In some philosophical arguments an important role is played by the claim that certain situations differ from each other with respect to phenomenology. One class of such arguments are minimal pair arguments. These have been used to argue that there is cognitive phenomenology, that high-level properties are represented in perceptual experience, that understanding has phenomenology, and more. I argue that facts about our mental lives systematically block such arguments, reply to a range of objections, and apply my critique to some (...) examples from the literature. (shrink)

We argue that deliberative decision-making that is inclusive, transparent and accountable can contribute to more trustworthy and legitimate decisions on difficult ethical questions and political trade-offs during the pandemic and beyond.

In this thesis I seek to advance our understanding of what intuitions are. I argue that intuitions are experiences of a certain kind. In particular, they are experiences with representational content, and with a certain phenomenal character. -/- In Chapter 1 I identify our target and provide some important reliminaries. Intuitions are mental states, but which ones? Giving examples helps: a person has an intuition when it seems to her that torturing the innocent is wrong, or that if something is (...) red it is coloured. We can also provide an initial characterisation of the state by saying that it has representational content, often causes belief, and appears to justify belief. In addition, there is something it is like to have an intuition: intuition has a certain phenomenal character. -/- Some argue that intuition does not explain anything which cannot be explained by other mental states. One version of this view takes intuition to reduce to belief. In Chapter 2 I argue that this entails that agents are rationally criticisable in situations where we know they are not, and that such views are therefore untenable. A parallel argument shows that the corresponding approach to perception fails. This suggests a similarity in nature: both intuition and perception are experiences. -/- Others take intuition to reduce to a disposition to have a belief. In Chapter 3 I consider a line of argument against such views, find it unsuccessful, and present two new arguments. One is likely to be dialectically ineffective. The other suffers no such weakness: it shows that the proposed reduction fails. As before, the argument also applies to perception, and suggests that intuition and perception are both experiences. -/- In the remainder of the thesis I develop an account of intuition as an experience. I distinguish between content-specific and attitude-specific phenomenology, and argue that intuition lacks the former (Chapter 4), but has the latter (Chapter 5). This allows us to say what intuition is: it is is an experience with representational content and with attitude-specific phenomenology of a certain kind. -/- In Chapter 6 I put this account of intuition to use. When a person has a perceptual or intuitional experience, I argue that simply having the experience is what makes the subject justified in believing what the experience represents. Moreover, what explains that intuition and perception can justify belief in this way is precisely their phenomenal character. (shrink)

This report by the WHO Consultative Group on Equity and Universal Health Coverage addresses how countries can make fair progress towards the goal of universal coverage. It explains the relevant tradeoffs between different desirable ends and offers guidance on how to make these tradeoffs.

This paper argues that, contrary to common opinion, intuition can result from conscious reasoning. It also discusses why this matters.

I argue against Barbara Montero's claim that Conservation of Energy has nothing to do with physicalism. I reject her reconstruction of the argument for physicalism from CoE, and offer an alternative reconstruction that better captures the intuitions of those who believe that there is a conflict between interactionist dualism and CoE.

Fifty years have passed since Norwood Russell Hanson's unexpected death, yet he remains an important voice in philosophy of science. This book is a revised and expanded edition of a collection of Hanson's essays originally published in 1971, edited by Stephen Toulmin and Harry Woolf. The new volume features a comprehensive introduction by Matthew Lund (Rowan University) and two new essays. The first is "Observation and Explanation: A Guide to Philosophy of Science", originally published as a posthumous book by (...) Harper and Row. This essay, written near the end of Hanson’s life, represents his mature philosophy of science. The second new addition, Hanson's essay "The Trial of Galileo", is something of a "lost" work – it was only published in a small run collection on famous trials and was left out of the published lists of Hanson’s works. Ever the outspoken firebrand, Hanson found many lessons and warnings from Galileo's trial that were relevant to Cold War America. -/- This volume not only contains Hanson's best-known work in history and philosophy of science, but also highlights the breadth of his philosophical thought. Hanson balanced extreme versatility with a unified approach to conceptual and philosophical problems. Hanson's central insight is that philosophy and science both strive to render the world intelligible -- the various concepts central to our attempts to make sense of the world are interdependent, and cannot operate, or even be fully understood, independently. The essays included in this collection present Hanson's thinking on religious belief, theory, observation, meaning, cosmology, modality, logic, and philosophy of mind. This collection also includes Hanson's lectures on the theory of flight, Hanson's greatest passion. (shrink)

Norwood Russell Hanson was one of the most important philosophers of science of the post-war period. Hanson brought Wittgensteinian ordinary language philosophy to bear on the concepts of science, and his treatments of observation, discovery, and the theory-ladenness of scientific facts remain central to the philosophy of science. Additionally, Hanson was one of philosophy’s great personalities, and his sense of humor and charm come through fully in the pages of Perception and Discovery. -/- Perception and Discovery, originally published in 1969, (...) is Hanson’s posthumous textbook in philosophy of science. The book focuses on the indispensable role philosophy plays in scientific thinking. Perception and Discovery features Hanson’s most complete and mature account of theory-laden observation, a discussion of conceptual and logical boundaries, and a detailed treatment of the epistemological features of scientific research and scientific reasoning. This book is of interest to scholars of philosophy of science, particularly those concerned with Hanson’s thought and the development of the discipline in the middle of the 20th century. However, even fifty years after Hanson’s early death, Perception and Discovery still has a great deal to offer all readers interested in science. (shrink)

A simple reductive view of intuition holds that intuition is a type of belief. That an agent who intuits that p sometimes believes that p is false is often thought to demonstrate that the simple reductive view is false. I show that this argument is inconclusive, but also that an argument for the same conclusion can be rebuilt using the notion of rational criticisability. I then use that notion to argue that perception is also not reducible to belief, and that (...) neither intuition nor perception is reducible to credence. (shrink)

La cobertura universal de salud está en el centro de la acción actual para fortalecer los sistemas de salud y mejorar el nivel y la distribución de la salud y los servicios de salud. Este documento es el informe fi nal del Grupo Consultivo de la OMS sobre la Equidad y Cobertura Universal de Salud. Aquí se abordan los temas clave de la justicia (fairness) y la equidad que surgen en el camino hacia la cobertura universal de salud. Por lo (...) tanto, el informe es pertinente para cada agente que infl uye en ese camino y en particular para los gobiernos, ya que se encargan de supervisar y guiar el progreso hacia la cobertura universal de salud. (shrink)

This report from the WHO Consultative Group on Equity and Universal Health Coverage offers advice on how to make progress fairly towards universal health coverage.

In the 20th century, the term “media logic” was introduced to denote the influence of independent mass media on political systems and other institutions. In recent years the idea has been reworked and labeled “mediatization” to widen the framework by including new media and new areas of application. In Section Two the paper discusses different conceptualizations. It is argued that even if they bring new insights, they cannot be unified into one concept, and that they also lack a consistent definition (...) of digital media. Section three provides a definition of digital media in order to identify new trajectories made possible by these media, which have led into a new media matrix built around the internet and mobile devices. It will be argued that the new media matrix cannot be understood from a point of view defined by the framework of 20th century mass media because digital media open new trajectories and because in the new matrix the previously existing media have had to transform themselves. (shrink)

Research on preference reversals has demonstrated a disproportionate influence of outcome probability on choices between monetary gambles. The aim was to investigate the hypothesis that this is a prominence effect originally demonstrated for riskless choice. Another aim was to test the structure compatibility hypothesis as an explanation of the effect. The hypothesis implies that probability should be the prominent attribute when compared with value attributes both in a choice and a preference rating procedure. In Experiment 1, two groups of undergraduates (...) were presented with medical treatments described by two value attributes (effectiveness and pain-relief). All participants performed both a matching task and made preference ratings. In the latter task, outcome probabilities were added to the descriptions of the medical treatments for one of the groups. In line with the hypothesis, this reduced the prominence effect on the preference ratings observed for effectiveness. In Experiment 2, a matching task was used to demonstrate that probability was considered more important by a group of participating undergraduates than the value attributes. Furthermore, in both choices and preference ratings the expected prominence effect was found for probability. (shrink)

The article presents a conceptual framework for distinguishing different sorts of heterogeneous digital materials. The hypothesis is that a wide range of heterogeneous data resources can be characterized and classified due to their particular configurations of hypertext features such as scripts, links, interactive processes, and time scalings, and that the hypertext configuration is a major but not sole source of the messiness of big data. The notion of hypertext will be revalidated, placed at the center of the interpretation of networked (...) digital media, and used in the analysis of the fast-growing amounts of heterogeneous digital collections, assemblages, and corpora. The introduction summarizes the wider background of a fast-changing data landscape. (shrink)

The historical consensus is that logical evidence is special. Whereas empirical evidence is used to support theories within both the natural and social sciences, logic answers solely to a priori evidence. Further, unlike other areas of research that rely upon a priori evidence, such as mathematics, logical evidence is basic. While we can assume the validity of certain inferences in order to establish truths within mathematics and test scientifi c theories, logicians cannot use results from mathematics or the empirical sciences (...) without seemingly begging the question. Appeals to rational intuition and analyticity in order to account for logical knowledge are symptomatic of these commitments to the apriority and basicness of logical evidence. This chapter argues that these historically prevalent accounts of logical evidence are mistaken, and that if we take logical practice seriously we fi nd that logical evidence is rather unexceptional, sharing many similarities to the types of evidence appealed to within other research areas. (shrink)

The article discuss the interpretation of modernity in Bruno Latours 'The end of modernity'. On the one hand, it argues that the notion of modernity should be modified as nobody can be only modern. On the other hand, it argues that the notion of modernity changes over the ages and that we are in the middle of a process best understood as a new modernization of modernity.

In the present study it was shown that both decision heuristics and social value orientation play important roles in the building of preferences. This was revealed in decision tasks in which participants were deciding about candidates for a job position. An eye-tracking equipment was applied in order to register participants´ information acquisition. It was revealed that participants performing well on a series of heuristics tasks (availability, representativeness, anchoríng & adjustment,and attribution) including a confidence judgment also behaved more accurately than low (...) performers in the fulfillment of the preference tasks. It was also established that the high performers were not as influenced by whether uncertainty was presented in terms of probabilities or in terms of frequencies as was the low performers. With regard to social value orientation the results revealed that decision processing differences were more systematic between cooperators and competitors than between cooperators and individualists. Also, the cooperators did not seem to attend more to proenvironmental goals than to profit goals in the evaluation of the candidates. Finally, it was shown that accountable cooperators invested more time in their decisions than those that were not accountable, and that no such difference was observed between accountable and not accountable competitors or individualists. (shrink)

The article includes my contribution to the "Future of Text Initiative" and summarizes a more elabotate article on 'E-text' in The Oxford Researech Encyclopedia Literature from 2018.

The purpose of this chapter is to clarify what the concept of digital media might add to the understanding of mediatization and what the concept of mediatization might add to the understanding of digital media. It is argued that digital media open an array of new trajectories in human communication, which were not anticipated in previous conceptualizations of media and mediatization. If digital media are to be included, the concept of mediatization has to be revised and new parameters must be (...) integrated in the concept of media. At the same time, it is argued that the concept of mediatization still provides a variety of perspectives of relevance to the study of digital media. The claim that the concept of mediatization has to be reinterpreted can only be legitimized if digital media are considered distinct from the media formerly referred to in mediatization theory. Such characteristics are presented and digital media are defined in section 2, while section 1 is devoted to theories of mediatization and the notion of media. Section 3 analyses the relation between mediatization and digitization. Finally, in section 4, medium theory is revisited with a view to harvest some missing fruits in contemporary mediatization theory. (shrink)

The article discusses the limitations of psycho-physical parallellism and the implications of a pscycho-physical interaction paradigm considering the notion Downward Causation. The focus is on the notion of levels in nature and their interrelations, and it argues that the notion of rule-based systems should be considered a subcategory of rule-generating systems partly based on redundancy functions rather than rules.

Until the late 19th century scientists almost always assumed that the world could be described as a rule-based and hence deterministic system or as a set of such systems. The assumption is maintained in many 20th century theories although it has also been doubted because of the breakthrough of statistical theories in thermodynamics (Boltzmann and Gibbs) and other fields, unsolved questions in quantum mechanics as well as several theories forwarded within the social sciences. Until recently it has furthermore been assumed (...) that a rule-based and deterministic system was also predictable if only the rules were known, but this assumption has now been undermined by modern chaos-theory describing rule-based and deterministic, but unpredictable systems, while catastrophe-theory delivers a set of types describing various kinds of instability and conditions for the stability of a given system. Hence the main trait in the theoretical development in the 20th-century science can be described as a basic modification and limitation of some of the fundamental and strong assumptions forwarded in the previous epochs of modern science. Ironically, the very same process has been a process in which the human capacity to intervene in nature has expanded dramatically and mainly with the help of the very same theories, and not least because they allow nature to be described and made manipulable on a lower level and a more fine-grained scale. While the overall theoretical consistency between the various theories has gone, the reach of human intervention in nature has increased based on quite new dimensions whether in the area of physics (e.g.: energy technologies, chemical technologies, nanotechnologies etc.) or biology (ge¬netic manipulation) or in the area of psychology, sociology and culture (artificial simulations of mental processes, new means of communication, implying changes in the social infrastructure and cultural behaviour etc.). While some of these changes and new conditions can be reflected from within the conceptual framework of rule-based systems, albeit more complex than formerly recognized, others seem to give rise to the question of whether there are »systems« and relations between different systems in the world which are not rule-based? For instance, it seems to be obvious that the notion of instability represents a major conceptual break with former theories of rule-based systems, as the stability of the latter is an axiomatically given property implied in the very notion of rule-based systems, while instability can only be the result of external influence which should be explained as the result of another rule-based sy¬stem. While there are no difficulties implied concerning the stability of rule-based systems, the notion of unstable states of a system raises the question of how there can be a system at all if there are no invariant stabilising principles? This is the first question which I will address. And I shall do so by taking two examples of such systems as my point of departure. The first example will be the computer and the second will be ordinary language. In both cases I will argue that the stability of these systems (which are both defined by the existence/presence of human intentions) are provided by the help of - differently organised - redundancy functions which both allow the maintenance of systems in unstable macro-states, suspension of previous rules, underdetermination and overdetermination and generation/emergence/creation of new rules more or less independent of previous rules by the help of optional recursions to the permanently accessible underlying levels as for instance the level of binary representation in computers. Since the notion of redundancy is both controversial as such and often avoided, the concept is discussed (as defined in Claude Shannon's mathematical theory of information and in the semiotic framework of J. J. Greimas) and leading to a more general definition in which the redundancy functions serve to overcome noisy conditions, but at the cost of rule-based stability, determination, and predictability. A second question will be how the notion of rule-generating systems relates to the notion of anticipatory systems and it will be argued that rule-generating systems share some features with an¬ticipatory systems and that the former from a certain viewpoint can be seen as a subclass of the latter, although anticipative features are not necessarily a part of the definition of rule-generating systems. On the other hand, it will be discussed whether anticipatory systems which are not rule-generating systems can exist and it will be argued that the capacity to anticipate is strongly limited if it is not part of a rule-generating system. Therefore, it is concluded that the most powerful anticipatory systems need to be rule-generating systems. (shrink)

Since World War II the concept of Information has received several new definitions. Information can be understood as knowledge in general, as theoretical, formalized knowledge in general or as knowledge related to specific domains or specific representational forms. Because of these mutually inconsistent concepts the common traits are to be found in a perspective transcendent to those theories. The central cultural changes, it is argued, take place on the level of the societal knowledge infrastructure, evolving from the knowledge infrastructure of (...) the industrial societies as a long-term secularization process, resulting in new forms for representation and manipulation of knowledge. The process is seen as rooted in changes of the primary domains for knowledge extraction and in a change in the human relations to the languages in which we interpret the relations to nature. (shrink)

Throughout what is now the more than 50-year history of the computer many theories have been advanced regarding the contribution this machine would make to changes both in the structure of society and in ways of thinking. Like other theories regarding the future, these should also be taken with a pinch of salt. The history of the development of computer technology contains many predictions which have failed to come true and many applications that have not been foreseen. While we must (...) reserve judgment as to the question of the impact on the structure of society and human thought, there is no reason to wait for history when it comes to the question: what are the properties that could give the computer such far-reaching importance? The present book is intended as an answer to this question. The fact that this is a theoretical analysis is due to the nature of the subject. No other possibilities are available because such a description of the properties of the computer must be valid for any kind of application. An additional demand is that the description should be capable of providing an account of the properties which permit and limit these possible applications, just as it must make it possible to characterize a computer as distinct from a) other machines whether clocks, steam engines, thermostats, or mechanical and automatic calculating machines, b) other symbolic media whether printed, mechanical, or electronic and c) other symbolic languages whether ordinary languages, spoken or written or formal languages. This triple limitation, however, (with regard to other machines, symbolic media and symbolic languages) raises a theoretical question as it implies a meeting between concepts of mechanical-deterministic systems, which stem from mathematical physics, and concepts of symbolic systems which stem from the description of symbolic activities common to the humanities. The relationship between science and the humanities has traditionally been seen from a dualistic perspective, as a relationship between two clearly separate subject areas, each studied on its own set of premises and using its own methods. In the present case, however, this perspective cannot be maintained since there is both a common subject area and a new - and specific - kind of interaction between physical and symbolic processes. (shrink)

The composition of a timeline depends on purpose, perspective, and scale – and of the very understanding of the word, the phenomenon referred to, and whether the focus is the idea or concept, an instance of an idea or a phenomenon, a process, or an event and so forth. The main function of timelines is to provide an overview over a long history, it is a kind of a mnemotechnic device or a particular kind of Knowledge Organization System (KOS).b The (...) entries in the timeline should be brief and indisputable. Therefore, timelines often identify the first occurrences rather than the most widespread or most qualified instances leaving the fuller and more complex, and possibly disputable story out. But even first occurrences are often difficult to establish. The first occurrence is most often only the first finding of an instance. Older instances may be found and competing definitions develop either within a field or in different fields. This is further complicated since the phenomena, their names, and their meanings may change over time. Former meanings may become redundant, or they must accommodate and coexist with new meanings. The time and place of the composition of the timeline are to be considered in interpreting the things listed. The following note will discuss these issues as they occur in the development of the notions of text, e-text and hypertext, and the origin of machine translation. (shrink)

In this article, we propose the Fair Priority Model for COVID-19 vaccine distribution, and emphasize three fundamental values we believe should be considered when distributing a COVID-19 vaccine among countries: Benefiting people and limiting harm, prioritizing the disadvantaged, and equal moral concern for all individuals. The Priority Model addresses these values by focusing on mitigating three types of harms caused by COVID-19: death and permanent organ damage, indirect health consequences, such as health care system strain and stress, as well as (...) economic destruction. It proposes proceeding in three phases: the first addresses premature death, the second long-term health issues and economic harms, and the third aims to contain viral transmission fully and restore pre-pandemic activity. -/- To those who may deem an ethical framework irrelevant because of the belief that many countries will pursue "vaccine nationalism," we argue such a framework still has broad relevance. Reasonable national partiality would permit countries to focus on vaccine distribution within their borders up until the rate of transmission is below 1, at which point there would not be sufficient vaccine-preventable harm to justify retaining a vaccine. When a government reaches the limit of national partiality, it should release vaccines for other countries. -/- We also argue against two other recent proposals. Distributing a vaccine proportional to a country's population mistakenly assumes that equality requires treating differently situated countries identically. Prioritizing countries according to the number of front-line health care workers, the proportion of the population over 65, and the number of people with comorbidities within each country may exacerbate disadvantage and end up giving the vaccine in large part to wealthy nations. (shrink)

This paper describes the Danish legal framework for district cooling as an example of a model which so far has had limited success. A number of suggestions are analysed and discussed.

All parties involved in researching, developing, manufacturing, and distributing COVID-19 vaccines need guidance on their ethical obligations. We focus on pharmaceutical companies' obligations because their capacities to research, develop, manufacture, and distribute vaccines make them uniquely placed for stemming the pandemic. We argue that an ethical approach to COVID-19 vaccine production and distribution should satisfy four uncontroversial principles: optimising vaccine production, including development, testing, and manufacturing; fair distribution; sustainability; and accountability. All parties' obligations should be coordinated and mutually consistent. For (...) instance, companies should not be obligated to provide host countries with additional booster shots at the expense of fulfilling bilateral contracts with countries in which there are surges. Finally, any satisfactory approach should include mechanisms for assurance that all parties are honouring their obligations. This assurance enables countries, pharmaceutical companies, global organisations, and others to verify compliance with the chosen approach and protect ethically compliant stakeholders from being unfairly exploited by unethical behaviour of others. (shrink)

Normative thinking about addiction has traditionally been divided between, on the one hand, a medical model which sees addiction as a disease characterized by compulsive and relapsing drug use over which the addict has little or no control and, on the other, a moral model which sees addiction as a choice characterized by voluntary behaviour under the control of the addict. Proponents of the former appeal to evidence showing that regular consumption of drugs causes persistent changes in the brain structures (...) and functions known to be involved in the motivation of behavior. On this evidence, it is often concluded that becoming addicted involves a transition from voluntary, chosen drug use to non-voluntary compulsive drug use. Against this view, proponents of the moral model provide ample evidence that addictive drug use involves voluntary chosen behaviour. In this paper we argue that although they are right about something, both views are mistaken. We present a third model that neither rules out the view of addictive drug use as compulsive, nor that it involves voluntary chosen behavior. -/- . (shrink)

We offer a summary of the WHO Report "Making Fair Choices on the Path to Universal Health Coverage".

In the present study it was shown that decision heuristics and confidence judgements play important roles in the building of preferences. Based on a dual-process account of thinking, the study compared people who did well versus poorly on a series of decision heuristics and overconfidence judgement tasks. The two groups were found to differ with regard to their information search behaviour in introduced multiattribute choice tasks. High performers on the judgemental tasks were less influenced in their decision processes by numerical (...) information format (probabilities vs. frequencies) compared to low performers. They also looked at more attributes and spent more time on the multiattribute choice tasks. The results reveal that performance on decision heuristics and overconfidence tasks has a bearing both on heuristic and analytic processes in multiattribute decision making. (shrink)

The goal of achieving Universal Health Coverage (UHC) can generally be realized only in stages. Moreover, resource, capacity and political constraints mean governments often face difficult trade-offs on the path to UHC. In a 2014 report, Making fair choices on the path to UHC, the WHO Consultative Group on Equity and Universal Health Coverage articulated principles for making such trade-offs in an equitable manner. We present three case studies which illustrate how these principles can guide practical decision-making. These case studies (...) show how progressive realization of the right to health can be effectively guided by priority-setting principles, including generating the greatest total health gain, priority for the worse off, and financial risk protection. They also demonstrate the value of a fair and accountable process of priority setting. (shrink)

We reply to critics of the World Health Organisation's Report "Making Fair Choices on the Path to Universal Health Coverage". We clarify and defend the report's key moral commitments. We also explain its role in guiding policy in the face of both financial and political constraints on making fair choices.

In response to commentators, we argue that whether waiving patent rights will meaningfully improve access to COVID-19 vaccines for low income and middle-income countries (LMICs), particularly in the short term, is an empirical matter. We also reject preferentially allocating vaccines to countries that hosted trials because doing so unethically favours those with research infrastructure, rather than those facing the worst burdens from COVID-19.

This World Bank Report offers a new conception of fair decision processes in health financing. It argues that such procedural fairness can contribute to fairer outcomes, strengthen the legitimacy of decision processes, build trust in authorities, and promote the sustainability of reforms on the path to health coverage for all.

The book is addressed to all readers interested in cognitive science, and especially in research combining a logical analysis with psychological, linguistic and neurobiological approaches. The publication is the result of a collaboration between the Department of Cognitive Science at University of Lodz and the Department of Cognitive Science at Lund University. It is intended to provide a comprehensive presentation of the key research issues undertaken in both Departments, including considerations on meaning, natural language and reasoning, linguistic as well (...) as numerical competence, the theory of decision making, modelling of conceptual representations, cognitive and game theoretic approach to social interactions. (shrink)

Wittgenstein’ın bir yaşam olayı olarak görmediği ölümün ne anlama geldiğine ilişkin düşüncesi açımlanıyor. Wittgenstein’ın düşüncesinin varlık-bilimsel dayanağı olan tek bir dünyanın var sayılması birden çok dünya varsayılan bir yaklaşımla karşılaştırılıyor.

Artikkeli käsittelee Saul Kripken Ludwig Wittgensteinin myöhemmistä töistä koostamaa merkityskeptistä haastetta, erityisesti niin kutsuttua äärellisyyden ongelmaa. Pääargumentti on, että skeptisen haasteen pääasiallinen vastaaja, semanttinen dispositionalismi, ei uusimmistakaan yrityksistä huolimatta ole kyennyt ratkaisemaan äärettömyyden ongelmaa. Ratkaistakseen ongelman dispositionalistin tulisi selittää, kuinka on mahdollista, että äärellinen puhuja voisi omata disposition käyttää jotain termiä äärettömässä määrässä tapauksia määrätyllä tavalla. Monet dispositionalistit esittävät, että ratkaisu löytyy niin kutsutuista ceteris paribus -ehdoista, joita vastaan Martin Kusch on argumentoinut. Jatkan Kuschin kritiikkiä ja osoitan ceteris paribus -strategian (...) keskeiset ongelmat, minkä lisäksi vastaan myös kahteen näistä ehdoista riippumattomaan dispositionalistiseen strategiaan. (shrink)

Jotta olisimme moraalisesti vastuussa teoistamme, meidän on kyettävä muodostamaan käsityksiä oikeasta ja väärästä ja toimimaan ainakin jossain määrin niiden mukaisesti. Jos olemme täysivaltaisia moraalitoimijoita, myös ymmärrämme miksi jotkin teot ovat väärin, ja kykenemme siten joustavasti mukauttamaan toimintaamme eri tilanteisiin. Esitän, ettei näköpiirissä ole tekoälyjärjestelmiä, jotka kykenisivät aidosti välittämään oikein tekemisestä tai ymmärtämään moraalin vaatimuksia, koska nämä kyvyt vaativat kokemustietoisuutta ja kokonaisvaltaista arvostelukykyä. Emme siten voi sysätä koneille vastuuta teoistaan. Meidän on sen sijaan pyrittävä rakentamaan keinotekoisia oikeintekijöitä - järjestelmiä, jotka eivät (...) ole moraalitoimijoita, mutta kuitenkin toimivat likipitäen siten kuin me itse parhaimmillamme tekisimme. (shrink)

Anmeldelse af Ole Thyssens 'Det filosofiske blik' og 'Blikskift'.

On varsin yleisesti hyväksyttyä, että rangaistuksen ilmaisullinen tehtävä - eli se, että se ilmaisee yhteisön paheksuntaa - on yksi sen ominaispiirre. Viime aikoina on kuitenkin esitetty myös kunnianhimoisempia väitteitä siitä, että rangaistuksen voisi oikeuttaa sen ilmaisullisella tehtävällä. Nämä näkemykset ovat myös saaneet runsaasti kritiikkiä. Tässä esseessä kehittelen aiemmin muotoilemaani versiota ekspressiivisestä rangaistusteoriasta, jonka mukaan asenteiden toiminnallinen ilmaisu rankaisemalla on oikeutettua siksi, että muuten rikoksen uhrilla ei ole hänelle kuuluvaa oikeudenhaltijan statusta. Jos ihmisen oikeuksia voi loukata rangaistuksetta, ne jäävät moraaliseksi ihanteeksi (...) eivätkä toteudu sosiaalisina tosiasioina. Esitän, että tämä näkemys välttää ainakin useimmat muille ilmaisuteorioille esitetyt haasteet. (shrink)

Käsittelen tässä artikkelissa Leibnizin käsitystä kuolemasta, jota ei tarkkaan ottaen ole olemassa. Kuoleminen on Leibnizin mukaan vain tila, jossa havaintomme eivät nouse tarkoiksi ja vaivumme ikäänkuin elottoman luonnon tasolle.

Logical consequence is typically construed as a metalinguistic relation between sentences. Deflationism is an account of logic that challenges this orthodoxy. In Williamson’s recent presentation of deflationism, logic’s primary concern is with universal generalizations over absolutely everything. As well as an interesting account of logic in its own right, deflationism has also been recruited to decide between competing logics in resolving semantic paradoxes. This paper defends deflationism from its most important challenge to date, due to Ole Hjortland. It then presents (...) two new problems for the view. Hjortland’s objection is that deflationism cannot discriminate between distinct logics. I show that his example of classical logic and supervaluationism depends on equivocating about whether the language includes a “definitely” operator. Moreover, I prove a result that blocks this line of objection no matter the choice of logics. I end by criticizing deflationism on two fronts. First, it cannot do the work it has been recruited to perform. That is, it cannot help adjudicate between competing logics. This is because a theory of logic cannot be as easily separated from a theory of truth as its proponents claim. Second, deflationism currently has no adequate answer to the following challenge: what does a sentence’s universal generalization have to do with its logical truth? I argue that the most promising, stipulative response on behalf of the deflationist amounts to an unwarranted change of subject. (shrink)

Most theories of conditionals and attitudes do not analyze either phenomenon in terms of the other. A few view attitude reports as a species of conditionals (e.g. Stalnaker 1984, Heim 1992). Based on evidence from Kalaallisut, this paper argues for the opposite thesis: conditionals are a species of attitude reports. The argument builds on prior findings that conditionals are modal topic-comment structures (e.g. Haiman 1978, Bittner 2001), and that in mood-based Kalaallisut English future (e.g. Ole will win) translates into a (...) factual report of a prospect-oriented attitudinal state (e.g. expectation or anxiety, see Bittner 2005). It is argued that in conditionals the antecedent introduces a topical subdomain of an input modal base (Kratzer 1981) and requires the consequent to comment. The comment is a factual report of an attitude to the topical antecedent sub-domain. [This paper was published in 2011 as "Time and modality without tenses or modals"]. (shrink)

Contributors: -/- John Beatty (British Columbia); Kelly James Clark (Ibn Haldun, Istanbul); Angela Coventry (Portland State); Thomas Holden (UC Santa Barbara); Willem Lemmens (Antwerp); Robin Le Poidevin (Leeds); Jennifer Marusic (Edinburgh); Kevin Meeker (South Alabama); Amyas Merivale (Oxford); Peter Millican (Oxford); Dan O’Brien (Oxford Brookes); Graham Oppy (Monash); Paul Russell (Lund); Andre C. Willis (Brown).

The project “A Plurality of Lives” was funded and hosted by the Pufendorf Institute for Advanced Studies at Lund University, Sweden. The aim of the project was to better understand how a second origin of life, either in the form of a discovery of extraterrestrial life, life developed in a laboratory, or machines equipped with abilities previously only ascribed to living beings, will change how we understand and relate to life. Because of the inherently interdisciplinary nature of the project (...) aim, the project took an interdisciplinary approach with a research group made up of 12 senior researchers representing 12 different disciplines. The project resulted in a joint volume, an international symposium, several new projects, and a network of researchers in the field, all continuing to communicate about and advance the aim of the project. (shrink)

What is meaning-making? How do new domains of meanings emerge in the course of child’s development? What is the role of consciousness in this process? What is the difference between making sense of pointing, pantomime and language utterances? Are great apes capable of meaning-making? What about dogs? Parrots? Can we, in any way, relate their functioning and behavior to a child’s? Are artificial systems capable of meaning-making? The above questions motivated the emergence of cognitive semiotics as a discipline devoted to (...) theoretical and empirical studies of meaning-making processes. As a transdisciplinary approach to meaning and meaning-making, cognitive semiotics necessarily draws on a different disciplines: starting with philosophy of mind, via semiotics and linguistics, cognitive science(s), neuroanthropology, developmental and evolutionary psychology, comparative studies, and ending with robotics. The book presents extensively this discipline. It is a very eclectic story: highly abstract problems of philosophy of mind are discussed and, simultaneously, results of very specific experiments on picture recognition are presented. On the one hand, intentional acts involved in semiotic activity are elaborated; on the other, a computational system capable of a limited interpretation of excerpts from Carroll’s Through the Looking-Glass is described. Specifically, the two roads to cognitive semiotics are explored in the book: phenomenological-enactive path developed by the so-called Lund school and author’s own proposal: a functional-cognitivist path. (shrink)

Sokrates var inte bara en filosofisk nydanare. Genom sitt sätt att involvera sina samtalspartners i den filosofiska processen var han också i hög utsträckning en pedagogisk nydanare. Hans pedagogiska grundidé var den så kallade majeutiska metoden – det vill säga ”barnmorskemetoden”. Med det menade han att han inte överförde sina egna färdiga tankar till den han talade med utan han hjälpte sin samtalspartner att föda sina egna tankar. Inom pedagogiken är det vanligt att använda den så kallade ”Sokratiska metoden” vilket (...) i sin enklaste form bara innebär att man ställer frågor till studenterna. Den här artikeln kommer emellertid att handla om en mer sofistikerad metod som används för begreppsanalys/begreppsdefinition i grupp. Metoden är inspirerad av Sokrates men skiljer sig också en del från hur Sokrates själv grep sig an sina dialoger – åtminstone så som de beskrivs av Platon. Artikeln innehåller en kort historisk och pedagogisk bakgrund men syftar framför allt till att utgöra en praktisk vägledning för genomförande av sokratiska dialoger i filosofiundervisningen. Artikeln bygger framför allt på mina egna erfarenheter av att använda Sokratisk Dialog i undervisningen vid Filosofiska institutionen vid Lunds universitet, Lunds Tekniska Högskola, Sveriges Lantbruksuniversitet och i det privata näringslivet. Artikeln vänder sig till alla som undervisar i filosofi på universitetet eller gymnasiet eller i filosofiska metoder för studenter vid andra utbildningar, t.ex. värdeteori, vetenskapsteori eller tillämpad etik för ingenjörer eller medicinare – eller i vilket annat ämne som helst där det förekommer begrepp som saknar en enkel och knivskarp definition men som är viktiga för ämnet. (shrink)

Alguns filósofos alegam que intuições são experiências não sensórias (BENGSON, 2015; CHUDNOFF, 2011, 2013; KOKSVIK, 2020). Há algo como sentir uma intuição e isso é particular e único a esse estado mental. No entanto, alguns questionam essa experiência a partir da perspectiva de primeira pessoa: eles alegam não ter nenhuma experiência do tipo. Como resolver isso? John Bengson, Elijah Chudnoff e Ole Koksvik alegam que esses que afirmam não terem a experiência intuicional estão a procurando de maneira errada no seu (...) fluxo de consciência. Bengson diz que não devemos confiar apenas na nossa introspecção, mas sim vermos o que nos “atinge” ao sermos apresentados com certas situações. Chudnoff diz que as intuições são experiências constituídas de outras experiências, então não se deve esperar que as intuições venham sem nenhuma outra experiência. Koksvik diz que as intuições possuem apenas a fenomenologia de atitude específica, mas não fenomenologia de conteúdo específico. Isto é, não há uma distinção fenomenológica entre intuir que p e intuir que q. O objetivo aqui não é fornecer uma resposta definitiva a essa questão, mas fornecer um apanhado crítico das respostas dadas na literatura sobre esse desafio. (shrink)

Ajan luonnetta koskevissa käsityksissä on tyypillistä erottaa kaksi eriävää kantaa: A-teoreettinen presentismi ja B-teoreettinen eternalismi. Edeltävän väitetään tyypillisesti sopivan yhteen inhimillisen ajallisen kokemuksen kanssa ja jälkimmäisen ontologisesti perustavanlaatuisen luonnontieteen kanssa. Ilmikuvamme ajasta sisältää ehdottoman nykyisyyden ja yksisuuntaisen ajan kulun menneestä tulevaan. Tieteellinen kuva ajasta ei sisällä erityistä nykyisyyttä eikä ajan kulun edellyttämää dynaamista aikamuotojen muutosta. Monet ovat pitäneet kokemustamme ajan kulusta illuusiona. Tässä artikkelissa keskitytään A-sarjan mukaisen ajankulun virheteoreettiseen tulkintaan. Tarkastellaan mahdollisuutta, jonka mukaan meillä ei ole kyseistä kokemusta vaan kuvailemme (...) kokemustamme virheellisesti ajan virtaukseen liittyvillä vertauskuvilla. Tätä tukee fysikalistinen argumentti: Jos ajan kulun kokemuksellamme ei ole fysikaalista perustaa, meillä ei voi olla sen mukaista kokemustakaan ajasta. (shrink)