An introduction to the special issue on epistemic logic and the foundations of game theory edited by Michael Bacharach and Philippe Mongin. Contributors are Michael Bacharach, Robert Stalnaker, Salvatore Modica and Aldo Rustichini, Luc Lismont and Philippe Mongin, and Hyun-Song Shin and Timothy Williamson.

The philosophical interest in the nature, value, and varieties of human understanding has swelled in recent years. This article will provide an overview of new research in the epistemology of understanding, with a particular focus on the following questions: What is understanding and why should we care about it? Is understanding reducible to knowledge? Does it require truth, belief, or justification? Can there be lucky understanding? Does it require ‘grasping’ or some kind of ‘know-how’? This cluster of questions has largely (...) set the research agenda for the study of understanding in epistemology. This article will conclude by discussing some varieties of understanding and highlight directions for future research. (shrink)

The practice of medicine frequently involves the unconsented restriction of liberty. The reasons for unilateral liberty restrictions are typically that being confined, strapped down, or sedated are necessary to prevent the person from harming themselves or others. In this paper, we target the ethics of chemical restraints, which are medications that are used to intentionally restrict the mental states associated with the unwanted behaviors, and are typically not specifically indicated for the condition for which the patient is being treated. Specifically, (...) we aim to identify the conditions under which chemical restraints are ethically permissible. It is wrong to assume that what is morally true of physical restraints is also true of chemical restraints. Our aim is thus to identify the conditions under which chemical restraints are permissible while distinguishing these conditions from those of the application of physical restraints. (shrink)

Sometimes we learn through the use of imagination. The epistemology of imagination asks how this is possible. One barrier to progress on this question has been a lack of agreement on how to characterize imagination; for example, is imagination a mental state, ability, character trait, or cognitive process? This paper argues that we should characterize imagination as a cognitive ability, exercises of which are cognitive processes. Following dual process theories of cognition developed in cognitive science, the set of imaginative processes (...) is then divided into two kinds: one that is unconscious, uncontrolled, and effortless, and another that is conscious, controlled, and effortful. This paper outlines the different epistemological strengths and weaknesses of the two kinds of imaginative process, and argues that a dual process model of imagination helpfully resolves or clarifies issues in the epistemology of imagination and the closely related epistemology of thought experiments. (shrink)

Should we regret the fact that we are often more emotionally resilient in response to the deaths of our loved ones than we might expect -- that the suffering associated with grief often dissipates more quickly and more fully than we anticipate? Dan Moller ("Love and Death") argues that we should, because this resilience epistemically severs us from our loved ones and thereby "deprives us of insight into our own condition." I argue that Moller's conclusion is correct despite resting on (...) a mistaken picture of the nature and significance of grief. Unlike Moller, I contend that grief is a composite emotional process, rather than a single mental state; that grief is a species of emotional attention rather than perception; and that grief is a form of activity directed at placing our relationships with the deceased on new terms. It is precisely because grief has these three features that it facilitates the scrutiny of our practical identities and thus fosters self-knowledge and self-understanding. (shrink)

Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, EarlyView.

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

This paper asks whether there is a moral virtue of hope, and if so, what it is. The enterprise is motivated by a historical asymmetry, namely that while Christian thinkers have long classed hope as a theological virtue, it has not traditionally been classed as a moral one. But this is puzzling, for hoping well is not confined to the sphere of religion; and consequently we might expect that if the theological virtue is structurally sound, there will be a secular, (...) moral analogue. This paper proposes that there is such an analogue, and that it is closely linked to the everyday notion of “having your priorities straight,” a phenomenon which is naturally understood in terms of the attitude of hope. It turns out that the priorities model provides an abstract way of characterizing a central but underexplored virtue, one which can be developed in secular or theological ways. (shrink)

This paper contains a critical examination of the prospects for analyses of knowledge that weaken the factivity condition such that knowledge implies approximate truth.

This article considers distinct ways of understanding the world, referred to in psychology as Functions of Consciousness or as Cognitive Modes, having as the scope of interest epistemology and natural sciences. Inspired by C.G. Jung's Simile of the Spectrum, we consider three basic cognitive modes associated to: (R) embodied instinct, experience, and action; (G) reality perception and learning; and (B) concept abstraction, rational thinking, and language. RGB stand for the primary colors: red, green, and blue. Accordingly, a conceptual map between (...) cognitive modes and primary and secondary colors is built based on the physics and physiology of color perception and epistemological characteristics of the aforementioned cognitive modes, leading to logical relations structured as an Hexagon of Opposition. Finally, this model of cognitive modes is applied to the analysis and interpretation of some important episodes in the historical development of physics and technology. (shrink)

This is the introduction to the Routledge Companion to Thought Experiments.

This paper explores the prospects of combining two views. The first view is metaphysical rationalism : all things have an explanation. The second view is metaphysical essentialism: there are real essences. The exploration is motivated by a conflict between the views. Metaphysical essentialism posits facts about essences. Metaphysical rationalism demands explanations for all facts. But facts about essences appear to resist explanation. I consider two solutions to the conflict. Exemption solutions attempt to exempt facts about essences from the demand for (...) explanation. Explanation solutions attempt to explain facts about essences. I argue that exemption solutions are less promising than explanation solutions. I then consider how explanation solutions might be developed. I suggest that a “generative” approach is most promising. I tentatively conclude that the prospects for combining metaphysical rationalism and metaphysical essentialism turn on the viability of a generative approach. This sets the agenda for defending the combination as well as the more general project of explaining essences. (shrink)

According to the perceptual view of language comprehension, listeners typically recover high-level linguistic properties such as utterance meaning without inferential work. The perceptual view is subject to the Objection from Context: since utterance meaning is massively context-sensitive, and context-sensitivity requires cognitive inference, the perceptual view is false. In recent work, Berit Brogaard provides a challenging reply to this objection. She argues that in language comprehension context-sensitivity is typically exercised not through inferences, but rather through top-down perceptual modulations or perceptual learning. (...) This paper provides a complete formulation of the Objection from Context and evaluates Brogaards reply to it. Drawing on conceptual considerations and empirical examples, we argue that the exercise of context-sensitivity in language comprehension does, in fact, typically involve inference. (shrink)

Authors critical of corporate power focus almost exclusively on one solution: bringing it under democratic control. However important this is, there are at least two other options, which are rarely discussed: reducing powerful firms’ size and influence, or accepting corporate power as a necessary evil. This article provides a comparative perspective for evaluating all three options. It argues that the trade-offs we face in responding to corporate power have a trilemmatic structure. The pure strategies of accepting powerful firms, breaking them (...) up, or rendering them more accountable are each incompatible with one of three important values: power balance, economies of scale, and minimizing agency costs, respectively. While the latter two concepts are purely economic and efficiency-based, the value of power balance can be grounded in a variety of reasons. Different normative interpretations of power balance are discussed, along with their implications for policy choices within the trilemma. (shrink)

If there is something (P) that every possible agent is committed to value, and certain actions or attitudes either enhance or diminish P, then normative claims about a range of intentional actions can be objectively and non-trivially evaluated. I argue that the degree of existence as an agent depends on the consistency of reflexive-relating with other individuals of the agent-kind: the ontological thesis. I then show that in intending to act on a reason, every agent is rationally committed to value (...) ‘above all else’ being an agent, what consists in exercising the capacity to act and having the freedom to discriminate between more or less valuable actions: the transcendental thesis. Since the degree of possession of this personal but non-contingent good depends on relating to other agents in a special way, certain actions and attitudes may be objectively right or wrong for all agents. (shrink)

There is a loud and persistent drum beat of support for schools, for citizenship, for diversity and inclusion, and increasingly for labor market readiness with very little critical attention to the assumptions underlying these agendas, let alone to their many internal contradictions. Accordingly, in this book I examine the philosophical, motivational, and practical challenges of education theory, policy, and practice in the twenty-first century. As I proceed, I do not neglect the historical, comparative international context so essential to better understanding (...) where we are, as well as what is attainable in terms of educational justice. I argue that we must constructively critique some of our most cherished beliefs about education if we are to save the hope of real justice from the rhetoric of imagined justice. (shrink)

Evaluative claims and assumptions are ubiquitous in positive psychology. Some will deny this. But such disavowals are belied by the literature. Some will consider the presence of evaluative claims a problem and hope to root them out. But this is a mistake. If positive psychology is to live up to its raison d’être – to be the scientific study of the psychological components of human flourishing or well-being – it must make evaluative claims. Well-being consists in those things that are (...) good for us, that make life go well. Thus, one cannot investigate this topic without making claims about what is good for people and what they have reason to do. It’s time, therefore, to embrace the fact that positive psychology is value-laden. Doing so would benefit the field by allowing for more rigorous theorizing, and – perhaps counterintuitively – increasing the field’s objectivity. (shrink)

The ‘Big 3’ theories of well-being—hedonism, desire-satisfactionism, and objective list theory—attempt to explain why certain things are good for people by appealing to prudentially good-making properties. But they don’t attempt to explain why the properties they advert to make something good for a person. Perfectionism, the view that well-being consists in nature-fulfilment, is often considered a competitor to these views (or else a version of the objective list theory). However, I argue that perfectionism is best understood as explaining why certain (...) properties are prudentially good-making. This version of perfectionism is compatible with each of the Big 3, and, I argue, quite attractive. (shrink)

Whatever the merits idealized liberal accounts of citizenship education may have in the seminar room, in this essay I argue that they are both unpersuasive and ineffectual. This is the case, because they are insufficiently attentive to the empirical realities, first (a) with respect to how real – versus imaginary – school systems function; and second, (b) with respect to the broader political context in which citizenship education policies are implemented. Because so much is already known about the former, I (...) devote more attention in this essay to the latter. (shrink)

There has been a growing charge that perdurantism—with its bloated ontology of very person-like objects that coincide persons—implies the repugnant conclusion that we are morally obliged to be feckless. I argue that this charge critically overlooks the epistemic situation—what I call the ‘veil of ignorance’—that perdurantists find themselves in. Though the veil of ignorance still requires an alteration of our commonsense understanding of the demands on action, I argue for two conclusions. The first is that the alteration that is required (...) isn’t a moral one, but rather an alteration of prudential reasoning. Second, and more importantly, this alteration isn’t necessarily a repugnant one. In fact, given that it prudentially pushes one towards greater impartiality, it may be seen as a point in favor of perdurantism. (shrink)

Several anti-debunkers have argued that evolutionary explanations of our moral beliefs fail to meet a necessary condition on undermining defeat called modal security. They conclude that evolution, therefore, does not debunk our moral beliefs. This article shows that modal security is false if knowledge is virtuous achievement. New information can undermine a given belief without providing reason to doubt that that belief is sensitive or safe. This leads to a novel conception of undermining defeat, and it shows that successful debunking (...) of moral realism is possible. (shrink)

My thesis is that social constructionists should embrace minimalist race. By this I mean they should accept the minimalist concept of race and the existence of minimalist races. They are likely to reject this suggestion because they are antirealists about biological race. But their antirealism about biological race is based on their identification of the biological concept of race with the racialist concept of race. The minimalist concept of race is free of the invidious features that make the racialist concept (...) objectionable. It represents race as ancestry marked by patterns of visible physical differences. The reasons social constructionists have to reject the racialist concept of race do not extend to the minimalist concept of race. Social constructionists should accept that minimalist races exist, because it is overwhelmingly plausible that such races exist. Furthermore, they need minimalist races to account for the biological correlate of social race and to secure the biological materials the project of social construction requires. (shrink)

ABSTRACT The logic of humor has been acknowledged as an essential dimension of every joke. However, what is the logic of jokes, exactly? The modern theories of humor maintain that jokes are characterized by their own logic, dubbed “pseudo,” “playful,” or “local,” which has been the object of frequent criticisms. This article intends to address the limitations of the current perspectives on the logic of jokes by proposing a rhetorical approach to humorous texts. Building on the traditional development of Aristotle’s (...) almost neglected view of jokes as surprising enthymemes, the former are analyzed as rhetorical arguments. Like enthymemes, jokes are characterized by natural inferences that can be represented as topics, and quasi-formalized in argumentation theory as argumentation schemes. Like rhetorical arguments, jokes express a reason in support of different types of conclusions and proceed from distinct kinds of reasoning and semantic relations. (shrink)

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

This chapter first introduces naturalistic approaches to ethics more generally and distinguishes methodological ethical naturalism (the focus of this chapter), from metaphysical ethical naturalism. The second part then discusses evolutionary ethics as a specific variant of methodological ethical naturalism. After introducing the concepts of evolutionary theory that are relevant for evolutionary ethics, I will sketch the history of evolutionary ethics, which offers an interesting lesson about why it became a controversial topic, and then focus on four central questions about ethics (...) that can be approached from within the framework of evolutionary ethics: 1. What should we do? 2. Why are we moral? 3. Are there moral facts? 4. Can we have justified moral beliefs and moral knowledge? (shrink)

S-frames and i-frames do not represent two opposed types of intervention. Rather they are interpretive lenses for focusing on specific aspects of interventions, all of which include individual and structural dimensions. There is no sense to be made of prioritizing either system change or individual change, because each requires the other.

Awareness and concern about climate change are widespread. But rates of pro-environmental behaviour are low. This is partly due to the way in which pro-environmental behaviour is framed—as a sacrifice or burden that individuals bear for the planet and future generations. This framing elicits well-known cognitive biases, discouraging what we should be encouraging. We should abandon the self-sacrifice framing, and instead frame pro-environmental behaviour as intrinsically desirable. There is a large body of evidence that, around the world, people who are (...) living more environmentally lifestyles are happier than those not doing so. This is the message we should be spreading. (shrink)

Drawing on the epistemology of logic literature on anti-exceptionalism about logic, we set out to investigate the following metaphilosophical questions empirically: Is philosophy special? Are its methods (dis)continuous with science? More specifically, we test the following metaphilosophical hypotheses empirically: philosophical deductivism, philosophical inductivism, and philosophical abductivism. Using indicator words to classify arguments by type (namely, deductive, inductive, and abductive arguments), we searched through a large corpus of philosophical texts mined from the JSTOR database (N = 435,703) to find patterns of (...) argumentation. The results of our quantitative, corpus-based study suggest that deductive arguments are significantly more common than abductive arguments and inductive arguments in philosophical texts overall, but they are gradually and steadily giving way to non-deductive (i.e. inductive and abductive) arguments in academic philosophy. (shrink)

The issue of voting rights for older children has been high on the political and philosophical agenda for quite some time now, and not without reason. Aside from principled moral and philosophical reasons why it is an important matter, many economic, environmental, and political issues are currently being decided—sometimes through indecision—that greatly impact the future of today’s children. Past and current generations of adults have, arguably, mortgaged their children’s future, and this makes the question whether (some) children should be granted (...) the right to vote all the more pressing. Should (some) children be given the right to vote? Moreover, does the answer to this question depend on civic education, on whether children have been deliberately prepared for the exercise of that right? These are the questions that will occupy us in this article. Our answer to the first will be that older children—children roughly between 14 and 16 years of age1—ought to be given the right to vote. (shrink)

Attention plays a role in demonstrative thought: It sets the targets. Visual experience also plays a role. I argue here that it makes visual information available for use in the voluntary control of focal attention. To do so I use both introspection and neurophysiological evidence from projections between areas of attentional control and neural correlates of consciousness. Campbell and Smithies also identify roles for experience, but they further argue that only experience can play those roles. In contrast, I argue that (...) experience is not the only way in which visual information could be accessed for the voluntary control of attention. (shrink)

This paper introduces a model for evidence denial that explains this behavior as a manifestation of rationality and it is based on the contention that social values (measurable as utilities) often underwrite these sorts of responses. Moreover, it is contended that the value associated with group membership in particular can override epistemic reason when the expected utility of a belief or belief system is great. However, it is also true that it appears to be the case that it is still (...) possible for such unreasonable believers to reverse this sort of dogmatism and to change their beliefs in a way that is epistemically rational. The conjecture made here is that we should expect this to happen only when the expected utility of the beliefs in question dips below a threshold where the utility value of continued dogmatism and the associated group membership is no longer sufficient to motivate defusing the counter-evidence that tells against such epistemically irrational beliefs. (shrink)

This chapter examines what protest is from the point of view of pragmatics, and how it relates to propaganda—specifically what Jason Stanley calls ‘positive propaganda.’ It analyzes the phrase “Black Lives Matter,” taking it to be a political speech act that offers a unique route to understanding of the pragmatics of protest. From this, it considers the moral-epistemological function of protest, and develops an account of the authority that protest, as a speech act, both calls upon and makes explicit. It (...) then argues that, rather than simply its effects, it is protest’s distinct pragmatic features—that is, its entitlement conditions, and the uptake it aim at—that best capture its important moral, political, and epistemic elements. It therefore rejects the idea that protests are paradigmatic examples of ‘positive propaganda,’ because the propaganda model cannot capture protests’ function of foregrounding the socially located moral authority of the protestor. (shrink)

This chapter explores an unappreciated psychological dimension of intellectual humility. In particular, I argue there is a plausible connection between intellectual humility and epistemic egocentrism. Epistemic egocentrism is a well-known cognitive bias – often called ‘the curse of knowledge’ – whereby an agent attributes his or her own mental states to other people. I hypothesize that an individual who exhibits this bias is more likely to possess a variety of traits that are characteristic of intellectual humility. This is surprising because (...) intellectual humility is often regarded as an antidote to cognitive biases, whereas I claim that a particular cognitive bias (namely, the curse of knowledge) may help foster an intellectual virtue. (shrink)

This paper explores the relationship between romantic love and polyamory. Our central question is whether traditional norms of monogamy can be excised from romantic love so as to harmonize with polyamory’s ethical dimensions (as we construe them). How one answers this question bears on another: whether ‘polyamory’ should principally be understood in terms of romantic love or instead some alternative conception(s). Our efforts to address these questions begin by briefly motivating our favored approach to romantic love, a “narratival” one inspired (...) by 1930s cultural theorist Denis de Rougemont, wherein such love is exclusive, supernatural or promising transcendence, painful, impeded, and, ultimately, fatal. We maintain that, even once exclusivity is removed as an official component, tensions with polyamory’s ethical dimensions remain: romantic love’s other elements rationalize acting and feeling in ways that privilege a singular beloved above others. A tempting solution is to further revise romantic love. However, we are skeptical that this leaves space for distinctively romantic love. Our tentative proposal, then, is that polyamory’s ethical dimensions favor rejecting romantic love as ultimately desirable. (shrink)

In this paper, I argue that sportspersonship is a means of performing fundamental sociality; it is about the conversion of a foe (inimicus) into an enemy (hostis). Drawing on Carl Schmitt’s distinction between enemy and foe – inimicus and hostis – as well as his discussion of the ius publicum Europaeum, I suggest a model of sportspersonship that sees it as expressing the competitive relations between equals that undergird the most minimal form of sociality; relations that any deeper union takes (...) as its foundation. It is the performance of this fundamental sociality, I argue, that grounds the value of sport in general (though this does not mean that there cannot be other, contingent values in sport). (shrink)

Moral realism and ethical naturalism are both highly attractive ethical positions but historically they have often been thought to be irreconcilable. Since the late 1980s defenders of Cornell Realism have argued that the two positions can consistently be combined. They make three constitutive claims: (i) Moral properties are natural kind properties that (ii) are identical to (or supervene) on descriptive functional properties, which (iii) causally regulate our use of moral terms. We offer new arguments against the feasibility of Cornell realism (...) and then show that there is a way to be a naturalistic realist that avoids internal inconsistency and uniquely provides for moral normativity. (shrink)

In the essay “Cézanne’s Doubt,” Merleau-Ponty explores the relationship between Paul Cézanne’s art and his embodiment. The doubt in question is ultimately about the meaning of his disabilities. Should Cézanne’s disabilities or impairments shape how we interpret his art or should they instead be treated as incidental, as mere biographical data? Although Merleau-Ponty's essay isn’t intended to be phenomenological, its line of questioning is as much about lived experience as it is about art criticism, art history, and aesthetics. I here (...) offer a reading of “Cézanne’s Doubt” as an exploration of one of the more fundamental issues for phenomenological methodology: the relationship between normality and the normate. I first defend this phenomenological and disability-centric or crip reading of the essay. I then argue that insofar as one takes oneself to be “normal” and insofar as doing so underwrites phenomenological inquiry, the problematic of the normate, not just that of normality, is central to phenomenology. (shrink)

In this chapter, I develop a pragmatic defense of critical patriotism, one that recognizes the many personal and social benefits of patriotic sentiment yet which is also infused with a passion for justice. Though the argument is pragmatic given the ubiquity of patriotic sentiment, I argue that critical patriotism is able to reconcile a love of one’s country with an ardent determination to reform and improve it.

A familiar injunction is to follow your dreams. But what are these dreams? Despite their importance, philosophers have almost entirely ignored the topic. This paper fills this gap by advancing an account of the psychological makeup and the normative powers of dreams. To elucidate their psychology, I identify the salient features of dreams. I argue that these features are explained by the hypothesis that dreams are a species of hope. More specifically, the proposal is that dreams fit the standard model (...) of hope, which characterizes hope in terms of desire and belief. But this analysis is only plausible if hope, so understood, is suited to play the normative roles that dreams appear to play (otherwise the significance of dreams will need to be deflated). I argue that dream-constituting desires play a dual normative role: they ground weighty practical reasons (rooted in the identity of the dreamer) and likewise help us to learn about our reasons for action. I argue that hope in the standard sense can fulfill both roles. So while many philosophers in recent years have been focused on analyzing more complex forms of hope, it turns out that our most basic hopes are among the most normatively significant. (shrink)

Contemporary philosophers and scientists have done much to expand our understanding of the structure and neural mechanisms of joint action. But the phenomenology of joint action has only recently become a live topic for research. One method of clarifying what is unique about the phenomenology of joint action is by considering the alternative perspective of agents subsumed in group action. By group action we mean instances of individual agents acting while embedded within a group agent, instead of with individual coordination. (...) Paradigm examples are educational bureaucracies, corporations, and nation states. There is a phenomenological difference between agents whose actions are subsumed within a group action (“the university did X”) as compared to agents who act jointly (“we did x”). Attending to this difference clarifies what is phenomenologically distinctive about joint action. Appealing to an Aristotelian account of agency and to the metaphysical concept of weak emergence, we argue that what makes paradigmatic group action distinctive is the relative inaccessibility, un-revisability, and evaluative simplicity of the group agent’s goal(s) from the perspective of individual agents. This suggests that a distinctive feature of joint agency is the maintenance of a greater sense of individual agency. Put simply, joint agency is often experienced as an enhancement of the individuals’ agency precisely because our paradigmatic agential powers are extended intersubjectively as we act together. In contrast, group agency often involves a loss of the sense of agency, precisely because it is the emergent group agent that maintains the agential powers. (shrink)

This dissertation fits within the literature on subordinating speech and aims to demonstrate that how language subordinates is more complex than has been described by most philosophers. I argue that the harms that subordinating speech inflicts on its targets (chapter one), the type of authority that is exercised by subordinating speakers (chapters two and three), and the expansive variety of subordinating speech acts themselves (chapter three) are all under-developed subjects in need of further refinement—and, in some cases, large paradigm shifts. (...) I also examine cases that have yet to be adequately addressed by philosophers working on this topic, like the explosion of abusive speech online (chapter four) or the distinctive speech acts of protest groups (chapter five). I argue that by considering these alongside the ‘paradigm’ cases of subordinating speech that inform most models, we are better able to capture the lived realities of this phenomena, as described by members of groups targeted by such speech. I develop a novel account of speaker authority to explain the variety of pragmatic effects subordinating speech generates. Instead of seeing this authority as reducible to either a formal position or a merely local, linguistic phenomenon, I argue for a conception of speaker authority that is a richly contextual social fact, distributed unevenly among members of different social groups. I also develop an account of collective authority that explains how a group of speakers can join together to subordinate in a way that no individual speaker is capable of doing. This account, I argue, is better able to explain the social reality of subordinating speech than individualist models. Overall, I show how a more fine-grained account of subordinating speaker authority gives us a more accurate picture of the different subordinating speech acts available to different speakers, along with how these may harm their targets. (shrink)

This is a short (c. 4000 words) teaching piece aimed at first year undergraduates, on the topic of moral relativism.

Marx’s theory of historical materialism seeks to explain human history and development on the basis of the material conditions underlying all human existence. For Marx, the most important of all human activities is the activity of production by means of labor. With his focus on production through labor, Marx argues that it is possible to provide a materialistic explanation of how human beings not only transform the world (by applying the “forces of production” to it) but also transform themselves in (...) transforming the world (by entering into “relations of production” with one another). For Marx, the productive labor of human beings – and the resulting interplay between the forces and relations of production – function together as the engine which drives all historical change and development. By understanding how the productive activities of human beings give rise to the division of labor and class conflict, it becomes possible, according to Marx, to understand how different historical epochs succeed one another, and how the trajectory of human history points towards a communist society within which the division of labor and class conflict will be abolished. (shrink)

The Zhuangzi 莊子 depicts persons as surviving their deaths through the natural transformations of the world into very different forms—such as roosters, cart-wheels, rat livers, and so on. It is common to interpret these passages metaphorically. In this essay, however, I suggest employing a “Conventionalist” view of persons that says whether a person survives some event is not merely determined by the world, but is partly determined by our own attitudes. On this reading, Zhuangzi’s many teachings urging us to embrace (...) transformation are not merely a psychological aid for dealing with death, but also serve as a tool for literally surviving it. (shrink)

Kant’s doctrine of the “transcendental object” has always puzzled interpreters. On the one hand, he says that the transcendental object is the object to which we relate our representations. On the other hand, he declares the transcendental object to be unknowable and identifies it with the thing in itself. I argue that this poses a problem that Kant only in the B edition of the Critique solves in a satisfactory manner. According to this solution, we ascribe sensible predicates to things (...) in themselves, but only insofar as they appear. I conclude that this could motivate a phenomenalist account of Kant’s idealism, but one that gives due weight to the role of things in themselves. (shrink)

There is a non-trivial chance that sometime in the (perhaps somewhat distant) future, someone will build an artificial general intelligence that will surpass human-level cognitive proficiency and go on to become "superintelligent", vastly outperforming humans. The advent of superintelligent AI has great potential, for good or ill. It is therefore imperative that we find a way to ensure-long before one arrives-that any superintelligence we build will consistently act in ways congenial to our interests. This is a very difficult challenge in (...) part because most of the final goals we could give an AI admit of so-called "perverse instantiations". I propose a novel solution to this puzzle: instruct the AI to love humanity. The proposal is compared with Yudkowsky's Coherent Extrapolated Volition, and Bostrom's Moral Modeling proposals. (shrink)

Pope Benedict XVI argued that it is "necessary and reasonable to raise the question of God through the use of reason" and to understand "theology, as inquiry into the rationality of faith." (Ratzinger 2006) The idea that faith per se can be reconciled with rationality per se presents a delicate analytical task for philosophy of religion, to consistently ground a belief system which is regarded by nonbelievers as inherently ungrounded and inconsistent, without negating any grounding postulates internal to the dogma. (...) Focussing on Abrahamic theism, with special emphasis on Christianity, I interpret the Biblical narrative as a symbolic representation of a universal normative structure grounded in social ontology and the value-commitments intrinsic to agency. (shrink)

There are long-standing doubts about whether data from subjective scales—for instance, self-reports of happiness—are cardinally comparable. It is unclear how to assess whether these doubts are justified without first addressing two unresolved theoretical questions: how do people interpret subjective scales? Which assumptions are required for cardinal comparability? This paper offers answers to both. It proposes an explanation for scale interpretation derived from philosophy of language and game theory. In short: conversation is a cooperative endeavour governed by various maxims (Grice 1989); (...) because subjective scales are vague and individuals want to make themselves understood, scale interpretation is a search for a focal point (Schelling 1960). A specific focal point it hypothesised; if this hypothesis is correct, subjective data will be cardinally comparable. Four individually necessary and jointly sufficient conditions for cardinal comparability are specified. The paper then argues this hypothesis can be empirically be tested, makes an initial attempt to do so using subjective well-being data, and concludes it is supported. Numerous areas for further research are identified including, at the end of the paper, how certain tests could be used to ‘correct’ subjective data if they are not cardinal. (shrink)

Philosophical views about the logical structure of time are typically divided between proponents of A and B theories, based on McTaggart's A and B series. Drawing on Paul Ricoeur's hermeneutic phenomenology, I develop and defend McTaggart's thesis that the C series and the A series working together give a consistent description of temporal experience, provided that the two series are treated as distinct dimensions internal to time. In the proposed two-dimensional model, the C series expresses a nesting order of the (...) constitutive states of a world, whereas ontological continuity and change are properties of the A series. This, I argue, allows for limited backward causation. (shrink)