This paper discusses the logical space of alternative conceptual engineering projects, with a specific focus on (1) the processes, (2) the targets and goals, and (3) the methods of such projects. We present an overview of how these three aspects interact in the contemporary literature and discuss those alternative projects that have yet to be explored based on our suggested typology. We show how choices about each element in a conceptual engineering project constrain the possibilities for the others, thereby giving (...) rise to distinct groupings of possible projects under the banner of conceptual engineering. We conclude with a critical reflection on the potential ethical issues that arise as a result of effectively putting conceptual engineering into practice. (shrink)

The income gap between women and men expands with age, culminating in a gender pension gap in old age that is much larger than pay gaps earlier in life. In this article, I question two attempts to justify gender pension gaps. One insists that lower financial contribution justifies women's lower overall pensions. The second states that women must receive less monthly because they live longer. I argue that neither of these reasons is fair in a gender‐unjust world. Rather than justifying (...) pension gaps, female longevity is an opportunity to promote gender justice: by subsidizing longer lives, old‐age redistribution attenuates lifetime gender inequality. In the case of retirement pensions, the use of age to promote gender equality may be preferable to explicit gender differentiation. There is, then, a feminist case for old‐age redistribution. (shrink)

Conceptual engineering means to provide a method to assess and improve our concepts working as cognitive devices. But conceptual engineering still lacks an account of what concepts are (as cognitive devices) and of what engineering is (in the case of cognition). And without such prior understanding of its subject matter, or so it is claimed here, conceptual engineering is bound to remain useless, merely operating as a piecemeal approach, with no overall grip on its target domain. The purpose of this (...) programmatic paper is to overcome this knowledge gap by providing some guidelines for developing the theories of concepts and of cognition that will ground the systematic unified framework needed to effectively implement conceptual engineering as a widely applicable method for the cognitive optimization of our conceptual devices. (shrink)

Conceptual engineering is the method for assessing and improving our representational devices. On its ‘broad-spectrum’ version, it is expected to be appropriately applicable to any of our representation-involving cognitive activities, with major consequences for our whole cognitive life. This paper is about the theoretical foundations of conceptual engineering thus characterised. With a view to ensuring the actionability of conceptual engineering as a broad-spectrum method, it addresses the issue of how best to construe the subject matter of conceptual engineering and successively (...) defends the theses that conceptual engineering should be: (i) About concepts, (ii) psychologically theorised, (iii) as multiply realised functional kinds. Thereby, I claim to theoretically secure and justify the maximum scope, flexibility, and impact for the method of conceptual engineering on our representational devices in our whole cognitive life—in other words, a broad-spectrum version of conceptual engineering. (shrink)

Conceptual engineering is the method for assessing and improving our concepts. Some have recently claimed that the implementation of such method in the form of ameliorative projects is truth-driven and should thus be epistemically constrained, ultimately at least (Simion 2018; cf. Podosky 2018). This paper challenges that claim on the assumption of a social constructionist analysis of ideologies, and provides an alternative, pragmatic and cognitive framework for determining the legitimacy of ameliorative conceptual projects overall. The upshot is that one should (...) not ameliorate for the sake of truth or knowledge, in the case of ideologies—at least, not primarily. (shrink)

Conceptual engineering is the method for assessing and improving our concepts. However, little has been written about how best to conceive of concepts for the purposes of conceptual engineering. In this paper, I aim to fill this foundational gap, proceeding in three main steps: First, I propose a methodological framework for evaluating the conduciveness of a given concept of concept for conceptual engineering. Then, I develop a typology that contrasts two competing concepts of concept that can be used in conceptual (...) engineering — namely, the philosophical and psychological ones. Finally, I evaluate these two concepts of concept using the proposed methodological framework and I show that, when it comes to making conceptual engineering an actionable method, the psychological concept of concept outclasses its philosophical counterpart on all counts. This provides a baseline from which the concept of concept can be further improved for the purposes of conceptual engineering. (shrink)

Conceptual engineering is commonly characterized as the method for assessing and improving our representational devices. Little has been said, however, on how best to construe these representational devices—in other words, on what conceptual engineering should be all about. This paper tackles this problem with a basic strategy: First, by presenting a taxonomy of the different possible subject matters for conceptual engineering; then, by comparatively assessing them and selecting the most conducive one with a view to making conceptual engineering an actionable (...) method, that is, a method that can be applied effectively and consistently to specific case studies. The outcome is that conceptual engineering should be all about concepts on pain of pragmatic inconsistencies otherwise. (shrink)

Of all the risks we face in life, ranging from unemployment to old age, early death is among the most tragic and yet most neglected by modern states. Liberal egalitarians might find it easy to dismiss social insurance against early death, but I argue they should not. Early in this paper, I explain why social insurance should include the risk of premature death by replying to four common criticisms. What follows is a case for a novel form of insurance that (...) is more liberal and egalitarian across ages than the status quo. More specifically, I show that granting storable pensions in all life stages - youth, middle and old age - promotes liberty and reduces lifetime inequality. Writers on age group and longevity justice often overlook the extent to which liberal lifetime equality can supply insightful arguments against inequality across ages. These call for a policy that gives each age group the freedom to draw a storable pension. I call that policy "freetirement". (shrink)

Justice Across Ages offers an attractive account of justice between the young and the old that brings together three notable principles of age-group justice: complete-lives equality, relational equality, and prudence. Yet, the book says little about the fact that many of us live longer than others, and the little it does say casts doubt on whether lifespan inequality threatens justice as construed by the three principles. This essay argues, instead, that theories of justice between the young and the old should (...) not dispense with a conception of justice between different longevity groups. It concludes that we must be sensitive to lifespan variations when designing policies to promote justice across age groups. (shrink)

Retirement is often viewed as a reward for a working life. While many have reason to want a work-free retirement, not everyone does. Should working retirees have to give up their retirement pension and, consequently, their status as retirees? The answer, I argue, boils down to whether we conceive of retirement as free time (need-free) or as leisure (work-free). In this article, I put forward a liberal case in favour of free time, despite whether our liberalism leans towards perfectionism or (...) neutralism, with social primary goods being a case in point. Applying this case for free time to retirement yields two significant policy implications. First, it demands “free synchronic combination” – that retirees may use their retirement pensions however they see fit, including to work. Second, it also yields “free diachronic combination” – that, within limits, individuals have discretionary control over how to combine retirement and work across time – thus challenging the idea that retirement should be available only in old age and not earlier in life. So far, the literature on free time focused only on narrow temporal units, such as hours and days, but there is much to gain by extending the concept into retirement. (shrink)

Composition as Identity is the view that an object is identical to its parts taken collectively. I elaborate and defend a theory based on this idea: composition is a kind of identity. Since this claim is best presented within a plural logic, I develop a formal system of plural logic. The principles of this system differ from the standard views on plural logic because one of my central claims is that identity is a relation which comes in a variety of (...) forms and only one of them obeys substitution unrestrictedly. I justify this departure from orthodoxy by showing some problems which result from attempts to avoid inconsistencies within plural logic by means of postulating other non-singular terms besides plural terms. Thereby, some of the main criticisms raised against Composition as Identity can be addressed. Further, I argue that the way objects are arranged is relevant with respect to the question which object they compose, i.e. to which object they are identical to. This helps to meet a second group of arguments against Composition as Identity. These arguments aim to show that identifying composite objects on the basis of the identity of their parts entails, contrary to our common sense view, that rearranging the parts of a composite object does not leave us with a different object. Moreover, it allows us to carve out the intensional aspects of Composition as Identity and to defend mereological universalism, the claim that any objects compose some object. Much of the pressure put on the latter view can be avoided by distinguishing the question whether some objects compose an object from the question what object they compose. Eventually, I conclude that Composition as Identity is a coherent and plausible position, as long as we take identity to be a more complex relation than commonly assumed. (shrink)

This book is conceived as an introductory text into the theory of syntactic and semantic information, and information flow.

In this paper I defend an intermediate position between the ‘bare mathematical results’ view and the ‘transmission’ view of mathematical explanations of physical phenomena (MEPPs). I argue that, in MEPPs, it is not enough to deduce the explanandum from the generalizations cited in the explanans. Rather, we must add information regarding why those generalizations obtain. However, I also argue that it is not necessary to provide explanatory proofs of the mathematical theorems that represent those generalizations. I illustrate this with the (...) bridges of Königsberg case. -/- . (shrink)

This paper explores the role that Mary Shepherd's (1777–1847) acceptance of the so-called imago-dei thesis plays for her account of the human mind. That is, it analyses Shepherd's commitment to the doctrine that humans are created in the image of God, (see Gen. 1, 26–7) parts of which Shepherd quotes in Essays on the Perception of an External Universe (EPEU), 157, and the ways it informs her understanding of the human mind. In particular, it demonstrates how this thesis informs her (...) understanding of the cognitive and moral capacities of the human mind. In other words, I argue that her commitment to this thesis explains why she believes that human beings are capable of reaching the “higher acquirement of intelligence” and the “completion of virtuous habits” (EPEU 381). Thus, this paper highlights the relevance of Shepherd's theological assumptions to (the ever-growing number of) scholars interested in her understanding of the mind. (shrink)

In this paper I argue for a novel interpretation of Shepherd’s notion of selfhood. In distinction to Deborah Boyle’s interpretation, I contend that Shepherd differentiates between the mind and the self. The latter, for Shepherd, is an effect arising from causal interactions between mind and body – specifically those interactions that give rise to our present stream of consciousness, our memories, and that can unite these two. Thus, the body plays a constitutive role in the formation of the self. The (...) upshot of this interpretation is that it can dissolve the problem of individuating mind that Boyle identifies. Briefly, the problem consists in Shepherd seemingly individuating minds in terms of their associated bodies and bodies in terms of the minds they are united with. My interpretation, however, allows to see that Shepherd neither wants nor needs to individuate the mind in isolation of the body and to read the passages, in which the problem seems to arise, as being about what makes living beings individual – with mind and body both playing a crucial role in this context. (shrink)

We review some results in the theory of non-relativistic quantum unstable systems. We account for the most important definitions of quantum resonances that we identify with unstable quantum systems. Then, we recall the properties and construction of Gamow states as vectors in some extensions of Hilbert spaces, called Rigged Hilbert Spaces. Gamow states account for the purely exponential decaying part of a resonance; the experimental exponential decay for long periods of time physically characterizes a resonance. We briefly discuss one of (...) the most usual models for resonances: the Friedrichs model. Using an algebraic formalism for states and observables, we show that Gamow states cannot be pure states or mixtures from a standard view point. We discuss some additional properties of Gamow states, such as the possibility of obtaining mean values of certain observables on Gamow states. A modification of the time evolution law for the linear space spanned by Gamow shows that some non-commuting observables on this space become commuting for large values of time. We apply Gamow states for a possible explanation of the Loschmidt echo. (shrink)

The aims of this paper are twofold. First, I offer a new insight into Shepherd’s theory of mind by demonstrating that she distinguishes a threefold ‘Variety of Intellect’, that is, three kinds of minds grouped according to their cognitive limitations. Following Shepherd, I call them (i) minds afflicted with idiocy, (ii) inferior understandings, and (iii) sound understandings. Second, I show how Shepherd’s distinction informs her theory of education. While Shepherd claims that her views serve to improve educational practices, she does (...) not explain how her threefold ‘Variety of intellect’ does so. I argue that Shepherd’s distinction contributes to her aim by providing pedagogues with a more comprehensive grasp of the various cognitive limitations of the people in their care. This allows the former to adjust their expectations and to provide need-oriented guidance. (shrink)

Through modern driver assistant systems, algorithmic decisions already have a significant impact on the behavior of vehicles in everyday traffic. This will become even more prominent in the near future considering the development of autonomous driving functionality. The need to consider ethical principles in the design of such systems is generally acknowledged. However, scope, principles and strategies for their implementations are not yet clear. Most of the current discussions concentrate on situations of unavoidable crashes in which the life of human (...) beings is existentially affected. In this paper, we argue that ethical considerations should be mandatory for any algorithmic decision of autonomous vehicles, instead of a limitation to hazard situations. Such an ethically aligned behavior is relevant because autonomous vehicles, like any other traffic participants, operate in a shared public space, where every behavioral decision impacts the operational possibilities of others. These possibilities concern the fulfillment of a road-user’s safety, utility and comfort needs. We propose that, to operate ethically in such space, an autonomous vehicle will have to take its behavior decisions according to a just distribution of operational possibilities among all traffic participants. Using an application on a partially-autonomous prototype vehicle, we describe how to apply and implement concepts of distributive justice to the driving environment and demonstrate the impact on its behavior in comparison to an advanced but egoistic decision maker. (shrink)

In this paper I argue that the idea of human dignity has a precise and philosophically relevant sense. Following recent works,we can find some important clues in the long history of the term.Traditionally, dignity conveys the idea of a high and honourable position in a hierarchical order, either in society or in nature. At first glance, nothing may seem more contrary to the contemporary conception of human dignity, especially in regard to human rights.However,an account of dignity as high rank provides (...) an illuminating perspective on the role it plays in the egalitarian discourse of human rights. In order to preserve that relational sense regarding human dignity, we can use the notion of moral status, towhich somemoral philosophers have paid attention in recent years.I explore the possibilities of the idea of moral status to better understand the idea of human dignity and its close relationship with human rights. (shrink)

The bridges of Königsberg case has been widely cited in recent philosophical discussions on scientific explanation as a potential example of a structural explanation of a physical phenomenon. However, when discussing this case, different authors have focused on two different versions, depending on what they take the explanandum to be. In one version, the explanandum is the _failure_ of a given individual in performing an Eulerian walk over the bridge system. In the other version, the explanandum is the _impossibility_ of (...) performing an Eulerian walk over the bridges. The goal of this paper is to show that only the latter version amounts to a real case of a structural explanation. I will also suggest how to fix the first version, and show how my remarks apply to other purported cases of structural explanations. (shrink)

The central aim of the present investigation is to shed light on Nietzsche’s understanding of happiness and a good life, starting from Nietzsche’s appropriation of Plato’s and Aristotle’s doctrine of a hierarchy of human beings and forms of life.

Why are we still intrigued by Nietzsche? This chapter argues that sustained interest stems from Nietzsche’s challenge to what we might call the ‘staticism’ inherent in our ordinary experience. Staticism can be defined, roughly speaking, as the view that the world is a collection of enduring, re-identifiable objects that change only very gradually and according to determinate laws. The chapter discusses Nietzsche’s rejection of remnants of staticism in Hegel and Schopenhauer (1). It outlines why Nietzsche deems belief in any variant (...) of the staticist picture as problematic (2); and examines his adualistic-dialetheic stance towards, for example, first-person and third-person descriptions in the philosophy of mind (3). The chapter closes with a discussion of the contributions of "Nietzsche on Time and History". (shrink)

The Enhanced Indispensability Argument appeals to the existence of Mathematical Explanations of Physical Phenomena to justify mathematical Platonism, following the principle of Inference to the Best Explanation. In this paper, I examine one example of a MEPP—the explanation of the 13-year and 17-year life cycle of magicicadas—and argue that this case cannot be used defend the EIA. I then generalize my analysis of the cicada case to other MEPPs, and show that these explanations rely on what I will call ‘optimal (...) representations’, which are representations that capture all that is relevant to explain a physical phenomenon at a specified level of description. In the end, because the role of mathematics in MEPPs is ultimately representational, they cannot be used to support mathematical Platonism. I finish the paper by addressing the claim, advanced by many EIA defendants, that quantification over mathematical objects results in explanations that have more theoretical virtues, especially that they are more general and modally stronger than alternative explanations. I will show that the EIA cannot be successfully defended by appealing to these notions. (shrink)

This article examines Nietzsche’s analysis of the phenomenology of agent causation. Sense of agent causation, our sense of self-efficacy, is tenacious because it originates, according to Nietzsche’s hypothesis, in the embodied and situated experience of effort in overcoming resistances. It arises at the level of the organism and is sustained by higher-order cognitive functions. Based on this hypothesis, Nietzsche regards the sense of self as emerging from a homeostatic system of drives and affects that unify such as to maintain self-efficacy (...) levels. He relies on the same hypothesis to explain the emergence of an ascetic moral system and its specific, interpretive-affective ‘mechanism of willing’. The article aligns Nietzsche’s account of agent causation with Albert Bandura’s self-efficacy studies and Antonio Damasio’s recent account of self-systems as homeostatic systems. (shrink)

The paper argues against a commitment to metaphysical necessity, semantic modalities are enough. The best approaches to elucidate the semantic modalities are (still) versions of lingustic ersatzism and fictionalism, even if only developed in parts. Within these necessary properties and the difference between natural and semantic laws can be accounted for. The proper background theory for this is an updated version of Logical Empiricism, which is congenial to recent trends in Structural Realism. The anti-metaphysical attitude of Logical Empiricism deserves revitalization. (...) Another target besides metaphysical necessity are substantial forms of iterated modalities, as used, for instance, in the philosophy of religion. (shrink)

Philosophers disagree whether composition as identity entails mereological universalism. Bricker :264–294, 2016) has recently considered an argument which concludes that composition as identity supports universalism. The key step in this argument is the thesis that any objects are identical to some object, which Bricker justifies with the principle of the universality of identity. I will spell out this principle in more detail and argue that it has an unexpected consequence. If the universality of identity holds, then composition as identity not (...) only leads us to universalism, but also leads to the view that there are no mereological atoms. (shrink)

Up to now researchers have maintained that Nietzsche’s philosophy has no concept of social justice or have hardly noticed such a concept. On the contrary, this article argues that social justice plays an important role in Nietzsche’s political thinking. It shows that his conception of justice is modelled after Plato’s antique concept of political justice. The main thesis of the paper is that this conception is embodied in Nietzsche’s notion of a well-ordered state or society. An additional thesis concerns the (...) anthropological basis of what Nietzsche holds to be a just social order. This basis is constituted by his conviction that people are not only fundamentally unequal but also extremely different in worth and rank. (shrink)

El trabajo consiste en una elucidación de los elementos que conforman el concepto de pena natural (poena naturalis) en el Derecho penal. Se puede caracterizar la pena natural como el daño o sufrimiento que recae sobre el autor de un delito, producto de la comisión del mismo, que debe ser descontado de la pena legal que ha de aplicársele. Si bien existe un mínimo acuerdo sobre esto, tanto en la jurisprudencia como en la doctrina penal se observan serios desacuerdos acerca (...) de los requisitos que se deben cumplir para reconocer que se está frente a una pena natural. Para elucidar los elementos, se utilizará el constructivismo conceptual de Ronald Dworkin, a fin de describir el desacuerdo y sus implicancias, reconocer los elementos principales de la pena natural y justificarlos bajo su mejor luz moral. ABSTRACT This study focuses on the clarification of the conceptual elements of poena naturalis in criminal law settings. The poena naturalis is the damage or suffering that falls on the convict for its commission. This damage must be deducted from the poena forensis to be applied. Although there is a minimum agreement about the concept of poena naturalis, in the jurisprudence and among legal scholars, there are serious disagreements about the elements of poena naturalis. To elucidate the elements, I will adopt Ronald Dworkin’s conceptual constructivism to describe the disagreement and its implications. At last, I will justify the main elements of the poena naturalis by their best moral light. (shrink)

For Nietzsche’s hypothesis of a threat of nihilism to be intelligible, this chapter attributes to him at least three assumptions that underpin his philosophical project: (1) what there is, is becoming (and not being), (2) most (if not all) strongly believe in being, and (3) nihilism is a function of the belief in being. This chapter argues that Nietzsche held two doctrines of becoming: one more radical, which he believes is required to fend off nihilism, and one much more moderate—the (...) ontology of relations he develops under the label ‘will to power’. Based on the latter he attempts (but ultimately fails) to develop an ‘adualistic’—neither monistic nor dualistic—practice of thought, a ‘simultaneity-thinking’ ("Zugleich-Denken") that would no longer be subject to nihilism. (shrink)

The main aim of this article is to reflect on the impact of biases related to artificial intelligence (AI) systems developed to tackle issues arising from the COVID-19 pandemic, with special focus on those developed for triage and risk prediction. A secondary aim is to review assessment tools that have been developed to prevent biases in AI systems. In addition, we provide a conceptual clarification for some terms related to biases in this particular context. We focus mainly on nonracial biases (...) that may be less considered when addressing biases in AI systems in the existing literature. In the manuscript, we found that the existence of bias in AI systems used for COVID-19 can result in algorithmic justice and that the legal frameworks and strategies developed to prevent the apparition of bias have failed to adequately consider social determinants of health. Finally, we make some recommendations on how to include more diverse professional profiles in order to develop AI systems that increase the epistemic diversity needed to tackle AI biases during the COVID-19 pandemic and beyond. (shrink)

This chapter provides summaries of the chapter of this book and introduces the major themes and debates addressed in the volume. Discussed are Nietzsche’s metaphysics; his philosophy of mind in light of contemporary views; the question of panpsychism of Beyond Good and Evil 36; the rejection of dualism in favour of monism, in particular a monism of value; Nietzsche’s positions on consciousness and embodied cognition in light of recent cognitive science; a conception of freedom and agency based on an intrinsically (...) motivating; embodied sense of self-efficacy; a Nietzschean account of valuing understood as drive-induced affective orientations of which an agent approves; the idea of ressentiment conceived as a process of intentional, not reflectively strategic, self-deception about one’s own conscious mental states; and a defence of a Nietzschean naturalism. (shrink)

En la literatura jurídico penal, el arrepentimiento cobra relevancia en un lugar específico: la condena, más precisamente, en la determinación de la pena del sujeto que ha sido encontrado responsable por la comisión de un delito y que, a su vez, se encuentra arrepentido por su accionar. Desde la concepción comunicativa del castigo, en este trabajo contestaré las siguientes preguntas: ¿El arrepentimiento significa un menor reproche penal o es indiferente para la determinación de la pena? en caso de que implique (...) un acercamiento al castigo mínimo establecido en la legislación ¿Cuándo es razonable que esto suceda? (shrink)

This paper looks at some aspects of semantic metarepresentation. It is mostly concerned with questions more formal, concerning the representation format in semantic metarepresentations, and the way they are processed. Section 1 distinguishes between metacognition and metarepresentation in a narrow and broad sense. Section 2 reminds the reader of some main areas where metarepresentations have to be used. The main part considers the ways that metarepresentations are built and processed. Section 3 introduces some general ideas how semantic metarepresentations are built (...) and processed. Section 4 looks at some recent theories about ways that semantic metarepresentations are built and processed. (shrink)

At least some serial killers are psychopathic serial killers. Psychopathic serial killers raise interesting questions about the nature of evil and moral responsibility. On the one hand, serial killers seem to be obviously evil, if anything is. On the other hand, psychopathy is a diagnosable disorder that, among other things, involves a diminished ability to understand and use basic moral distinctions. This feature of psychopathy suggests that psychopathic serial killers have at least diminished responsibility for what they do. In this (...) chapter I consider whether psychopathic serial killers might be properly said to be both evil and morally responsible for their actions. I argue that psychopathic serial killers are plausibly evil in at least one recognizable sense of the term, but that they are nevertheless not likely to be responsible for many of the evils they perpetuate. (shrink)

La mal llamada “Conquista del Desierto” constituyó una serie de campañas militares ocurridas en el actual territorio patagónico argentino entre los años 1878 y 1885 cuyo resultado fue el asesinato, la violación y sometimiento a la esclavitud de diversos pueblos y comunidades indígenas. Este no fue un caso aislado, sino que se suma a una serie de ataques sistemáticos que han sufrido los indígenas en la Argentina. En los últimos años, a raíz del reclamo y las luchas de los pueblos (...) y comunidades indígenas, así como también de las organizaciones de derechos humanos, se han comenzado a juzgar algunos de estos hechos. En particular, la Masacre de Napalpí (1924) y la Masacre de La Bomba (1947) fueron los primeros que lograron respuestas judiciales favorables. En ambos se determinó que el accionar estatal era constitutivo de un genocidio y, por lo tanto, se debía resarcir a las comunidades actuales. Ahora bien, la Campaña del Desierto, al día de hoy, no tiene respuesta por parte del Estado. Teniendo presente este panorama, nuestro objetivo en este trabajo es reconstruir los diferentes problemas que enfrenta la posibilidad del reclamo judicial. Para ello, comenzaremos describiendo en qué consistió la Campaña del Desierto. Luego, explicaremos la noción de genocidio aplicado a hechos de injusticias históricas. Como tercer paso, reconstruiremos los casos jurisprudenciales que se han preocupado por genocidios indígenas ocurridos en el pasado. Con este panorama revelado, nos enfocaremos en los diferentes problemas jurídicos y políticos que surgen en los reclamos de justicia. (shrink)

Contra Todd Ryan’s interpretation, I argue that it is possible to reconstruct a metaphysical argument that does not restrict likeness in general to ideas. While I agree with Ryan that Berkeley’s writings provide us with the resources to reconstruct such an argument, I disagree with Ryan that this argument entails a restriction of likeness to ideas. Unlike Ryan, I argue that Berkeley is not committed to the claim that we can compare only ideas, but to the view that the only (...) thing that can be compared to an idea is another idea. (shrink)

This article argues that Nietzsche’s transvaluation project refers not to a mere inversion or negation of a set of nihilism-prone, Judeo-Christian values but, instead, to a different conception of what a value is and how it functions. Traditional values function within a standard logical framework and claim legitimacy and “bindingness” based on exogenous authority with absolute extension. Nietzsche regards this framework as unnecessarily reductive in its attempted exclusion of contradiction and real opposition among competing values. I propose a nonstandard, dialetheic (...) model of valuation that requires a value to be both true and false as well as neither true nor false.In our Europe, life is no longer quite so uncertain, contingent, nonsensical. [...] The power man has achieved now allows a reduction of those means of discipline of which the moral interpretation was the strongest.— KSA 12:5[71]The logic of our conscious thinking is only a crude and facilitated form of the thinking needed by our organism [...] A simultaneity-thinking [ein Zugleichdenken], for example, is needed of which we have hardly an inkling. [...] We are still growing continually, our sense of time and place, etc., is still developing.— KSA 11:34[124]. (shrink)

The following essay reconsiders the ontological and logical issues around Frege’s Basic Law (V). If focuses less on Russell’s Paradox, as most treatments of Frege’s Grundgesetze der Arithmetik (GGA)1 do, but rather on the relation between Frege’s Basic Law (V) and Cantor’s Theorem (CT). So for the most part the inconsistency of Naïve Comprehension (in the context of standard Second Order Logic) will not concern us, but rather the ontological issues central to the conflict between (BLV) and (CT). These ontological (...) issues are interesting in their own right. And if and only if in case ontological considerations make a strong case for something like (BLV) we have to trouble us with inconsistency and paraconsistency. These ontological issues also lead to a renewed methodological reflection what to assume or recognize as an axiom. (shrink)

Nietzsche's thought has been of renewed interest to philosophers in the Anglo-American philosophical community as well as to philosophers of a more phenomenological and hermeneutic background. The volume aims to appeal to both communities of scholars as it seeks to deepen the growing interest and appreciation of Nietzsche's contribution to our understanding of the mind. The 16 essays by leading Nietzsche scholars examine Nietzsche's understanding of consciousness and investigate its continuities with current developments in philosophy of mind, neuroscience, neuroethics, psychology, (...) linguistics, and metaphysics. Recent work in philosophy of mind emphasises non-reductive approaches to consciousness and self-consciousness. The mental is understood as always already embodied as well as situated or embedded in and emerging from a complex system. Nietzsche's thoroughly naturalistic philosophy has received renewed attention as it challenges any reductivist attempt to understand the mental exclusively as a physical phenomenon using the methods of the natural sciences. His understanding of nature and the physical, informed by but not reducible to the natural sciences of his time, is highly idiosyncratic. It posits the mental at several levels, from unconscious and proto-conscious drives, affects and emotions, to reflective, higher-order conscious states, intentionality and language. (shrink)

Scholars have long recognized the existence of myriad widespread deep disagreements on values, justice, morality, and ethics. In order to come to terms with such deep disagreements, resistant to rational solution, this article asserts the need for developing an ethics of disagreement. The reality that theoretical disagreements often turn into practical conflicts is a major justification for why such an ethics is necessary. This paper outlines an ethics of deep disagreement that is primarily conceived of as a form of virtue (...) ethics. Such an ethics asks opposing parties in moral and intellectual conflicts to acknowledge that (a) deep disagreements exist, (b) opposing positions should be recognized as worthy of respect, and that (c) one should seek dialogue and mutual understanding. This ethical approach conceives of toleration as a moral and political virtue and presents an argument for toleration based on deep disagreements. (shrink)

The following considerations concern modelling Belief Dynamics (BD) not just in the sense of a formalization, but rather in the sense of building a computational model and implementing the corresponding data structures and algorithms of recomputing beliefs. The purpose of such a project is to illustrate some ideas about belief changes in a Web of Beliefs (WoB) to explore and deepen one's understanding of belief changes by trying to implement or improve corresponding algorithms.

Stephen May (2011) holds that language rights have been insufficiently recognized, or just rejected as problematic, in human rights theory and practice. Defending the “human rights approach to language rights”, he claims that language rights should be accorded the status of fundamental human rights, recognized as such by states and international organizations. This article argues that the notion of language rights is far from clear. According to May, one key reason for rejecting the claim that language rights should be considered (...) as human rights is the widespread belief that language rights are collective rights. In order to address this kind of objection, the collective character attributed to language rights must be carefully assessed, distinguishing two different views of what a collective right is. (shrink)

This paper considers three general dilemmas that tend to undermine successful configurations of unity: the either/or dilemma, the synthesis dilemma and the relativism dilemma. It argues that, in his aesthetic writings, Schiller’s critique of Kantian dualisms leads him to an adualistic conception of unity that operates with a different, more inclusive approach to opposition and unification. In order to clarify Schiller’s innovative and often misunderstood position, the paper draws on the disjunctive logic recently developed by Friedrich Kümmel.

Dieser Beitrag greift das Phänomen Fake News auf und plädiert für einen analytischen Zugang zur Thematik. Zunächst grenzt er den Begriff der Fake News von anderen Phänomenen ab. Er zeigt auf, dass der Begriff nicht nur keinen analytischen Mehrwert bietet, sondern dass er die eigentlichen Probleme verschleiert und als Propagandabegriff u.a. Verwendung findet, um Zensur zu rechtfertigen und die Gegenseite zu delegitimieren. Trotzdem sollte die Politische Bildung nicht vollkommen auf den Begriff verzichten. Versteht man Fake News als einen fließenden Signifikant (...) in hegemonischen Projekten, erlaubt dies den Zugriff auf die politische Dimension von Desinformation. Fake News als politischer Kampfbegriff lässt sich darüber hinaus als einen Angriff auf die Autorität der Leitmedien interpretieren. Der Autor geht im Anschluss sowohl auf die inhaltliche als auch auf die formelle Dimension dieses Angriffs ein. Darauf basierend erarbeitet er einen Vorschlag, wie Fake News auf analytischer Basis in der Politischen Bildung behandelt werden könnten. (shrink)

Traditionally transcendental logic has been set apart from formal logic. Transcendental logic had to deal with the conditions of possibility of judgements, which were presupposed by formal logic. Defined as a purely philosophical enterprise transcendental logic was considered as being a priori delivering either analytic or even synthetic a priori results. In this paper it is argued that this separation from the (empirical) cognitive sciences should be given up. Transcendental logic should be understood as focusing on specific questions. These do (...) not, as some recent analytic philosophy has it, include a refutation of scepticism. And they are not to be separated from meta-logical investigations. Transcendental logic properly understood, and redefined along these theses, should concern itself with the (formal) re-construction of the presupposed necessary conditions and rules of linguistic communication in general. It aims at universality and reflexive closure. (shrink)

We argue that there is no tension between Reid's description of science and his claim that science is based on the principles of common sense. For Reid, science is rooted in common sense since it is based on the idea that fixed laws govern nature. This, however, does not contradict his view that the scientific notions of causation and explanation are fundamentally different from their common sense counterparts. After discussing these points, we dispute with Cobb's and Benbaji's interpretations of Reid's (...) views on causation and explanation. Finally, we present Reid's views from the perspective of the contemporary debate on scientific explanation. (shrink)

This volume presents new essays exploring important aspects of Nietzsche's philosophy in connection with two major themes: mind and nature. A team of leading experts address questions including: What is Nietzsche's conception of mind? How does mind relate with the nature? And what is Nietzsche's conception of nature? They all express the thought that Nietzsche's views on these matters are of great philosophical value, either because those views are consonant with contemporary thinking to a greater or lesser extent or because (...) they represent a rich alternative to contemporary attitudes. (shrink)

Alternative Learning System (ALS) has been adopted in Philippine basic education, yet there is no academic institution in the region prepares ALS teachers in teaching life skills. ALS teachers graduated from different programs of teacher education for formal education. In response, an extension project was conceptualized and implemented to enhance the teaching capacity and effectiveness of ALS teachers. Case study was conducted to evaluate the effectiveness of the project. It explored the transfer of life skills among ALS teachers. Data were (...) collected from multiple sources. Interview and written responses, and feedbacks were analyzed using thematic narrative analysis. Other data were analyzed using document and descriptive analyses. The project had achieved its objectives and rated best by participants. These indicate that the project was implemented effectively and successfully. ALS teachers have acquired life skills and transferred them to others. Thus, the project has made a difference in the lives of these teachers. (shrink)