In this volume of essays, each chapter flows together so seamlessly that the whole could easily be mistaken for a single monograph.

[This paper was presented at the APA Eastern Division Conference in New York City, January 2024] -/- Can one reasonably doubt that one is voluntarily making a commitment, even when one is doing so? Given that one voluntarily makes a commitment if and only if one (personally) knows that one is doing so, the answer appears to be “No.” After all, knowing implies justifiably believing, and it seems impossible that one could (synchronically and from a single personal perspective) reasonably doubt (...) what one justifiably believes. Indeed, assuming that one reasonably doubts that P only if one has sufficient evidence to believe that not-P, traditional epistemologists may hold that such “epistemic ambivalence” entails one’s believing a contradiction, while some Bayesians should hold that it entails violating “probabilism” (the norm that credences must conform to the axioms of probability). However, I argue that in at least some cases of romantic commitment-making, such ambivalence may not only be epistemically permissible, but even required, and perhaps best dealt with pragmatically. (shrink)

Sexual lust – understood as a feeling of sexual attraction towards another – has traditionally been viewed as a sort of desire or at least as an appetite akin to hunger. I argue here that this view is, at best, significantly incomplete. Further insights can be gained into certain occurrences of lust by noticing how strongly they resemble occurrences of “attitudinal” (“object-directed”) emotion. At least in humans, the analogy between the object-directed appetites and attitudinal emotions goes well beyond their psychological (...) structure to include similar ways in which their occurrence can be introspectively recognized, resulting in similar extensions of their functionality and meaningfulness to the subject. I conclude that although further research is needed, given the strength of the analogy, the ability of lust to satisfy some general requirements for being an emotion, and perhaps certain neurological findings, lust may somewhat uniquely straddle the line between appetite and emotion. (shrink)

An ongoing debate in the philosophy of emotion concerns the relationship between two prima facie aspects of emotional states. The first is affective: felt and/or motivational. The second, which I call object-identifying, represents whatever the emotion is about or directed towards. “Componentialists” – such as R. S. Lazarus, Jesse Prinz, and Antonio Damasio – assume that an emotion’s object-identifying aspect can have the same representational content as a non-emotional state’s, and that it is psychologically separable or dissociable from the emotion’s (...) affective aspect. Some further hold that emotions have no object-identifying aspects of their own, and can properly be said to be about things only in virtue of their associations with other mental states (such as beliefs or perceptions). By contrast, “blenderists” – such as Peter Goldie, York Gunther, and Matthew Ratcliffe – insist that the two aspects are indissociable, because the affective aspect “infuses” the object-identifying aspect, altering the subject’s concept or percept of the object. As a result, an emotion’s object-identifying aspect cannot possibly have the same representational content as any non-emotional state’s. I argue that the strongest blenderist arguments fail to rule out plausible componentialist alternatives, and that the blenderists’ broader motivations are orthogonal to structural issues. (shrink)

Can one’s belief that one romantically loves another be false? If so, under what conditions may one come to reasonably doubt, or at least suspend belief, that one does so? To begin to answer these questions, I first outline an affective/volitional view of love similar to psychologist R. J. Sternberg’s “triangular theory”, which analyzes types of love in terms of the degrees to which they include states of passion, emotion, and commitment. I then outline two sources of potential bias that (...) may cause one to believe that one romantically loves another when one does not. Partly on the basis of those potential sources of bias and partly on the basis of more specific issues, I then argue that at least to the extent that one is aware of these issues, one may reasonably doubt that one is experiencing romantic love’s emotional feelings, and one may reasonably doubt that one is making romantic love’s commitments. Finally, I order by relative dubitability the propositions that must be true about one’s passions, emotions, and commitments toward another in order for one to romantically love them. (shrink)

Human subjects seem to have a type of introspective access to their mental states that allows them to immediately judge the types and intensities of their occurrent emotions, as well as what those emotions are about or “directed at”. Such judgments manifest what I call “emotion-direction beliefs”, which, if reliably produced, may constitute emotion-direction knowledge. Many psychologists have argued that the “directed emotions” such beliefs represent have a componential structure, one that includes feelings of emotional responses and related but independent (...) representations of what those feelings are about. I argue that such componentiality may help to explain how emotion-direction knowledge is achievable. I begin by developing a hybrid view of introspection that combines David Chalmers’ phenomenal realism with Alvin Goldman’s “partial redeployment” account of meta-belief content. I then provide a process-reliabilist account of introspectively gained emotion-direction knowledge that outlines the minimum conditions of reliably forming emotion-direction beliefs, and specifies several ways in which the warrant of such beliefs could be defeated by relevant counterfactual alternatives. The overall account suggests how distinct introspective processes might be epistemically synergistic. (shrink)

According to Larry Hickman, John Dewey’s general philosophical project of analyzing and critiquing human experience may be understood in terms of technological inquiry (Hickman 1990, 1). Following this, I contend that technology provides a model for Dewey’s analysis of language and meaning, and this analysis suggests a treatment of linguistic metaphor as a way of meeting new demands of experience with old tools of a known and understood language. An account of metaphor consistent with Dewey’s views on (...) language and meaning avoids a strict dualism of literal meaning and metaphorical meaning as well as the explanatory shortcomings of a nondualistic theory like that found in Donald Davidson’s well-known paper ”What Metaphors Mean” (1978).2 A Deweyan explanation of. (shrink)

Jesse Prinz (2004) argues that emotional feelings (“state emotions”) can by themselves perceptually represent significant organism-environment relations. I object to this view mainly on the grounds that (1) it does not rule out the at least equally plausible view that emotional feelings are non-representational sensory registrations rather than perceptions, as Tyler Burge (2010) draws the distinction, and (2) perception of a relation requires perception of at least one of the relation’s relata, but an emotional feeling by itself perceives neither the (...) subject’s environment, nor in many cases the relevant subject itself. I then explore two ways in which emotional feelings as non-perceptual sensory registrations might still contribute to significant relation representation when associated with representations of the subject and/or its environment. After briefly discussing some difficulties presented by a multimodal, sensory-perceptual view of such representation, I argue in favor of a “cognitive recognition theory” that holds that significant relation instances are represented during emotion occurrences via applications of emotion-type concepts to "incoming" emotional feelings and their associated mental states. (shrink)

Among moral philosophers, general disapproval of genetic enhancement has in recent years given way to the view that the permissibility of a eugenic policy depends only on its particular features. Buchanan, Brock, Daniels, and Wikler have extensively defended such a view. However, while these authors go so far as to argue that there are conditions under which parents are not only permitted but also obligated to procure genetic treatments for their intended child, they stop short of arguing that there are (...) conditions under which parents are required to procure enhancements. By contrast, David Heyd argues that parents are required to procure treatments or enhancements for their future child, but only if the intervention would not alter the future child’s personal identity. In this paper I take the case for genetic enhancement a step further by arguing that there are conditions under which parents are morally required to procure genetic interventions for their intended child, regardless of whether the intervention is a treatment or an enhancement, and regardless of whether it would alter the child’s personal identity. (shrink)

This article responds to four critics of Democracy in Spite of the Demos and reiterates its central thesis. Christopher Holman and Théophile Pénigaud attempt to maintain the critical value of democracy by invoking different elements of the deliberative tradition, while Benjamin Schupmann answers my charges by appealing to a strong liberal constitutionalism. I argue that these attempts repeat the ambivalence described and criticized in the book: democracy is taken as an end in itself, but with asterisks that introduce conditions and (...) qualifications. As long as democracy is only desirable given certain caveats, the critical weight is placed on these caveats and not on the figure of democracy. Andrew Norris takes a different approach, interrogating the book’s use of ideology critique and the concept of “socially necessary delusion.” This intervention presents difficulties to the concluding suggestion of the book, but I maintain that that these difficulties can be productive and generative rather than limiting or prohibitive. (shrink)

In this article, I present some worries about the possible impact of global efforts to aid the needy in some of the world’s most desperate regions. Among the worries I address are possible unintended negative consequences that may occur elsewhere in a society when aid agencies hire highly qualified local people to promote their agendas; the possibility that foreign interests and priorities may have undue influence on a country’s direction and priorities, negatively impacting local authority and autonomy; and the related (...) problem of outside interventions undermining the responsiveness of local and national governments to their citizens. -/- Another issue I discuss is the possibility that efforts to aid the needy may involve an Each-We Dilemma, in which case conflicts may arise between what is individually rational or moral, and what is collectively rational or moral. Unfortunately, it is possible that if each of us does what we have most reason to do, morally, in aiding the needy, we together will bring about an outcome which is worse, morally, in terms of its overall impact on the global needy. -/- The article ends by briefly noting a number of claims and arguments that I made in my 2017 Uehiro Lectures regarding how good people should respond in a world of need. As I have long argued, I have no doubt that those who are well off are open to serious moral criticism if they ignore the plight of the needy. Unfortunately, however, for a host of both empirical and philosophical reasons, what one should do in light of that truth is much more complex, and murky, than most people have realized. (shrink)

This paper develops an understanding of climate denial as an expression of alienation in the sense described by Marx. We first argue for an expanded and differentiated conception of climate denial, theorizing four distinct types that go beyond the simple rejection of an anthropogenic warming trend: naturalist denialism, technological denialism, gradualist denialism, and politicized denialism. We then claim that these forms of climate denial illustrate and are illustrative of Marx’s concept of alienation from species-being (Gattungswesen). The article is intended as (...) a contribution to the growing literature on climate denial as a social and ideological problem rather than as an individual epistemic or moral issue. (shrink)

Barbara Fried described John Rawls’s response to libertarianism as “the unwritten theory of justice.” This paper argues that while there is no need for a new theory of justice to address the libertarian challenge, there is a need for an additional chapter. Taking up Fried’s suggestion that the Rawlsian response would benefit from a revised list of primary goods, I propose to add employment to the list, thus leading to adoption of a full employment principle in the original position that (...) ensures that anyone who wants to work will be able to do so. I argue that although Rawls famously proposed government as employer of last resort, he never integrated that comment into his theory, which lacks a full employment principle and says nothing about the injustice of involuntary unemployment in its ideal theory. I first refute the received view of Rawls’s treatment of employment as required by its importance for citizens’ self-respect, then show that in fact, the full employment assumption is the result of the role of general equilibrium theory in Rawls’s model of a well-ordered society, and indicate why developments in economic theory and economic policy support the proposed revision. (shrink)

In this essay, I attempt to measure various prevailing democratic theories against an argument that Carl Schmitt advances in the first chapter of his ‘Crisis of Parliamentary Democracy’. In practice, he claims there, democratic politics is compelled to introduce a distinction between ‘the will of the people’ and the behaviour of the empirical people, thus justifying the bracketing and unlimited suspension of the latter in the name of the former, even to the point of dictatorship. I argue that no contemporary (...) approach to democracy as a fundamental value is able to mount a compelling response to this critique and that we should therefore reconsider the status of democracy as a normative commitment. I proceed by carefully and closely reading Schmitt’s chapter and then by juxtaposing various currents of democratic theory (including liberal, deliberative, epistemic and various hybrids thereof) with the trajectory of Schmitt’s argument. This essay is therefore less of a contribution to Schmitt scholarship, in the sense that it does not take a panoramic view of his corpus to determine his final stance on democracy, and more of an intervention into contemporary democratic theory using Schmitt’s argument as a kind of lever. (shrink)

This article reconsiders Hannah Arendt’s account of “totalitarianism” in light of the climate catastrophe and the apparent inability of our political-economic system to respond to it adequately. In the last two chapters of The Origins of Totalitarianism, Arendt focuses on the “ideology” of totalitarian regimes: a pathological denial of reality, a privileging of the ideological system over empirical evidence, and a simultaneous feeling of total impotence and total omnipotence—an analysis that maps remarkably well onto the climate zeitgeist. Thus, while Arendt (...) used the concept of “totalitarianism” to foreclose alternatives to liberal capitalist democracy, the climate impasse suggests that the totalitarian label more properly belongs to the prevailing system itself. (shrink)

This essay considers the catastrophe of anthropogenic climate change in relation to two possible critical-theoretic dispositions. The first, represented by an emblematic passage from Adorno, retains the hope for the realization of a “rational society.” The second, represented by a complementary passage from Foucault, enjoins critical theory to abandon any ambition toward criticizing or transforming society at a totalizing level. We argue that the unfolding climate catastrophe demands a conception of critical theory more in line with the first disposition, and (...) that the relevance of the skeptical disposition is likewise seriously undermined if climate change is taken into account. (shrink)

Charles Mills adhered to the highest standards of philosophical scholarship, while seeing his work firmly as a contribution to the cause of social justice. He had a deep appreciation for historical context and a history of ideas approach to racial/philosophical questions. He was one of the foremost Rawls interpreters or our time, though only a few years before his passing was he so recognized. He channeled his analytic training in his habit of demonstrating how a view is strengthened when an (...) author shows how objections can be systematically replied to. I wish he had tried to integrate class and race into a larger theoretical system, of both an explanatory and normative character. Class is sometimes an unnoted presence in his explanation of white supremacy. Charles saw himself contributing to a collective scholarly social justice project and was happy to acknowledge the greater expertise of others in allied areas to his. (shrink)

Attempts to unify Marxist and feminist social critique have been vexed by the fact that ‘patriarchy’ predates the advent of capitalism (its transhistorical status). Feminists within the Marxist, socialist, and materialist traditions have responded to this point by either granting patriarchy a certain autonomy relative to capitalism (the ‘dual/triple systems’ approach), or by suggesting that patriarchal relations have a foundational and necessary status in the history of capitalist development (which we term the ‘origins-subsistence’ approach). This paper offers an alternative account (...) of the relationship between capitalism and the transhistorical status of ‘patriarchy’. In aid of a ‘unitary theory’ of Marxist Feminism, we argue that the transhistorical status of patriarchy is better understood through an application of Marx’s concepts of formal and real subsumption. A modified version of these concepts can illuminate not only capitalist appropriation of antecedent social and economic forms, but also its capacity to produce new forms of gendered exploitation and oppression. (shrink)

Summary Background Self-binding directives instruct clinicians to overrule treatment refusal during future severe episodes of illness. These directives are promoted as having potential to increase autonomy for individuals with severe episodic mental illness. Although lived experience is central to their creation, service users’ views on self-binding directives have not been investigated substantially. This study aimed to explore whether reasons for endorsement, ambivalence, or rejection given by service users with bipolar disorder can address concerns regarding self-binding directives, decision-making capacity, and human (...) rights. Methods This study used qualitative data from an internet-based survey distributed to the mailing list of the UK charity Bipolar UK, which contained multiple closed and open questions on advance decision-making in bipolar disorder. Quantitative analysis of a closed question about self-binding directives had already demonstrated endorsement amongst a very high proportion of participants with bipolar disorder who completed the survey. We conducted thematic analysis of responses from those participants who answered a subsequent open question about reasons for their view. Research was co-produced within a multi-disciplinary team, with clinical, legal, and ethical expertise, and lived experience of bipolar disorder. Ideas and methodologies associated with all these areas of expertise were used in the analysis of these reasons and to gain insight into the thoughts of individuals with bipolar disorder about self-binding directives and associated issues. Findings Between Oct 23 and Dec 5, 2017, 932 individuals with a self-reported clinical diagnosis of bipolar disorder completed the internet survey, with 565 (154 men; 400 women; 11 transgender or other) providing free text answers to the open question. A large majority of respondents endorsed self-binding directives, nearly all describing a determinate shift to types of distorted thinking and decision-making when unwell as their key justification. Responses indicating ambivalence were dominated by logistical concerns about the drafting and implementation of self-binding directives, while those who rejected self-binding directives also cited logistical concerns, validity of their thinking when unwell, and potential contravention of human rights. Interpretation This study is, to our knowledge, the first large study of reasons why mental health service users might endorse or reject the use of self-binding directives. The findings provide empirical support for introducing self-binding directives into mental health advance decision-making practice and policy and may help to address enduring ethical concerns surrounding possible implementation of the directive while a person retains decision-making capacity. The opinions expressed here in responses given by multiple service users with bipolar disorder challenge a prominent view within international disability rights debates that involuntary treatment and recognition of impaired mental capacity constitute inherent human rights violations. Funding The Wellcome Trust . (shrink)

In Climate Leviathan, Mann and Wainwright address the political implications of climate change by theorizing four possible planetary futures: Climate Leviathan as capitalist planetary sovereignty, Climate Mao as non-capitalist planetary sovereignty, Climate Behemoth as capitalist non-planetary sovereignty, and Climate X as non-capitalist non-planetary sovereignty. The authors of the present article agree that the depth and scale of destabilizations induced by climate change cannot be navigated justly from within the present social-political-economic system. We disagree, however, on which of the non-capitalist orientations (...) is better suited for generating viable alternatives to the worst dystopian futures. The article thus stages a debate to elucidate the theoretical and political divergence between Climate X and Climate Mao. (shrink)

Humans and artificial intelligences (AI) will increasingly participate digitally and physically in conflicts yet there is a lack of trusted communications across agents and platforms. For example, humans in disasters and conflict already use messaging and social media to share information, however, international humanitarian relief organisations treat this information as unverifiable and untrustworthy. AI may reduce the ‘fog-of-war’ and improve outcomes, however current AI implementations are often brittle, have a narrow scope of application and wide ethical risks. Meanwhile, human error (...) causes significant civilian harms even by combatants committed to complying with international humanitarian law. AI offers an opportunity to help reduce the tragedy of war and better deliver humanitarian aid to those who need it. However, to be successful, these systems must be trusted by humans and their information systems, overcoming flawed information flows in conflict and disaster zones that continue to be marked by intermittent communications, poor situation awareness, mistrust and human errors. In this paper, we consider the integration of a communications protocol (the ‘Whiteflag protocol’), distributed ledger technology, and information fusion with artificial intelligence (AI), to improve conflict communications called “Protected Assurance Understanding Situation & Entities” PAUSE. Such a trusted human-AI communication network could provide accountable information exchange regarding protected entities, critical infrastructure; humanitarian signals and status updates for humans and machines in conflicts. Trust-based information fusion provides resource-efficient use of diverse data sources to increase the reliability of reports. AI can be used to catch human mistakes and complement human decision making, while human judgment can direct and override AI recommendations. We examine several case studies for the integration of these technologies into a trusted human-AI network for humanitarian benefit including mapping a conflict zone with civilians and combatants in real time, preparation to avoid incidents and using the network to manage misinformation. (shrink)

The chromodielectric soliton model is Lorentz and chirally invariant. It has been demonstrated to exhibit dynamical chiral symmetry breaking and spatial confinement in the locally uniform approximation. We here study the full nonlocal quark self-energy in a color-dielectric medium modeled by a two-parameter Fermi function. Here color confinement is manifest. The self-energy thus obtained is used to calculate quark wave functions in the medium which, in turn, are used to calculate the nucleon and pion masses in the one-gluon-exchange approximation. The (...) nucleon mass is fixed to its empirical value using scaling arguments; the pion mass (for massless current quarks) turns out to be small but nonzero, depending on the model parameters. (shrink)

The article reflects on where AI is headed and the world along with it, considering trust, ethics and safety. Implicit in artificial thinking and doomsday appraisals is the engineered divorce from reality of sublime human embodiment. Jeffrey White, Dietrich Brandt, Jan Soeffner, and Larry Stapleton, four scholars associated with AI & Society, address these issues, and more, in the following exchange.

My job has been made easier tonight, given that Larry Hickman has already done most of the ‘heavy lifting’ for me. I think his paper is an excellent and convincing intervention into this debate, and one of the problems for me in constructing my talk has been that our discussions have forced me to rethink what I wanted to say. Given my Continental biases, I had expected to come out on Rorty’s side; in writing this paper, however, things (...) have become more complicated. So let me here thank Larry for both at once making my job tonight easier, and much to my chagrin, surprisingly difficult. What I want to suggest, in contrast to what you’ve just heard, is that the neopragmatism of Richard Rorty is not wholly inconsistent with Dewey’s pragmatism – or, at least, with a ‘thin’ version of Deweyian pragmatism. As we shall see, while the differences between Dewey and Rorty on the status of metaphysics are in all probability irreconcilable, Rorty’s reclamation of a ‘thin’ Dewey can be read as consistent with at least the spirit of Dewey’s work. I will try to make the stronger case that this reconciliation is possible according to the letter of Dewey’s philosophy as well, and the interrelated issues of method and social hope will serve as the avenues for this investigation. Given my audience, I imagine that what I’m about to say will be fodder for some interesting conversation, and so, in the spirit of Rorty’s thought, let me get on with my paper. (shrink)

In this paper, I evaluate three views of philosophical pragmatism’s practical implications for academic and non-academic or public discourses, as well as offer my own view of those implications. The first view is that of George Novack. In an underappreciated tract, Pragmatism versus Marxism, the American Trotskyite and union organizer launched a vicious attack on John Dewey’s career as a professional philosopher. He alleged that Dewey’s ideas were inaccessible to all but a small community of fellow academicians. While Novack conceded (...) that Dewey’s philosophical inquiries had a cross-pollinating influence on other academic fields, he doubted that the beneficial products of those inquiries traveled far beyond the walls of the so-called ‘ivory tower.’ Larry Hickman offers a second view. He understands Dewey’s claim in Experience and Nature that philosophy serves as a “liaison officer” to mean that philosophers should provide a common lexicon that translates between the languages of distinct disciplines. In other words, for Dewey, the role of philosophy, including philosophical pragmatism, is to facilitate interdisciplinarity. Since interdisciplinary sharing is usually confined to academic discourse, Novack’s challenge is perfectly compatible with Hickman’s interpretation of Dewey’s ‘liaison officer’ claim. Both Novack and Hickman are mistaken, though in different degrees and for different reasons. The third, and more promising, view is advanced by Robert Talisse. He cites the life and works of Sidney Hook, one of Dewey’s better-known students, as an exemplary case of a pragmatist who consistently realized his pragmatic commitments in public discourse. The most important reason for qualifying Hickman’s interpretation of Dewey’s ‘liaison officer’ claim is that the measure of pragmatism’s value is not solely the ability of pragmatists to facilitate interdisciplinary collaboration, but their ability to also insert their ideas into public discourse. In my view, philosophical pragmatists, and philosophers generally, should both facilitate interdisciplinarity in academic discourse and introduce philosophical notions into public discourse—that is, serving in the dual capacity of interdisciplinary scholar and public intellectual. (shrink)

Originally published in 1927, John Dewey’s The Public and Its Problems is a landmark work in pragmatist political philosophy. Today many commentators appreciate it as the mature expression of the American pragmatist’s democratic theory (though at least two later essays are perhaps more representative). It is also considered a classic text for students of twentieth-century American political thought. The book was originally a series of lectures given at Kenyon College in 1926. Many of its central ideas grew out of debate (...) Dewey had with a fellow public intellectual, Walter Lippmann. Besides its inclusion in the collected works (1996, edited by Larry Hickman), the only other edition to be released was by Swallow Press in 1954, containing Dewey’s half-page foreword (1927) and his twelve-page afterword (1946). With the arrival of Penn State Press’ new edition, introduced and edited by Melvin L. Rogers, The Public and Its Problems receives a monumental facelift. It includes a chronology of Dewey’s life events, an editorial note, and Rogers’ introduction to the work, subtitled ‘Revisiting the Public and Its Problems’. (shrink)

Jaegwon Kim’s supervenience/exclusion argument attempts to show that non-reductive physicalism is incompatible with mental causation. This influential argument can be seen as relying on the following principle, which I call “the piggyback principle”: If, with respect to an effect, E, an instance of a supervenient property, A, has no causal powers over and above, or in addition to, those had by its supervenience base, B, then the instance of A does not cause E (unless A is identical with B). In (...) their “Epiphenomenalism: The Dos and the Don’ts,” Larry Shapiro and Elliott Sober employ a novel empirical approach to challenge the piggyback principle. Their empirical approach pulls from the experiments of August Weismann regarding the inheritance of acquired characteristics. Through an examination of Weismann’s experiments, Shapiro and Sober extract lessons in reasoning about the epiphenomenalism of a property. And according to these empirically drawn lessons, the piggyback principle is a don’t. My primary aim in this paper is to defend the piggyback principle against Shapiro and Sober’s empirical approach. (shrink)

Scientific realism says of our best scientific theories that (1) most of their important posits exist and (2) most of their central claims are approximately true. Antirealists sometimes offer the pessimistic induction in reply: since (1) and (2) are false about past successful theories, they are probably false about our own best theories too. The contemporary debate about this argument has turned (and become stuck) on the question, Do the central terms of successful scientific theories refer? For example, Larry (...) Laudan offers a list of successful theories that employed central terms that failed to refer, and Philip Kitcher replies with a view about reference in which the central terms of such theories did sometimes refer. This article attempts to break this stalemate by proposing a direct version of the pessimistic induction, one that makes no explicit appeal to a substantive notion or theory of reference. While it is premature to say that this argument succeeds in showing that realism is probably false, the direct pessimistic induction is not subject to any kind of reference-based objection that might cripple a weaker, indirect version of the argument. Any attempt to trounce the direct pessimistic induction with a theory of reference fails. (shrink)

Larry Temkin draws on the work of Angus Deaton to argue that countries with poor governance sometimes rely on charitable giving and foreign aid in ways that enable them to avoid relying on their own citizens; this can cause them to be unresponsive to their citizens’ needs and thus prevent the long-term alleviation of poverty and other social problems. I argue that the implications of this “lack of government responsiveness argument” (or LOGRA) are both broader and narrower than they (...) might first appear. I explore how LOGRA applies more broadly to certain types of charitable giving in developed countries, with a focus on medical crowdfunding. I then highlight how LOGRA does not apply to charitable giving aimed at alleviating the suffering of the absolutely politically marginalized, or those especially vulnerable people to whom governments are never responsive. (shrink)

Les recherches menées dans le champ de la psychologie morale par Larry P. Nucci et Elliot Turiel conduisent à identifier le domaine moral avec le domaine des jugements prescriptifs concernant la manière dont nous devons nous comporter à l’égard des autres personnes. Ces travaux empiriques pourraient apporter du crédit aux propositions normatives du philosophe Ruwen Ogien qui défend une conception minimaliste de l’éthique. L’éthique minimale exclut en particulier le rapport à soi du domaine moral. À mon avis cependant, ces (...) travaux de psychologie morale ne permettent pas du tout d’affirmer que nous sommes, empiriquement parlant, des minimalistes moraux. Les résultats des recherches de Nucci et Turiel montrent que les personnes considèrent intuitivement que le domaine personnel – le domaine des actions qui affectent prioritairement l’agent lui-même – doit échapper au contrôle ou à l’interférence des autres personnes. Mais affirmer que c’est l’agent lui-même qui possède l’autorité légitime de décider dans le domaine personnel ne signifie pas que tout ce qu’il y fait soit moralement indifférent. (shrink)

This commentary contends that Larry May’s Hobbesian argument for limitations on sovereignty and lawmaking in Limiting Leviathan does not succeed. First, I show that Hobbes begins with a plausible instrumental theory of normativity. Second, I show that Hobbes then attempts, unsuccessfully—by his own lights—to defend a kind of non-instrumental, moral normativity. Thus, I contend, in order to successfully “limit the Leviathan” of the state, the Hobbesian must provide a sound instrumental argument in favor of the sovereign limiting their actions (...) and lawmaking. But, I argue, neither Hobbes nor May provides such an argument. (shrink)

Esta pesquisa analisa alguns tópicos sobre a metodologia de acordo com a filosofia da ciência de Larry Laudan, além de examinar, na área da educação, esta proposta de interpretação filosófica. Trouxemos como elementos algumas considerações e definições sobre a metodologia em Laudan, isto é, da metodologia como um instrumento para a realização da axiologia (que são as metas e os valores cognitivos), porém, apresentando também interessantes relações para com as teorias específicas, como o de justificar as teorias específicas e (...) de ser restringida por elas. A metodologia é também, dentro do modelo reticulado de Laudan, justificada pela axiologia. Para além desta análise, há também uma defesa da metodologia enquanto o estudo dela própria, o que permite encontrarmos conexões interessantes em teorias da educação, como no caso da investigação-ação, onde vemos que estamos diante de uma tradição de pesquisa nos moldes defendidos pela filosofia da ciência de Laudan, por reconhecermos que temos um modelo reticular composto por teorias específicas, metodologias e axiologia também na área da educação. Veremos também que a metodologia em Laudan possui um caráter dinâmico, tensionando e sendo tensionada pelos componentes da tradição de pesquisa, caracterizando o modelo reticulado de racionalidade proposto pelo filósofo. Este debate em Laudan, juntamente com a tradição de pesquisa da investigação-ação da área da educação serão investigados neste artigo. Como base para a construção deste texto, utilizamos as seguintes obras de Laudan: The Progress and its problems: towards a theory of scientific growth (1977), Science and Values (1984a), Explaining the success of science: beyond epistemic realism and relativism (1984b), Methodology’s prospects (1986), Progress or Rationality? The Prospects for Normative Naturalism (1987a), Aim-less Epistemology? (1990a) e Normative Naturalism (1990b). (shrink)

A political history and philosophy of the European Union. The journey of European states in their ungoing efforts from 1951 on (the Schuman Plan). Democracy, its political institutions and philosophical foundations, compared to Alexis de Tocqueville, De la démocratie en Amérique (two volumes, 1835, 1840; transl.: Democracy in Europe, London 1994) and a wide range of political theorists.

This paper discusses two aspects of Larry May's book Limiting Leviathan. First it discusses a passage in Leviathan, to which May draws attention, in which Hobbes connects obligation to "that, which in the disputations of scholars is called absurdity". Secondly it looks at the book's discussion of Hobbes and pacifist attitudes, with reference to Hobbes's contemporary critic John Eachard.

The film A Serious Man cinematically deconstructs the life of a mid-twentieth century, mid-western American physics professor named Larry Gopnik. As it happens, Larry is up for tenure with a wife who is about to leave him, an unemployed brother who sleeps on his couch, and two self-obsessed teenage children. The film presents a Job-like theodicy in which the mysteries of quantum physics are haunted both by questions of good and evil as well as the spectre of an (...) un-named God, reverently referred to as Hashem. The following paper examines the broader set of philosophical, theological and ethical concerns which arise from the film’s themes, using it to illustrate those concerns. Just as Newtonian physics underwrote Kant’s evocation of the image of starry skies above and moral law within, quantum physics underwrites a new set of ethical anxieties, which the film narrates as a key facet of contemporary western culture’s postmodern re-enchantment. Although some, such as Slavoj Zizek, see this as a positively charged opportunity to rethink metaphysics and ethics, the film leaves the audience with more sinister conclusions. (shrink)

The hypothesis that we want to test is whether the Kantian revolution, based on a Copernican-type hypothesis, is a revolution in the Kuhnian sense of “scientific revolution”. By answering it we accomplish the two aims of this paper: to draw a recuperative and justificatory perspective to the fundamental ideas from Thomas Kuhn’s Structure of Scientific Revolutions, related in particular to the refutation of Larry Laudan’s criticism on it and, by our own Kuhn-type reconstruction of the term “Copernican revolution” attributed (...) to Kant, to demonstrate the nominal hypothesis formulated above. Accordingly, we argue not only that, with Kant, we find analogously the Kuhntype model of revolution, and that the results of his revolutionary hypothesis on how reporting to the object coincide not only with the results provided by science and with their scientific status; but also that it is consistent with the model provided by Kuhn . (shrink)

Philosophers of science are divided over the interpretations of scientific normativity. Larry Laudan defends a sort of goal-directed rules for scientific methodology. In contrast, Gerard Doppelt thinks methodological rules are a mixed batch of rules in that some are goal-oriented hypothetical rules and others are goal-independent categorical rules. David Resnik thinks that the debate between them is at a standstill now. He further thinks there are certain rules, such as the rule of consistency which is goal independent. However, he (...) proposes a holistic understanding of the scientific methodology. Taking a thread from Resnik, the present paper also advocates a holistic understanding of the scientific methodology. Given that many scientific practices deal with systems, the focus will be given to the systems by assuming each as a constellation of methodological norms. By taking each system as a set of mutually supportive methodological rules whose instrumental values underwrite the coherence relation among them, the paper aims to provide what could be a viable holistic epistemological account that can explain scientific normativity at work in a scientific system. The paper will lay down specific holistic criteria for understanding the scientific methodology. They will be used to show how a holistic account could satisfactorily account for the success of the Compact Muon Solenoid (CMS) experiment in discovering the Higgs boson and how the holistic account can account for the instrumental error behind the apparent faster-than-light neutrino anomaly of the Oscillation Project with Emulsion-t Racking Apparatus (OPERA) experiments respectively. (shrink)

Review of: Husain Sarkar. A Theory of Method. xvii+ 229 pp., bibl., indexes. Berkeley/Los Angeles/London: University of California Press, 1983. $29.95. The subject of this book is best stated in the author's words: "A theory is about the world; a method is about theories; and, a theory of method is about methods" (p. 1). A theory of method seeks to offer a general framework within which to choose among methods. Through critical examination of the positions of Karl Popper, Imre Lakatos, (...) and Larry Laudan, Sarkar develops his own framework for evaluating methods, which includes two bold proposals: that the history of science cannot be used as an arbitrator among methods, and that methods should be chosen by testing the heuristic advice they give about which lines of scientific research to pursue further. (shrink)

En el presente artículo analizamos la novela gráfica Pax Romana (Jonathan Hickman 2007) como una representación de las posturas de la filosofía de la historia de la Ilustración. El discurso prevaleciente en la mayoría de los personajes y en la trama, argumentamos, es equiparable con la concepción de la Historia del positivismo y el marxismo. Establecemos que, en esta visionaria muestra del noveno arte, la filosofía de la historia ilustrada prevalece sobre la filosofía de la historia cristiana, pese a (...) que gran parte del hilo argumental haya recaído en personajes que representan la dirigencia de la Iglesia Católica. El desenlace de la miniserie evidencia el triunfo, a través de los viajes en el tiempo, de las metas de la Ilustración, como lo son la difusión de la Razón, la ciencia, el Progreso y el bienestar en todo el orbe. Sorpresivamente, en tanto que los viajes en el tiempo son planificados por el Vaticano, se dejan a un lado los presupuestos básicos de la filosofía de la historia cristiana, principalmente la idea de que el Reino de Dios no se dará en la Tierra sino en un lugar metafísico, en el Final de los Tiempos. (shrink)

In a recent exchange, John Worrall and Larry Laudan have debated the merits of the model of rational scientific change proposed by Laudan in his book Science and Values. On the model advocated by Laudan, rational change may take place at the level of scientific theory and methodology, as well as at the level of the epistemic aims of science. Moreover, the rationality of a change which occurs at any one of these three levels may be dependent on considerations (...) at the remaining levels. Yet, in spite of the avowedly anti-relativistic motivation of Laudan's model, Worrall criticizes Laudan for irrevocably relativizing scientific rationality to historically variant methodological standards. (shrink)

Larry Laudan v článku z roku 1983 označil problém demarkace, tj. rozlišení „vědy" a „pseudovědy", za filosofický pseudoproblém, kterým není třeba se zabývat, a slova „vědecké" a „pseudovědecké" za prázdné pojmy, které můžeme z našeho slovníku zcela vyškrtnout. V předkládané studii zpochybňuji toto Laudanovo stanovisko a předkládám argumenty ve prospěch tvrzení, že 1) rozlišení vědy a pseudovědy představuje důležitý a aktuální problém, kterým je třeba se zabývat, a že 2) možný způsob řešení tohoto problému nabízejí současná sociální studia vědy. (...) Jejich východiskem je pojetí vědy jako „formy života" a pojetí demarkačního kritéria jako proměnlivého souboru charakteristik, který sice nelze jednoznačně definovat, ale přesto jej lze zkoumat, a to prostřednictvím sociologické analýzy vědecké praxe. Mým záměrem je na příkladu několika vzorových studií představit specifika sociologického přístupu z hlediska jeho metodologie i povahy nabízených řešení a zhodnotit jeho možnosti i omezení pro filosofii vědy. (shrink)

Philosophy of science and history of science both have a significant relation to science itself; but what is their relation to each other? That question has been a focal point of philosophical and historical work throughout the second half of this century. An analysis and review of the progress made in dealing with this question, and especially that made in philosophy, is the focus of this thesis. Chapter one concerns logical positivist and empiricist approaches to philosophy of science, and the (...) significance of the criticisms levelled at them by analytic epistemologists such as Willard Quine and 'historicist' philosophers, especially Thomas Kuhn. Chapter two details the attempts by Kuhn and Lakatos to integrate these historicist criticisms with historically oriented philosophy of science, in their separate attempts at providing rational explanations of historical developments. Kuhn's latest work seeks to mend fences with philosophy, but his efforts remain too closely tied to the epistemological approaches strongly criticized in his earlier work. Lakatos' treatment of history is much more subtle than most have understood it to be, but the conception of scientific rationality that arises out of it is transformed into an abstract cultural product, more reminiscent of Hegel's geist than of individual human rationality. Chapters three and four discuss the recommendations of Lakatos and Laudan to historians with regard to historiography, and the actual historiographies and philosophy of history of practicing historians and historians of science. The philosophers' contributions indicate little concern for the historians' own methods, materials, and purposes; and the historians' writings present methodologies for history of science that are independent of the normative demarcations of philosophy of science, pace Lakatos and Laudan. Chapter five develops a philosophical position that fosters a more productive engagement between philosophy and history of science, a 'methodological historicism' that embraces the possibility of an important role for social and political factors in a philosophical study of scientific development. The epistemological relativism that might accompany such a historicist position need not be the radical epistemological anarchism of Feyerabend, though it will allow for a significant underdetermination of scientific development by reason nonetheless. (shrink)

A pesquisa tem como objetivo analisar aspectos/elementos da cosmologia de Aristóteles a partir da filosofia da ciência de Larry Laudan. A tentativa é apresentar neste artigo uma interpretação possível sobre o processo evolutivo da cosmologia da época sob o enfoque da filosofia de Laudan, baseado nas tradições de pesquisa, teorias específicas, modelo reticulado, progresso científico, metodologia, axiologia, etc. Abordaremos sobre a questão da aceitação das teorias específicas, a questão da eficácia na resolução de problemas, entre outras questões importantes para (...) a interpretação mencionada. O recorte histórico será importante enquanto elemento que permitiria visualizar esta interpretação filosófica e sobre como seria possível pensar em um modelo de reticulação neste contexto, na tentativa de apresentar os tensionamentos entre os componentes da tradição de pesquisa, como forma de destacar a necessidade de revisão constante destes elementos historicamente, dentro do processo evolutivo das tradições de pesquisa. Utilizaremos como base especialmente as obras O progresso e seus problemas: rumo a uma teoria do crescimento científico (2011) [1977] e Science and Values (1984). (shrink)

In a time when conservatives believe that the traditional family is under increasing fire, some think an appeal to Darwinian science may be the answer. I argue that these conservatives are wrong to maintain that Darwinian theory can serve as the intellectual foundation for the traditional conception of the family. Contra Larry Arnhart and James Q. Wilson, a Darwinian philosophy of nature simply lacks the stability the traditional family requires; it cannot support the traditional conception of human nature and (...) the normativity it was thought to contain. If conservatives are to maintain these traditional ideas, the theoretical foundation must lie elsewhere. (shrink)

The present essay addresses the epistemic difficulties involved in achieving consensus with respect to the Hayek–Keynes debate. It is argued that the empirical implications of the relevant theories are such that, regardless of what is observed, both theories can be interpreted as true, or at least, as not falsified. The essay explicates the respects in which the empirical evidence underdetermines the choice between the relevant theories. In particular, it is argued both that there are convenient responses that protect each theory (...) from what appears to be threatening evidence and that, for particular kinds of evidence, the two theories are empirically equivalent. Larry Laudan's suggestion that ampliative methodological criteria can resolve an underdetermined choice between multiple scientific theories is considered and rejected as a possible means to rational consensus. (shrink)

If A is better than B and B is better than C, then A is better than C, right? Larry Temkin and Stuart Rachels say: No! Betterness is nontransitive, they claim. In this paper, I discuss the central type of argument advanced by Temkin and Rachels for this radical idea, and argue that, given this view very likely has sceptical implications for practical reason, we would do well to identify alternative responses. I propose one such response, which employs the (...) idea that rational agents might regard some options as incommensurate in value, and will reasonably employ a heuristic of status quo maintenance to avoid suboptimal choices from incommensurate goods. (shrink)