This book consolidates emerging research on Aristotle's science and ethics in order to explore the extent to which the concepts, methods, and practices he developed for scientific inquiry and explanation are used to investigate moral phenomena. Each chapter shows, in a different way, that Aristotle's ethics is much more like a science than it is typically represented. The upshot of this is twofold. First, uncovering the links between Aristotle's science and ethics promises to open up new and innovative directions for (...) research into his moral philosophy. Second, showing why Aristotle thinks ethics can never be fully assimilated to the model of science will help shed new light on his views about the limits of science. The volume thus promises to make a significant contribution to our understanding of the epistemological, metaphysical, and psychological foundations of Aristotle's ethics. (shrink)

This essay has two aims. The first is to correct an increasingly popular way of misunderstanding Belot's Orgulity Argument. The Orgulity Argument charges Bayesianism with defect as a normative epistemology. For concreteness, our argument focuses on Cisewski et al.'s recent rejoinder to Belot. The conditions that underwrite their version of the argument are too strong and Belot does not endorse them on our reading. A more compelling version of the Orgulity Argument than Cisewski et al. present is available, however---a point (...) that we make by drawing an analogy with de Finetti's argument against mandating countable additivity. Having presented the best version of the Orgulity Argument, our second aim is to develop a reply to it. We extend Elga's idea of appealing to finitely additive probability to show that the challenge posed by the Orgulity Argument can be met. (shrink)

Gadamer's Truth and Method: A Polyphonic Commentary offers a fresh look at Gadamer's magnum opus, Truth and Method, which was first published in German in 1960, translated into English in 1975, and is widely recognized as a ground-breaking text of philosophical hermeneutics. The volume features essays from fourteen scholars--both established and rising stars--each of which cover a portion of Truth and Method following the order of the text itself. The result is a robust, historically and thematically rich polyphonic reading of (...) the text as a whole, valuable both for scholarship and teaching. (shrink)

A standard way to challenge convergence-based accounts of inductive success is to claim that they are too weak to constrain inductive inferences in the short run. We respond to such a challenge by answering some questions raised by Juhl (1994). When it comes to predicting limiting relative frequencies in the framework of Reichenbach, we show that speed-optimal convergence—a long-run success condition—induces dynamic coherence in the short run.

Idiosyncratic responses as more strictly personal responses to fiction film that vary across individual spectators. In philosophy of film, idiosyncratic responses are often deemed inappropriate, unwarranted and unintended by the film. One type of idiosyncratic response is when empathy with a character triggers the spectator to reflect on his own real life issues. Self-reflection can be triggered by egoistic drift, where the spectator starts imagining himself in the character’s shoes, by re-experiencing memories, or by unfamiliar experiences that draw the spectator’s (...) attention. Film may facilitate self-reflection by slowing down narrative development and making the narrative indeterminate. Such scenes make idiosyncratic responses, such as self-reflection, appropriate and intended. Fiction film is a safe context for the spectator to reflect on personal issues, as it also affords him with distancing techniques if the reflection becomes too painful or unwanted. The fictional context further encourages self-reflection in response to empathy, as the spectator is relieved from real life moral obligations to help the other. (shrink)

Like human existence itself, our enduring legacies—whether poetic, ethical, political, or philosophical—continually unfold and require recurrent communal engagement and (re)enactment. In other words, an ongoing performance of significant works must occur, and this task requires the collective human activity of re-membering or gathering-together-again. In the Symposium, Diotima provides an account of human pursuits of immortality through the creation of artifacts, including laws, poems, and philosophical discourses that resonates with Gadamer’s account of our engagement with artworks and texts. This essay explores (...) common places among Gadamer and Plato; however, it does so through the complex character of Diotima the philosopher-priestess. Diotima’s teaching on the processive character of human existence and her understanding of knowledge as dynamic has been largely ignored. Given Gadamer’s historically oriented philosophical hermeneutics, not to mention his creative and critical engagement with Platonic themes such as beauty, recollection, and art, Diotima makes for an especially fruitful dialogue partner. (shrink)

This essay is concerned with Gadamer’s reflections on solidarity and practice as found in several of his later writings. While Gadamer offers a robust explanation of practice, practical reason, and how both are operative in solidarities, his investigations of solidarity are in no way systematic. He does, however, distinguish two aspects of solidarity, viz. what one might call “natural solidarity” and “avowed solidarity”. In contrast to natural solidarities, avowed solidarities require an intentional decision and commitment to act with others for (...) a common cause. Since Gadamer’s writings on solidarity are more sketches than detailed treatises, we will bring his work into dialogue with feminist and political philosopher Sally Scholz. Scholz has devoted significant research to the concept of political solidarity. Like Gadamer, Scholz too is concerned with how we engage natural others and how our present practices harm and exploit them. By bringing Scholz’s and Gadamer’s work into dialogue, we gain a better understanding of different facets and types of solidarity, how they interrelate and influence one other, and how their interrelations might help to effect positive social and political changes for all who inhabit this world. (shrink)

Several prominent contemporary philosophers, including Jürgen Habermas, John Caputo, and Robert Bernasconi, have at times painted a somewhat negative picture of Gadamer as not only an uncritical traditionalist, but also as one whose philosophical project fails to appreciate difference. Against such claims, I argue that Gadamer’s reflections on art exhibit a genuine appreciation for alterity not unrelated to his hermeneutical approach to the other. Thus, by bringing Gadamer’s reflections on our experience of art into conversation with key aspects of his (...) philosophical hermeneutics, we are able to better assess the viability of Gadamer’s contributions to contemporary discussions of difference and alterity. -/- Sections two through six focus on key concepts in Gadamer’s account of art’s dynamic ontology and our experience of art. Such concepts include the play structure of art, hermeneutic identity, tarrying with a work, and contemporaneity. The opening sections provide not only a discussion of these central themes, but they also (1) draw attention to the various ways in which difference and otherness are integral to Gadamer’s account, and (2) utilize relevant musical examples that prepare the reader for a more focused discussion of a Gadamerian approach to free jazz in section seven. By highlighting how Gadamer’s understanding of art possesses a dialogical play structure, is characterized by identity and difference, requires actively engaged spectators and auditors, and is amenable to what many criticize as an unintelligible musical expression, viz. free jazz, Gadamer’s project is shown as other-affirming and open to ambiguity and dynamism. That is, the essential structures and concepts characterizing Gadamer’s reflections on art are likewise central to his overall hermeneutical project, and hence are not rightly described as un-attuned to difference or other-negating. Rather, Gadamer’s philosophical project upholds difference, since it requires a dialogical interplay between self and other that creates the possibility for a transformative experience. (shrink)

In seeking an answer to the question of what it means for a theory to be fundamental, it is enlightening to ask why the current best theories of physics are not generally believed to be fundamental. This reveals a set of conditions that a theory of physics must satisfy in order to be considered fundamental. Physics aspires to describe ever deeper levels of reality, which may be without end. Ultimately, at any stage we may not be able to tell whether (...) we've reached rock bottom, or even if there is a base level – nevertheless, I draft a checklist to help us identify when to stop digging, in the case where we may have reached a candidate for a final theory. Given that the list is – according to (current) mainstream belief in high-energy physics – complete, and each criterion well-motivated, I argue that a physical theory that satisfies all the criteria can be assumed to be fundamental in the absence of evidence to the contrary (i.e., I argue that the necessary conditions are jointly sufficient for a claim of fundamentality in physics). (shrink)

Singularities in general relativity and quantum field theory are often taken not only to motivate the search for a more-fundamental theory (quantum gravity, QG), but also to characterise this new theory and shape expectations of what it is to achieve. Here, we first evaluate how particular types of singularities may suggest an incompleteness of current theories. We then classify four different 'attitudes' towards singularities in the search for QG, and show, through examples in the physics literature, that these lead to (...) different scenarios for the new theory. Two of the attitudes prompt singularity resolution, but only one suggests the need for a theory of QG. Rather than evaluate the different attitudes, we close with some suggestions of factors that influence the choice between them. (shrink)

Driven neither by experiment nor anomalous observation, physicists are seeking a new fundamental theory of gravity---motivated, guided, and constrained by purely theoretical and philosophical concerns. Here, I briefly consider two of these issues: dreams of unification, and the resolution of spacetime singularities.

Feelings of gratitude toward the natural environment are problematic because gratitude seems to be an appropriate response to someone’s intentional decision to benefit us, and ecosystems that sustain human life do not choose to do so. In accordance with one defense of the rationality and appropriateness of gratitude toward nature, intentional action can be regarded as not being a necessary condition for feelings of gratitude. Instead, gratitude toward an entity can be considered both rational and appropriate when (1) that entity (...) is the source of a valuable and unearned benefit and (2) the benefit did not result from some accidental and/or regrettable feature of that entity’s character. According to this analysis, we can provide a rational ground for gratitude to particular ecosystems by citing the valuable and unearned benefits that we receive from those systems and by demonstrating that these benefits result from elements within the ecosystems that are neither regrettable nor accidental. (shrink)

Principles are central to physical reasoning, particularly in the search for a theory of quantum gravity, where novel empirical data are lacking. One principle widely adopted in the search for QG is ultraviolet completion: the idea that a theory should hold up to all possible high energies. We argue— contra standard scientific practice—that UV-completion is poorly motivated as a guiding principle in theory-construction, and cannot be used as a criterion of theory-justification in the search for QG. For this, we explore (...) the reasons for expecting, or desiring, a UV-complete theory, as well as analyse how UV-completion is used, and how it should be used, in various specific approaches to QG. 1Introduction 1.1Principles in theory development and evaluation 2Primer on UV-Completion, Renormalizability, and All That 2.1Renormalizability and UV-completion 2.2Other forms of UV-completion 3Why Should QG Be UV-Complete? 3.1UV-completion and fundamentality 3.2UV-completion and minimal length 4UV-Completion in Different Approaches to QG 4.1String theory 4.2Asymptotic safety 4.3Causal dynamical triangulation 4.4Higher derivative approaches 4.5Supergravity 4.6Causal set theory 4.7Canonical QG 4.8Loop quantum gravity 4.9Approaches based on alternative gravitational theories 4.10Emergent gravity approaches 5UV-Completion as a Guiding Principle in QG 6Conclusion. (shrink)

Relationships between current theories, and relationships between current theories and the sought theory of quantum gravity (QG), play an essential role in motivating the need for QG, aiding the search for QG, and defining what would count as QG. Correspondence is the broad class of inter-theory relationships intended to demonstrate the necessary compatibility of two theories whose domains of validity overlap, in the overlap regions. The variety of roles that correspondence plays in the search for QG are illustrated, using examples (...) from specific QG approaches. Reduction is argued to be a special case of correspondence, and to form part of the definition of QG. Finally, the appropriate account of emergence in the context of QG is presented, and compared to conceptions of emergence in the broader philosophy literature. It is argued that, while emergence is likely to hold between QG and general relativity, emergence is not part of the definition of QG, and nor can it serve usefully in the development and justification of the new theory. (shrink)

In a recent paper, Pettigrew reports a generalization of the celebrated accuracy-dominance theorem due to Predd et al., but Pettigrew’s proof is incorrect. I will explain the mistakes and provide a correct proof.

We introduce a fairness criterion that we call Spanning. Spanning i) is implied by Calibration, ii) retains interesting properties of Calibration that some other ways of relaxing that criterion do not, and iii) unlike Calibration and other prominent ways of weakening it, is consistent with Equalized Odds outside of trivial cases.

In times of crisis, when current theories are revealed as inadequate to task, and new physics is thought to be required—physics turns to re-evaluate its principles, and to seek new ones. This paper explores the various types, and roles of principles that feature in the problem of quantum gravity as a current crisis in physics. I illustrate the diversity of the principles being appealed to, and show that principles serve in a variety of roles in all stages of the crisis, (...) including in motivating the need for a new theory, and defining what this theory should be like. In particular, I consider: the generalised correspondence principle, UV-completion, background independence, and the holographic principle. I also explore how the current crisis fits with Friedman’s view on the roles of principles in revolutionary theory-change, finding that while many key aspects of this view are not represented in quantum gravity, the view could potentially offer a useful diagnostic, and prescriptive strategy. This paper is intended to be relatively non-technical, and to bring some of the philosophical issues from the search for quantum gravity to a more general philosophical audience interested in the roles of principles in scientific theory-change. (shrink)

This article explores and defends the idea that the etiquette conventions governing dinner parties, whether formal or informal, have moral significance. Their significance derives from the way that they foster and facilitate shared moral aims. I draw on literary and philosophical sources to make this claim, beginning with Isak Dineson's short story, Babette's Feast. I employ the concept of ritual from Confucius and Xunzi, as well as Immanuel Kant's detailed discussion of dinner parties in the Anthropology. Kant's account in particular (...) helps illuminate how properly conducted dinners can enhance our understanding and promote moral community among the people who attend. I conclude that dinner parties play an important role in the moral life, and that the etiquette conventions governing them derive their binding force from their contribution to that role. (shrink)

The best accuracy arguments for probabilism apply only to credence functions with finite domains, that is, credence functions that assign credence to at most finitely many propositions. This is a significant limitation. It reveals that the support for the accuracy-first program in epistemology is a lot weaker than it seems at first glance, and it means that accuracy arguments cannot yet accomplish everything that their competitors, the pragmatic (Dutch book) arguments, can. In this paper, I investigate the extent to which (...) this limitation can be overcome. Building on the best arguments in finite domains, I present two accuracy arguments for probabilism that are perfectly general—they apply to credence functions with arbitrary domains. I then discuss how the arguments’ premises can be challenged. We will see that it is particularly difficult to characterize admissible accuracy measures in infinite domains. (shrink)

In this paper I describe and defend an account of virtuous motivation that differs from what we might call ordinary moral motivation. It is possible to be morally motivated without being virtuously motivated. In the first half of the essay, I explore different senses of moral motivation and the philosophical puzzles and problems it poses. In the second half, I give an account of virtuous motivation that, unlike ordinary moral motivation, requires the motivational structure characteristic of a fully virtuous person. (...) I draw on Aristotle's account of virtuous action to argue that a fully virtuous agent's judgment reflects a robust form of moral knowledge about what features of an action render it virtuous and hence, choiceworthy. Virtuously motivated actions are chosen in light of those features and are accompanied by the affective state appropriate to the overall moral landscape in which the judgment is made. (shrink)

Typically, a less fundamental theory, or structure, emerging from a more fundamental one is an example of synchronic emergence. A model emerging from a prior model upon which it nevertheless depends is an example of diachronic emergence. The case of spacetime emergent from quantum gravity and quantum cosmology challenges these two conceptions of emergence. Here, I propose two more-general conceptions of emergence, analogous to the synchronic and diachronic ones, but which are potentially applicable to the case of emergent spacetime: an (...) inter-level, hierarchical conception, and an intra-level, ‘flat’ conception. I then explore whether, and how, these ideas may be applicable in the case of several putative examples of relativistic spacetime emergent from the non-spatiotemporal structures described by different approaches to quantum gravity, and of spacetime emergent from a non-spatiotemporal ‘big bang’ state according to different examples of quantum cosmology. (shrink)

Several approaches to developing a theory of quantum gravity suggest that spacetime—as described by general relativity—is not fundamental. Instead, spacetime is supposed to be explained by reference to the relations between more fundamental entities, analogous to `atoms' of spacetime, which themselves are not (fully) spatiotemporal. Such a case may be understood as emergence of \textit{content}: a `hierarchical' case of emergence, where spacetime emerges at a `higher', or less-fundamental, level than its `lower-level' non-spatiotempral basis. But quantum gravity cosmology also presents us (...) with the possibility of emergence of \textit{context}: where spacetime emerges from some `prior' non-spatiotemporal state (replacing the Big Bang), due to particular conditions in the early universe. I present a general conception of emergence which is plausibly able to accommodate both pictures. This is a positive conception that does not rely on a failure of reduction or explanation in any sense (indeed, reduction is a necessary feature of quantum gravity, and is useful in understanding emergence in this case). I also consider the possibility that the distinction between content- and context- based explanations is blurred, or usefully `collapsed', in the case of spacetime emergence. (shrink)

Epistemic decision theory produces arguments with both normative and mathematical premises. I begin by arguing that philosophers should care about whether the mathematical premises (1) are true, (2) are strong, and (3) admit simple proofs. I then discuss a theorem that Briggs and Pettigrew (2020) use as a premise in a novel accuracy-dominance argument for conditionalization. I argue that the theorem and its proof can be improved in a number of ways. First, I present a counterexample that shows that one (...) of the theorem’s claims is false. As a result of this, Briggs and Pettigrew’s argument for conditionalization is unsound. I go on to explore how a sound accuracy-dominance argument for conditionalization might be recovered. In the course of doing this, I prove two new theorems that correct and strengthen the result reported by Briggs and Pettigrew. I show how my results can be combined with various normative premises to produce sound arguments for conditionalization. I also show that my results can be used to support normative conclusions that are stronger than the one that Briggs and Pettigrew’s argument supports. Finally, I show that Briggs and Pettigrew’s proofs can be simplified considerably. (shrink)

An elderly patient in a care home only wants human nurses to provide her care – not robots. If she selected her carers based on skin colour, it would be seen as racist and morally objectionable, but is choosing a human nurse instead of a robot also morally objectionable and speciesist? A plausible response is that it is not, because humans provide a better standard of care than robots do, making such a choice justifiable. In this paper, I show why (...) this response is incorrect, because robots can theoretically care as well as human nurses can. I differentiate between practical caring and emotional caring, and I argue that robots can match the standard of practical care given by human nurses, and they can simulate emotional care. There is growing evidence that people respond positively to robotic creatures and carebots, and AI software is apt to emotionally support patients in spite of the machine’s own lack of emotions. I make the case that the appearance of emotional care is sufficient, and need not be linked to emotional states within the robot. After all, human nurses undoubtedly ‘fake’ emotional care and compassion sometimes, yet their patients still feel adequately cared for. I show that it is a mistake to claim that ‘the human touch’ is in itself a contributor to a higher standard of care; ‘the robotic touch’ will suffice. Nevertheless, it is not speciesist to favour human nurses over carebots, because carebots do not suffer as the result of such a choice. (shrink)

I suspect the answer to the question in the title of this paper is no. But the scope of my paper will be considerably more limited: I will be concerned with whether certain types of considerations that are commonly cited in favor of dynamic semantics do in fact push us towards a dynamic semantics. Ultimately, I will argue that the evidence points to a dynamics of discourse that is best treated pragmatically, rather than as part of the semantics.

For two ideally rational agents, does learning a finite amount of shared evidence necessitate agreement? No. But does it at least guard against belief polarization, the case in which their opinions get further apart? No. OK, but are rational agents guaranteed to avoid polarization if they have access to an infinite, increasing stream of shared evidence? No.

I think that there is an awful lot wrong with the exclusion problem. So, it seems, does just about everybody else. But of course everyone disagrees about exactly _what_ is wrong with it, and I think there is more to be said about that. So I propose to say a few more words about why the exclusion problem is not really a problem after all—at least, not for the nonreductive physicalist. The genuine _dualist_ is still in trouble. Indeed, one of (...) my main points will be that the nonreductive physicalist is in a rather different position vis à vis the exclusion problem than the dualist is. Properly understanding nonreductive physicalism—and clearly recognizing that it is, after all, a form of _physicalism_—goes a long way toward solving the exclusion problem. (shrink)

According to Margaret Cavendish the entire natural world is essentially rational such that everything thinks in some way or another. In this paper, I examine why Cavendish would believe that the natural world is ubiquitously rational, arguing against the usual account, which holds that she does so in order to account for the orderly production of very complex phenomena (e.g. living beings) given the limits of the mechanical philosophy. Rather, I argue, she attributes ubiquitous rationality to the natural world in (...) order to ground a theory of the ubiquitous freedom of nature, which in turn accounts for both the world's orderly and disorderly behavior. (shrink)

Relational egalitarianism is a theory of justice according to which people must relate as equals. In this article, we develop relational sufficientarianism – a view of justice according to which people must relate as sufficients. We distinguish between three versions of this ideal, one that is incompatible with relational egalitarianism and two that are not. Building on this, we argue that relational theorists have good reason to support a pluralist view that is both egalitarian and sufficientarian.

The moral problem, as articulated by Smith, arises out of the attempt to introduce the experimental method of reasoning into moral subjects, developed by Hume. This paper returns to Locke’s earlier attempt to provide an empirically adequate account of morality and the debate his attempt generated. It argues that the seeds of a more adequate, naturalistic account of the metaphysics and epistemology of morals than that developed by either Locke or Hume can already be found in aspects of Locke’s Essay (...) and in the defence of his views published by Catharine Trotter Cockburn. Locke and Cockburn find a natural, intrinsically moral, human disposition in our tendency to judge the moral good or evil of persons or actions in the light of their conformity with a moral law. It is constitutive of our nature as social beings that we are endowed ‘with a moral sense or conscience, that approves of virtuous actions, and disapproves the contrary.’ Moral laws are those prohibitions and obligations that benefit others and society as a whole. Thus, the question of natural, moral motivation is seen to be independent of the question of the objective grounds of moral truth. In virtue of our nature as social beings we are motivated to do what is approved of by other members of our society. Whether what is approved of by a society genuinely fosters the welfare of its members is an independent, a posteriori question that can only be answered through reasoned, empirically informed debate. (shrink)

The numerous and diverse roles of theory reduction in science have been insufficiently explored in the philosophy literature on reduction. Part of the reason for this has been a lack of attention paid to reduction2 (successional reduction)---although I here argue that this sense of reduction is closer to reduction1 (explanatory reduction) than is commonly recognised, and I use an account of reduction that is neutral between the two. This paper draws attention to the utility---and incredible versatility---of theory reduction. A non-exhaustive (...) list of various applications of reduction in science is presented, some of which are drawn from a particular case-study, being the current search for a new theory of fundamental physics. This case-study is especially interesting because it employs both senses of reduction at once, and because of the huge weight being put on reduction by the different research groups involved; additionally, it presents some unique uses for reduction---revealing, I argue, the fact that reduction can be of specialised and unexpected service in particular scientific cases. The paper makes two other general findings: that the functions of reduction that are typically assumed to characterise the different forms of the relation may instead be understood as secondary consequences of some other roles; and that most of the roles that reduction plays in science can actually also be fulfilled by a weaker relation than (the typical understanding of) reduction. (shrink)

Dissertation Prospectus. Exploring the limits of New Mechanism as a general theory of scientific explanation, limiting its scope and proposing constraints.

Frantz Fanon offers a lucid account of his entrance into the white world where the weightiness of the ‘white gaze’ nearly crushed him. In chapter five of Black Skins, White Masks, he develops his historico-racial and epidermal racial schemata as correctives to Merleau-Ponty’s overly inclusive corporeal schema. Experientially aware of the reality of socially constructed (racialized) subjectivities, Fanon uses his schemata to explain the creation, maintenance, and eventual rigidification of white-scripted ‘blackness’. Through a re-telling of his own experiences of racism, (...) Fanon is able to show how a black person in a racialized context eventually internalizes the ‘white gaze’. In this essay I bring Fanon’s insights into conversation with Foucault’s discussion of panoptic surveillance. Although the internalization of the white narrative creates a situation in which external constraints are no longer needed, Fanon highlights both the historical contingency of ‘blackness’ and the ways in which the oppressed can re-narrate their subjectivities. Lastly, I discuss Fanon’s historically attuned ‘new humanism’, once again engaging Fanon and Foucault as dialogue partners. (shrink)

A comprehensive understanding of the ethics of the COVID-19 pandemic priorities must be sensitive to the influence of social inequality. We distinguish between ex-ante and ex-post relevance of social inequality for COVID-19 disadvantage. Ex-ante relevance refers to the distribution of risks of exposure. Ex-post relevance refers to the effect of inequality on how patients respond to infection. In the case of COVID-19, both ex-ante and ex-post effects suggest a distribution which is sensitive to the prevalence social inequality. On this basis, (...) we provide a generic fairness argument for the claim that welfare states ought to favour a healthcare priority scheme that gives particular weight to protecting the socially disadvantaged. (shrink)

Common sense tells us that in certain circumstances, helping someone is morally obligatory. That intuition appears incompatible with Kant's account of beneficence as a wide imperfect duty, and its implication that agents may exercise latitude over which beneficent actions to perform. In this paper, I offer a resolution to the problem from which it follows that some opportunities to help admit latitude and others do not. I argue that beneficence has two components: the familiar wide duty to help others achieve (...) their ends and a narrow duty to avoid indifference to others as end-setters. Although we are not always required to help, we are always required not to be indifferent. When helping someone is the only way not to be indifferent to a person, helping him/her is obligatory. My account avoids certain difficulties with other proposed solutions and can also address an important concern about proximity. (shrink)

According to luck egalitarianism, it is unjust if some are worse off than others through no fault or choice of their own. The most common criticism of luck egalitarianism is the ‘harshness objection’, which states that luck egalitarianism allows for too harsh consequences, as it fails to provide justification for why those responsible for their bad fate can be entitled to society's assistance. It has largely gone unnoticed that the harshness objection is open to a number of very different interpretations. (...) We present four different interpretations of the harshness objection in which the problem pertains to counterintuitive implications, badness of outcome, disproportionality, or inconsistency, respectively. We analyse and discuss appropriate luck egalitarian replies. Disentangling these different versions clarifies what is at the heart of this dispute and reveals the point of the harshness objection. We conclude that only the inconsistency version involves a durable problem for luck egalitarianism. (shrink)

Recent impossibility theorems for fair risk assessment extend to the domain of epistemic justice. We translate the relevant model, demonstrating that the problems of fair risk assessment and just credibility assessment are structurally the same. We motivate the fairness criteria involved in the theorems as also being appropriate in the setting of testimonial justice. Any account of testimonial justice that implies the fairness/justice criteria must be abandoned, on pain of triviality.

While there are some empirical problems that could suggest the need for a theory of quantum gravity, most of these are not standardly taken as motivations for seeking a new theory. Rather, the quest for a theory of quantum gravity has been primarily motivated, guided, and constrained by philosophical and theoretical concerns. A critical examination of these can help us better understand what the theory is supposed to achieve—and, further, what it should be expected to achieve. On the other hand, (...) there are various approaches towards finding a theory of quantum gravity, with different aims, methods, and starting-points—they disagree on what the theory is supposed to be like. A relevant question is then: what is it that unites these approaches such that we classify them as approaches to quantum gravity? This paper argues that a basic characterisation of the theory can be given in terms of the minimal shared motivation across these different approaches, and that this itself can be seen as motivated by various other problems that have been appealed to as reasons for seeking a theory of quantum gravity. (shrink)

Between 1653 and 1655 Margaret Cavendish makes a radical transition in her theory of matter, rejecting her earlier atomism in favour of an infinitely-extended and infinitely-divisible material plenum, with matter being ubiquitously self-moving, sensing, and rational. It is unclear, however, if Cavendish can actually dispense of atomism. One of her arguments against atomism, for example, depends upon the created world being harmonious and orderly, a premise Cavendish herself repeatedly undermines by noting nature’s many disorders. I argue that her supposed difficulties (...) with atomism expose a deeper tension in her work between two fundamental metaphysical commitments each of which has substantial philosophical support: her monist theory of the material world (which maintains that there exists just one natural substance which is the single principal cause) and her occasional theory of causation (which requires multiple finite principal causes in nature -- causes that might be considered individual substances). Her monism undermines atomism while her theory of occasional cause seems to rest on a conception of nature that would be especially friendly to atomism. I argue further that we can solve this tension within a Cavendishian framework in such a way as to preserve her theory of causation and her monism, but that this solution depends upon our taking her monism in a particular (and weak) form. I finally note that we can best make sense of her unique and interesting form of monism by acknowledging her social-political motivations in addition to her motivations in natural philosophy. (shrink)

This article focuses on foundational issues in dynamic and static semantics, specifically on what is conceptually at stake between the dynamic framework and the truth-conditional framework, and consequently what kinds of evidence support each framework. The article examines two questions. First, it explores the consequences of taking the proposition as central semantic notion as characteristic of static semantics, and argues that this is not as limiting in accounting for discourse dynamics as many think. Specifically, it explores what it means for (...) a static semantics to incorporate the notion of context change potential in a dynamic pragmatics and denies that this conception of static semantics requires that all updates to the context be eliminative and distributive. Second, it argues that the central difference between the two frameworks is whether semantics or pragmatics accounts for dynamics, and explores what this means for the oft-heard claim that dynamic semantics blurs the semantics/pragmatics distinction. (shrink)

Within physics there are two ways of establishing the relative fundamentality of one theory compared to another, via two senses of reduction: "inter-level" and "intra-level" (Crowther, 2018). The former is standardly recognised as roughly correlating with the chain of ontological dependence (i.e., the phenomena described by theories of macro-physics are typically supposed to be ontologically dependent on the entities/behaviour described by theories of micro-physics), and thus has been of interest to naturalised metaphysics. The latter, though, has not been considered interesting (...) for metaphysics, because it is not thought to correlate either with ontological dependence, nor causal or dynamical dependence. I argue, however, that this is a mistake, and that actually, the intra-level relation does reflect ontological dependence (in the same sense as the inter-level relation) and thus should not be neglected by metaphysics of physics. This argument further supports the assertion that the same notion of fundamentality underlies both the inter- and intra-level claims of fundamentality in physics, and that this notion of relative fundamentality in physics correlates with that of metaphysics. (shrink)

Our aim here is to present a result that connects some approaches to justifying countable additivity. This result allows us to better understand the force of a recent argument for countable additivity due to Easwaran. We have two main points. First, Easwaran’s argument in favour of countable additivity should have little persuasive force on those permissive probabilists who have already made their peace with violations of conglomerability. As our result shows, Easwaran’s main premiss – the comparative principle – is strictly (...) stronger than conglomerability. Second, with the connections between the comparative principle and other probabilistic concepts clearly in view, we point out that opponents of countable additivity can still make a case that countable additivity is an arbitrary stopping point between finite and full additivity. (shrink)

Through examining Douglass's and Fanon's concrete experiences of oppression, Cynthia R. Nielsen demonstrates the empirical validity of Foucault's theoretical analyses concerning power, resistance, and subject-formation. Going beyond merely confirming Foucault's insights, Douglass and Fanon expand, strengthen, and offer correctives to the emancipatory dimensions of Foucault's project. Unlike Foucault, Douglass and Fanon were not hesitant to make transhistorical judgments condemning slavery and colonization. Foucault's reticence here signals a weakness in his account of human being. This weakness sets him at cross-purposes (...) not only with Scotus, but also with Douglass and Fanon. Scotus's anthropology provides a basis for transhistorical moral critique; thus he is a valuable dialogue partner for those concerned about social justice and human flourishing. (shrink)

Performance is increasingly important to the poet, which is evidenced by the growing numbers of videos and audio recordings online including YouTube, the National Poetry library, and Poetry Archive. As a result, there are greater opportunities to engage with poets reading their own work and consequently, there is a need to move away from thinking of poetry as primary something that takes shape on the page. Furthermore, by refocusing attention to poetry as an oral artform, in particular to poetry performance, (...) different ways of understanding the value of poetry come to the fore. The live poetry performance, I argue, offers an attempt to reclaim the personal individual expression of language in contemporary society and demands attention by the audience because of the role of voice and body in the performance. Through awareness of ‘uniqueness of voice,’ the performed poem becomes a site of collective meaning making with individual identity intact as a shared endeavour between performer and audience, and necessarily resists appropriation (in the sense that the words experienced cannot be divorced from the performer or the performance space to serve as a proxy for meaning elsewhere). This chapter therefore makes an argument for the need to engage with spoken word and performance poetry in the live performance space. (shrink)

Frederick Douglass, in his first autobiography, Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, describes how his sociopolitical identity was scripted by the white other and how his spatiotemporal existence was likewise constrained through constant surveillance and disciplinary dispositifs. Even so, Douglass was able to assert his humanity through creative acts of resistance. In this essay, I highlight the ways in which Douglass refused to accept the other-imposed narrative, demonstrating with his life the truth of his being—a human being unwilling to (...) be classified as thing or property. As I engage selected passages and key events from Douglass's narrative, I likewise explore the ways in which the resistance tactics. (shrink)

We provide counterexamples to some purported characterizations of dilation due to Pedersen and Wheeler :1305–1342, 2014, ISIPTA ’15: Proceedings of the 9th international symposium on imprecise probability: theories and applications, 2015).

The work of prominent analytical Marxist G. A. Cohen provides a vision of socialism which has distributive justice and community at its core. While Cohen's view of distributive justice has been hugely influential, much less has been said about community. This article argues that community plays three distinct roles in Cohen's socialism. One is as an independent value, the second is as a necessary adjacent counterpart to justice, which serves both to restrict and facilitate distributive equality, and the third is (...) as a critique of the liberal contractualist view of humanity. We argue that each of these are distinct and valuable elements in Cohen's thought, each of which must be recognized to understand the range and implications of Cohen's socialism. (shrink)

This essay aims to construct a relationship between Aristotle's account of friendship in the Nicomachean Ethics and the ideal of companionship articulated and lived out by St. Ignatius of Loyola, the founder of the Jesuit order. Although on the surface, it may seem as though Aristotelian friendship and Ignatian companionship have little in common, given that the accounts were developed in such different contexts, I argue that there are similarities worth exploring. Taken together, the accounts can help illuminate the good (...) of friendship as we experience it in the current age. The essay has three parts. In Part I, I set out Aristotle's account of friendship, focusing especially on his claims about shared activity in friendship and the role that friends play in times of suffering and bad fortune. In Part II, I turn to the Ignatian idea of companionship, both as he wrote about it and as he lived it. Ignatian spirituality takes it as a given that human life often follows a very rocky and difficult path. The spiritual practices of the Ignatian tradition are designed to help us cultivate the dispositions and habits necessary to sustain us through those experiences of grief, agony, and isolation. Those same dispositions and habits, I will suggest, also enable us to sustain our friends and be good companions during times of both joy and despair. In Part III, I will draw these two accounts together and consider what friendship on this Aristotelian-Ignatian model might look like today. Here I will focus on the ways in which friends are companions to each other during the despair and isolation occasioned by serious illness, trauma, and death. Both Aristotle and Ignatius have important insights into the value and function of friendship in these moments, insights that can help us think through the contemporary version of the same problem. (shrink)