Picking up on Marx’s and Hegel’s analyses of human beings as social and individual, the article shows that what is at stake is not merely the possibility of individuality, but also the correct conception of the universal good. Both Marx and Hegel suppose that individuals must be social or political as individuals, which means, at least in Hegel’s case, that particular interests must form part of the universal good. The good and the rational is not something that requires sacrificing one’s (...) interests for the community or denying one’s particular character so as to become an equal rational agent. Very much to the contrary, the rational or the common good is nothing but the harmonious structuring of particular interests. While Section I introduces Marx’s and Hegel’s conceptions of individual and social beings, Sections II and III discuss their respective views of individuality, and Sections IV and V discuss the notion of a universal good containing individual interests. (shrink)

This article discusses an interpretation of Kant's conception of transcendental subjectivity, which manages to avoid many of the concerns that have been raised by analytic interpreters over this doctrine. It is an interpretation put forward by selected C19 and early C20 neo-Kantian writers. The article starts out by offering a neo-Kantian interpretation of the object as something that is constituted by the categories and that serves as a standard of truth within a theory of judgment. The second part explicates transcendental (...) subjectivity as the system of categories, which is self-referential and constitutes objects, in order to then evaluate this conception by means of a comparison with Hegel's absolute subject. Rather than delineating the differences between neo-Kantian writers, the article systematically expounds a shared project, which consists in providing the ultimate foundation for judgments by means of an anti-psychologist and non-metaphysical interpretation of transcendental subjectivity. (shrink)

This paper deals with the core version of the Trolley Problem. In one case many people favor an act which will bring about the death of one person but save five other persons. In another case most people would refuse to “sacrifice” one person in order to save five other lives. Since the two cases seem similar in all relevant respects, we have to explain and justify the diverging verdicts. Since I don’t find current proposals of a solution convincing, I (...) propose an alternative one according to which —but not —violates two forms of equality. I also test the underlying egalitarian principle against other cases. I argue that it offers a good explanation and also a normative justification of our intuitive verdicts about the cases. (shrink)

This article gives an overview over different principles of epistemic closure, their attractions and their problems.

The possibility of knowledge attributions across contexts (where attributor and subject find themselves in different epistemic contexts) can create serious problems for certain views of knowledge. Amongst such views is subject—sensitive invariantism—the view that knowledge is determined not only by epistemic factors (belief, truth, evidence, etc.) but also by non—epistemic factors (practical interests, etc.). I argue that subject—sensitive invariantism either runs into a contradiction or has to make very implausible assumptions. The problem has been very much neglected but is so (...) serious that one should look for alternative accounts of knowledge. (shrink)

With Hegel’s metaphysics attracting renewed attention, it is time to address a long-standing criticism: Scholars from Marx to Popper and Habermas have worried that Hegel’s metaphysics has anti-individualist and authoritarian implications, which are particularly pronounced in his Philosophy of History, since Hegel identifies historical progress with reason imposing itself on individuals. Rather than proposing an alternative non-metaphysical conception of reason, as Pippin or Brandom have done, this article argues that critics are broadly right in their metaphysical reading of Hegel’s central (...) concepts. However, they are mistaken about what Hegel’s approach entails, when one examines the specific types of states discussed by the philosopher in his Philosophy of History. Even on a traditional metaphysical reading, Hegel is not only non-authoritarian; he also makes a powerful argument concerning freedom, whereupon the freest society involves collective oversight and the shaping of social structures so as to ensure that they benefit everybody. (shrink)

This paper argues against common views that at least in many cases Robert Nozick is not forced to deny common closure principles. More importantly, Nozick does not – despite first (and second) appearances and despite his own words – deny closure. On the contrary, he is defending a more sophisticated and complex principle of closure. This principle does remarkably well though it is not without problems. It is surprising how rarely Nozick’s principle of closure has been discussed. He should be (...) seen not so much as a denier of closure than as someone who’s proposing an alternative, more complex principle of closure. (shrink)

That knowledge is factive, that is, that knowledge that p requires that p, has for a long time typically been treated as a truism. Recently, however, some authors have raised doubts about and arguments against this claim. In a recent paper in this journal, Michael Shaffer presents new arguments against the denial of the factivity of knowledge. This article discusses one of Shaffer’s objections: the one from “inconsistency and explosion”. I discuss two potential replies to Shaffer’s problem: dialetheism plus paraconsistency (...) and epistemic pluralism. This is not to be understood so much as a criticism of Shaffer’s view but rather as a request to develop his very promising objection from inconsistency and explosion further. (shrink)

While Hegel's metaphysics was long reviled, it has garnered more interest in recent years, with even the so-called non-metaphysical Hegelians starting to explicitly discuss Hegel’s metaphysical commitments. This brings up the old question: what are the social-philosophical implications of Hegel’s metaphysics? This chapter provides a unique answer to this question by contrasting the former non-metaphysical reading (as developed by Robert Pippin) with a traditional way of interpreting Hegel’s metaphysics and social philosophy, whose lineage includes not Wittgenstein, Sellars, or Brandom, but (...) rather Schelling, Marx, and Adorno. After discussing the two varieties of metaphysics (Sections 1–3), I will argue that a traditional metaphysical Hegel is more realist when it comes to assessing the power of social structures (Section 4), focused on structural freedom rather than agency (Sections 5 and 6), and more empowering for and lenient towards individuals who can make their interests count and are free to be irrational and egoist (Section 7). (shrink)

The neo-Kantian Hermann Cohen is famously anti-empiricist in that he denies that sensations can make a definable contribution to knowledge. However, in the second edition of Kant’s Theory of Experience (1885), Cohen considers a proposition that contrasts with both his other work and that of his followers: a Kantian who studies scientific claims to truth—and the grounds on which they are made—cannot limit himself to studying mathematics and logical principles, but needs to also investigate underlying presuppositions about the empirical element (...) of science. Due to his subjectivist approach, Cohen argues, Kant not only failed to explain how scientific observation and experiments are possible, but also misconceived the role of the ideas, particularly the idea of a system of nature. (shrink)

Is knowledge necessary or sufficient or both necessary and sufficient for acceptable practical reasoning and rational action? Several authors (e.g., Williamson, Hawthorne, and Stanley) have recently argued that the answer to these questions is positive. In this paper I present several objections against this view (both in its basic form as well in more developed forms). I also offer a sketch of an alternative view: What matters for the acceptability of practical reasoning in at least many cases (and in all (...) the cases discussed by the defenders of a strong link between knowledge and practical reasoning) is not so much knowledge but expected utility. (shrink)

The core argument of this article is that Adorno adopts the distinction between an abstract and a concrete universal from Hegel and criticizes Hegel, on that basis, as abstract. The first two parts of the article outline that both thinkers take the abstract universal to be the form of a false type of knowledge and society, and the concrete universal to be a positive aim. However, as the third part argues, Adorno rejects how the concrete universal is understood in Hegel’s (...) philosophy and formulates a different conception of it. The fourth part questions if Adorno manages to overcome the problems he identifies in Hegel or whether they are inherent to the programme of dialectics both endorse. (shrink)

Many interpreters argue that irrational acts of exchange can count as rational and civic-minded for Hegel—even though, admittedly, the persons who are exchanging their property are usually unaware of this fact. While I do not want to deny that property exchange can count as rational in terms of ‘mutual recognition’ as interpreters claim, this proposition raises an important question: What about the irrationality and arbitrariness that individuals as property owners and persons consciously enjoy? Are they mere vestiges of nature in (...) Hegel’s system, or do they constitute a simple yet valid form of freedom that is not only a part of Hegel’s rational system of right, but its necessary starting point? I will argue the latter: The arbitrary, purely egoist self-definition of property owners is the simplest possible type of freedom for Hegel, which he dissects in order to show how the very arbitrary self-definition implicitly relies on an identity between persons, and hence foreshadows the more social forms of freedom Hegel will discuss later in his book. I make this argument by highlighting Hegel’s references to his discussion of atoms and freedom in his Logic of Being. (shrink)

Feminist bioethicists of a variety of persuasions discuss the 2013 case of Marlise Munoz, a pregnant woman whose medical care was in dispute after she became brain dead.

Ernest Sosa has made and continues to make major contributions to a wide variety of topics in epistemology. In this paper I discuss some of his core ideas about the nature of knowledge and scepticism. I start with a discussion of the safety account of knowledge – a view he has championed and further developed over the years. I continue with some questions concerning the role of the concept of an epistemic virtue for our understanding of knowledge. Safety and virtue (...) hang very closely together for Sosa. All this easily leads to some thoughts on epistemic scepticism and on Sosa's stance on this. (shrink)

We often describe lives (or parts of lives) as meaningful or as not meaningful. It is also common to characterize them as more or less meaningful. Some lives, we tend to think, are more meaningful than others. But how then can one compare lives with respect to how much meaning they contain? Can one? This paper argues that (i) only a notion of rough equality can be used when comparing different lives with respect to their meaning, and that (ii) the (...) relation of being more meaningful is not transitive. It follows that all attempts to rank different lives in terms of meaning can at best lead to partially indeterminate and incomplete rankings. One should also give up on the idea of “maximizing” meaning. I will use Thaddeus Metz’s important recent book “Meaning in Life. An Analytic Study” as a foil for my discussion. (shrink)

Introduction to and overview over my book "Epistemic Contextualism. A Defense" (OUP 2016).

Big decisions in a person’s life often affect the preferences and standards of a good life which that person’s future self will develop after implementing her decision. This paper argues that in such cases the person might lack any reasons to choose one way rather than the other. Neither preference-based views nor happiness-based views of justified choice offer sufficient help here. The available options are not comparable in the relevant sense and there is no rational choice to make. Thus, ironically, (...) in many of a person’s most important decisions the idea of that person’s good seems to have no application. (shrink)

Contrastivism about knowledge is the view that one does not just know some proposition. It is more adequate to say that one knows something rather than something else: I know that I am looking at a tree rather than a bush but I do not know that I am looking at a tree rather than a cleverly done tree imitation. Knowledge is a three-place relation between a subject, a proposition and a contrast set of propositions. There are several advantages of (...) a contrastivist view but also certain problems with it. (shrink)

‘Normative powers’ are capacities to create normative reasons by our willing or say-so. They are significant, because if we have them and exercise them, then sometimes the reasons we have are ‘up to us’. But such powers seem mysterious. How can we, by willing, create reasons? In this paper, I examine whether normative powers can be adequately explained normatively, by appeal to norms of a practice, normative principles, human interests, or values. Can normative explanations of normative powers explain how an (...) exercise of the will can afford us special freedom in determining our reasons? I argue that normative approaches to answering this question prove to be inadequate. To vindicate the thought that normative powers can make our reasons ‘up to us’, we need an altogether different approach to understanding them, one that is located not in the normative but in the metaphysical. I end the paper by sketching a metaphysical explanation of normative powers. This metaphysical defence of normative powers provides a window into a different, more agent-centered way of thinking about rational agency. (shrink)

This paper analyzes and discusses Mephisto's famous remark in Goethe's FAUST. It turns out that he is being incoherent in interesting ways.

Desires are contentful mental states. But what determines the content of a desire? Two different classic answers were proposed by Russell and by Wittgenstein, starting in the 1910s. Russell proposed a behaviorist account according to which the content of the desire is fixed by the type of state that puts an end to the relevant kind of behavior which was triggered by some initial discomfort. The desire’s content consists in its “satisfaction conditions”. Wittgenstein criticized such an account for neglecting the (...) crucial point that the relation between a desire and its content is a conceptual, internal one, not an external contingent one. Desires specify their own contents, their “fulfillment conditions”. Even though there is a lot to say in favor of Wittgenstein’s criticism, this paper argues that Russell pointed at an important aspect of desires which plays a crucial role for accounts of self-knowledge of one’s own desires. It turns out that fulfillment conditions and satisfaction conditions are tied together in rational self-knowledge of one’s own desires. In this sense, the views of Russell and Wittgenstein can be combined in a fruitful way. (shrink)

Over the decades, the claim that everything is revisable (defended by Quine and others) has played an important role in Epistemology and Philosophy of Science. Some time ago, Katz (1988) argued that this claim is paradoxical. This paper does not discuss this objection but rather argues that the claim of universal revisability allows for two different readings but in each case leads to a contradiction and is false.

ABSTRACTDoes knowledge entail belief? This paper argues that the answer depends on how one interprets ‘belief’. There are two different notions of belief: belief as such and belief for knowledge. They often differ in their degrees of conviction such that one but not both might be present in a particular case. The core of the paper is dedicated to a defense of this overlooked distinction. The beginning of the paper presents the distinction. It then presents two cases which are supposed (...) to back up the claim that there is an important distinction here; I also offer some explanations concerning the structure of these cases. Finally, I add further considerations in support of the core thesis, and discuss objections. The distinction is important as such but also has interesting implications concerning the much discussed ‘entailment thesis’ according to which knowledge entails belief. It is argued here that even if knowledge entails belief-for-knowledge, it does not entail belief-as-such. This constitutes an interesting middle position and compromise in the philosophical debate about the entailment thesis. One further implication of this paper is that the discussion about the entailment thesis needs to take degrees of conviction seriously. Still another implication is that epistemic contextualists can deal very well with the relevant phenomena. (shrink)

In virtue of what is something a reason for action? That is, what makes a consideration a reason to act? This is a metaphysical or meta-normative question about the grounding of reasons for action. The answer to the grounding question has been traditionally given in ‘pure’, univocal terms. This paper argues that there is good reason to understand the ground of practical normativity as a hybrid of traditional ‘pure’ views. The paper 1) surveys the three leading ‘pure’ answers to the (...) question of a normative ground, 2) examines one or two of the most difficult problems for each, proposing along the way a new objection to one, and 3) argues that a particular hybrid view about normative grounds –‘hybrid voluntarism’ – avoids each of the main problems faced by the three leading ‘pure’ views. (shrink)

This chapter argues that there is a particular kind of ‘internal’ commitment typically made in the context of romantic love relationships that has striking meta-normative implications for how we understand the role of the will in practical normativity. Internal commitments cannot plausibly explain the reasons we have in committed relationships on the usual model—as triggering reasons that are already there, in the way that making a promise triggers a reason via a pre-existing norm of the form ‘If you make a (...) promise to x, then you have a reason to x’. Instead, internal commitments are that in virtue of which one has the special reasons of committed relationships; they are the grounds of such reasons. In this way, the will is a source of practical normativity. (shrink)

Contemporary discussions of epistemological skepticism - the view that we do not and cannot know anything about the world around us - focus very much on a certain kind of skeptical argument involving a skeptical scenario (a situation familiar from Descartes’ First Meditation). According to the argument, knowing some ordinary proposition about the world (one we usually take ourselves to know) requires knowing we are not in some such skeptical scenario SK; however, since we cannot know that we are not (...) in SK we also cannot know any ordinary proposition. One of the most prominent skeptical scenarios is the brain-in-the-vat-scenario: An evil scientist has operated on an unsuspecting subject, removed the subject’s brain and put it in a vat where it is kept functioning and is connected to some computer which feeds the brain the illusion that everything is “normal”. This paper looks at one aspect of this scenario after another – envatment, disembodiment, weird cognitive processes, lack of the right kind of epistemic standing, and systematic deception. The conclusion is that none of these aspects (in isolation or in combination) is of any relevance for a would-be skeptical argument; the brain-in-the-vat-scenario is irrelevant to and useless for skeptical purposes. Given that related scenarios (e.g., involving evil demons) share the defects of the brain-in-the-vat-scenario, the skeptic should not put any hopes on Cartesian topoi. (shrink)

For each of the many goals of an agent it is true that the agent wants its realization. Given further very plausible assumptions, one can show that there is no good reason for an agent not to want the realization of all of his goals. However, it seems also true that reaching all of one’s goals would be extremely boring; most human beings would consider such a life not worth living. In this respect, leading a life is like playing some (...) game: A game loses its point if one always easily wins. Human agents not only pursue goals but they also have the second-order desire to lead the life of a goal-pursuer. More precisely, they want to be goal-pursuers such that many but not all of their goals are being realized. I argue here that they have a good reason not to want the realization of all of their goals. Now, all this constitutes an antinomy: Apparently, there are very plausible arguments both for affirming as well as denying that an agent has good reasons not to want the realization of his goals. This antinomy is similar to the preface-paradox about beliefs which has a convincing solution (due to Frank Ramsey). I argue, however, that there is no such solution in the case of goals. This leaves us with the question what a solution could look like. (shrink)

According to a widely held view, rationality demands that the preferences of a person be transitive. The transitivity assumption is an axiom in standard theories of rational choice. It is also prima facie very plausible. I argue here that transitivity is not a necessary condition of rationality; it is a constraint only in some cases. The argument presented here is based on the non-linearity of differential utility functions. This paper has four parts. First, I present an argument against the transitivity (...) assumption (I, II). Second, I discuss some objections; this will also bring out some features of the view defended here, like the essentially comparative nature of choice (III). Then, I discuss certain proposals that promise to avoid my conclusion (IV). Finally, I go into some implications concerning the nature of rational decision making (V). To accept some intransitivities as rational does not make our life easier; it can even lead to hard choices. However, it does not lead to skepticism about rational choice. (shrink)

In this article, I identify and critically examine 3 dogmas of normativity that support a commonly accepted ‘Passivist View' of rational agency. I raise some questions about these dogmas, suggest what we should believe in their place, and moot an alternative ‘Activist View' of what it is to be a rational agent that grows out of rejection of the 3 dogmas. Underwriting the dogmas and the Passivist View, I suggest, is a deeply held but mistaken assumption that the normative domain (...) is fundamentally akin to the nonnormative domain. Once we allow that the normative may be fundamentally unlike the nonnormative in certain key ways, a shift in our thinking about what it is to be rational becomes possible. I end by considering some implications of this paradigm shift in rationality from the passive to the active for various applied matters. (shrink)

This paper is the introduction to the volume. It gives an argumentative view of the philosophical landscape concerning incommensurability and incomparability. It argues that incomparability, not incommensurability, is the important phenomenon on which philosophers should be focusing and that the arguments for the existence of incomparability are so far not compelling.

What makes a choice hard? I discuss and criticize three common answers and then make a proposal of my own. Paradigmatic hard choices are not hard because of our ignorance, the incommensurability of values, or the incomparability of the alternatives. They are hard because the alternatives are on a par; they are comparable, but one is not better than the other, and yet nor are they equally good. So understood, hard choices open up a new way of thinking about what (...) it is to be a rational agent. (shrink)

This paper discusses and criticizes Joseph Nye’s account of soft power. First, we set the stage and make some general remarks about the notion of social power. In the main part of this paper we offer a detailed critical discussion of Nye’s conception of soft power. We conclude that it is too unclear and confused to be of much analytical use. However, despite this failure, Nye is aiming at explaining an important but also neglected form of social power: the power (...) to influence the will and not just the behavior of other agents. In the last part of this paper we briefly discuss Steven Lukes’ alternative view of a “third dimension” of power and end with a sketch of a more promising way to account for this neglected form of power. (shrink)

Usually, apologies are made by using non-conditional utterances: “I apologize for ruining your evening!” Very little, if any, attention has been given so far to conditional apologies which typically use utterances such as “If I have ruined your evening, I apologize!” This paper argues that such conditional utterances can constitute genuine apologies and play important moral roles in situations of uncertainty. It also proposes a closer analysis of such conditional apologies and contrasts them with unconditional apologies.

This Element offers the first detailed study of Catharine Trotter Cockburn's philosophy and covers her contributions to philosophical debates in epistemology, metaphysics, moral philosophy, and philosophy of religion. It examines not only Cockburn's view that sensation and reflection are the sources of knowledge, but also how she draws attention to the limitations of human understanding and how she approaches metaphysical debates through this lens. In the area of moral philosophy, this Element argues that it is helpful to take seriously Cockburn's (...) distinction between questions concerning the metaphysical foundation of morality and questions concerning the practice of morality. Moreover, this Element examines Cockburn's religious views and considers her understanding of the relation between morality and religion and her religious views concerning the resurrection and the afterlife. (shrink)

Journal of Philosophy of Education, Volume 56, Issue 2, Page 281-289, April 2022.

This article discusses anglophone readings of G. W. F. Hegel against the backdrop of German-language scholarship. The article starts by differentiating types of metaphysics (I). Following a taxonomy introduced by Paul Redding, I then discuss Charles Taylor’s Christian-mystical (II), the so-called »non-metaphysical« (III) and the »revised metaphysical« reading (IV). Terry Pinkard’s work serves as an example of (III) and Stephen Houlgate’s as an example of (IV). I highlight problematic aspects of each reading that concern: the meaning of »reason in the (...) world« (II), the anti-relativist clout of Hegel’s philosophy (III) and the difference between the development of logical concepts and the empirical origin of the world and human thinking (IV). The text ends (V) by pointing to the social implications of each type of reading. (shrink)

This is a reply to and critique of Gregory Mankiw's recent paper "Defending the One Percent".

In recent years, documentary formats have entered prominently into the realm of the culture industry, especially since Hollywood and Netflix started to invest in costly productions addressed to the mainstream. Many of these documentaries claim to show reality in its immediacy (“as it really is”), to reveal that which is obscured, or to critically assess societal evils. They use aesthetic strategies that reinforce the appearance of authenticity, while concealing the mediation of what they represent, and the authoritarian stances they presuppose. (...) This turns them into powerful instruments for diffusing authoritarian and populist ideologies. Their political impact on society, their performative power of opinion-shaping, and their subliminal influence on how we perceive and understand reality call urgently for critical assessment. Horkheimer and Adorno’s critique of the culture industry, along with their philosophical, sociological, and aesthetic writings, provide a constructive starting point. This essay aims to mobilize their critical theory of society for the problematization of documentary films in terms of their dialectical relation to society. (shrink)

Amongst those who answered Molyneux’s question in the negative or at least not in the positive, George Berkeley is of particular interest because he argued for a very radical position. Most of his contribution to the discussion can be found in his Essay towards a New Theory of Vision. I will give an exposition of his view (2) and then move on to a critical discussion of this kind of view, - what one could call the “Berkeleian view” (3). I (...) think that the problems of what has become a standard negative answer to the question (mainly brought forward by empiricists) become very clear in Berkeley’s case and one can also learn a lot from this. (shrink)

Chung Kuo, Cina, a documentary film by Michelangelo Antonioni, aroused fierce criticism both in China and in Europe when it was released in 1973. While these objections contradicted one another, they all share a conceptual core : the notion of realism understood in a Marxian sense as a critical representation of reality. Yet by refusing to grant a coherent and essentialist meaning to its images, Chung Kuo, Cina problematizes the presuppositions of such an understanding of realism. In this way, the (...) film anticipates some of its intrinsic difficulties and inaugurates a new form of criticism. -/- À sa sortie en 1973, le film documentaire Chung Kuo, Cina de Michelangelo Antonioni a provoqué des critiques farouches aussi bien en Chine qu’en Europe. Bien qu’elles se contredisent entre elles, ces objections se rejoignent toutes dans un noyau conceptuel autour de la notion de réalisme, entendu au sens marxiste comme représentation critique de la réalité. Cependant, en refusant d’accorder un sens cohérent et essentialiste à ses images, ce film permet de problématiser les présupposés de cette compréhension même du réalisme. Il préfigure ainsi certaines difficultés qui lui sont inhérentes et permet de concevoir une autre manière d’entendre la critique. (shrink)

The Atlas Group appeals to philosophical thinking in multiple ways—both through its aesthetic figuration and its conceptual references. Presented as a foundation dedicated to the research and the compilation of documents on Lebanese contemporary history and organized in the form of an invented archive, this artistic project deliberately coalesces real and fictitious elements and confronts, subversively, Western views on the socio- political reality of the Middle East with implicit knowledge and experiences from the region. The singular constitution of this curious (...) archive subtly undermines the rational classification to which it alludes, thereby frustrating unilateral appropriations. Moreover, the question of the mediation of subjective experience and factual reality is consistently raised through the hysterical documents. This article aims to deploy how Walid Raad's project subtly criticises objectivist hegemonic claims by confronting divergent, often incommensurate approaches to the conflictual reality in Lebanon and its appropriation by media, historiography and politics. (shrink)

Can quite different values be rationally weighed against one another? Can the value of one thing always be ranked as greater than, equal to, or less than the value of something else? If the answer to these questions is no, then in what areas do we find commensurability and comparability unavailable? And what are the implications for moral and legal decision making? This book struggles with these questions, and arrives at distinctly different answers.".

This paper takes a new look at Francis Hutcheson's moral sense theory and examines it in light of the views of his rationalist critics and opponents who claim that there has to be an antecedent moral standard prior to any sense or affections. I examine how Gilbert Burnet, Samuel Clarke, and Catharine Trotter Cockburn each argue for the priority of reason over a moral sense and how Hutcheson responds or could respond to their views. Furthermore, I consider the proposal that (...) rather than regarding Hutcheson's moral sense theory as fundamentally opposed to moral rationalism, Hutcheson and Clarke endorse a shared moral metaphysics, as argued by Patricia Sheridan. Although I consider this proposal as too broad and believe it overlooks relevant metaphysical differences between Clarke and Hutcheson, I argue that the dispute between Hutcheson and his critics and opponents will not be settled without taking their underlying moral metaphysics into consideration. (shrink)

Epistemic contrastivism is the view that knowledge is a ternary relation between a person, a proposition and a set of contrast propositions. This view is in tension with widely shared accounts of practical reasoning: be it the claim that knowledge of the premises is necessary for acceptable practical reasoning based on them or sufficient for the acceptability of the use of the premises in practical reasoning, or be it the claim that there is a looser connection between knowledge and practical (...) reasoning. Given plausible assumptions, epistemic contrastivism implies that we should cut all links between knowledge and practical reasoning. However, the denial of any such link requires additional and independent arguments; if such arguments are lacking, then all the worse for epistemic contrastivism. (shrink)

Can I be wrong about my own beliefs? More precisely: Can I falsely believe that I believe that p? I argue that the answer is negative. This runs against what many philosophers and psychologists have traditionally thought and still think. I use a rather new kind of argument, – one that is based on considerations about Moore's paradox. It shows that if one believes that one believes that p then one believes that p – even though one can believe that (...) p without believing that one believes that p. (shrink)

This article discusses Keith DeRose’s treatment of the lottery problem in Chapter 5 of his recent The Appearance of Ignorance. I agree with a lot of it but also raise some critical points and questions and make some friendly proposals. I discuss different ways to set up the problem, go into the difference between knowing and ending inquiry, propose to distinguish between two different kinds of lotteries, add to the defense of the idea that one can know lottery propositions, give (...) a critical discussion of DeRose’s contextualist solution to the problem, and support his defense against an absurdity objection with additional arguments. (shrink)

This paper presents an argument against the widespread view that ‘hard choices’ are hard because of the incomparability of the alternatives. The argument has two parts. First, I argue that any plausible theory of practical reason must be ‘comparativist’ in form, that is, it must hold that a comparative relation between the alternatives with respect to what matters in the choice determines a justified choice in that situation. If comparativist views of practical reason are correct, however, the incomparabilist view of (...) hard choices should be rejected. Incomparabilism about hard choices leads us to an implausible error theory about the phenomenology of hard choices, threatens an unattractive view of human agency, and leaves us in perplexity about what we are doing when we choose in hard choices. The second part of the argument explores the main competitor to comparativist views of practical reason, noncomparativist view, according tow which a choice is justified so long as it is not worse than any of the alternatives. This view is often assumed by rational choice theorists but has its best philosophical defense in work by Joseph Raz. On Raz’s view, incomparabilism about hard choices avoids the problems faced if comparativism is correct, but it faces different difficulties. I argue that Raz’s noncomparativist view mistakenly assimilates practical reason to more restricted normative domains such as the law. (shrink)

This paper argues for the existence of a fourth positive generic value relation that can hold between two items beyond ‘better than’, ‘worse than’, and ‘equally good’: namely ‘on a par’.