In this article we offer a perspective on the immense number of problems and challenges confronting humanity in our common biosphere. As our human population grows and urbanization increases globally, billions of humans with diverse beliefs and opinions are living in large urban areas without the basic needs of life. The way forward in our biosphere is not violence and disrespect. It is working to maintain and improve our common biosphere and solve our common global problems. Religion and religious believers (...) will need science, so humans can survive and sustain our biosphere. (shrink)

Is there a possible biological explanation for religion? That is, is there a genetic basis for believing in mystical, supernatural beings when there is no scientifi c evidence for their existence? Can we explain why some people prefer to accept myth over science? Why do so many people still accept creation and refuse to embrace evolution? Is there an evolutionary basis for religious beliefs? It is certainly true that religions have been part of human civilization throughout most of its recent (...) history, at least for the last 5,000 years, and probably for much longer. Even great nonmystical philosophers such as Confucius, Buddha, and Lao Tzu have had their teachings evolve into mystical religions with spiritual ancestors, gods and reincarnation. On the other hand, religion is largely absent in modern Chinese culture, and of diminishing importance in Japanese and European cultures. In all cultures, the degrees of education gained by individuals correlate inversely with attachments to mystical deities. Atheists abound although they may be reluctant to come out of the closet and affi rm their rational convictions. In this article, we seek explanations for human irrationality. (shrink)

We examine that both science and religion were original products of the human imagination. However, the approaches taken to develop these two explanations of life, were entirely different. The precepts of evolution are well established through the scientific method. This approach has led to the accumulation of immense amounts of evidence for biological evolution, and much scientific progress has been made to understand the pathways taken for the appearance of organisms and their macromolecular constituents. The existence of spiritual beings has (...) not and presumably cannot be documented via a scientific approach, no more than a fairy tale or a myth. However, science, education and knowledge coupled to proper actions are exactly what are needed to make the correct decisions so as to preserve and improve our common, shared biosphere which is currently confronted with two immense problems: human population growth and climate change. (shrink)

The protection of rare species abounds with scientific and ethical considerations. An ethical dilemma can emerge when the life of one species is valued higher than that of another, and so we discuss the basis of ranking, protection, and valuation of plants and animals. A duty to protect rare species exists in this age of great losses to plant and animal life, but the scientific and public communities are not always in agreement regarding what species deserve protection. Using a case (...) study, we illustrate how the decision to kill beavers to protect a rare plant and rare animals found in a tidewater creek demanded an ecological ethic approach. We present the concept of a" conservation mediator" and how its use may help find a common ground between stakeholders and decision-makers in similar situations. (shrink)

Graduates' employability indicates the excellent education and relevant preparation they obtained from their respective degrees. Tracer studies have enabled higher education institutions to profile their graduates while also reflecting on the quality of education they provide. With the foregoing, a tracer study determined the demographic and academic profile of teacher education graduates from 2017 to 2020 in a state university in the West Philippines. It also ascertained the advanced studies they attended after college, their employment data, the relevance of college (...) preparation with their current employment, difficulties they encountered while securing employment and in their present job, and recommendations to strengthen the teacher education program. The study utilized a descriptive survey research design with 80 non-random samples chosen based on availability. The survey was based on the Philippine Commission on Higher Education with modifications elucidated from previous studies. Results showed that graduates took the teacher education program with a strong passion for the teaching profession. More graduates received honors and awards, passed the licensure examinations for teachers, attended advanced studies for professional development, and are employable. Besides, the graduates’ college preparation is relevant to their current employment. Further, difficulties and problems encountered and recommendations to strengthen the teacher education program were noted. These findings may serve as a baseline for curriculum review and give suggestions for future tracer studies. (shrink)

This book collects and focuses recent writings of Arthur Schlesinger on the themes of its title. In its short Foreword and seven concise essays, the book aims to explore, in some contrast with the genre of “instant history,” the relationship between President George W. Bush’s Iraq adventure and the national past. This aim and the present work are deserving of wide attention, both because of the contemporary need to deal with the extended war in Iraq and because Americans, in particular, (...) need to attend to their own history, if we are to avoid past mistakes and make the best use of our ongoing political traditions and institutions. In order to know better where we might go in the future, we need an adequate picture of where we have been in the past. Schlesinger invites us to debate the war, the Presidency, and their relation to the American past. (shrink)

Berkeley's doctrines about mind, the language of nature, substance, minima sensibilia, notions, abstract ideas, inference, and freedom appropriate principles developed by the 16th-century logician Peter Ramus and his 17th-century followers (e.g., Alexander Richardson, William Ames, John Milton). Even though Berkeley expresses himself in Cartesian or Lockean terms, he relies on a Ramist way of thinking that is not a form of mere rhetoric or pedagogy but a logic and ontology grounded in Stoicism. This article summarizes the central features of (...) Ramism, indicates how Berkeley adapts Ramist concepts and strategies, and chronicles Ramism's pervasiveness in Berkeley's education, especially at Trinity College Dublin. (shrink)

This is a expository and critical review of Arthur Schlesinger, Jr. 's last book, War and the American Presidency. The book collects and focuses recent writings of Arthur Schlesinger on the themes of its title. In its short Foreword and seven concise essays, the book aims to explore, in some contrast with the genre of “instant history,” the relationship between President George W. Bush’s Iraq adventure and the national past. This aim and the present work are deserving of wide attention, (...) both because of the contemporary need to deal with the extended war in Iraq and because Americans, in particular, need to attend to their own history, if we are to avoid past mistakes and make the best use of our ongoing political traditions and institutions. In order to know better where we might go in the future, we need an adequate picture of where we have been in the past. Schlesinger invites us to debate the war, the Presidency, and their relation to the American past. (shrink)

In this article I offer a critique of certain moral perspectives that are found in the second edition of Engelhardt’s Foundation of Bioethics. These views are spelled out in explicit detail in his second edition, and follow on the heels of a profound religious conversion. I question some of the conclusions that Engelhardt reaches as they touch upon moral frameworks, pluralism, and a ‘secular’ bioethics.

Contemporary theories of consciousness are based on widely different concepts of its nature, most or all of which probably embody aspects of the truth about it. Starting with a concept of consciousness indicated by the phrase “the feeling of what happens” (the title of a book by Antonio Damásio), we attempt to build a framework capable of supporting and resolving divergent views. We picture consciousness in terms of Reality experiencing itself from the perspective of cognitive agents. Each conscious experience is (...) regarded as composed of momentary feeling events that are combined by recognition and evaluation into extended conscious episodes that bind cognitive contents with a wide range of apparent durations (0.1 secs to 2 or more secs, for us humans, depending on circumstances and context). Three necessary conditions for the existence of consciousness are identified: a) a ground of Reality, envisaged as an universal field of potentiality encompassing all possible manifestations, whether material or 'mental'; b) a transitional zone, leading to; c) a manifest world with its fundamental divisions into material, 'informational' and quale-endowed aspects. We explore ideas about the nature of these necessary conditions, how they may relate to one another and whether our suggestions have empirical implications. (shrink)

I explain why, from the perspective of knowledge-centric anti-luck epistemology, objective act consequentialist theories of ethics imply skepticism about the moral status of our prospective actions and also tend to be self-defeating, undermining the justification of consequentialist theories themselves. For according to knowledge-centric anti-luck epistemology there are modal anti-luck demands on both knowledge and justification, and it turns out that our beliefs about the moral status of our prospective actions are almost never able to satisfy these demands if objective act (...) consequentialism is true. This kind of applied moral skepticism introduces problematic limits on our ability to use objective act consequentialism’s explanatory power as evidence for its truth. This is, in part, a product of higher-order defeat as I explain in the final section. There is, however, a silver lining for objective act consequentialists. For there is at least one type of objective act consequentialism, prior existence consequentialism, that is poised to avoid at least some of the epistemic problems discussed in this paper. (shrink)

When a belief is self-fulfilling, having it guarantees its truth. When a belief is self-defeating, having it guarantees its falsity. These are the cases of “self-impacting” beliefs to be examined below. Scenarios of self-defeating beliefs can yield apparently dilemmatic situations in which we seem to lack sufficient reason to have any belief whatsoever. Scenarios of self-fulfilling beliefs can yield apparently dilemmatic situations in which we seem to lack reason to have any one belief over another. Both scenarios have been used (...) independently to challenge Evidentialism, on which what we may rationally believe is all and only what fits our current evidence. Here we tie the two scenarios together and explore what a knowledge-sensitive evidentialist approach to one implies for the other. (shrink)

This article aims to read feminist new materialisms (Barad), together with ‘postulated’ linguistic or cultural primacy of Queer Theory (Butler), to show how both are engaged in similar critical-ethical endeavours. The central argument is that the criticism of Barad and new materialisms misses Butler’s materialistic insights due to a narrow interpretation of Butler's alleged social-constructivist position. There is, therefore, a specific focus on where they both make similar ethical appeals. Moreover, the article relies on Adorno's negative dialectic to highlight an (...) interpretation of Barad and Butler as being part of the same dialectical movement, in which materialism and idealism fluctuate in their mutual criticisms, thus continuing the procession towards 'new knowledge' and emancipation, or freedom, through their motions back and forth. (shrink)

This essay is a defense of the social construction of racialism. I follow a standard definition of “racialism” which is the belief that “there are heritable characteristics, possessed by members of our species, that allow us to divide them into a small set of races, in such a way that all the members of these races share certain traits and tendencies with each other that they do not share with other members of any other race”. In particular I want to (...) defend the “radical” social-constructive thesis that holds “the concept of race is exclusively the product of historical and cultural causes. It claims that humans do not tend to classify people into races when groups with different phenotypes meet, save for particular historical circumstances”. The quoted position is the consensus view among historians, sociologists, anthropologists, and other social scientists who study racialism but has recently been criticized by philosophical defenders of cognitive/evolutionary psychological approaches to racialism. Drawing on developmental studies as well as historical and contemporary cross-cultural research, CEP philosophers point to similarities of racialism across time and space. They hold that social constructionist approaches to racialism cannot explain these similarities. I hold that SC approaches do explain these similarities and that such similarities actually pose a significant challenge to the proposed CEP research program on racialism. (shrink)

In this paper, I expand my upon earlier linguistic research (Lian, 2023), which delved into the genre of abstracts from Western philosophical papers. I engage with the philosophical ramifications emanating from the guidelines established for crafting philosophy paper abstracts (Lian, 2023) and underscore their significance in the domain of academic philosophical writing. A pivotal focus of this research is to navigate the intricate philosophical challenges posed by cross-disciplinary investigations bridging applied linguistic statistics with philosophical paper composition, specifically, the nuanced interpretation (...) of linguistic findings in a manner palatable to philosophers. My exploration probes into the dynamics of various concepts within Inter-Disciplinary Research (IDR), highlighting the complexities in reconciling semantic intuitions related to the notions of "Method (M)" and "Conclusion (C)". I delineate three philosophical stances: (1) deferring to scientific authority, (2) recognizing domain-specific terminologies, and (3) interrogating peripheral scientific theories. I posit that these stances significantly influence the ways philosophers engage with and resolve the cross-disciplinary semantic and theoretical contentions stemming from the rhetorical structures of "Method (M)" and "Conclusion (C)". This work proposes avenues to attain either "theoretical coherence" or "disciplinary synthesis", thereby fostering enhanced cross-disciplinary collaboration and fortifying academic discourse across diverse fields. -/- Keywords: Inter-Disciplinary Research (IDR), Applied linguistics, Philosophical writing, Genre Analysis, Rhetorical Moves 本研究將先介紹筆者的語言學碩士論文（連，2023），如何分析《東吳哲學學報》2017年至2021年西方哲學論文摘要語體的修辭語步特徵與提供寫作建議，並試圖從哲學圈內人的角度，對連（2023）的哲學寫作 建議進行批判性的反思，探討哲學教師或新手哲學家可以如何看待華文哲學論文摘要的寫作建議。接著，筆者將問題聚焦在跨領域學科（應用語言學統計結果與哲學論文寫作）之間的哲學問題，即——哲學家應如何看待語言學家 針對哲學論文的研究結果。筆者將考慮領域間研究（IDR）的語言與詞語概念關係。而藉由討論上述跨領域研究中語義直覺分歧的問題，筆者提出了三種可能的哲學態度：(1)服從科學權威、(2)尊重特定領域用詞、(3 )質疑邊緣科學理論。筆者認為，上述三種態度對於哲學家如何看待「方法(M)」和「結論(C)」這兩項跨領域語義概念分歧和可能理論分歧有著重要的影響。筆者希冀藉由提出相關解決方案來尋求「理論統一」或「領域整 合」的可行性，最終得以促進跨領域合作與跨學門間良好學術交流的互動成長。 -/- 關鍵詞：領域間研究（IDR）、應用語言學、哲學寫作、語體分析、修辭語步 . (shrink)

The basing demand on doxastic justification is a widely held and highly intuitive dogma of contemporary epistemology. In Silva [2015, AJP], I argued that the dialectical significance of this dogma is severely limited by our lack of independent grounds for endorsing it. Oliveira [2015, AJP] sought to defend the basing demand on doxastic justification. Here I explain why Oliveira’s attempted defense of the basing demand misses its mark. I also briefly suggest that there is an alternative way of defending the (...) basing demand. The alternative way is reconciliatory: it shows that most epistemologists may have been right to insist on such a demand, but perhaps still wrong to treat it as a dialectically powerful tool in the assessment of certain substantive epistemological theories. (shrink)

[This is a paper that was originally written in 2017 and doesn't represent Silva's current thinking about degrees of confidence, conviction, and rationality.] Can there be knowledge and rational belief in the absence of a rational degree of confidence? Yes, and cases of "mistuned knowledge" demonstrate this. In this paper we leverage this normative possibility in support of advancing our understanding of the metaphysical relation between belief and credence. It is generally assumed that a Lockean metaphysics of belief that reduces (...) outright belief to degrees of confidence would immediately effect a unification of coarse-grained epistemology of belief with fine-grained epistemology of confidence. Scott Sturgeon has suggested that the unification is effected by understanding the relation between outright belief and confidence as an instance of the determinable-determinate relation. But determination of belief by confidence would not by itself yield the result that norms for confidence carry over to norms for outright belief unless belief and high confidence are token identical. We argue that this token-identity thesis is incompatible with the neglected phenomenon of “mistuned knowledge”—knowledge and rational belief in the absence of rational confidence. We contend that there are genuine cases of mistuned knowledge and that, therefore, epistemological unification must forego token identity of belief and high confidence. We show how partial epistemological unification can be secured given determination of outright belief by degrees of confidence even without token-identity. Finally, we suggest a direction for the pursuit of thoroughgoing epistemological unification. (shrink)

Reading proficiency plays a vital role in keeping up-to-date with technological advancements and innovations in education. However, there are Grade 7 students who need help with the essential skill of reading. These students need support for them to cope with the classroom demands. This transcendental phenomenological qualitative research aims to determine the academic experiences of struggling readers inside the classroom. Five struggling readers were the participants of this study. These five participants were purposefully selected after being recommended by the school (...) reading coordinator. The interview guide questionnaire was the instrument of this study. The interview guide questionnaire contains open-ended questions that were validated by experts. One-on-one interviews were conducted for about 20 to 40 minutes each. Using an audio recorder, the interviews were recorded. After the interview, a verbatim transcription was made and thematic analysis was utilized to analyze the significant lines of the participants. The following themes were elicited from the participants' responses, namely: lack of computer skills, limited visual attention span, hesitation and anxiety to participate, difficulty in interaction, difficulty with the use of technology in education, confusion with letter-sound identification, less motivation to learn, problem understanding the lesson, and slow in taking down notes. The participants attributed their reading difficulties to themselves, their teachers, and their parents. In light of these findings, it is strongly recommended that a robust and comprehensive reading recovery program be implemented. This program should address struggling readers' multifaceted challenges and provide them with the necessary support to enhance their reading proficiency and overall academic performance. (shrink)

My argument proceeds in two stages. In §I, I sum up the intuitions of a popular argument for 'satisfaction accounts' of Purgatory that I label, TAP. I then offer an argument, taken from a few standard orthodox Christian beliefs and one axiom of Christian theology, to so show that TAP is unsound. In the same section, I entertain some plausible responses to my argument that are prima facie consistent with these beliefs and axiom. I find these responses wanting. In §II, (...) I offer a sorites problem for TAP, given the orthodox Christian understanding of Christ’s parousia, showing that TAP and the intuitions driving it are faulty. To attempt something of a corrective, I end by offering some modest theological suggestions for thinking through “the logic of total transformation.”. (shrink)

Our doxastic states are our belief-like states, and these include outright doxastic states and degreed doxastic states. The former include believing that p, having the opinion that p, thinking that p, being sure that p, being certain that p, and doubting that p. The latter include degrees of confidence, credences, and perhaps some phenomenal states. But we also have conviction (being convinced simpliciter that p) and degrees of conviction (being more or less convinced that p). This volume shows: how and (...) why all of the outright doxastic states mentioned above can be reduced to conviction thresholds; what degrees of conviction fundamentally are (degreed reliance-dispositions); why degrees of conviction are not credences; when suspending a belief is compatible with continuing to believe; and the surprising extent to which Kant endorsed the theory of conviction that emerges in this volume. (shrink)

Catastrophic risk raises questions that are not only of practical importance, but also of great philosophical interest, such as how to define catastrophe and what distinguishes catastrophic outcomes from non-catastrophic ones. Catastrophic risk also raises questions about how to rationally respond to such risks. How to rationally respond arguably partly depends on the severity of the uncertainty, for instance, whether quantitative probabilistic information is available, or whether only comparative likelihood information is available, or neither type of information. Finally, catastrophic risk (...) raises important ethical questions about what to do when catastrophe avoidance conflicts with equity promotion. (shrink)

Various philosophers discuss perlocutionary silencing, but none defend an account of perlocutionary silencing. This gap may exist because perlocutionary success depends on extralinguistic effects, whereas silencing interrupts speech, leaving theorists to rely on extemporary accounts when they discuss perlocutionary silencing. Consequently, scholars assume perlocutionary silencing occurs but neglect to explain how perlocutionary silencing harms speakers as speakers. In relation to that shortcoming, I defend a novel account of perlocutionary silencing. I argue that speakers experience perlocutionary silencing when they are illegitimately (...) deprived of perlocutionary influence on a conversation in which they are active participants, where perlocutionary influence on the conversation relates to speech-related perlocutionary goals meant to influence the conversation or conversational direction. Thus, this account grounds perlocutionary silencing in linguistic phenomena and characterizes perlocutionary silencing in a way that explains why those who experience perlocutionary silencing are harmed as speakers. Moreover, this account explains how perlocutionary silencing harms speakers as conversational participants in a way that cannot be captured by illocutionary or locutionary silencing, for a speaker may be perlocutionarily silenced despite illocutionary success. Consequently, the account explains why “All Lives Matter” silences Black Lives Matter and “Not All Men” silences women sharing experiences of sexual harassment. (shrink)

The major competing statistical paradigms share a common remarkable but unremarked thread: in many of their inferential applications, different probability interpretations are combined. How this plays out in different theories of inference depends on the type of question asked. We distinguish four question types: confirmation, evidence, decision, and prediction. We show that Bayesian confirmation theory mixes what are intuitively “subjective” and “objective” interpretations of probability, whereas the likelihood-based account of evidence melds three conceptions of what constitutes an “objective” probability.

This qualitative study employing the sentiment analysis method uncovered the people's sentiments on the appointment of Vice-President Sara Z Duterte as the Secretary of the Department of Education. The comments from the Facebook online news platforms were used as the corpora of this study. Results revealed that the appointment of Vice-President Sara Z. Duterte as the Department of Education Secretary received 79% positive sentiments, 11% negative sentiments, and 10% neutral sentiments from the people. This indicates that most people responded favorably (...) to the appointment of Vice President Sara Z. Duterte to the position of Secretary of the Department of Education. This suggests that people believed Vice President Duterte's ability to lead the Education Department and bring about significant changes within the department. (shrink)

Epistemic luck is a generic notion used to describe any of a number of ways in which it can be accidental, coincidental, or fortuitous that a person has a true belief. For example, one can form a true belief as a result of a lucky guess, as when one believes through guesswork that “C” is the right answer to a multiple-choice question and one’s belief just happens to be correct. One can form a true belief via wishful thinking; for example, (...) an optimist’s belief that it will not rain may luckily turn out to be correct, despite forecasts for heavy rain all day. One can reason from false premises to a belief that coincidentally happens to be true. One can accidentally arrive at a true belief through invalid or fallacious reasoning. And one can fortuitously arrive at a true belief from testimony that was intended to mislead but unwittingly reported the truth. In all of these cases, it is just a matter of luck that the person has a true belief. -/- Until the twenty-first century, there was nearly universal agreement among epistemologists that epistemic luck is incompatible with knowledge. Call this view “the incompatibility thesis.” In light of the incompatibility thesis, epistemic luck presents epistemologists with three distinct but related challenges. The first is that of providing an accurate analysis of knowledge (in terms of individually necessary and jointly sufficient conditions for “S knows that p,” where ‘S’ represents the knower and ‘p’ represents the proposition known). An adequate analysis of knowledge must succeed in specifying conditions that rule out all instances of knowledge-destroying epistemic luck. The second challenge is to resolve the skeptical paradox that the ubiquity of epistemic luck generates: As will become clear in section 2c, epistemic luck is an all-pervasive phenomenon. Coupling this fact with the incompatibility thesis entails that we have no propositional knowledge. The non-skeptical epistemologist must somehow reconcile the strong intuition that epistemic luck is not compatible with knowledge with the equally evident observation that it must be. The third challenge concerns the special skeptical threat that epistemic luck seems to pose for more reflective forms of knowledge, such as knowing that one knows. Each of these challenges will be explored in the present article. (shrink)

Educational Data Mining (EDM) shows interesting scientific results lately. However, little has been discussed about philosophical questions regarding the type of knowledge produced in this area. This paper aims to present two epistemological issues in EDM: (i) a question of ontological nature about the content of the knowledge obtained; and (ii) a question of deontological nature, about the guidelines and principles adopted by the researcher in education, to the detriment of the results of his own research. In the end, some (...) considerations and guidelines are outlined as a result of the discussion of the issues raised. (shrink)

Suppose that a decision-maker's aim, under certainty, is to maximise some continuous value, such as lifetime income or continuous social welfare. Can such a decision-maker rationally satisfy what has been called "continuity for easy cases" while at the same time satisfying what seems to be a widespread intuition against the full-blown continuity axiom of expected utility theory? In this note I argue that the answer is "no": given transitivity and a weak trade-off principle, continuity for easy cases violates the anti-continuity (...) intuition. I end the note by exploring an even weaker continuity condition that is consistent with the aforementioned intuition. (shrink)

According to the orthodox treatment of risk preferences in decision theory, they are to be explained in terms of the agent's desires about concrete outcomes. The orthodoxy has been criticised both for conflating two types of attitudes and for committing agents to attitudes that do not seem rationally required. To avoid these problems, it has been suggested that an agent's attitudes to risk should be captured by a risk function that is independent of her utility and probability functions. The main (...) problem with that approach is that it suggests that attitudes to risk are wholly distinct from people's (non-instrumental) desires. To overcome this problem, we develop a framework where an agent's utility function is defined over chance propositions (i.e., propositions describing objective probability distributions) as well as ordinary (non-chance) ones, and argue that one should explain different risk attitudes in terms of different forms of the utility function over such propositions. (shrink)

Visual imagery is a form of sensory imagination, involving subjective experiences typically described as similar to perception, but which occur in the absence of corresponding external stimuli. We used the Activation Likelihood Estimation algorithm (ALE) to identify regions consistently activated by visual imagery across 40 neuroimaging studies, the first such meta-analysis. We also employed a recently developed multi-modal parcellation of the human brain to attribute stereotactic co-ordinates to one of 180 anatomical regions, the first time this approach has been combined (...) with the ALE algorithm. We identified a total 634 foci, based on measurements from 464 participants. Our overall comparison identified activation in the superior parietal lobule, particularly in the left hemisphere, consistent with the proposed ‘top-down’ role for this brain region in imagery. Inferior premotor areas and the inferior frontal sulcus were reliably activated, a finding consistent with the prominent semantic demands made by many visual imagery tasks. We observed bilateral activation in several areas associated with the integration of eye movements and visual information, including the supplementary and cingulate eye fields (SCEFs) and the frontal eye fields (FEFs), suggesting that enactive processes are important in visual imagery. V1 was typically activated during visual imagery, even when participants have their eyes closed, consistent with influential depictive theories of visual imagery. Temporal lobe activation was restricted to area PH and regions of the fusiform gyrus, adjacent to the fusiform face complex (FFC). These results provide a secure foundation for future work to characterise in greater detail the functional contributions of specific areas to visual imagery. (shrink)

Many philosophers think that we should use a lottery to decide who gets a good to which two persons have an equal claim but which only one person can get. Some philosophers think that we should save identified persons from harm even at the expense of saving a somewhat greater number of statistical persons from the same harm. I defend a principled way of justifying both judgements, namely, by appealing to the decreasing marginal moral value of survival chances. I identify (...) four desiderata that, I contend, any such justification should satisfy, and explain how my account meets these desiderata, unlike some previous accounts. (shrink)

The phenomenal concept strategy (PCS) is widely regarded as the most promising physicalist defence against the so-called epistemic arguments—the anti-physicalist arguments that establish an ontological gap between physical and phenomenal facts on the basis of the occurrence of epistemic gaps in our descriptions of these facts. The PCS tries to undercut the force of the epistemic arguments by attributing the occurrence of the epistemic gaps to the special character of phenomenal concepts—the concepts by means of which we think about our (...) phenomenal experiences. In this essay, the author examines David Chalmers' master argument against the PCS and the objections raised against this argument by Peter Carruthers, Bénédicte Veillet and Katalin Balog in defending the PCS. While the author finds these objections to be successful defences of the PCS, the author shares Balog's belief that in this regard, the debate between the physicalists and anti-physicalists is a stalemate. (shrink)

This paper finds out whether a higher degree matters in school performance, and in demonstrating leadership and core behavioral competencies among school heads. This was conducted to support the existing and future policies of the Department of Education and interested funders for the scholarship and advanced studies of school heads. Using a cross-sectional method, it involved 192 randomly selected participants. Data on school performance was obtained at the office of Surigao del Sur Division, while data on competencies were gathered through (...) the self-administered assessment tools developed by the Department of Education. These data were analyzed using descriptive statistics and analysis of variance. Results revealed that there was no significant difference in the school performance of school heads. This implies that the highest degree obtained is not a guarantee for better school performance. As found, those with doctorate degrees had a very high and consistent demonstration in all dimensions of leadership and core behavioral competencies. As unveiled, there were significant differences in the demonstrated competencies based on the highest educational qualifications. These imply that obtaining the highest degrees can allow school heads to acquire, develop, and demonstrate the competencies consistently better than their counterparts. Results have implications for DepEd officials, funders, and policy-makers. (shrink)

In this paper we briefly examine and evaluate Quine’s physicalism. On the supposition, in accordance with Quine’s views, that there can be no change of any sort without a physical change, we argue that this point leaves plenty of room to understand and accept a limited autonomy of the special sciences and of other domains of disciplinary and common-sense inquiry and discourse. The argument depends on distinguishing specific, detailed programs of reduction from the general Quinean strategy of reduction by explication. (...) We argue that the details of the relations of particular sciences, disciplines and domains of discourse depend on empirical evidence and empirical-theoretical developments and that the generalized approach of reduction by explication is also subject to related empirical-theoretical constraints. So understood, physicalism lacks much of the controversial force and many of the implications sometimes associated with it. (shrink)

Philosophers ask just whose expression, if anyone’s, we hear in lyric poetry. Walton provides a novel possibility: it’s the reader who “uses” the poem (just as a speech giver uses a speech) who makes the language expressive. But worries arise once we consider poems in particular social or political settings, those which require a strong self-other distinction, or those with expressions that should not be disassociated from the subjects whose experience they draw from. One way to meet this challenge is (...) to consider the poem expressive of a plural subject, which frees us from looking for a particular individual whose voice we hear in the work, whether she be fictional or actual. Some lyrics give voice to a group whose experience is attended to in the work. This may be done through a posited fictional speaker, but the ontology of the speaker is shown to be less important. Attending to a group whose concerns are voiced allows us to explain how poems can manage to address our-worldly concerns even when lacking actual persons whose expressions we encounter in the poems. (shrink)

Critical in the computationalist account of the mind is the phenomenon called computational or computer simulation of human thinking, which is used to establish the theses that human thinking is a computational process and that computing machines are thinking systems. Accordingly, if human thinking can be simulated computationally then human thinking is a computational process; and if human thinking is a computational process then its computational simulation is itself a thinking process. This paper shows that the said phenomenon—the computational simulation (...) of human thinking—is ill-conceived, and that, as a consequence, the theses that it intends to establish are problematic. It is argued that what is simulated computationally is not human thinking as such but merely its behavioral manifestations; and that a computational simulation of these behavioral manifestations does not necessarily establish that human thinking is computational, as it is logically possible for a non-computational system to exhibit behaviors that lend themselves to a computational simulation. (shrink)

Stoicism deserves everything that Broic$ are doing to its movement. This is because Stoics stuff the value of everything into their own heads, thus denying that external things are good and that other people have intrinsic value. Stoics are psychopathic narcissists and axiological solipsists. And this makes Stoicism easy to coopt into bro-y, shallow, self-help-y garbage.

This paper primarily disputes Dreyfus’s account of Heidegger’s critique of Husserl’s theory of intentionality. Specifically, it raises objections to the three central claims of such an account; namely: that Searle’s theory of intentional action can be used as a stand-in for Husserl’s; that Heidegger rejects the primordiality of the intentionality of consciousness; and that Heidegger distinguishes between conscious and unconscious types of intentional actions and he privileges the latter over the former. I show the first to be unwarranted owing to (...) a lack of fundamental parallelisms between Searle’s and Husserl’s theories of intentionality. I show the second to be mistaken for failing to take into account Heidegger’s strategic handling of the concept of consciousness and for contradicting Heidegger’s concept of care as the essential meaning of Dasein’s being-in-the-world. Lastly, I show the third to be highly problematic for lacking in textual evidence and explanatory power. (shrink)

I defend a weak version of the Pigou-Dalton principle for chances. The principle says that it is better to increase the survival chance of a person who is more likely to die rather than a person who is less likely to die, assuming that the two people do not differ in any other morally relevant respect. The principle justifies plausible moral judgements that standard ex post views, such as prioritarianism and rank-dependent egalitarianism, cannot accommodate. However, the principle can be justified (...) by the same reasoning that has recently been used to defend the core axiom of ex post prioritarianism and egalitarianism, namely, Pigou-Dalton for well-being. The arguably biggest challenge for proponents of Pigou-Dalton for chances is that it violates State Dominance for social prospects. However, I argue that we have independent reason for rejecting State Dominance for social prospects, since it prevents a social planner from properly respecting people's preferences. (shrink)

This essay shows the presence of transcendence in the on-going attempt to come up with a purely scientific account of the workings of the human mind. At the center of the developmental stages of this attempt is the computational theory of mind, which regards the human mind as some kind of computer. With Wittgenstein’s analysis of the limits of linguistic representation in the Tractatus as a framework, it is argued that the various difficulties encountered by this attempt are primarily due (...) to the transcendental nature of the human mind, which eludes scientific explanation. (shrink)

Singer and Regan predicate their arguments -- for ethical vegetarianism, against animal experimentation, and for an end to animal exploitation generally -- on the equal considerability premise (EC). According to (EC), we owe humans and sentient nonhumans exactly the same degree of moral considerability. While Singer's and Regan's conclusions follow from (EC), many philosophers reject their arguments because they find (EC)'s implications morally repugnant and intuitively unacceptable. Like most people, you probably reject (EC). Never the less, you're already committed to (...) the mere considerability premise -- the premise that sentient nonhuman animals deserve some moral consideration, although not as much consideration as that owed humans. I argue that the mere considerability premise entails that vegetarianism is morally obligatory in most contexts and that animal experimentation is almost always wrong. Since you accept the mere considerability premise, you are already rationally committed to the immorality of eating meat and the wrongfulness of most animal experimentation. Hence, moral consistency requires that you stop eating meat and stop purchasing products tested on animals. (shrink)

In this essay, I argue that an immortal existence could be desirable. Taking the accounts of Williams and Smuts under careful consideration, I agree with Fischer that an immortal existence could be gratifying. When Fischer argues that it is unfair for Williams to posit that an immortal life must have self-exhausting pleasures and, overall, a better experience than mortal life, he gets to the crux of the argument for immortality: as long as there are positive categorical desires for the individual, (...) then such life-affirming desires will provide an impetus to carry on. In moving past the Teiresias model of a phenomenon that retains memories while changing characters, I argue that a life of intellectual inquiry – which essentially alters the character of the individual while maintaining memories – offers an outward looking existence which provides internal pleasures. Accordingly, with the use of technology, computer simulations have the potential to provide pleasures and experiences that escape reality. In this sense, technology has the potential to supplement an immortal life. We cannot say whether there will be a pinnacle of such learning and pleasure which leads to decreasing returns, but it seems plausible that an immortal being who incorporates learning and pleasure that could potentially lead to innovation and discovery would seek to continue such intellectual inquiry and varied experiences until all learning potentials were exhausted. (shrink)

This study employed an Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis (IPA) which aimed to explore the lived experiences, challenges, and coping mechanisms of teachers in the public school both in elementary and secondary schools in Malolos, Bulacan. The findings of this study revealed that most teachers are significantly challenged with the poor internet connection, multitasking and multitudes of paperwork to be submitted, communication with the parents and teachers and the different modalities of learning which are cited as the contributing factors of stress and (...) anxiety. As to the experiences of the teachers, they became a module writer, online teacher, reporter while doing the online classes and juggling with the work at home as a homemaker. However, the good experiences of this pandemic brought realization to the teachers that they were able to unleash their potential and utilized the skills needed to survive in this difficult time. Moreover, teachers coped up with the situations through prayers, listening and watching motivational videos, yoga and others became farmers too just to avoid stress. Finally, the teachers also gave their suggestions to further help other teachers also who are struggling during this pandemic. Majority of the participants gave emphasis to focus on stabilizing mental health. Others also highlighted the need to seek the assistance of other people who are knowledgeable in terms of ICT. Continuing innovation and researching to update oneself was also one of the suggested ways to deal with the current paradigm shift in education. (shrink)

This study developed and validated E-learning Self-directed Interactive Modules (E-SelfIMo) for Earth Science. The study employed Research and Development method, using the Borg and Gall development procedure, in creating eight e-modules using Kotobee software, evaluating them by experts and students, and determining their effectiveness in terms of students' conceptual understanding. Experts agreed that E-SelfIMo met the DepEd standards for non-printed learning materials, and students attested to their high validity in content, format, and usefulness. Pretest and posttest results for the effectiveness (...) of E-SelfIMo revealed that students exposed to the E-SelfIMo have progressed from “Near Mastery” to “Near Full Mastery” in the chosen Earth Science topics, showing more significant improvement in their conceptual understanding than the control group. This study concludes that E-SelfIMo supports interactive, active, and self-directed learning thereby, improving students’ motivation, engagement, interest, and performance. The E-SelfIMo could be used with technology integration as a teaching and learning tool. -/- . (shrink)

Various changes and advances have taken place in the ways of teaching and learning. With the encountered global pandemic crisis, flexible learning has been practiced particularly in state universities and colleges. This study sought to determine the level of procedural fluency in College Algebra as well as the difficulties and interventions applied by tertiary students of Cotabato State University (CSU) in the flexible learning set-up. The period covered by the study was during the first semester of the school year 2021-2022. (...) The respondents were a sample of 30 first-year mathematics major students of CSU. It used mixed methods; the quantitative approach was utilized to know the students’ knowledge of procedures in solving mathematical problems while the qualitative approach was utilized to explore the difficulties of the students in learning mathematics as well as the coping strategies that can serve as basis for mathematics intervention program. The findings revealed that most of the respondents have a low level of procedural fluency in College Algebra, particularly emerging in the understanding the problem, devising a strategy, and solving steps while inept in the problem-solving checking process. On the part of new normal learning, difficulties were experienced such as poor knowledge of the prerequisite skills and unstable internet connection. As part of their interventions, facing the encountered problems, practicing repeatedly, and watching online video tutorials were applied. Based on the findings of the study, it is concluded that the first-year students have low level of procedural fluency in College Algebra problem-solving particularly in the Polya’s principles of understanding the problem, devising a plan, carrying out the plan, and checking the answer. Because of the learning challenges encountered by the students, it is recommended to develop step-by-step video tutorials that can address their problem-solving difficulties and supplement their learning in the flexible mode of delivery. (shrink)

This study sought to examine the factors affecting the Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) students’ Mathematics performance in a modular distance learning at Notre Dame Village National High School (NDVNHS). In particular, the researcher was interested to determine if these factors had a significant effect on the students’ Pre-Calculus and General Mathematics performance considering the number of hours spent in modular learning. The period covered by the study was during the first semester of the school year 2020-2021. The respondents (...) were all 67 Grade 11 STEM students of NDVNHS. A quantitative research design was utilized particularly using Multivariate Analysis of Covariance (MANCOVA). The findings of the study revealed that majority of the STEM students had a good performance in their Mathematics subjects for the first semester. Also, the factors specifically type of motivation (intrinsic or extrinsic) and support system (parents, siblings, relatives, friends, or classmates) had statistically significant effect on their mathematics performance in the new normal considering the amount of time they spent in learning using modules. Moreover, there were statistically significant differences in both Pre-Calculus and General Mathematics performances between the type of motivation and support system when adjusted for the number of hours spent in modular learning. Based on the findings, the study concluded that the students’ motivation and support system can greatly affect their mathematics performance when controlling for the allocated time in modular learning. Especially in Pre-Calculus and General Mathematics, motivation and support system are important factors in learning using modules. In the new normal education, the students should increase their level of motivation as well as exposure in self-learning and be given full support towards the processes in the modular approach of distance learning. (shrink)

El artículo aborda la relación entre Nietzsche y Levinas, en particular se enfrenta a la concepción de cuerpo y narración sostenida por cada autor. En ese sentido se afirma que la aparente distancia que existe entre ambos pensadores puede reducirse a partir de las temáticas que se estudian en este trabajo. A la luz de todo ello, la lectura del cuerpo de Nietzsche y la comprensión de narración de Levinas no habrían sido solo reflexiones filosóficas, sino más bien el pretexto (...) para que ambos pensadores critiquen el pensamiento establecido y propongan, cada uno a su modo, un quehacer filosófico que afecta directamente la existencia humana en cuanto reflexión sobre las formas como se comprende la vida misma. (shrink)

I attempt to describe and defend an alternative definition of insanity. I claim that my definition follows from an adequate general understanding of legal excuse and that it describes correctly the question that jurors in the recent Andrea Yates case and others like it ought to be faced with. My essay has three parts. In the first, I briefly criticize M'Naghten- and Durham-inspired insanity statutes. In the second, I sketch and defend a general understanding of legal excuse and try to (...) show how an adequate insanity statute follows from it. Finally, in the third section, I describe and defend a rough version of the statute itself. In the course of doing so, I try to explain why I believe that statute is superior to the American Law Institute's various model insanity statutes. (shrink)

I argue, first, that the deprived individuals whose predicaments Nussbaum cites as examples of "adaptive preference" do not in fact prefer the conditions of their lives to what we should regard as more desirable alternatives, indeed that we believe they are badly off precisely because they are not living the lives they would prefer to live if they had other options and were aware of them. Secondly, I argue that even where individuals in deprived circumstances acquire tastes for conditions that (...) we regard as bad, they are typically better off having their acquired preferences satisfied. If they are badly off it is because they cannot get what we and they, would regard as more desirable alternatives. Preference utilitarianism explains why individuals in such circumstances are badly off whether they have adapted to their deprived circumstances or not. Even if they prefer the conditions of their lives to all other available alternatives, most would prefer alternatives that are not available to them which would, on the preferentist account, make them better off. And that, on the preferentist account, is the basis for a radical critique of unjust institutions that limit people's options and prevent them from getting what they want. (shrink)