophers, including those who think virtue should be modeled on skills, disagree about the extent to which wise people make decisions using intuitions or principled deliberation and reflection. The expert skill model resolves this debate by showing that wisdom includes substantial intuitive and deliberative and reflective abilities. (shrink)

There are two senses of ‘what scientists know’: An individual sense (the separate opinions of individual scientists) and a collective sense (the state of the discipline). The latter is what matters for policy and planning, but it is not something that can be directly observed or reported. A function can be defined to map individual judgments onto an aggregate judgment. I argue that such a function cannot effectively capture community opinion, especially in cases that matter to us.

Daniel Dennett (1996) has disputed David Chalmers' (1995) assertion that there is a "hard problem of consciousness" worth solving in the philosophy of mind. In this paper I defend Chalmers against Dennett on this point: I argue that there is a hard problem of consciousness, that it is distinct in kind from the so-called easy problems, and that it is vital for the sake of honest and productive research in the cognitive sciences to be clear about the difference. But I (...) have my own rebuke for Chalmers on the point of explanation. Chalmers (1995, 1996) proposes to "solve" the hard problem of consciousness by positing qualia as fundamental features of the universe, alongside such ontological basics as mass and space-time. But this is an inadequate solution: to posit, I will urge, is not to explain. To bolster this view, I borrow from an account of explanation by which it must provide "epistemic satisfaction" to be considered successful (Rowlands, 2001; Campbell, 2009), and show that Chalmers' proposal fails on this account. I conclude that research in the science of consciousness cannot move forward without greater conceptual clarity in the field. (shrink)

Contemporary neuroscientific theories of consciousness are typically based on the study of vision and have neglected olfaction. Several of these (e.g. Global Workspace Theories, the Information Integration theory, and the various theories offered by Crick and Koch) claim that a thalamic relay is necessary for consciousness. Studies on olfaction and the olfactory system's anatomical structure show this claim to be incorrect, thus showing these theories to be either false or inadequate as general and comprehensive accounts of consciousness. Attempts to rescue (...) these theories by claiming that there is a structure in the olfactory system that is functionally equivalent to the thalamus in the visual system, such as the olfactory bulb or the olfactory cortex, are also shown to fail. If we wish to understand consciousness, we have to wake up and smell it. (shrink)

The badness of having conflicting emotions is a familiar theme in academic ethics, clinical psychology, and commercial self-help, where emotional harmony is often put forward as an ideal. Many philosophers give emotional harmony pride of place in their theories of practical reason.1 Here we offer a defense of a particular species of emotional conflict, namely, ambivalence. We articulate an conception of ambivalence, on which ambivalence is unresolved inconsistent desire (§1) and present a case of appropriate ambivalence (§2), before considering two (...) alternative defenses of emotional conflict (§3). We then argue that inconsistent desires can be fitting (§4) and that it can be reasonable not to resolve inconsistent desires (§5), before considering an objection (§6) and concluding the discussion (§7). (shrink)

This paper addresses a fundamental line of research in neuroscience: the identification of a putative neural processing core of the cerebral cortex, often claimed to be “canonical”. This “canonical” core would be shared by the entire cortex, and would explain why it is so powerful and diversified in tasks and functions, yet so uniform in architecture. The purpose of this paper is to analyze the search for canonical explanations over the past 40 years, discussing the theoretical frameworks informing this research. (...) It will highlight a bias that, in my opinion, has limited the success of this research project, that of overlooking the dimension of cortical development. The earliest explanation of the cerebral cortex as canonical was attempted by David Marr, deriving putative cortical circuits from general mathematical laws, loosely following a deductive-nomological account. Although Marr’s theory turned out to be incorrect, one of its merits was to have put the issue of cortical circuit development at the top of his agenda. This aspect has been largely neglected in much of the research on canonical models that has followed. Models proposed in the 1980s were conceived as mechanistic. They identified a small number of components that interacted as a basic circuit, with each component defined as a function. More recent models have been presented as idealized canonical computations, distinct from mechanistic explanations, due to the lack of identifiable cortical components. Currently, the entire enterprise of coming up with a single canonical explanation has been criticized as being misguided, and the premise of the uniformity of the cortex has been strongly challenged. This debate is analyzed here. The legacy of the canonical circuit concept is reflected in both positive and negative ways in recent large-scale brain projects, such as the Human Brain Project. One positive aspect is that these projects might achieve the aim of producing detailed simulations of cortical electrical activity, a negative one regards whether they will be able to find ways of simulating how circuits actually develop. (shrink)

In an effort to produce new and more sustainable technologies, designers have turned to nature in search of inspiration and innovation. Biomimetic design (from the Greek bios, life, mimesis, imitation) is the conscious imitation of biological models to solve today's technical and ecological challenges. Nowadays numerous different approaches exist that take inspiration from nature as a model for design, such as biomimicry, biomimetics, bionics, permaculture, ecological engineering, etc. This variety of practices comes in turn with a wide range of different (...) promises, including sustainability, increased resilience, multi-functionality, and a lower degree of risk. How are we to make sense of this heterogeneous amalgam of existing practices and technologies, and of the numerous promises attached to them? We suggest that a typology of biomimetic approaches would provide a useful hermeneutic framework to understand the different tensions that pull this variegated landscape in different directions. This is achieved through a critical analysis of the literature in different fields of biomimetic design and the philosophy of biomimicry, in order to derive conceptual and normative assumptions concerning the meaning and value of the imitation of nature. These two dimensions are then intersected to derive an analytical grid composed of six different biomimetic types, which enable the classification of existing and possible biomimetic approaches, practices, and technologies according to their specific conceptual assumptions and guiding norms. (shrink)

We argue that the fragility of contemporary marriages—and the corresponding high rates of divorce—can be explained (in large part) by a three-part mismatch: between our relationship values, our evolved psychobiological natures, and our modern social, physical, and technological environment. “Love drugs” could help address this mismatch by boosting our psychobiologies while keeping our values and our environment intact. While individual couples should be free to use pharmacological interventions to sustain and improve their romantic connection, we suggest that they may have (...) an obligation to do so as well, in certain cases. Specifically, we argue that couples with offspring may have a special responsibility to enhance their relationships for the sake of their children. We outline an evolutionarily informed research program for identifying promising biomedical enhancements of love and commitment. (shrink)

In English, as in many other languages, male-gendered pronouns are sometimes used to refer not only to men, but to individuals whose gender is unknown or unspecified, to human beings in general (as in ―mankind‖) and sometimes even to females (as when the casual ―Hey guys‖ is spoken to a group of women). These so-called he/man or masculine generics have come under fire in recent decades for being sexist, even archaic, and positively harmful to women and girls; and advocates of (...) gender-neutral (or nonsexist) language have put forward serious efforts to discourage their use. Have they been successful, and to what extent? In this paper, I review some of the main arguments in favor of abolishing sexist male generics. I then present three studies tracking the use of he/man terminology in academic, popular, and personal discourse over the past several decades. I show that the use of these terms has fallen dramatically in recent years, while nonsexist alternatives have gradually taken their place. We may be paying witness to the early stages of the ultimate extinction of masculine generics. (shrink)

Contemporary phenomenal externalists are motivated to a large extent by the transparency of experience and by the related doctrine of representationalism. On their own, however, transparency and representationalism do not suffice to establish externalism. Hence we should hesitate to dismiss phenomenal internalism, a view shared by many generations of competent philosophers. Rather, we should keep both our options open, internalism and externalism. It is hard, however, to see how to keep open the internalist option, for although transparency and representationalism have (...) not yet definitively established externalism, they have indeed made it quite intuitive. Internalism, by comparison, comes across at first sight as antiquated and ridden with difficulties. This is why I propose the Stained Glass model of consciousness. I do so with the following two aims: first, to make internalism intuitive in the age of transparency, and second, to show how to resist the many recent anti-internalist arguments. In particular, I argue that phenomenal internalism need not be epistemically worrisome, that it is compatible at once with transparency, representationalism, and content externalism, and that although it requires an error theory, this error theory is a harmless one. (shrink)

I respond to Karola Stotz's criticisms of my previously published challenges to the inference from developmental systems theory to an extended view of cognition.

Review of: "Biology as a postmodern science: Universals, historicity, and context".

This paper represents a counterreply to “A rejoinder to Alessio Gava’s ‘Van Fraassen, a inferência da melhor explicação e a Matrix realista’”, by Minikoski and Rodrigues da Silva, released in Problemata (v. 12, n. 2, 2021). The authors originally published an essay in the same journal, “Van Fraassen and inference to the best explanation” (2016), the object of critic - ‘friendly and gentle’ - in a work of mine that also appeared in Problemata, in 2019. In this paper I will (...) show that, even when the subject matter is the inference to the best explanation, realists and antirealists end up debating about the same old topics, that represent the essence of the controversy between the two philosophical stances. (shrink)

Sleep and dreaming are important daily phenomena that are receiving growing attention from both the scientific and the philosophical communities. The increasingly popular predictive brain framework within cognitive science aims to give a full account of all aspects of cognition. The aim of this paper is to critically assess the theoretical advantages of Predictive Processing (PP, as proposed by Clark 2013, Clark 2016; and Hohwy 2013) in defining sleep and dreaming. After a brief introduction, we overview the state of the (...) art at the intersection between dream research and PP (with particular reference to Hobson and Friston 2012; Hobson et al. 2014). In the following sections we focus on two theoretically promising aspects of the research program. First, we consider the explanations of phenomenal consciousness during sleep (i.e. dreaming) and how it arises from the neural work of the brain. PP provides a good picture of the peculiarity of dreaming but it can’t fully address the problem of how consciousness comes to be in the first place. We propose that Integrated Information Theory (IIT) (Oizumi et al. 2014; Tononi et al. 2016) is a good candidate for this role and we will show its advantages and points of contact with PP. After introducing IIT, we deal with the evolutionary function of sleeping and dreaming. We illustrate that PP fits with contemporary researches on the important adaptive function of sleep and we discuss why IIT can account for sleep mentation (i.e. dreaming) in evolutionary terms (Albantakis et al. 2014). In the final section, we discuss two future avenues for dream research that can fruitfully adopt the perspective offered by PP: (a) the role of bodily predictions in the constitution of the sleeping brain activity and the dreaming experience, and (b) the precise role of the difference stages of sleep (REM (Rapid eye movement), NREM (Non-rapid eye movement) in the constitution and refinement of the predictive machinery. (shrink)

Vera Zasulich’s shooting of Trepov, a governor of St Petersburg who had ordered the flogging of a political prisoner, in January 1878, catapulted her to international fame as a revolutionary heroine, a reputation that she put to good use by becoming one of the five ‘founding parents’ of Russian Marxism that created the ‘Group for the Emancipation of Labour’ in 1883. But her act of self-sacrifice also triggered, to her dismay, the institutionalisation of individual terrorist tactics in the Russian Populist (...) movement with the creation of the ‘People’s Will’ (Narodnaya Volya) Party in 1879. The organisation went into decline after the killing of Tsar Alexander II in 1881, and Populism itself was increasingly superseded by Marxism as the hegemonic force on the left with the rise of the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party (RSDLP). But individual terrorist tactics reappeared with the creation of the Socialist Revolutionary Party in 1902, prompting Zasulich to write an article for Die neue Zeit, the theoretical organ of German Social Democracy, in which she both condemned the Neo-Populist tendency as deleterious to the rising labour movement and supported the organisational plans for the RSDLP sponsored by the Iskra group, developed at length by Lenin in his book What Is to Be Done?, published in March 1902. This article provides the background to Vera Zasulich’s article ‘The Terrorist Tendency in Russia’ (December 1902), setting it against the history of the Russian revolutionary movement from 1878 to 1902. (shrink)

Articolo divulgativo pubblicato su L'Indiscreto il 17 maggio 2024. Si tratta del primo di una serie di articoli che verranno raccolti come opera di divulgazione sulla filosofia analitica. Ripercorro la storia del divario analitico-continentale. Si possono individuare due principali forze dietro la filosofia continentale: la prima è quella di Heidegger (manifesta nella fenomenologia, nell'ermeneutica e nell'esistenzialismo), la seconda è quella di Marx (manifesta nella teoria critica e nel poststrutturalismo). Si individuano quindi quattro distinzioni tipiche tra la tradizione continentale e quella (...) analitica; si individuano però anche loro continue eccezioni. Inevitabilmente, si conclude che la distinzione è debolmente fondata. (shrink)

This paper explores an emerging sub-field of both empirical bioethics and experimental philosophy, which has been called “experimental philosophical bioethics” (bioxphi). As an empirical discipline, bioxphi adopts the methods of experimental moral psychology and cognitive science; it does so to make sense of the eliciting factors and underlying cognitive processes that shape people’s moral judgments, particularly about real-world matters of bioethical concern. Yet, as a normative discipline situated within the broader field of bioethics, it also aims to contribute to substantive (...) ethical questions about what should be done in a given context. What are some of the ways in which this aim has been pursued? In this paper, we employ a case study approach to examine and critically evaluate four strategies from the recent literature by which scholars in bioxphi have leveraged empirical data in the service of normative arguments. (shrink)

Articolo divulgativo pubblicato su L'Indiscreto il 15 dicembre 2021. Analizza alcune tematiche relative al rapporto tra religione e videogiochi prendendo quattro titoli esemplari.

Causation is one of philosophy's most venerable and thoroughly-analyzed concepts. However, the study of how ordinary people make causal judgments is a much more recent addition to the philosophical arsenal. One of the most prominent views of causal explanation, especially in the realm of harmful or potentially harmful behavior, is that unusual or counternormative events are accorded privileged status in ordinary causal explanations. This is a fundamental assumption in psychological theories of counterfactual reasoning, and has been transported to philosophy by (...) Hitchcock and Knobe (2009). A different view--the basis of the culpable control model of blame (CCM)--is that primary causal status is accorded to behaviors that arouse negative evaluative reactions, including behaviors that stem from nefarious motives, negligence or recklessness, a faulty character, or behaviors that lead to harmful or potentially harmful consequences. This paper describes four empirical studies that show consistent support for the CCM. (shrink)

Il presente elaborato è stato sviluppato come tesina per la laurea triennale il lettere moderne presso l'Università Ca' Foscari, con relatore la prof. Patrizia Solinas. Non è più stata discussa in quanto non avevo i soldi per pagarmi gli studi. L'elaborato inizia esponendo i principi della filosofia del linguaggio di Grice, in particolare le massime pragmatiche e, di conseguenza, le implicature. Si presentano quindi alcune teorie pragmatiche alternative, quali la Relevance Theory e il calcolo delle implicature scalari tramite l'operatore di (...) esaustificazione. (shrink)

Pharmaceuticals or other emerging technologies could be used to enhance (or diminish) feelings of lust, attraction, and attachment in adult romantic partnerships. While such interventions could conceivably be used to promote individual (and couple) well-being, their widespread development and/or adoption might lead to “medicalization” of human love and heartache—for some, a source of serious concern. In this essay, we argue that the “medicalization of love” need not necessarily be problematic, on balance, but could plausibly be expected to have either good (...) or bad consequences depending upon how it unfolds. By anticipating some of the specific ways in which these technologies could yield unwanted outcomes, bioethicists and others can help direct the course of love’s “medicalization”—should it happen to occur—more toward the “good” side than the “bad.”. (shrink)

Articolo divulgativo pubblicato su Club Theologicum il 12 dicembre 2022. La prima sezione collega il problema dell'identità personale al paradosso delle sorite. La seconda approfondisce il problema, rifacendosi agli esperimenti mentali di Parfit in Ragioni e Persone. Si conclude sposando un ecceitismo coerente con la teologia cristiana. La terza parte espone alcune argomentazioni tipiche di filosofia della mente per analizzare la possibilità di assegnare una soggettività a una macchina. Nella quarta parte, concludo sottolineando i più comuni dilemmi etici legati all'intelligenza (...) artificiale, come il facilitare il ricorso all'opzione militare nella risoluzione delle controversie internazionali. (shrink)

If I were asked to put forward an ethical principle which I considered to be especially certain, it would be that no one can be responsible, in the properly ethical sense, for the conduct of another. Responsibility belongs essentially to the individual. The implications of this principle are much more far-reaching than is evident at first, and reflection upon them may lead many to withdraw the assent which they might otherwise be very ready to accord to this view of responsibility. (...) But if the difficulties do appear to be insurmountable, and that, very certainly, does not seem to me to be the case, then the proper procedure will be, not to revert to the barbarous notion of collective or group responsibility, but to give up altogether the view that we are accountable in any distinctively moral sense. (shrink)

This article explores the Foucauldian analysis of the linkage between temporality and politics, addressing mainly two loci of Foucault’s production: the assessment of the post-WWII ordoliberal experience in The Birth of Biopoliticsand the Iran reportage for “Corriere Della Sera”. The article emphasizes the relevance of Foucault’s assessment of ordoliberal Germany for contemporary studies on neoliberalism and inscribes Foucault in a wider tradition of thought on the relevance of history and temporality for the comprehension of political dynamics. In TBoB, Foucault offered (...) a prescient analysis of neoliberal temporality and its de-politicizing effects. In his view, ordoliberal theorists and politicians sought to ground political legitimacy in the economy itself, giving birth to a political-economic “double circuit” which did away with history and made political consensus “permanent” and automatic. The connection between neoliberalism, the re-structuring of state sovereignty, and temporality will be highlighted. Furthermore, by analyzingthe almost-coeval Iranian reportages and the eulogy for Clavel, the article further investigates Fou-cault’s reflection on the link between temporality, politics,and subjectivation processes. If the anal-ysis of ordoliberal temporality in TBoB describes a linkage between de-temporalization and de-politicization, the reportages will be highlighted as a possible “pars construens” –as a way to reinstate the possibility of political action through the appeal to different ways to experience tem-porality. The article concludes that Foucault’s sparse comments on temporality can be read as an attempt, albeit not fully developed, not only to envision the de-politicizing effects of marketization but also to envisage new, re-politicizing modes of experiencing temporality and history. (shrink)

Background: Recent literature on addiction and judgments about the characteristics of agents has focused on the implications of adopting a ‘brain disease’ versus ‘moral weakness’ model of addiction. Typically, such judgments have to do with what capacities an agent has (e.g., the ability to abstain from substance use). Much less work, however, has been conducted on the relationship between addiction and judgments about an agent’s identity, including whether or to what extent an individual is seen as the same person after (...) becoming addicted. Methods: We conducted a series of vignette-based experiments (total N = 3,620) to assess lay attitudes concerning addiction and identity persistence, systematically manipulating key characteristics of agents and their drug of addiction. Conclusions: In Study 1, we found that US participants judged an agent who became addicted to drugs as being closer to ‘a completely different person’ than ‘completely the same person’ as the agent who existed prior to the addiction. In Studies 2-6, we investigated the intuitive basis for this result, finding that lay judgments of altered identity as a consequence of drug use and addiction are driven primarily by perceived negative changes in the moral character of drug users, who are seen as having deviated from their good true selves. (shrink)

Aspetti filosofico-matematici dei celebri paradossi di Zenone di Elea.

A great achievement makes one’s life go better independently of its results, but what makes an achievement great? A simple answer is—its difficulty. I defend this view against recent, pressing objections by interpreting difficulty in terms of competitiveness. Difficulty is determined not by how hard the agent worked for the end but by how hard others would need to do in order to compete. Successfully reaching a goal is a valuable achievement because it is difficult, and it is difficult because (...) it is competitive. Hence, both virtuosic performances and lucky successes can be valuable achievements. (shrink)

Bozza di un articolo mai pubblicato. Originariamente pensato per la rivista Immoderati, non è più stato pubblicato a causa del passaggio della rivista al gruppo Liberi Oltre le Illusioni, oltre che alla cessazione della polemica che aveva motivato la stesura dell'articolo. Nella prima parte, analizzo il ruolo dell'omosessualità nella Lettera di Giuda, nel Levitico (per la quale si prevede la pena capitale) e nella Lettera ai Romani. Nella seconda, analizzo i giudizi dei Padri della Chiesa e alcune razionalizzazioni filosofiche della (...) condanna dell'omosessualità. Concludo che il canone Biblico di per sé non contiene alcuna condanna esplicita dell'omosessualità com'è oggi intesa, mentre tali condanne sono effettivamente presenti nella tradizione di pensiero recente. Ciò lascia comunque uno spazio di manovra che può consentire ai fedeli omosessuali di vivere con serenità la propria condizione nella Chiesa. (shrink)

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

The paper deals with the controversial issue of realism in Wittgenstein’s Tractatus. Most of the problems are grounded in the logical-linguistic foundation of important ontological notions given within the text (such as object, state of affairs, fact, etc.). This has led some scholars to think that there is no conception of the world in the Tractatus that is independent of language and that in his work Wittgenstein is simply engaged in a logical investigation of what it is essential for any (...) language to represent reality. Therefore, no conclusions about a transcendent world can be drawn from it. Here we argue that it is true that the author of the Tractatus is engaged in a logical investigation, conducted a priori and internal to language, on the conditions that are (or have to be) satisfied by any significant language. However, what such an investigation reveals, given one of these languages, is the necessity to presuppose a world made in a certain way and transcendent to the language that pretends to describe it. Two issues are considered to clarify the sense of the realism of the Tractatus — that of the existence of simple objects, and that of the truth of propositions — and a new interpretative schema for the text is advanced. (shrink)

In "La science et l’hypothèse" Henri Poincaré scrive: «Compito dello scienziato è ordinare; si fa la scienza con i fatti, come si fa una casa con le pietre; ma un cumulo di fatti non è una scienza, proprio come un mucchio di pietre non è una casa» . Oltre a richiamare qualcosa che a molti potrebbe persino apparire ovvio – cioè che la scienza non possa in alcun modo ridursi ad un mero agglomerato di fatti che il ricercatore registra in (...) ambito osservativo, ma richieda piuttosto un attento processo di elaborazione razionale sia in fase preventiva rispetto al contesto dell’esperienza, sia in fase di valutazione dei dati sperimentali raccolti – questa affermazione ha il merito di ricordarci qualcosa che spesso viene passato sotto silenzio, vale a dire il fatto che durante il nostro tentativo di comprendere il mondo si dia alla conoscenza una materia, un complesso di "oggetti", tale da risultare determinante nella costruzione e nella formulazione delle nostre teorie. Se questo è vero, si può quindi parlare di una materia, e di una forma da essa distinta, della conoscenza scientifica, sebbene con alcune precisazioni. Nel contributo si preciserà questa distinzione facendo riferimento alle assiomatizzazioni di alcune discipline scientifiche condotte nella prima metà del secolo scorso. (shrink)

In order to defend his controversial claim that observation is unaided perception, Bas van Fraassen, the originator of constructive empiricism, suggested that, for all we know, the images produced by a microscope could be in a situation analogous to that of the rainbows, which are ‘images of nothing’. He added that reflections in the water, rainbows, and the like are ‘public hallucinations’, but it is not clear whether this constitutes an ontological category apart or an empty set. In this paper (...) an argument will be put forward to the effect that rainbows can be thought of as events, that is, as part of a subcategory of entities that van Fraassen has always considered legitimate phenomena. I argue that rainbows are actually not images in the relevant (representational) sense and that there is no need to ontologically inflate the category of entities in order to account for them, which would run counter to the empiricist principle of parsimony. (shrink)

An exploration of the nexus between ecology, evolutionary biology and molecular biology, via the concept of phenotypic plasticity.

The practice of Emergency Management in Michigan raises anew the question of whose knowledge matters to whom and for what reasons, against the background of what projects, challenges, and systemic imperatives. In this paper, I offer a historical overview of state intervention laws across the United States, focusing specifically on Michigan’s Emergency Manager laws. I draw on recent analyses of these laws to develop an account of a phenomenon that I call epistemic redlining, which, I suggest, is a form of (...) group-based credibility discounting not readily countenanced by existing, ‘culprit-based’ accounts of epistemic injustice. I argue that epistemic redlining plays a crucial role in ongoing projects of racialized subordination and dispossession in Michigan, and that such discounting tends to have structural causes that can be difficult to identify and uproot. Contrary to the general thrust of recent work on the topic, I argue that epistemic redlining ought to be understood as a form of epistemic injustice. (shrink)

Discutindo acerca das centenas de detecções de planetas extrassolares, que supostamente aconteceram desde 1989 e que ele considera (incorretamente) como instâncias de observações, Peter Kosso disse, justamente, que segundo os parâmetros de Bas van Fraassen esses objetos celestes seriam observáveis. Ora, tais astros poderiam sem dúvida ser observados diretamente (sem a necessidade de instrumentos), nas condições apropriadas. Mas, acrescenta Kosso, “esse tipo de epistemologia externalista, que permite que a justificação se baseie em informação que não temos a disposição (nós não (...) estamos em condição de ver planetas extrassolares a olho nu [atualmente]), não ajuda a decidir quais particulares afirmações científicas garantem a crença” (Kosso 2006, 225, nota 1). Van Fraassen provavelmente incorre em uma petição de princípio não muito diferente daquelas que ele muitas vezes desmascarou em textos de autores realistas, quando apela para o fato de o objeto detectado ser observável, para atribuir o estatuto de ‘observação’ a uma certa detecção. O ponto é, mais uma vez, entender o que vale como observação, particularmente quando isso envolve o uso de algum instrumento. Endossar aquilo que Otávio Bueno chama de ‘padrão internalista’ parece garantir solidez à qualificação de determinadas ações como observações. Uma das principais consequências dessa adoção é que tal critério, não operando nenhuma distinção relevante entre detecções ‘diretas’ e detecções mediadas por instrumentos, permite que a linha que separa observáveis e inobserváveis seja traçada de maneira diferente de como van Fraassen acredita que deveria ser, abarcando, entre os observáveis, mais (tipos de) entidades do que esse parece estar disposto a admitir. (shrink)

This paper explains how to use a new software tool for argument diagramming available free on the Internet, showing especially how it can be used in the classroom to enhance critical thinking in philosophy. The user loads a text file containing an argument into a box on the computer interface, and then creates an argument diagram by dragging lines from one node to another. A key feature is the support for argumentation schemes, common patterns of defeasible reasoning historically know as (...) topics . Several examples are presented, as well as the results of an experiment in using the system with students in a university classroom. (shrink)

Background Retraction is a mechanism for alerting readers to unreliable material and other problems in the published scientific and scholarly record. Retracted publications generally remain visible and searchable, but the intention of retraction is to mark them as “removed” from the citable record of scholarship. However, in practice, some retracted articles continue to be treated by researchers and the public as valid content as they are often unaware of the retraction. Research over the past decade has identified a number of (...) factors contributing to the unintentional spread of retracted research. The goal of the Reducing the Inadvertent Spread of Retracted Science: Shaping a Research and Implementation Agenda (RISRS) project was to develop an actionable agenda for reducing the inadvertent spread of retracted science. This included identifying how retraction status could be more thoroughly disseminated, and determining what actions are feasible and relevant for particular stakeholders who play a role in the distribution of knowledge. -/- Methods These recommendations were developed as part of a year-long process that included a scoping review of empirical literature and successive rounds of stakeholder consultation, culminating in a three-part online workshop that brought together a diverse body of 65 stakeholders in October–November 2020 to engage in collaborative problem solving and dialogue. Stakeholders held roles such as publishers, editors, researchers, librarians, standards developers, funding program officers, and technologists and worked for institutions such as universities, governmental agencies, funding organizations, publishing houses, libraries, standards organizations, and technology providers. Workshop discussions were seeded by materials derived from stakeholder interviews (N = 47) and short original discussion pieces contributed by stakeholders. The online workshop resulted in a set of recommendations to address the complexities of retracted research throughout the scholarly communications ecosystem. -/- Results The RISRS recommendations are: (1) Develop a systematic cross-industry approach to ensure the public availability of consistent, standardized, interoperable, and timely information about retractions; (2) Recommend a taxonomy of retraction categories/classifications and corresponding retraction metadata that can be adopted by all stakeholders; (3) Develop best practices for coordinating the retraction process to enable timely, fair, unbiased outcomes; and (4) Educate stakeholders about pre- and post-publication stewardship, including retraction and correction of the scholarly record. -/- Conclusions Our stakeholder engagement study led to 4 recommendations to address inadvertent citation of retracted research, and formation of a working group to develop the Communication of Retractions, Removals, and Expressions of Concern (CORREC) Recommended Practice. Further work will be needed to determine how well retractions are currently documented, how retraction of code and datasets impacts related publications, and to identify if retraction metadata (fails to) propagate. Outcomes of all this work should lead to ensuring retracted papers are never cited without awareness of the retraction, and that, in public fora outside of science, retracted papers are not treated as valid scientific outputs. (shrink)

NOTA PRELIMINAR: o texto a seguir representa a versão ampliada (e corrigida conforme as indicações dos pareceristas) do artigo homônimo, publicado na revista Archai em 2014. Por algum problema técnico, acabou sendo publicada, na época, a primeira versão, sem as melhorias sugeridas pelos avaliadores. Eis, então, a versão ‘definitiva’ do artigo “Zenão e a impossibilidade da analogia”: -/- A reductio ad absurdum foi elevada por Zenão de Eléia a único método que permitiria vislumbrar a verdadeira realidade, invisível tanto aos sentidos (...) quanto à maneira de pensar comum. Mostrando uma certa continuidade com os filósofos anteriores, não só na busca de um procedimento para que a especulação pudesse avançar, como também na mesma rota de afastamento daquilo que é mais próximo, conhecido e particular (visível) em direção àquilo que é menos conhecido, distante e universal (invisível), para dizê-lo em termos aristotélicos, Zenão utilizou-se de argumentos aporéticos como único caminho possível para poder entrever o ‘reino do Ser’. Esse, com efeito, é invisível não somente aos nossos sentidos, como também ao nosso raciocínio ordinário. Eis que somente a ‘via do não-ser’, a única que poderia ser trilhada após Parménides, como diz Wolff, nos permite ter uma ideia, por quanto vaga, daquilo que é ‘verdadeiramente invisível’. Tão invisível ao ponto de ser inalcançável até mesmo pelo pensamento. (shrink)

In this issue, Ahmadi1 reports on the practice of hymenoplasty—a surgical intervention meant to restore a presumed physical marker of virginity prior to a woman's marriage. As Mehri and Sills2 have stated, these women ‘want to ensure that blood is spilled on their wedding night sheets.’ Although Ahmadi's research was carried out in Iran specifically, this surgery is becoming increasingly popular in a number of Western countries as well, especially among Muslim populations.3 What are the ethics of hymen restoration?Consider the (...) role of the physician. Two of the doctors interviewed by Ahmadi reported being in ‘a perpetual state of guilt because of the surgery's inherent aim at deceiving the groom’ and noted their ‘personal conflict’ at being involved in this deception. Yet: "None of the doctors believed that the surgery was unethical, arguing that the girl could be ‘abused’ and ‘can even die’ if she is discovered not … ". (shrink)

In this paper I engage interdisciplinary conversation on inaction as the dominant response to climate change, and develop an analysis of the specific phenomenon of complacency through a critical-feminist lens. I suggest that Chris Cuomo's discussion of the “insufficiency” problem and Susan Sherwin's call for a “public ethics” jointly point toward particularly promising harm-reduction strategies. I draw upon and extend their work by arguing that extant philosophical accounts of complacency are inadequate to the task of sorting out what it means (...) to be complacent on climate change. I offer a sketch for an alternative account, which I take to be a start in the direction of mapping out a diverse array of “motivational vices” that need to be named, grappled with, and remedied. (shrink)

In this paper, I want to focus not on the problems that I believe may threaten Kant’s account of the highest good, but instead on those that I believe threaten the majority of the interpretive reconstructions attempted by commentators and thus prevent the emergence of a consensus in the near future. My goal is to set forth exactly four problems to which I believe any successful interpretation or reconstruction of Kant’s account of the highest good will have to provide substantive (...) solutions and, in doing so, either break new theoretical ground or at least provide a more comprehensive methodology for sorting through the texts. (shrink)

Bozza di articolo non publicato. Il motivo è che era stato pensato nel contesto della polemica di Agamben e Cacciari sul green pass, ma la mia rivista di fiducia non riusciva a pubblicarlo in tempi sufficientemente brevi. Nel frattempo, tale articolo è stato superato dal mio "Il divario analitico-continentale", pubblicato su l'Indiscreto. Questa bozza fa una panoramica sul fenomeno del pragmatismo italiano (Vailati, Calderoni, Papini, Prezzolini…), sottolinea le somiglianze tra pragmatismo e filosofia analitica, e i contrasti con la filosofia continentale. (...) Si fa il paragone tra la polemica di Cacciari-Agamben e il Sokal Affair. (shrink)

In a pair of recent articles, Brian Leftow and Eleonore Stump offer independent, although similar, accounts of the metaphysics of the Incarnation. Both believe that their Aquinas-inspired theories can offer solutions to the kind of Leibniz’s Law problems that can seem to threaten the logical possibility of this traditional Christian doctrine. In this paper, I’ll have a look at their compositional account of the nature of God incarnate. In the end, I believe their position can be seen to have unacceptable (...) philosophical and theological implications, and that is it inadequate to solve the Leibniz’s law problems that motivate it in the first place. (shrink)