Frege argued for the force-content distinction not only by appealing to the logical and fictional contexts which are most closely associated with the “Frege point", but also based on the fact that an affirmative answer to a yes-no question constitutes an assertion. Supposedly this is only intelligible if the question contains a forceless thought or proposition which an affirmative answer then asserts. Against this I argue that this fact more readily supports the view that questions operate on assertions and other (...) forceful acts themselves. Force is neither added to propositions as on the traditional view, nor is it cancelled as has recently been proposed. Rather higher-level acts such as questioning, but also e.g. conditionalizing, embed and present assertoric or directive acts that are forceful and committal, while suspending commitment to them. The Frege point confounds different varieties of force and the question whether something is merely presented for consideration with the question what is so presented. Force is representational: through assertoric and directive force indicators subjects non-conceptually present positions of theoretical or practical knowledge, while interrogative acts indicate positions of wondering which strive for such knowledge. (shrink)

In this paper I criticize theory-biased and overly individualist approaches to understanding others and introduce the PAIR account of joint attention as a pragmatic, affectively charged intentional relation. I argue that this relation obtains in virtue of intentional contents in the minds of the co-attenders, and – against the received understanding of intentional states as propositional attitudes – that we should recognize what I call “subject mode” and “position mode” intentional content. Based on findings from developmental psychology, I propose that (...) subject mode content represents the co-attenders as co-subjects, who are like them and who are at least disposed to act jointly with them. I conclude by arguing that in joint attention we experience and understand affective, actional and perceptual relations at a non-conceptual level prior to the differentiation of mind and body. (shrink)

In this paper I propose three steps to overcome the force-content dichotomy and dispel the Frege point. First, we should ascribe content to force indicators. Through basic assertoric and directive force indicators such as intonation, word order and mood, a subject presents its position of theoretical or practical knowledge of a state of affairs as a fact, as something that is the case, or as a goal, as something to do. Force indicators do not operate on truth- or satisfaction evaluable (...) entities as on the traditional view, but complete and unify them. Second, higher-level acts such as interrogative, logical and fictional acts create higher-level unities that may suspend commitment to the assertions and directions they operate on. But they do not cancel their force, but transfer the meaning of force indicators into the new unities they create. For example, in the context of asking a theoretical or practical question, the assertoric or directive force indicator now presents the kind of knowledge the subject is seeking. Third, the Frege point conflates different varieties of force. We neither need Frege’s assertion sign, nor Hare’s neustic, nor Hanks’s cancellation sign, but only ordinary force indicators and interrogative, logical and fictional markers. Propositions are not forceless contents to which a subject commits by forceful acts, but forceful acts put forward by higher-level acts which may suspend commitment to them. (shrink)

Raimo Tuomela’s most important contribution to the philosophy of collective intentionality was his development of the notion of the we-mode. In my chapter I extend the notion of we-mode to that of role-mode, the mode in which individual and collective subjects feel, think and act as occupants of roles within groups and institutional structures. I focus on how being in role-mode is manifest in the minds of subjects and on the following points. First, I argue that both we-mode and role-mode (...) are best thought of as further modifications of I-consciousness, respectively we-consciousness. Second, role-mode is further characterized by the fact that subjects will take positions as role occupants that they won’t take as mere individuals, or we-mode group members, or in other roles. Third, such divergences are only possible against a background of agreements between positions taken in different modes. Fourth, such divergences are also grounded in decision making procedures and the accessibility and admissibility of sources of evidence. Fifth, role-mode goes all the way down, that is, it is also manifest in how subjects feel, move and comport themselves when they occupy their roles. To put it into fashionable jargon, it is embodied and enacted. (shrink)

This paper argues that to account for group speech acts, we should adopt a representationalist account of mode / force. Individual and collective subjects do not only represent what they e.g. assert or order. By asserting or ordering they also indicate their theoretical or practical positions towards what they assert or order. The ‘Frege point’ cannot establish the received dichotomy of force and propositional content. On the contrary, only the representationalist account allows a satisfactory response to it. It also allows (...) us to give a more satisfactory analysis of the speech act of inviting a joint commitment and to answer two important questions Bernhard Schmid has raised about group speech acts, namely whether there are 1st person plural forms of Moore’s paradox and of 1st person authority. (shrink)

This paper discusses Raimo Tuomela's we-mode account in his recent book "Social Ontology: Collective Intentionality and Group Agents" and develops the idea that mode should be thought of as representational. I argue that in any posture – intentional state or speech act – we do not merely represent a state of affairs as what we believe, or intend etc. – as the received view of 'propositional attitudes' has it –, but our position relative to that state of affairs and thus (...) ourselves. That is, we represent the subject through what I call "subject mode" and its position through what I call "position mode". I argue that the key to understanding collective intentionality is to understand how we represent others as co-subjects of positions rather than as their objects. This is shown on various levels of collective intentionality. On the non-conceptual level of joint attention we experience others as co-subjects who we attend with rather than to and who we are at least also disposed to act jointly with. On the conceptual level of the we-mode we represent others as co-subjects of positions of knowledge, intention, belief and shared values. Organizations and thus group agents in Tuomela's sense I propose to understand in terms of what I call "role mode", that is, in terms of the positions individuals and groups take as occupants of certain roles, for example, as committee members, or as chancellor of Germany. I try to show how this account, while very much in the spirit of Tuomela's, can avoid his fictionalism about group agents and some other problems of his account, while steering between the Scylla of excessive individualism and the Charybdis of extreme collectivism. (shrink)

In this paper, we report the results from an experimental reproductive ethics study exploring questions about reproduction and parenthood. The main finding in our study is that, while we may assume that everyone understands these concepts and their relationship in the same way, this assumption may be unwarranted. For example, we may assume that if ‘x is y’s father’, it follows that ‘y is x’s child’. However, the participants in our study did not necessarily agree that it does follow. This (...) means, at the very least, that we need to make sure all parties in a debate have the same relationships in mind when talking about reproduction and parenthood. Moreover, it gives us reason to explore more carefully the conditions which support or undermine the connections between these concepts. This cannot come from purely theoretical reasoning, nor from empirical research alone, but from the alliance between the two. (shrink)

A gas in a box is perhaps the most important model system studied in thermodynamics and statistical mechanics. Usually, studies focus on the gas, whereas the box merely serves as an idealized confinement. The present article focuses on the box as the central object and develops a thermodynamic theory by treating the geometric degrees of freedom of the box as the degrees of freedom of a thermodynamic system. Applying standard mathematical methods to the thermody- namics of an empty box allows (...) equations with the same structure as those of cosmology and classical and quantum mechanics to be derived. The simple model system of an empty box is shown to have interesting connections to classical mechanics, special relativity, and quantum field theory. (shrink)

In this paper I outline the PAIR account of joint attention as a perceptual-practical, affectively charged intentional relation. I argue that to explain joint attention we need to leave the received understanding of propositions and propositional attitudes and the picture of content connected to it behind and embrace the notions of subject mode and position mode content. I also explore the relation between joint attention and communication.

In this paper I first introduce Tomasello’s notion of thought and his account of its emergence and development through differentiation, arguing that it calls into question the theory bias of the philosophical tradition on thought as well as its frequent atomism. I then raise some worries that he may be overextending the concept of thought, arguing that we should recognize an area of intentionality intermediate between action and perception on the one hand and thought on the other. After that I (...) argue that the co-operative nature of humans is reflected in the very structure of their intentionality and thought: in co-operative modes such as the mode of joint attention and action and the we-mode, they experience and represent others as co-subjects of joint relations to situations in the world rather than as mere objects. In conclusion, I briefly comment on what Tomasello refers to as one of two big open questions in the theory of collective intentionality, namely that of the irreducibility of jointness. (shrink)

The contribution deals with knowledge of what to do, and how, where, when and why to do it, as it is found in a multitude of plans, rules, procedures, maxims, and other instructions. It is argued that while this knowledge is conceptual and propositional, it is still irreducible to theoretical knowledge of what is the case and why it is the case. It is knowledge of goals, of ends and means, rather than of facts. It is knowledge-to that is irreducibly (...) practical in having world to mind direction of fit and the essential function of guiding as yet uncompleted action. While practical knowledge is fundamentally different from theoretical knowledge in terms of mind-world relations, the practical and theoretical domains are still parallel in terms of justificatory and inferential relations, they are like mirror images of one another. It is shown that if this view of practical knowledge is accepted, convincing Gettier cases for practical knowledge can be constructed. An extensive analysis of these cases demonstrates the usefulness of the notions of practical deduction, abduction, and induction. (shrink)

How can people function appropriately and respond normatively in social contexts even if they are not aware of rules governing these contexts? John Searle has rightly criticized a popular way out of this problem by simply asserting that they follow them unconsciously. His alternative explanation is based on his notion of a preintentional, nonrepresentational background. In this paper I criticize this explanation and the underlying account of the background and suggest an alternative explanation of the normativity of elementary social practices (...) and of the background itself. I propose to think of the background as being intentional, but nonconceptual, and of the basic normativity or proto-normativity as being instituted through common sensory-motor-emotional schemata established in the joint interactions of groups. The paper concludes with some reflections on what role this level of collective intentionality and the notion of the background can play in a layered account of the social mind and the ontology of the social world. (shrink)

In addition to the Frege point, Frege also argued for the force-content distinction from the fact that an affirmative answer to a yes-no question constitutes an assertion. I argue that this fact more readily supports the view that questions operate on and present assertions and other forceful acts themselves. Force is neither added to propositions as on the traditional view, nor is it cancelled as has recently been proposed. Rather higher level acts such as questioning, but also e.g. conditionalizing, embed (...) assertive or directive acts that are forceful and committal, while suspending commitment to them. The Frege point confounds different varieties of force and the question whether something is merely presented for consideration with the question what is so presented. Force is representational: through assertoric and directive force indicators subjects non-conceptually present positions of theoretical or practical knowledge, while interrogative acts indicate positions of wondering which strive for such knowledge. (shrink)

How can the law be characterized in a theory of collective intentionality that treats collective intentionality as essentially layered and tries to understand these layers in terms of the structure and the format of the representations involved? And can such a theory of collective intentionality open up new perspectives on the law and shed new light on traditional questions of legal philosophy? As a philosopher of collective intentionality who is new to legal philosophy, I want to begin exploring these questions (...) in this paper. I will try to characterize the law in terms of the layered account of collective intentionality that I have introduced in some earlier writings (Schmitz 2013; 2018). In the light of this account I will then discuss a traditional question in the philosophy of law: the relation between law and morality. I begin by giving a brief sketch of the layered account in the next section. Collective intentionality should be understood in terms of experiencing and representing others as co-subjects, rather than as objects, of intentional states and acts on different layers or levels. I distinguish the nonconceptual layer of the joint sensory-motor-emotional intentionality of joint attention and joint bodily action, the conceptual level of shared we-mode beliefs, intentions, obligations, values, and so on, and the institutional level characterized through role differentiation, positions taken in role-mode, e.g. as a judge or attorney, and writing and other forms of documentation. In the third section I introduce a set of parameters for representations such as their degree of richness, of context-dependence, of density and differentiation of representational role and of durability and stability, which can be used to more precisely distinguish different layers. I also put forward the hypothesis that these properties are connected and tend to cluster, and that higher levels can only function and determine conditions of satisfaction against lower level ones. In the fourth and final section I critically discuss the sharp positivistic separation of morality and the law according to which whether something is a law is completely independent of its moral merits. I argue that this only seems plausible if we take an observational stance towards the law, but not towards morality. When we treat them the same way, it rather appears that the moral attitudes of the co-subjects of a society will determine whether and to what extent they will accept its legal order. I conclude by proposing to think of the law as being itself an institutionalized form of morality. (shrink)

A perceptual realism that is naive in a good way must be naively realistic about world and mind. But contemporary self-described naive realists often have trouble acknowledging that both the good cases of successful perception and the bad cases of illusion and hallucination involve internal experiential states with intentional contents that present the world as being a certain way. They prefer to think about experience solely in relational terms because they worry that otherwise we won’t be able to escape from (...) radical skepticism. I argue that experiential relations to objects require that their subjects be in internal experiential states. But this does not mean that these states are our epistemological starting point which can be known independently of any knowledge of the external world. We do escape the epistemological predicament of radical skepticism because the good cases are primary over the bad ones. But this is not because the good cases alone provide reasons for belief, but because we do not need a reason to think we are in a good case, but do need a reason to think we are not, and such a reason must come from a good case. So bad cases can only be thought of as deviations from good cases. And we can only understand experiences as states with contents distinct from their objects and present in good and bad cases once we understand misrepresentation, that is, bad cases, and therefore only as we ascribe knowledge of the external world to ourselves. (shrink)

In diesem Aufsatz argumentiere ich, dass die Standardauffassung von Propositionen und propositionalen Einstellungen inadäquat ist, ein Artefakt der gegenwärtig herrschenden theorielastigen Auffassung von Intentionalität, Sprache und Rationalität, und skizziere eine alternative Auffassung. Im folgenden Abschnitt belege ich erst einmal die These der Theorielastigkeit anhand einiger Beispiele vor allem aus der gegenwärtigen analytischen Philosophie. Der dritte Abschnitt erklärt, wie diese Theorielastigkeit im Standardverständnis von Propositionen und propositionalen Einstellungen verkörpert ist. Im vierten Abschnitt argumentiere ich, dass dieses Standardverständnis der Proposition zwei unvereinbare (...) Rollen zuweist. Sie kann nicht sowohl einen Sachverhalt repräsentieren, der Gegenstand praktischer genauso wie theoretischer Stellungnahmen sein kann, als auch wie eine theoretische Stellungnahme Wahrheitswertträger sein. In den folgenden Abschnitten versuche ich eine partielle Diagnose, wie es zu dieser Auffassung kommen kann: gewisse Formen der Neutralisierung von Stellungnahmen durch das bloße „in den Raum stellen“ (fünfter Abschnitt), durch fiktionale Kontexte (sechster Abschnitt) und den Kontext logischer Verknüpfungen (der so genannte „Frege-Punkt“; siebter Abschnitt) werden verwechselt mit der Neutralität zwischen dem Praktischen und Theoretischen, zwischen Wollen und Wahrheit, die die Standardauffassung erfordern würde. Der achte Abschnitt skizziert in groben Umrissen ein alternatives Bild. Demnach wird eine Repräsentation eines Sachverhalts erst durch die dazu kommende theoretische oder praktische Position zu einer Stellungnahme und damit zum Träger eines Erfüllungswerts. Die Bereiche des Praktischen und des Theoretischen sind parallel strukturiert und unterschieden sich im Wesentlichen nur durch die Verschiedenheit der Passrichtungen. Grundlegende rationale Operationen wie Deduktion, Abduktion und Induktion können auf praktischen Stellungnahmen genauso ausgeführt werden wie auf theoretischen. Im neunten Abschnitt verorte ich die tieferen Wurzeln der Theorielastigkeit in dem Verlangen, das Praktische an die dem Theoretischen eigene Form der Objektivität zu assimilieren. Dieses Verlangen muss aber fruchtlos bleiben, und die dem Praktischen eigene Form der Objektivität wird so verfehlt. Der letzte Abschnitt deutet an, wie sich Werturteile in dem skizzierten Rahmen deuten lassen. (shrink)

Abstract. The dissertation defends the thesis that the mind-body problem arises against the background of the elimination of the manifest physical world, and that the only satisfactory response to it is to take back that elimination and thus to dissolve the problem. Various materialist and dualist responses are shown to be inadequate. They are only different forms of ontological fundamentalism – physics fundamentalism and consciousness fundamentalism – that lead to ultimately meaningless metaphysical constructions. By contrast, on the ontologically pluralist view (...) outlined here, the fact that the entire spatiotemporal world has a physical microstructure is compatible with a naive realism with regard to both the manifest physical world and to consciousness. We only need to ascribe physical microstructures to both while identifying neither with these structures. After an introduction that identifies the elimination of the manifest physical world in modernity as the metaphysical background of the mind-body problem and describes the dilemmatic situation created by the typical reactions to it, the first chapter attempts to clarify what consciousness is. The second chapter then discusses some of the standard formulations of the so-called “puzzle” or “mystery” of consciousness. It is shown that these cannot be transformed into a genuine, answerable question. The notion that other macrophenomena can be explained much better than consciousness, perhaps even in a completely transparent way, is revealed to be an illusion, an artefact of the tacit elimination of the manifest physical world. In the third chapter, the thesis that consciousness has spatial properties is defended against various forms of skepticism. The fourth chapter begins the debate with the mind-body identity theory by discussing various positions on identity statements in the philosophy of language. This discussion leads to the conclusion that the idea of informative identity statements is meaningless. On this basis, the notion of an empirically contentful so-called “scientific identification” of consciousness phenomena with their neuronal correlates is criticized in the fifth chapter. The sixth chapter argues that it is possible to dissolve the problem of mental causation if a physiological and ultimately also a microphysical structure is ascribed to consciousness. In a concluding reflection it is explained what it means that the present suggestion amounts to a dissolution rather than a solution of the traditional mind-body problem. Zusammenfassung. In dieser Arbeit wird die These vertreten, dass das Leib-Seele- Problem vor dem Hintergrund der Elimination der manifesten physischen Welt entsteht und die einzig befriedigende Reaktion darauf nur sein kann, diese Elimination wieder rückgängig zu machen und das Problem damit aufzulösen. Materialistische und dualistische Reaktionen werden als unzulänglich erwiesen. Sie sind nur verschiedene Formen eines ontologischen Fundamentalismus – Physikfundamentalismus und Bewusstseinsfundamentalismus – der zu letztlich sinnlosen metaphysischen Konstruktionen führt. Dagegen ist nach dem hier vertretenen ontologischen Pluralismus die Tatsache, dass die gesamte raumzeitliche Welt eine physikalische Mikrostruktur hat, mit einem naiven Realismus sowohl in Bezug auf die manifeste physische Welt als auch in Bezug auf das Bewusstsein vereinbar. Wir müssen nur beiden eine physikalische Mikrostruktur zuschreiben ohne sie mit dieser zu idenfizieren. Nachdem in der Einleitung die Elimination der manifesten physischen Welt in der Neuzeit als der metaphysische Hintergrund des Leib-Seele-Problems identifiziert und die durch die typischen Reaktionen darauf entstehende dilemmatische Aus- gangssituation beschrieben worden ist, klärt das erste Kapitel, was Bewusstsein ist. Im zweiten Kapitel werden dann einige gängige Formulierungen des so genannten „Bewusstseinsrätsels“ vorgestellt. Es wird gezeigt, dass diese sich nicht in eine wirklich beantwortbare Frage transformieren lassen. Die Vorstellung, dass sich andere Makrophänomene wesentlich besser erklären lassen als das Bewusstsein, oder gar in vollständig transparenter Weise, wird als Illusion, als Artefakt der stillschweigenden Elimination der manifesten Welt erwiesen. Im dritten Kapitel wird die These, dass das Bewusstsein räumliche Eigenschaften hat, gegen verschiedene Formen der Skepsis verteidigt. Im vierten Kapitel beginnt die Auseinandersetzung mit der Identitätstheorie mit einer Diskussion sprachphilosophischer Positionen zu Identitätsaussagen, die die These begründet, dass die Vorstellung informativer Identitätsaussagen sinnlos ist. Auf dieser Grundlage wird im fünften Kapitel die Vorstellung einer empirisch gehaltvollen so genannten „wissenschaftlichen Identifikation“ von Bewusstseinsphänomenen mit ihren neuronalen Korrelaten kritisiert. Im sechsten Kapitel wird gezeigt, dass sich das Problem mentaler Verursachung auflösen lässt, wenn man Bewusstseinsphänomenen eine physiologische und letztlich auch physikalische Mikrostruktur zuschreibt. In einer Schlussbetrachtung wird erläutert, warum der Vorschlag in dieser Arbeit eine Auflösung statt einer Lösung des Leib-Seele-Problems darstellt. (shrink)

The Frege point to the effect that e.g. the clauses of conditionals are not asserted and therefore cannot be assertions is often taken to establish a dichotomy between the content of a speech act, which is propositional and belongs to logic and semantics, and its force, which belongs to pragmatics. Recently this dichotomy has been questioned by philosophers such as Peter Hanks and Francois Recanati, who propose act-theoretic accounts of propositions, argue that we can’t account for propositional unity independently of (...) the forceful acts of speakers, and respond to the Frege point by appealing to a notion of force cancellation. I argue that the notion of force cancellation is faced with a dilemma and offer an alternative response to the Frege point, which extends the act-theoretic account to logical acts such as conditionalizing or disjoining. Such higher-level acts allow us to present forceful acts while suspending commitment to them. In connecting them, a subject rather commits to an affirmation function of such acts. In contrast, the Frege point confuses a lack of commitment to what is put forward with a lack of commitment or force in what is put forward. (shrink)

Questions are not on all fours with assertions or directions, but higher-level acts that can operate on either to yield theoretical questions, as when one asks whether the door is closed, or practical questions, as when one asks whether to close it. They contain interrogative force indicators, which present positions of wondering, but also assertoric or directive force indicators which present the position of theoretical or practical knowledge the subject is striving for. Views based on the traditional force-content distinction take (...) the indicative mood for granted and therefore do not understand assertion in contrast to direction, but in contrast to questions and other higher-level acts such as logical and fictional acts. But a corresponding sign like Frege's judgement stroke can only redundantly signal the absence of a higher-level act. (shrink)

The book presents the first comprehensive survey of limits of the intentional control of action from an interdisciplinary perspective. It brings together leading scholars from philosophy, psychology, and the law to elucidate this theoretically and practically important topic from a variety of theoretical and disciplinary approaches. It provides reflections on conceptual foundations as well as a wealth of empirical data and will be a valuable resource for students and researchers alike. Among the authors: Clancy Blair, Todd S. Braver, Michael W. (...) Cole, Anika Fäsche, Maayan Davidov, Peter Gollwitzer, Kai Robin Grzyb, Tobias Heikamp, Gabriele Oettingen, Rachel McKinnon, Nachschon Meiran, Hans Christian Röhl, Michael Schmitz, John R. Searle, Gottfried Seebaß, Gisela Trommsdorff, Felix Thiede, J. Lukas Thürmer, Frank Wieber. (shrink)

How can consciousness, how can the mind be causally efficacious in a world which seems—in some sense—to be thoroughly governed by physical causality? Mental causation has been a nagging problem in philosophy since the beginning of the modern age, when, inspired by the rise of physics, a metaphysical picture became dominant according to which the manifest macrophysical world of rocks, trees, colors, sounds etc. could be eliminated in favor of, or identified with, the microconstituents of these entities and their basic (...) physical properties, plus their effects on human or animal minds. Against the background of this ontology, the argument from causal closure, or the causal completeness of physics, exerts strong pressure to also identify consciousness with microphysical entities—or even to eliminate it in favor of the latter—the only other options apparently being either the denial of the causal closure of the physical level, epiphenomenalism about the mind, or the view that its physical effects are generally overdetermined. In this paper, however, I want to introduce what I call the “microstructure view” (MV) of the brain-consciousness relation, and I want to try to make plausible that the problem of mental causation can also be solved, or perhaps rather dissolved, on the basis of this account. On the MV, the minimal neuronal correlates of consciousness—of the global state of consciousness, or specific states of consciousness such as pain—are not identical with these states, but rather constitute their microstructure, or, as I shall also say, equivalently, compose them. (shrink)

Various authors debate the question of whether neuroscience is relevant to criminal responsibility. However, a plethora of different techniques and technologies, each with their own abilities and drawbacks, lurks beneath the label “neuroscience”; and in criminal law responsibility is not a single, unitary and generic concept, but it is rather a syndrome of at least six different concepts. Consequently, there are at least six different responsibility questions that the criminal law asks—at least one for each responsibility concept—and, I will suggest, (...) a multitude of ways in which the techniques and technologies that comprise neuroscience might help us to address those diverse questions. In a way, on my account neuroscience is relevant to criminal responsibility in many ways, but I hesitate to state my position like this because doing so obscures two points which I would rather highlight: one, neither neuroscience nor criminal responsibility are as unified as that; and two, the criminal law asks many different responsibility questions and not just one generic question. (shrink)

This study aims to investigate the relationship between job burnout and employee performance in the feed industry during the ASF outbreak. Further, the researchers employed a descriptive-correlational research design in order to analyze the acquired data and produce pertinent findings. Thus, the researchers gathered data from one hundred two (102) feed industry employees. The Maslach Burnout Inventory (MBI) and Individual Work Performance Questionnaire (IWPQ) were employed to ascertain the extent of job burnout experienced by the respondents and evaluate employee performance, (...) respectively. Based on the statistical analysis, there is a significant relationship between job burnout and employee performance. Moreover, the study's findings were thoroughly analyzed and discussed. (shrink)

Fred Adams and collaborators advocate a view on which empty-name sentences semantically encode incomplete propositions, but which can be used to conversationally implicate descriptive propositions. This account has come under criticism recently from Marga Reimer and Anthony Everett. Reimer correctly observes that their account does not pass a natural test for conversational implicatures, namely, that an explanation of our intuitions in terms of implicature should be such that we upon hearing it recognize it to be roughly correct. Everett argues that (...) the implicature view provides an explanation of only some of our intuitions, and is in fact incompatible with others, especially those concerning the modal profile of sentences containing empty names. I offer a pragmatist treatment of empty names based upon the recognition that the Gricean distinction between what is said and what is implicated is not exhaustive, and argue that such a solution avoids both Everett's and Reimer's criticisms. (shrink)

In this paper, we locate a general rhetorical strategy employed in theoretical discourse wherein philosophers argue from the mere existence of internalized oppression to some kind of epistemic, moral, political, or cognitive deficiency of oppressed people. We argue that this strategy has harmful consequences for oppressed people, breaking down our analysis in terms of individual and structural harms within both epistemic and moral domains. These harms include attempting to undermine the self-trust of oppressed people, reinforcing unjust epistemic power hierarchies, undermining (...) the moral agency of oppressed people, and obscuring real issues of oppression. In light of these many harms, we conclude that there are pro tanto reasons not to employ this strategy, and instead offer a series of suggestions for those considering adopting such a rhetorical move. (shrink)

Garrath Williams claims that truly responsible people must possess a “capacity … to respond [appropriately] to normative demands” (2008:462). However, there are people whom we would normally praise for their responsibility despite the fact that they do not yet possess such a capacity (e.g. consistently well-behaved young children), and others who have such capacity but who are still patently irresponsible (e.g. some badly-behaved adults). Thus, I argue that to qualify for the accolade “a responsible person” one need not possess such (...) a capacity, but only to be earnestly willing to do the right thing and to have a history that testifies to this willingness. Although we may have good reasons to prefer to have such a capacity ourselves, and to associate ourselves with others who have it, at a conceptual level I do not think that such considerations support the claim that having this capacity is a necessary condition of being a responsible person in the virtue sense. (shrink)

Harry S. Broudy has studied the utility of general education through the development and testing of his Newspaper Test of the Uses of Schooling (NPT). The results of research with a new version of the NPT are reported in this essay and some options for future research are presented. The results of the study indicate that continued development and testing of the NPT will prove important. Promising new versions of the test are suggested for future research to pursue, including a (...) Hypertest version. Additional instruments and research strategies are also suggested that could be used to broaden the "search for evidence" of the uses of schooling. (shrink)

Luck egalitarians think that considerations of responsibility can excuse departures from strict equality. However critics argue that allowing responsibility to play this role has objectionably harsh consequences. Luck egalitarians usually respond either by explaining why that harshness is not excessive, or by identifying allegedly legitimate exclusions from the default responsibility-tracking rule to tone down that harshness. And in response, critics respectively deny that this harshness is not excessive, or they argue that those exclusions would be ineffective or lacking in justification. (...) Rather than taking sides, after criticizing both positions I also argue that this way of carrying on the debate – i.e. as a debate about whether the harsh demands of responsibility outweigh other considerations, and about whether exclusions to responsibility-tracking would be effective and/or justified – is deeply problematic. On my account, the demands of responsibility do not – in fact, they can not – conflict with the demands of other normative considerations, because responsibility only provides a formal structure within which those other considerations determine how people may be treated, but it does not generate its own practical demands. (shrink)

The distinction between the force/mode of speech acts and intentional states and their propositional content has been a central feature of analytic philosophy since Gottlob Frege and Bertrand Russell. In this introduction we present the distinction and its motivation and review some recent challenges to it that appeal to the problem of the unity of the proposition, in order to give the reader a sense of the current state of debate to which the contributions of this volume respond.

It has become standard for feminist philosophers of language to analyze Catherine MacKinnon's claim in terms of speech act theory. Backed by the Austinian observation that speech can do things and the legal claim that pornography is speech, the claim is that the speech acts performed by means of pornography silence women. This turns upon the notion of illocutionary silencing, or disablement. In this paper I observe that the focus by feminist philosophers of language on the failure to achieve uptake (...) for illocutionary acts serves to group together different kinds of illocutionary silencing which function in very different ways. (shrink)

In this paper I argue that Beall and Restall's claim that there is one true logic of metaphysical modality is incompatible with the formulation of logical pluralism that they give. I investigate various ways of reconciling their pluralism with this claim, but conclude that none of the options can be made to work.

Aim Excellent organization of the internal processes is essential for a well-functioning health care system. Particularly, the process of treatment and interaction with the patients is important because the perception of treatment and interaction has a direct relation to the patients’ satisfaction. The latter has a strong influence on the recovery of the patients. The impact of the maturity level of the treatment and interaction process on patient orientation is investigated at the example of an extensive survey of hospital managers (...) in Ukraine. -/- Method The analysis is based on an empirical data collection conducted with hospital managers and their deputies in a large Ukrainian city, which is acknowledged as a ‘model city’ with regard to a comprehensive health care reform in the country. By means of the Business Process Maturity Model (BPMM) we have tested our hypothesis that a high level of process maturity leads to a high level of patient orientation. For this purpose, we have developed a scale for measuring the level of process maturity and have checked the method on validity and reliability. A total of 79 hospital managers and deputies, who represent all public health care facilities of the city (hospitals, primary care clinics, etc.), participated in the study. -/- Results The study reveals a clear relationship between the level of maturity of the treatment and interaction process and the level of patient orientation of the respective health care facility. The variance, which is explained by the independent variable process maturity level, is 16.3 %. All formative dimensions have a strong significant influence on the construct “patient orientation”. Likewise the maturity level of the treatment and interaction process shows a strong significant influence on patient orientation. -/- Conclusion For health care facilities it is of great importance to achieve a high maturity level of the treatment and interaction process to live up to the claim of being patient oriented. The maturity of the process can be tested using the questionnaire developed in the course of our study. (shrink)

This paper examines how people think about aiding others in a way that can inform both theory and practice. It uses data gathered from Kiva, an online, non-profit organization that allows individuals to aid other individuals around the world, to isolate intuitions that people find broadly compelling. The central result of the paper is that people seem to give more priority to aiding those in greater need, at least below some threshold. That is, the data strongly suggest incorporating both a (...) threshold and a prioritarian principle into the analysis of what principles for aid distribution people accept. This conclusion should be of broad interest to aid practitioners and policy makers. It may also provide important information for political philosophers interested in building, justifying, and criticizing theories about meeting needs using empirical evidence. (shrink)

In this paper I want to introduce and defend what I call the "subject mode account" of collective intentionality. I propose to understand collectives from joint attention dyads over small informal groups of various types to organizations, institutions and political entities such as nation states, in terms of their self-awareness. On the subject mode account, the self-consciousness of such collectives is constitutive for their being. More precisely, their self-representation as subjects of joint theoretical and practical positions towards the world – (...) rather than as objects of such positions – makes them what they are. Members of such collectives represent each other as co-subjects of such positions and thus represent the world from the point of view of the collective. (shrink)

Um dos principais problemas epistemológicos que podem ser encontrados no estudo dos experimentos mentais diz respeito ao critério de escolha entre casos que produzam resultados contraditórios. Que justificação possuímos para escolher entre C e ~C? James Roberto Brown argumenta a favor de um critério de probabilidade, onde se atribui probabilidade aos dois fenômenos e o mais provável de ser verdadeiro é o que aceitamos. John Norton argumenta que experimentos mentais são argumentos, por isso eles podem ser reconstruídos como argumentos. Através (...) desse processo podemos encontrar as falhas na argumentação do experimento e decidir, através de justificação lógica, qual é a conclusão correta. A abordagem de Brown se mostra muito infrutífera por não apresentar como o cálculo de probabilidade deve funcionar, nem como é possível atribuir probabilidades a verdade dos resultados dos experimentos mentais. Por outro lado, para aceitar a resposta de Norton, necessitamos aceitar que experimentos mentais realmente façam uso de argumentos e que isso seja tudo o que podemos dizer sobre eles. Essa estruturação não permite nenhuma outra fonte epistêmica para justificar os resultados dos experimentos metais. (shrink)

Third-party property insurance (TPPI) protects insured drivers who accidentally damage an expensive car from the threat of financial ruin. Perhaps more importantly though, TPPI also protects the victims whose losses might otherwise go uncompensated. Ought responsible drivers therefore take out TPPI? This paper begins by enumerating some reasons for why a rational person might believe that they have a moral obligation to take out TPPI. It will be argued that if what is at stake in taking responsibility is the ability (...) to compensate our possible future victims for their losses, then it might initially seem that most people should be thankful for the availability of relatively inexpensive TPPI because without it they may not have sufficient funds to do the right thing and compensate their victims in the event of an accident. But is the ability to compensate one's victims really what is at stake in taking responsibility? The second part of this paper will critically examine the arguments for the above position, and it will argue that these arguments do not support the conclusion that injurers should compensate their victims for their losses, and hence that drivers need not take out TPPI in order to be responsible. Further still, even if these arguments did support the conclusion that injurers should compensate their victims for their losses, then (perhaps surprisingly) nobody should to be allowed to take out TPPI because doing so would frustrate justice. (shrink)

This thesis considers two allegations which conservatives often level at no-fault systems — namely, that responsibility is abnegated under no-fault systems, and that no-fault systems under- and over-compensate. I argue that although each of these allegations can be satisfactorily met – the responsibility allegation rests on the mistaken assumption that to properly take responsibility for our actions we must accept liability for those losses for which we are causally responsible; and the compensation allegation rests on the mistaken assumption that tort (...) law’s compensatory decisions provide a legitimate norm against which no-fault’s decisions can be compared and criticized – doing so leads in a direction which is at odds with accident law reform advocates’ typical recommendations. On my account, accident law should not just be reformed in line with no-fault’s principles, but rather it should be completely abandoned since the principles that protect no- fault systems from the conservatives’ two allegations are incompatible with retaining the category of accident law, they entail that no-fault systems are a form of social welfare and not accident law systems, and that under these systems serious deprivation – and to a lesser extent causal responsibility – should be conditions of eligibility to claim benefits. (shrink)

Self-esteem can influence educational success, and educational success can also be influenced by self-esteem. Hence, high self-esteem has been recognized as a key predictor of academic success in students. Thus, this study investigates the relationship between self-esteem and anxiety of senior high school students. Employing descriptive-correlational design with 194 senior high school students enrolled in private schools during the school year 2021-2022. Based on the statistical analysis, there is a correlation between self-esteem and anxiety (r.=.125).

In this article, I contribute to the debate between two philosophical traditions—the Kantian and the Aristotelian—on the requirements of criminal responsibility and the grounds for excuse by taking this debate to a new context: international criminal law. After laying out broadly Kantian and Aristotelian conceptions of criminal responsibility, I defend a quasi-Aristotelian conception, which affords a central role to moral development, and especially to the development of moral perception, for international criminal law. I show than an implication of this view (...) is that persons who are substantially and non-culpably limited in their capacity for ordinary moral perception warrant an excuse for engaging in unlawful conduct. I identify a particular set of conditions that trigger this excuse, and then I systematically examine it as applied to the controversial case of former-child-soldier-turned leader of the Lord’s Resistance Army, Dominic Ongwen, who is currently at trial at the International Criminal Court. (shrink)

Egalitarians must address two questions: i. What should there be an equality of, which concerns the currency of the ‘equalisandum’; and ii. How should this thing be allocated to achieve the so-called equal distribution? A plausible initial composite answer to these two questions is that resources should be allocated in accordance with choice, because this way the resulting distribution of the said equalisandum will ‘track responsibility’ — responsibility will be tracked in the sense that only we will be responsible for (...) the resources that are available to us, since our allocation of resources will be a consequence of our own choices. But the effects of actual choices should not be preserved until the prior effects of luck in constitution and circumstance are first eliminated. For instance, people can choose badly because their choice-making capacity was compromised due to a lack of intelligence (i.e. due to constitutional bad luck), or because only bad options were open to them (i.e. due to circumstantial bad luck), and under such conditions we are not responsible for our choices. So perhaps a better composite answer to our two questions (from the perspective of tracking responsibility) might be that resources should be allocated so as to reflect people’s choices, but only once those choices have been corrected for the distorting effects of constitutional and circumstantial luck, and on this account choice preservation and luck elimination are two complementary aims of the egalitarian ideal. Nevertheless, it is one thing to say that luck’s effects should be eliminated, but quite another to figure out just how much resource redistribution would be required to achieve this outcome, and so it was precisely for this purpose that in 1981 Ronald Dworkin developed the ingenuous hypothetical insurance market argumentative device (HIMAD), which he then used in conjunction with the talent slavery (TS) argument, to arrive at an estimate of the amount of redistribution that would be required to reduce the extent of luck’s effects. However recently Daniel Markovits has cast doubt over Dworkin’s estimates of the amount of redistribution that would be required, by pointing out flaws with his understanding of how the hypothetical insurance market would function. Nevertheless, Markovits patched it up and he used this patched-up version of Dworkin’s HIMAD together with his own version of the TS argument to reach his own conservative estimate of how much redistribution there ought to be in an egalitarian society. Notably though, on Markovits’ account once the HIMAD is patched-up and properly understood, the TS argument will also allegedly show that the two aims of egalitarianism are not necessarily complementary, but rather that they can actually compete with one another. According to his own ‘equal-agent’ egalitarian theory, the aim of choice preservation is more important than the aim of luck elimination, and so he alleges that when the latter aim comes into conflict with the former aim then the latter will need to be sacrificed to ensure that people are not subordinated to one another as agents. I believe that Markovits’ critique of Dworkin is spot on, but I also think that his own positive thesis — and hence his conclusion about how much redistribution there ought to be in an egalitarian society — is flawed. Hence, this paper will begin in Section I by explaining how Dworkin uses the HIMAD and his TS argument to estimate the amount of redistribution that there ought to be in an egalitarian society — this section will be largely expository in content. Markovits’ critique of Dworkin will then be outlined in Section II, as will be his own positive thesis. My critique of Markovits, and my own positive thesis, will then make a fleeting appearance in Section III. Finally, I will conclude by rejecting both Dworkin’s and Markovits’ estimates of the amount of redistribution that there ought to be in an egalitarian society, and by reaffirming the responsibility-tracking egalitarian claim that choice preservation and luck elimination are complementary and not competing egalitarian aims. (shrink)

It could be argued that tort law is failing, and arguably an example of this failure is the recent public liability and insurance (‘PL&I’) crisis. A number of solutions have been proposed, but ultimately the chosen solution should address whatever we take to be the cause of this failure. On one account, the PL&I crisis is a result of an unwarranted expansion of the scope of tort law. Proponents of this position sometimes argue that the duty of care owed by (...) defendants to plaintiffs has expanded beyond reasonable levels, such that parties who were not really responsible for another’s misfortune are successfully sued, while those who really were to blame get away without taking any responsibility. However people should take responsibility for their actions, and the only likely consequence of allowing them to shirk it is that they and others will be less likely to exercise due care in the future, since the deterrents of liability and of no compensation for accidentally self-imposed losses will not be there. Others also argue that this expansion is not warranted because it is inappropriately fueled by ‘deep pocket’ considerations rather than by considerations of fault. They argue that the presence of liability insurance sways the judiciary to award damages against defendants since they know that insurers, and not the defendant personally, will pay for it in the end anyway. But although it may seem that no real person has to bear these burdens when they are imposed onto insurers, in reality all of society bears them collectively when insurers are forced to hike their premiums to cover these increasing damages payments. In any case, it seems unfair to force insurers to cover these costs simply because they can afford to do so. If such an expansion is indeed the cause of the PL&I crisis, then a contraction of the scope of tort liability, and a pious return to the fault principle, might remedy the situation. However it could also be argued that inadequate deterrence is the cause of this crisis. On this account the problem would lie not with the tort system’s continued unwarranted expansion, but in the fact that defendants really have been too careless. If prospective injurers were appropriately deterred from engaging in unnecessarily risky activities, then fewer accidents would ever occur in the first place, and this would reduce the need for litigation at its very source. If we take this to be the cause of tort law’s failure then our solution should aim to improve deterrence. Glen Robinson has argued that improved deterrence could be achieved if plaintiffs were allowed to sue defendants for wrongful exposure to ongoing risks of future harm, even in the absence of currently materialized losses. He argues that at least in toxic injury type cases the tortious creation of risk [should be seen as] an appropriate basis of liability, with damages being assessed according to the value of the risk, as an alternative to forcing risk victims to abide the outcome of the event and seek damages only if and when harm materializes. In a sense, Robinson wishes to treat newly-acquired wrongful risks as de-facto wrongful losses, and these are what would be compensated in liability for risk creation (‘LFRC’) cases. Robinson argues that if the extent of damages were fixed to the extent of risk exposure, all detected unreasonable risk creators would be forced to bear the costs of their activities, rather than only those who could be found responsible for another’s injuries ‘on the balance of probabilities’. The incidence of accidents should decrease as a result of improved deterrence, reduce the ‘suing fest’, and so resolve the PL&I crisis. So whilst the first solution involves contracting the scope of tort liability, Robinson’s solution involves an expansion of its scope. However Robinson acknowledges that LFRC seems prima facie incompatible with current tort principles which in the least require the presence of plaintiff losses, defendant fault, and causation to be established before making defendants liable for plaintiffs’ compensation. Since losses would be absent in LFRC cases by definition, the first evidentiary requirement would always be frustrated, and in its absence proof of defendant fault and causation would also seem scant. If such an expansion of tort liability were not supported by current tort principles then it would be no better than proposals to switch accident law across to no-fault, since both solutions would require comprehensive legal reform. However Robinson argues that the above three evidentiary requirements could be met in LFRC cases to the same extent that they are met in other currently accepted cases, and hence that his solution would therefore be preferable to no-fault solutions as it would only require incremental but not comprehensive legal reform. Although I believe that actual losses should be present before allowing plaintiffs to seek compensation, I will not present a positive argument for this conclusion. My aim in this paper is not to debate the relative merits of Robinson’s solution as compared to no-fault solutions, nor to determine which account of the cause of the PL&I crisis is closer to the truth, but rather to find out whether Robinson’s solution would indeed require less radical legal reform than, for example, proposed no-fault solutions. I will argue that Robinson fails to show that current tort principles would support his proposed solution, and hence that his solution is at best on an even footing with no-fault solutions since both would require comprehensive legal reform. (shrink)

What constitutes illocutionary silencing? This is the key question underlying much recent work on Catherine MacKinnon's claim that pornography silences women. In what follows I argue that the focus of the literature on the notion of audience `uptake' serves to mischaracterize the phenomena. I defend a broader interpretation of what it means for an illocutionary act to succeed, and show how this broader interpretation provides a better characterization of the kinds of silencing experienced by women.

Technik und Künstliche Intelligenz gehören zu den brisanten Themen der gegenwärtigen Theologie. Wie kann Theologie zu Technik und KI beitragen? Der Technikdiskurs ist aufgeladen mit religiösen Motiven, und Technologien wie Roboter fordern die Theologie, z. B. das Menschenbild, die Ethik und die religiöse Praxis, neu heraus. Der Sammelband erforscht aus theologischer Perspektive die drängenden Themen unserer Zeit. Dazu begibt sich die Theologie in Dialog mit den Technikwissenschaften. Untersucht werden die Veränderungen des Menschenbildes durch Roboter, Religiöse Roboter, Optimierung des Körpers, medizinische (...) Technologien, Autoregulative Waffensysteme und wie die Theologie durch die Technologisierung transformiert wird. Aus interdisziplinärer Perspektive werden neue Forschungsergebnisse aus dem internationalen Raum vorgestellt und neue Wege beschritten. Puzio, Anna/Kunkel, Nicole/Klinge, Hendrik (eds.): Alexa, wie hältst du es mit der Religion? Theologische Zugänge zu Technik und Künstlicher Intelligenz (Theologie und KI 1). Darmstadt: wbg 2023. (shrink)

Elite women seized the public health campaign during the 1900 plague outbreak to assert political influence and advocate for sanitation reform grounded in their domestic experiences. These women advocated for their inclusion in the political sphere by valuing their domestic experiences as knowledge relevant for public health initiatives. This reframing of experience positioned them as viable citizens in the imminent Federation. Applying Laura Zanotti's concept of relational ontology, this analysis frames their actions as not simply a battle against institutional authority (...) but as careful and strategic interactions with their era's political context, exploiting aspects of it that were beneficial to them. Their ambivalent involvement in the public health campaign illustrates a complex chapter in Australian medical history. Women used the opportunity of plague to reevaluate their experience of the home as a form of knowledge relevant to public health. At the same time, they leveraged their growing status as political subjects to oppress others. (shrink)

Plato's city-soul analogy underwrites his overarching argument in the Philebus. I sketch the main lines of the analogy, and then defend it against two prominent objections.