This study assessed the mode of test administration, birth variables, and students’ academic performance in Mathematics in Obubra Local Government Area of Cross River State, Nigeria. The study was guided by three null hypotheses following a quasi- experimental research design. Simple random and purposive sampling techniques were employed in selecting a sample of 250 respondents from a population of 5,792 students. Birth Order Checklist (BOC) and Mathematics Achievement Test (MAT) were used for data collection. The experimental group was assigned to (...) take a Computer-Based Test (CBT) while the control group took a Paper-Pencil Test (PPT) in mathematics. The null hypotheses were tested at .05 alpha level using two-way analysis of variance. Major findings revealed that, the interactive effects of gender and mode of test administration on the academic performance of students is non- significant [F(1,249)=0.028, p>.05, partial η2=.000]; the interactive effects of gender and birth order on the academic performance of students was not statistically significant [F(3,249)=0.782, p>.05, partial η2=.010]; the interactive effect of gender and birth order on the academic performance of students in mathematics is statistically significant [F(3,249)=2.854, p<.05, partial η2 =.034]. Based on these findings conclusions and recommendations were made for improved academic performance and school system effectiveness. (shrink)

Dasgupta poses a serious challenge to realism about natural properties. He argues that there is no acceptable explanation of why natural properties deserve the value realists assign to them and are consequently absent of value. In response, this paper defines and defends an alternative non-explanatory account of normativity compatible with realism. Unlike Lewis and Sider, who believe it is sufficient to defend realism solely on realist terms, I engage with the challenge on unfriendly grounds by revealing a tu quoque. Dasgupta (...) and anti-realists face a similar challenge to that directed against realism: one that not only undermines the objection to realism by legitimising non-explanatory normativity but leaves them facing a significant dilemma. (shrink)

I describe and motivate Rational Internalism, a principle concerning the relationship between motivating reasons (which explain actions) and normative reasons (which justify actions). I use this principle to construct a novel argument against Objectivist theories of normative reasons, which hold that facts about normative reasons can be analyzed in terms of an independently specified class of normative or evaluative facts. I then argue for an alternative theory of normative reasons, the Reasoning View, which is consistent with both Rational Internalism and (...) one standard motivation for Objectivism. (shrink)

According to many philosophers, rationality is, at least in part, a matter of one’s attitudes cohering with one another. Theorists who endorse this idea have devoted much attention to formulating various coherence requirements. Surprisingly, they have said very little about what it takes for a set of attitudes to be coherent in general. We articulate and defend a general account on which a set of attitudes is coherent just in case and because it is logically possible for the attitudes to (...) be jointly satisfied in the sense of jointly fitting the world. In addition, we show how the account can help adjudicate debates about how to formulate various rational requirements. (shrink)

In this paper, I will argue that there is a version of possibilism—inspired by the modal analogue of Kit Fine’s fragmentalism—that can be combined with a weakening of actualism. The reasons for analysing this view, which I call Modal Fragmentalism, are twofold. Firstly, it can enrich our understanding of the actualism/possibilism divide, by showing that, at least in principle, the adoption of possibilia does not correspond to an outright rejection of the actualist intuitions. Secondly, and more specifically, it can enrich (...) our understanding of concretism, by proving that, at least in principle, the idea that objects have properties in an absolute manner is compatible with transworld identity. (shrink)

The standard story about self-control states that self-control is limited, aversive, and that the function of self-control is to resist impulses or temptation. Several cases are provided that challenge this standard story. An alternative, future-oriented account of self-control is defended, where the function of self-control is to manage interference that arises from overlapping information processing pathways. This provides a computationally tractable account of self-control rooted in one’s being vigilant. Self-control manifests the maintenance dimension of vigilance. This not only provides an (...) attractive alternative to the standard story about self-control, but also indicates how the future-oriented aspects of self-control are more fundamental than the present-oriented aspects. (shrink)

Samuel Kerstein’s recent (2013) How To Treat Persons is an ambitious attempt to develop a new, broadly Kantian account of what it is to treat others as mere means and what it means to act in accordance with others’ dignity. His project is explicitly nonfoundationalist: his interpretation stands or falls on its ability to accommodate our pretheoretic intuitions, and he does an admirable job of handling carefully a range of well fleshed out and sometimes subtle examples. In what follows, (...) I shall give a quick summary of the chapters and then say two good things about the book and one critical thing. (shrink)

Some normative theories are self-defeating. They tell us to respond to our situations in ways that bring about outcomes that are bad, given the aims of the theories, and which could have been avoided. Across a wide range of debates in ethics, decision theory, political philosophy, and formal epistemology, many philosophers treat the fact that a normative theory is self-defeating as sufficient grounds for rejecting it. I argue that this widespread and consequential assumption is false. In particular, I argue that (...) a theory can be self-defeating and still internally consistent, action-guiding, and suitable as a standard for criticism. (shrink)

Jennifer Saul argues that the evidence from the literature on implicit biases entails a form of skepticism. In this paper, I argue that Saul faces a dilemma: her argument is either self-defeating, or it does not yield a skeptical conclusion. For Saul, both results are unacceptable; thus, her argument fails.

How do we know ourselves? When it comes to our states of mind, it might seem that self-knowledge enjoys a privilege: I know what I'm thinking because I have immediate access to my mind. Inspired by Sartre, two American philosophers, Richard Moran and Charles Larmore, have argued that this idea fails to account for our singular relationship with our own minds. In addition to knowing ourselves through theoretical reflection, we are also capable of practical reflection. We can answer the question (...) of what we think in a practical way: through a decision or a commitment, rather than a self-interpretation. But what is the relationship between these two types of self-reflection? What should we do when they conflict? This book seeks to answer these questions. In so doing, it shows the importance of another path to self-knowledge hitherto left aside by analytic authors: phenomenological reflection on our experience of the world. -/- Comment se connaît-on soi-même ? Concernant nos états d’esprit, il peut sembler que la connaissance de soi jouisse d’un privilège : je sais ce que je pense parce que j’ai un accès immédiat à mon esprit. S’inspirant de Sartre, deux philosophes américains, Richard Moran et Charles Larmore, ont soutenu que cette idée ne rend pas compte de notre rapport singulier à notre propre esprit. En plus de se connaître par une réflexion théorique, on est aussi capable d’une réflexion pratique. On peut répondre de façon pratique à la question de savoir ce qu’on pense : par une décision ou un engagement, plutôt qu’une interprétation de soi. Mais quel est le rapport entre ces deux types de réflexion sur soi ? Que faire lorsqu’elles entrent en conflit ? Ce livre cherche à répondre à ces questions. Ce faisant, il montre l’importance d’une autre voie vers la connaissance de soi jusqu’à présent laissée de côté par les auteurs analytiques : la réflexion phénoménologique sur notre expérience du monde. (shrink)

In recent years evolutionary psychologists have developed and defended the Massive Modularity Hypothesis, which maintains that our cognitive architecture—including the part that subserves ‘central processing’ —is largely or perhaps even entirely composed of innate, domain-specific computational mechanisms or ‘modules’. In this paper I argue for two claims. First, I show that the two main arguments that evolutionary psychologists have offered for this general architectural thesis fail to provide us with any reason to prefer it to a competing picture of the (...) mind which I call the Library Model of Cognition. Second, I argue that this alternative model is compatible with the central theoretical and methodological commitments of evolutionary psychology. Thus I argue that, at present, the endorsement of the Massive Modularity Hypothesis by evolutionary psychologists is both unwarranted and unmotivated. (shrink)

Discussions of Aristotle’s Metaphysics Z tend to treat it either as an independent treatise on substance and essence or as preliminary to the main conclusions of the Metaphysics. I argue instead that Z is central to Aristotle’s project of first philosophy in the Metaphysics: the first philosopher seeks the first causes of being qua being, especially substances, and in Z, Aristotle establishes that essences or forms are the first causes of being of perceptible substances. I also argue that the centrality (...) of Z to first philosophy is compatible with its status as theology. (shrink)

This paper examines the interplay of semantics and pragmatics within the domain of film. Films are made up of individual shots strung together in sequences over time. Though each shot is disconnected from the next, combinations of shots still convey coherent stories that take place in continuous space and time. How is this possible? The semantic view of film holds that film coherence is achieved in part through a kind of film language, a set of conventions which govern the relationships (...) between shots. In this paper, we develop and defend a new version of the semantic view. We articulate it for a pair of conventions that govern spatial relations between viewpoints. One such rule is already well-known; sometimes called the "180° Rule," we term it the X-Constraint; to this we add a previously unrecorded rule, the T-Constraint. As we show, both have the effect, in different ways, of limiting the way that viewpoint can shift through space from shot to shot over the course of a film sequence. Such constraints, we contend, are analogous to relations of discourse coherence that are widely recognized in the linguistic domain. If film is to have a language, it is a language made up of rules like these. (shrink)

We sometimes fail unwittingly to do things that we ought to do. And we are, from time to time, culpable for these unwitting omissions. We provide an outline of a theory of responsibility for unwitting omissions. We emphasize two distinctive ideas: (i) many unwitting omissions can be understood as failures of appropriate vigilance, and; (ii) the sort of self-control implicated in these failures of appropriate vigilance is valuable. We argue that the norms that govern vigilance and the value of self-control (...) explain culpability for unwitting omissions. (shrink)

The Gamer’s Dilemma consists of three intuitively plausible but conflicting assertions: (i) Virtual murder is morally permissible. (ii) Virtual child molestation is morally forbidden. (iii) There is no relevant moral difference between virtual murder and virtual child molestation in computer games. Numerous attempts to resolve (or dissolve) the Gamer’s Dilemma line the field of computer game ethics. Mostly, the phenomenon is approached using expressivist argumentation: Reprehensible virtual actions express something immoral in their performance but are not immoral by themselves. Consequentialists, (...) on the other hand, claim that the immorality of virtual actions arises from their harmful consequences. I argue that both approaches have serious difficulties meeting the moral challenge posed by the Gamer’s Dilemma. They tend to confuse the morality of in-game actions either with the morality of their real-world counterparts or with the morality of games as objects. Following this critical analysis, I will develop a Kantian argument and defend it against two objections. So far, deontological responses to the Gamer’s Dilemma have been sought in vain. Yet, with Kant, its moral challenge can be met by looking at the gamer’s reasons. From this perspective, the Gamer’s Dilemma is based on a false assumption: the moral status of gaming acts does not derive from a normative equation with their real-world counterparts but only from their justifications. (shrink)

Judgments of blame for others are typically sensitive to what an agent knows and desires. However, when people act negligently, they do not know what they are doing and do not desire the outcomes of their negligence. How, then, do people attribute blame for negligent wrongdoing? We propose that people attribute blame for negligent wrongdoing based on perceived mental control, or the degree to which an agent guides their thoughts and attention over time. To acquire information about others’ mental control, (...) people self-project their own perceived mental control to anchor third-personal judgments about mental control and concomitant responsibility for negligent wrongdoing. In four experiments (N = 841), we tested whether perceptions of mental control drive third-personal judgments of blame for negligent wrongdoing. Study 1 showed that the ease with which people can counterfactually imagine an individual being non-negligent mediated the relationship between judgments of control and blame. Studies 2a and 2b indicated that perceived mental control has a strong effect on judgments of blame for negligent wrongdoing and that first-personal judgments of mental control are moderately correlated with third-personal judgments of blame for negligent wrongdoing. Finally, we used an autobiographical memory manipulation in Study 3 to make personal episodes of forgetfulness salient. Participants for whom past personal episodes of forgetfulness were made salient judged negligent wrongdoers less harshly compared to a control group for whom past episodes of negligence were not salient. Collectively, these findings suggest that first-personal judgments of mental control drive third-personal judgments of blame for negligent wrongdoing and indicate a novel role for counterfactual thinking in the attribution of responsibility. (shrink)

This paper concerns the grounds of nonground: what it is in virtue of that facts of the form [F1 does not ground F2] hold. While the literature on iterated ground is expansive, there is comparatively little written on the grounds of nonground. I argue that nonground is grounded in distinctness from ground. If F1 does not ground F2, then [F1 does not ground F2] is grounded in the fact that F1 is distinct from that which does ground F2. While this (...) proposal strikes me as natural, it faces puzzles involving conjunction, contingency, and cardinality. The bulk of this paper explores how the view might be precisified, and how these puzzles might be resolved. (shrink)

Aristotle analyses a large range of objects as composites of matter and form. But how exactly should we understand the relation between the matter and form of a composite? Some commentators have argued that forms themselves are somehow material, that is, forms are impure. Others have denied that claim and argued for the purity of forms. In this paper, I develop a new purist interpretation of Metaphysics Z.10-11, a text central to the debate, which I call 'hierarchical purism'. I argue (...) that hierarchical purism can overcome the difficulties faced by previous versions of purism as well as by impurism. Roughly, on hierarchical purism, each composite can be considered and defined in two different ways: From the perspective of metaphysics, composites are considered only insofar as they have forms and defined purely formally. From the perspective of physics, composites are considered insofar as they have forms and matter and defined with reference to both. Moreover, while the metaphysical definition is a definition in the strict sense of 'definition', the physical definition is a definition in a loose sense. Analogous points hold for intelligible composites and geometry. Finally, neither sort of definitional practice implies that, for Aristotle, forms are impure. (shrink)

I provide a theory of the metaphysical foundations of identity: an account what grounds facts of the form a=b. In particular, I defend the claim that indiscernibility grounds identity. This is typically rejected because it is viciously circular; plausible assumptions about the logic of ground entail that the fact that a=b partially grounds itself. The theory I defend is immune to this circularity.

Metaphysics-first approaches dominate the current literature in the epistemology of modality. According to metaphysics-firsters, metaphysical theses have an important role in the justification of modal epistemologies. For example, the thesis that essentialist truths constitute the metaphysical grounds of modal truths is meant to have an important role in the justification of essentialist modal epistemologies. In this article, we argue against this approach. We first pick up some of the groundwork on behalf of the metaphysics-firsters and explicitly spell out potential arguments (...) for their view. However, despite some initial plausibility, these arguments are ultimately found wanting. We conclude that the metaphysics-first approach lacks motivation and puts far too stringent demands upon modal epistemologists. (shrink)

Fragmentalism was originally introduced as a new A-theory of time. It was further refined and discussed, and different developments of the original insight have been proposed. In a celebrated paper, Jonathan Simon contends that fragmentalism delivers a new realist account of the quantum state—which he calls conservative realism—according to which: the quantum state is a complete description of a physical system, the quantum state is grounded in its terms, and the superposition terms are themselves grounded in local goings-on about the (...) system in question. We will argue that fragmentalism, at least along the lines proposed by Simon, does not offer a new, satisfactory realistic account of the quantum state. This raises the question about whether there are some other viable forms of quantum fragmentalism. (shrink)

My primary target in this paper is a puzzle that emerges from the conjunction of several seemingly innocent assumptions in action theory and the metaphysics of moral responsibility. The puzzle I have in mind is this. On one widely held account of moral responsibility, an agent is morally responsible only for those actions or outcomes over which that agent exercises control. Recently, however, some have cited cases where agents appear to be morally responsible without exercising any control. This leads some (...) to abandon the control-based account of responsibility and replace it with an alternative account. It leads others to deny the intuition that agents are responsible in these troublesome cases. After outlining the account of moral responsibility I have in mind, I look at some of the arguments made against the viability of this theory. I show that there are conceptual resources for salvaging the control account, focusing in particular on the nature of vigilance. I also argue that there is empirical data that supports the control account so conceived. (shrink)

Is logic a normative science for reasoning? Do its principles play any role in the rationality of our beliefs? Being logically consistent is supposed to be a principle for the theoretical reasoning. Furthermore, it seems that logical consistency imposes a constraint on rational belief. However, the preface paradox puts this principle to the test, since the ‘state of preface’ would be a rational state. We will present an analysis according to a Bayesian model of degrees of belief in order to (...) exemplify a (dis)solution of the paradox and, simultaneously, the maintenance of the principle of consistency. (shrink)

Leibniz’s views on modality are among the most discussed by his interpreters. Although most of the discussion has focused on Leibniz’s analyses of modality, this essay explores Leibniz’s grounding of modality. Leibniz holds that possibilities and possibilia are grounded in the intellect of God. Although other early moderns agreed that modal truths are in some way dependent on God, there were sharp disagreements surrounding two distinct questions: (1) On what in God do modal truths and modal truth-makers depend? (2) What (...) is the manner(s) of dependence by which modal truths and modal truth-makers depend on God? Very roughly, Leibniz’s own answers are: (1) God’s intellect and (2) a form of ontological dependence. The essay first distinguishes Leibniz’s account from two nearby (and often misunderstood) alternatives found in Descartes and Spinoza. It then examines Leibniz’s theory in detail, showing how, on his account, God’s ideas provide both truth-makers for possibilities and necessities and an ontological foothold for those truth-makers, thereby explaining modal truths. Along the way, it suggests several refinements and possible amendments to Leibniz’s grounding thesis. It then defends Leibniz against a pair of recent objections by Robert Merrihew Adams and Andrew Chignell that invoke the early work of Kant. I conclude that whereas Leibniz’s alternative avoids collapsing into yet another form of Spinozism, the alternatives proposed by Adams, Chignell, and the early Kant do not. (shrink)

Are we ever morally permitted to do what is morally wrong? It seems intuitive that we are, but evidence for dissociations among judgment of permissibility and wrongness are relatively scarce. Across 4 experiments (N = 1,438), we show that people judge that some behaviors can be morally wrong and permissible. The dissociations arise because these judgments track different morally relevant aspects of everyday moral encounters. Judgments of individual rights predicted permissibility but not wrongness, while character assessment predicted wrongness but not (...) permissibility. These findings suggest a picture in which moral evaluation is granular enough to express reasoning about different types of normative considerations, notably the possibility that people can exercise their rights in morally problematic ways. (shrink)

The global pessimistic meta-induction argues from the falsity of scientific theories accepted in the past to the likely falsity of currently accepted scientific theories. I contend that this argument commits a statistical error previously unmentioned in the literature and is self-undermining. I then compare the global pessimistic meta-induction to a local pessimistic meta-induction based on recent negative assessments of the reliability of medical research. If there is any future in drawing pessimistic conclusions from the history of science, it lies in (...) local meta-inductions, but these meta-inductions will not result in global distrust of the results of science. (shrink)

In this paper, we focus on whether and to what extent we judge that people are responsible for the consequences of their forgetfulness. We ran a series of behavioral studies to measure judgments of responsibility for the consequences of forgetfulness. Our results show that we are disposed to hold others responsible for some of their forgetfulness. The level of stress that the forgetful agent is under modulates judgments of responsibility, though the level of care that the agent exhibits toward performing (...) the forgotten action does not. We argue that this result has important implications for a long-running debate about the nature of responsible agency. (shrink)

P. Kyle Stanford defends the problem of unconceived alternatives, which maintains that scientists are unlikely to conceive of all the scientifically plausible alternatives to the theories they accept. Stanford’s argument has been criticized on the grounds that the failure of individual scientists to conceive of relevant alternatives does not entail the failure of science as a corporate body to do so. I consider two replies to this criticism and find both lacking. In the process, I argue that Stanford does not (...) provide evidence that there are likely scientifically plausible unconceived alternatives to scientific theories accepted now and in the future. (shrink)

Mind wandering is typically operationalized as task-unrelated thought. Some argue for the need to distinguish between unintentional and intentional mind wandering, where an agent voluntarily shifts attention from task-related to task-unrelated thoughts. We reveal an inconsistency between the standard, task-unrelated thought definition of mind wandering and the occurrence of intentional mind wandering (together with plausible assumptions about tasks and intentions). This suggests that either the standard definition of mind wandering should be rejected or that intentional mind wandering is an incoherent (...) category. Solving this puzzle is critical for advancing theoretical frameworks of mind wandering. (shrink)

Mind wandering is a pervasive feature of subjective experience. But why does the mind tend to wriggle about rather than always staying focused? To answer this question, this paper defends the claim that mind wandering consists in task-unrelated thought. Despite being the standard view of mind wandering in cognitive psychology, there has been no systematic elaboration or defense of the task-unrelated thought view of mind wandering. Here, I argue for the task-unrelated thought view by showing how mind wandering reflects a (...) distinctive form of non-vigilant thinking. When the relationship between mind wandering and vigilance is clarified, several objections to the task-unrelated thought view can be defused. Not only does this provide a novel defense of the task-unrelated thought view of mind wandering, but it also presents an account of mind wandering that is compatible with a naturalistic account of subjectivity. (shrink)

Philosophical work in the ethics of thought focuses heavily on the ethics of belief, with, in recent years, a particular emphasis on the ways in which we might wrong other people either through our beliefs about them, or our failure to believe what they tell us. Yet in our own lives we often want not merely to be believed, but rather to be understood by others. What does it take to understand another person? In this paper, I provide an account (...) of interpersonal understanding that speaks to this widespread human desire to be understood by others. On the view I defend, to be understood by another person is for them to see our motivating reasons as justifying reasons, whether or not they actually take our reasons to have that normative force. I then provide an explanation of why such understanding is valuable in our lives, which emphasizes how being understood by another person is a way of being more fully with them. (shrink)

Kant’s Formula of Humanity can be analyzed into two parts. One is an injunction to treat humanity always as an end. The other is a prohibition on using humanity as a mere means. The second is often referred to as the FH prohibition or the mere means prohibition. It has become popular to interpret this prohibition in terms of consent. The idea is that, if X uses Y's humanity as a means and Y does not consent to it, then X (...) uses Y's humanity as a mere means. There is then debate about the kind of consent that is relevant: possible, actual, or rational. In this paper, I argue against this interpretation. Section one sets up the consent account. Section two attacks possible and actual consent accounts on doctrinal grounds. Section three extends this doctrinal attack to rational consent accounts. Section four circles back to the original motivation for the consent interpretation. I argue that the consent account rests on a misinterpretation, and I conclude with a quick sketch of an alternative interpretation of the FH prohibition. (shrink)

Actors, undercover investigators, and readers of fiction sometimes report “losing themselves” in the characters they imitate or read about. They speak of “taking on” or “assuming” the beliefs, thoughts, and feelings of someone else. I offer an account of this strange but familiar phenomenon—what I call imaginative transportation.

Perdurantists think of continuants as mereological sums of stages from different times. This view of persistence would force us to drop the idea that there is genuine change in the world. By exploiting a presentist metaphysics, Brogaard proposed a theory, called presentist four-dimensionalism, that aims to reconcile perdurantism with the idea that things undergo real change. However, her proposal commits us to reject the idea that stages must exist in their entirety. Giving up the tenet that all the stages are (...) equally real could be a price that perdurantists are unwilling to pay. I argue that Kit Fine ’s fragmentalism provides us with the tools to combine a presentist metaphysics with a perdurantist theory of persistence without giving up the idea that reality is constituted by more than purely present stages. (shrink)

In this paper, I examine the connections between bipolar disorder and consent. I defend the view that many (although far from all) individuals with bipolar disorder are competent to consent to a wide variety of things when they are in a manic state.

In this paper, I confront Parfit’s Mixed Maxims Objection. I argue that recent attempts to respond to this objection fail, and I argue that their failure is compounded by the failure of recent attempts to show how the Formula of Universal Law can be used to demarcate the category of obligatory maxims. I then set out my own response to the objection, drawing on remarks from Kant’s Metaphysics of Morals for inspiration and developing a novel account of how the Formula (...) of Universal Law can be employed to determine the deontic status of action tokens, action types, and maxims. (shrink)

Monism is the claim that only one object exists. While few contemporary philosophers endorse monism, it has an illustrious history – stretching back to Bradley, Spinoza and Parmenides. In this paper, I show that plausible assumptions about the higher-order logic of property identity entail that monism is true. Given the higher-order framework I operate in, this argument generalizes: it is also possible to establish that there is a single property, proposition, relation, etc. I then show why this form of monism (...) is inconsistent; because all propositions are identical, p is identical to ~p – and so they have the same truth-value. At least one of the assumptions that generate higher-order monism must be rejected. (shrink)

Much attention has been paid to moral understanding as an individual achievement, when a single agent gains insight into distinctly moral matters. Crucially overlooked, I argue, is the phenomenon of shared moral understanding, when you and I understand moral matters together, in a way that can’t be reduced to each of us having moral understanding on our own. My argument pays close attention to two central moral practices: justifying our actions to others, and apologizing for wrongdoing. I argue that, whenever (...) I owe you a justification or an apology, I thereby owe it to you to aim at our coming to a shared moral understanding. My argument has two upshots. The first is a novel explanation of the importance of moral understanding in our lives, one that emphasizes the importance of understanding moral reasons together. The second is a better understanding of the very obligations involved in two of our most central interpersonal moral practices. (shrink)

According to the attentional resources account, mind wandering (or “task-unrelated thought”) is thought to compete with a focal task for attentional resources. Here, we tested two key predictions of this account: First, that mind wandering should not interfere with performance on a task that does not require attentional resources; second, that as task requirements become automatized, performance should improve and depth of mind wandering should increase. Here, we used a serial reaction time task with implicit- and explicit-learning groups to test (...) these predictions. Providing novel evidence for the attentional resource account’s first prediction, results indicated that depth of mind wandering was negatively associated with learning in the explicit, but not the implicit, group, indicating that mind wandering is associated with impaired explicit, but not implicit, learning. Corroborating the attention resource account’s second prediction, we also found that, overall, performance improved while at the same time depth of mind wandering increased. From an implicit learning perspective, these results are consistent with the claim that explicit learning is impaired under attentional load, but implicit learning is not. (shrink)

In Metaphysics Λ, Aristotle appeals to the prime mover: an unmoved mover that is the first moving cause of the world. Elsewhere, he calls the science concerned with the prime mover ‘theology’ (Meta. E.1, 1026a19). But what is the point of this science? On a common view, its purpose is to give an account of the prime mover itself, and especially to prove its existence. By contrast, I argue that Aristotle’s theology in Metaphysics Λ is ‘nature-bound’: it ultimately aims at (...) explaining facts about the perceptible world, in particular the motion of heavenly bodies and the cycle of generation of perishable substances. (shrink)

Time and modality show remarkable similarities. Each of the most discussed theories in philosophy of time finds an analogous counterpart in modal metaphysics, suggesting that the parallel between the two notions is metaphysically deep. This chapter offers a brief overview of their analogies. Section 1 addresses the analogy between presentism and actualism. Section 2 explores the analogy between non-presentist theories and possibilism. Section 3 discusses the analogy between temporal and modal persistence.

Decision theory has had a long-standing history in the behavioural and social sciences as a tool for constructing good approximations of human behaviour. Yet as artificially intelligent systems (AIs) grow in intellectual capacity and eventually outpace humans, decision theory becomes evermore important as a model of AI behaviour. What sort of decision procedure might an AI employ? In this work, I propose that policy-based causal decision theory (PCDT), which places a primacy on the decision-relevance of predictors and simulations of agent (...) behaviour, may be such a procedure. I compare this account to the recently-developed functional decision theory (FDT), which is motivated by similar concerns. I also address potentially counterintuitive features of PCDT, such as its refusal to condition on observations made at certain times. (shrink)

I argue that Kant’s Categorical Imperative should be applied to individual maxim tokens rather than abstract maxim types. The article is divided into five sections. In the first, I explain my thesis. In the second, I show that my thesis disagrees with Rawls. In the third, I argue for my thesis on the basis of the wording of the Categorical Imperative and on the basis of considerations about autonomy. In the fourth, I argue for my thesis on the basis of (...) considerations about the ‘ought implies can’ principle. In the fifth, I provide a summary of the main argumentative moves and also explain some of the philosophical advantages of my thesis. (shrink)

Philosophy undergraduate course completion work published in 2015. This work examines Frege's concept of logical law and its relationship to other normative and descriptive approaches in the history of philosophy, as well as epistemological conceptions of the a priori aspects of mathematical knowledge.

Suppose that a patient is receiving treatment options from her doctor. In one case, the doctor says, “the surgery has a 90% survival rate.” Now, suppose the doctor instead said, “the procedure has a 10% mortality rate.” Predictably, the patient is more likely to consent on the first description and more likely to dissent on the second. This is an example of a framing effect. A framing effect occurs when “the description of [logically-equivalent] options in terms of gains (positive frame) (...) rather than losses (negative frame) elicits systematically different choices.” Framing effects are ubiquitous, but they are particularly troublesome in medicine. Many worry that there is tension between valuing informed consent and using framing effects in clinical settings. In this paper, I answer this question: if an individual is subject to a framing effect when she gives her consent, does this undermine the validity of her consent? I argue that framing effects do not undermine consent in general. (shrink)

Because moral understanding involves a distinctly first-personal grasp of moral matters, there is a temptation to think of its value primarily in terms of achievements that reflect well on its possessor: the moral worth of one's action or the virtue of one's character. These explanations, I argue, do not do full justice to the importance of moral understanding in our moral lives. Of equal importance is the value of moral understanding in our relations with other moral agents. In particular, I (...) argue that an understanding of moral matters is of central importance within relations of solidarity. In addition to highlighting an overlooked aspect of moral understanding's value, this view also has important implications for what solidarity requires of those who stand in that relationship. (shrink)

In recent years, the number of studies examining mind wandering has increased considerably, and research on the topic has spread widely across various domains of psychological research. Although the term “mind wandering” has been used to refer to various cognitive states, researchers typically operationalize mind wandering in terms of “task-unrelated thought” (TUT). Research on TUT has shed light on the various task features that require people’s attention, and on the consequences of task inattention. Important methodological and conceptual complications do persist, (...) however, in current investigations of TUT. As we argue, these complications may be dampening the development of a more nuanced scientific account of TUT. Here, we outline three of the more prominent methodological and conceptual complications in the literature on TUT, and we discuss potential directions for researchers to take as they move forward in their investigations of TUT. (shrink)

In collective action problems, large numbers of contributions together produce a good outcome, but any one contribution often makes no difference. Many philosophers think that act consequentialism implies that individuals should not contribute in these cases, given that their contributions cannot be expected to affect the outcome. Nearly everyone has assumed that the relevant expected effects of an action are those effects that are counterfactually dependent on what a given agent does. This assumption is at the heart of causal decision (...) theory. In contrast, evidential decision theory evaluates actions on the basis of whatever can be expected to happen, given that the agent performs some action, where this includes events that are simply correlated with the action. I show that causal and evidentialist versions of act consequentialism can diverge in collective action problems. Evidential decision theory can require us to do our part even when causal decision theory does not. (shrink)