In her paper, The case for physician assisted suicide: not proven, Bonnie Steinbock argues that the experience with Oregon’s Death with Dignity Act fails to demonstrate that the benefits of legalising physician assisted suicide outweigh its risks. Given that her verdict is based on a small number of highly controversial cases that will most likely occur under any regime of legally implemented safeguards, she renders it virtually impossible to prove the case for physician assisted suicide. In this brief paper, we (...) suggest some ways that may enable us to weigh the risks and benefits of legalisation more fairly and, hopefully, allow us to close the case for physician assisted suicide. (shrink)

In recent years, multifetal pregnancy reduction (MFPR) has increasingly been the subject of debate in Norway, and the intensity reached a tentative maximum when Legislation Department delivered the interpretative statement § 2 - Interpretation of the Abortion Act in 2016 in response to the Ministry of Health (2014) requesting the Legislation Department to consider whether the Law on abortion allows for MFPR of healthy fetuses in multiple pregnancies. The Legislation Department concluded that current abortion laws allow MFPR within the framework (...) the law otherwise stipulates. The debate has not subsided, and during autumn 2018, it was further intensified in connection with the Christian Democrat "crossroads" and signals from the Conservatives to consider removing §2.3c and to forbid MFPR. -/- Many of the arguments in the MFPR debate appear seemingly similar to arguments pending in the general abortion debate, and an analysis of what sets MFPR apart from other abortions is wanting. The aim of this article is, therefore, to examine whether there is a moral distinction between abortion and MFPR of healthy fetuses. We will cover the typical arguments of the Norwegian debate, and highlight them with scholarly articles from the literature. The most important arguments against MFPR that we have identified we have dubbed the harm argument, slippery-slope argument, intent argument, grief argument, psychological long-term effects for the woman and sorting argument. We conclude that counter-arguments do not measure up in terms of detecting a morally relevant difference between MFPR of healthy fetuses and abortions. Our conclusion is therefore that—despite what several debaters seem to think—there is no morally relevant difference between the two. Therefore, when we allow abortion, we should also allow MFPR. (shrink)

When interacting with other people, we assume that they have their reasons for what they do and believe, and experience recognizable feelings and emotions. When people act from weakness of will or are otherwise irrational, what they do can still be comprehensible to us, since we know what it is like to fall for temptation and act against one’s better judgment. Still, when someone’s experiences, feelings and way of thinking is vastly different from our own, understanding them becomes increasingly difficult. (...) Delusions and psychosis are often seen as marking the end of intelligibility. In this paper, I argue first for the importance of seeing other people as intelligible as long as this is at all possible. Second, I argue, based on both previous literature and my own lived experience, that more psychotic phenomena than previously thought can be rendered at least somewhat intelligible. Besides bizarre experiences like illusions, hallucinations and intense feelings of significance, I also explain what it is like to lose one’s bedrock, and how this loss impacts which beliefs one has reason to reject. Finally, I give an inside account of some disturbances of reason, and show that there are important similarities between certain psychotic reasoning problems and common non-pathological phenomena. (shrink)

The medical and social model of disability is discussed and debated among researchers, scholars, activists, and people in general. It is common to hold a mixed view and believe that some disabled people suffer more from social obstacles and others more from medical problems inherent in their bodies or minds. Rachel Cooper discusses possible ‘test environments’, making explicit an idea which likely plays an implicit part in many disability discussions. We place or imagine placing the disabled person in a range (...) of different environments. If there is a relevant test environment in which they do fine, their problem was societal/external; if there is not, it was medical/internal. Cooper admits that deciding on the appropriate range of test environments is an ethical and political question. In this chapter, I argue that we often ought to widen our scope when discussing psychiatric disabilities. (shrink)

It has been argued that we cannot be morally responsible in the sense required to deserve blame or punishment if the world is deterministic, but still morally responsible in the sense of being apt targets for moral criticism. Desert-entailing moral responsibility is supposed to be more freedom-demanding than other kinds of responsibility, since it justifies subjecting people to blame and punishments, is nonconsequentialist, and has been shown by thought experiments to be incompatible with determinism. In this paper, I will show (...) that all these arguments can be resisted. (shrink)

How should we adjust our beliefs in light of the testimony of those who are in a better epistemic position than ourselves, such as experts and other epistemic superiors? In this paper, I develop and defend a deference model of epistemic authority. The paper attempts to resolve the debate between the preemption view and the total evidence view of epistemic authority by taking an accuracy-first approach to the issue of how we should respond to authoritative and expert testimony. I argue (...) that when we look at the debate through the lens of accuracy, it becomes clear that matters are more complicated than either the preemption view or the total evidence view are able to account for. Consequently, a deference model, outlined within a credence-based framework, does a better job of capturing the relevant phenomena, and explaining how we should update our beliefs in response to epistemically authoritative testimony. (shrink)

Nos proponemos estudiar las objeciones de Cavendish hacia la filosofía experimental desde una perspectiva no dicotómica para mostrar que, lejos de establecer un enfrentamiento entre la filosofía contemplativa y la experimental, la razón y la sensación, o la naturaleza y el arte, la autora plantea una cooperación organizada entre estos aspectos. La postura de Cavendish puede comprenderse adecuadamente si se tiene en cuenta que su epistemología se arraiga en su metafísica, en la que los grados de la materia y los (...) distintos seres vivos que conforman el universo ocupan un lugar determinado y cumplen cierta función conformando una totalidad orgánica y armónica. (shrink)

My aim is to look into the representational aspect of ideas, exploring not only to what Hume refers as adequate ideas, but also these cases where for a number of reasons an idea does not reach that standard. It has been suggested that the latter are fictions, but an in-depth examination of Hume texts reveals that there are several types of imperfections, such as incompleteness or imprecision that prevent an idea from being adequate. This leads to an analysis of the (...) status of supposed or pretended ideas, and the possibility of there being terms with no ideas annexed to them. (shrink)

O presente artigo incide sobre o conceito de expressão no âmbito do pensamento leibniziano, pretendendo, a partir da sua análise, expor a crítica que Fernando Gil lhe tece, nomeadamente no que diz respeito à ideia de “causalidade expressiva”. Passando por vários conceitos leibnizianos como “substância simples”, “força”, “apetição” ou “entre-expressão”, o que se pretende analisar é a reflexão de Fernando Gil relativamente àquilo que o autor considera “a aporia da expressão leibniziana”, e, ainda, a sua reabilitação da inteligibilidade expressiva como (...) pensamento do contínuo, onde inteligibilidade, beleza e simplicidade se implicam mutuamente. (shrink)

Martha Nussbaum argues that animals are entitled to a flourishing life according to the norm for their species. Nussbaum furthermore suggests that in the case of dogs, breed norms as well as species norms are relevant. Her theses capture both common intuitions among laypeople according to which there is something wrong with the breeding of “unnatural” animals, or animals that are too different from their wild ancestors, and the dog enthusiast’s belief that dogs departing from the norms for their breed (...) are tragic. I argue that the high diversity of the dog species and the ultimate arbitrariness of breed norms support the thesis that a conception of welfare must be tied to what the individual requires in order to flourish. In the second part of the paper, I discuss the implications that an individualized welfare conception has for the breeding of dogs for conformation shows, for the pet market and for the performance of various tasks for which we need working dogs. (shrink)

Breeders of purebred dogs usually have several goals they want to accomplish, of which canine wellbeing is one. The purpose of this article is to investigate what we ought to do given this goal. Breeders typically think that they fulfil their wellbeing-related duties by doing the best they can within their breed of choice. However, it is true of most breeders that they could produce physically and mentally healthier dogs if they switched to a healthier breed. There are a few (...) breeds that are healthier than other breeds as well as mutts; we could maximize wellbeing for the next generations by focusing all our breeding resources on those. However, in the long run such a strategy would severely deplete the canine gene pool. If we are to breed for wellbeing in the long run, we must thus weigh the benefits of selection against physical and mental problems against the benefits of genetic diversity. The optimal breeding strategy for canine wellbeing is to preserve many breeds, though not all of them. Furthermore, we ought to combine strict health programs with looser barriers between breeds. Such a policy conflicts with the goal of breed preservation, at least if we think of breeds as populations registered within kennel clubs rather than types of dogs, but not with the goal of producing good working dogs capable of performing various tasks. (shrink)

Wouter Kusters argues that madness has much to offer philosophy, as does philosophy to madness. In this paper, i support both claims by drawing on a mad phenomenon which I label Radical Psychotic Doubt, or RPD. First, although skepticism is a minority position in epistemology, it has been claimed that anti-skeptical arguments remain unsatisfying. I argue that this complaint can be clarified and strengthened by showing that anti-skeptical arguments are irrelevant to RPD sufferers. Second, there's a debate about whether so-called (...) hinge commitments are beliefs or not. I argue that RPD can be used to strengthen the case that they are. Moreover, if hinges are beliefs, some madpeople are more epistemically rational than some sane philosophers. Third, drawing on my own mad experiences, I challenge evidentialism by presenting a better candidate for a truly forced cchoice about what to believe than William James' traditional religious example. I further show that in certain psychiatric contexts, evidentialism has more radical implications than Jamesian pragmatism, which comes out as more conservative. Finally, I discuss how philosophical theories like pragmatism and Pyrrhonism can provide inspiration for new and much-needed coping strategies for RPD sufferers. (shrink)

Durante los siglos XVII y XVIII hubo un intenso debate en las Islas Británicas en torno al materialismo. Mi objetivo consiste en caracterizar la postura de David Hume en el marco de ese debate. Sostengo que, no obstante rechazar la metafísica sustancialista para centrarse en el estudio de las percepciones, Hume sienta una posición respecto de la relación entre mente y materia. Sin embargo, esa posición reviste cierta complejidad en tanto no es explicitada en los textos que se editaron en (...) vida de Hume. Propongo definirla como un materialismo restringido, ya que, respecto de la naturaleza de la mente, Hume desestima tanto las posturas materialista como inmaterialista, pero respecto de las causas del pensamiento, termina acercándose al materialismo a partir de argumentos basados en la experiencia y en la analogía con la naturaleza. (shrink)

Psychiatric patients sometimes ask where to draw the line between who they are – their selves – and their mental illness. This problem is referred to as the self-illness ambiguity in the literature; it has been argued that solving said ambiguity is a crucial part of psychiatric treatment. I distinguish a Realist Solution from a Constructivist one. The former requires finding a supposedly pre-existing border, in the psychiatric patient’s mental life, between that which belongs to the self and that which (...) belongs to the mental illness. I argue that no such border exists, and that attempts to find it might even render the felt ambiguity worse. Instead, any solution must be constructivist; the patient (and others) should deliberate and discuss what to identify with or not. I further argue that psychiatric patients need not see their mental illness as wholly distinct from themselves to avoid ‘identifying with their diagnoses' in a problematic way. Finally, we can excuse problematic behaviour by mentally ill people – in fact, we can do so in a more nuanced and constructive way – while rejecting the view that the mental illness is wholly distinct from the patient’s self. (shrink)

Justin Garson introduces the distinction between two views on Madness we encounter again and again throughout history: Madness as dysfunction, and Madness as strategy. On the latter view, Madness serves some purpose for the person experiencing it, even if it’s simultaneously harmful. The strategy view makes intelligible why Madness often holds a certain allure – even when it’s prima facie terrifying. Moreover, if Madness is a strategy in Garson’s metaphorical sense – if it serves a purpose – it makes sense (...) to use consciously chosen strategies for living with Madness that doesn’t necessarily aim to annihilate or repress it as far as possible. In this paper, we use our own respective stories as case studies. We have both struggled to resist the allure of Madness, and both ended up embracing a kind of Pyrrhonian scepticism about reality instead of clinging to sane reality. (shrink)

In this book symposium text, I focus on Ciurria’s critique of P. F. Strawson’s incredibly influential paper “Freedom and Resentment”, and more generally present-day Strawsonians about moral responsibility. Ciurria rightfully argues that the picture painted of “our responsibility practices” is highly idealized; it ignores crucial power asymmetries and oppression. I agree with this. However, it seems to me that Ciurria sometimes lacks awareness of exactly how profound the disagreement between her and Strawson and his followers is.

ABSTRACT A restricted interpretation of Humean methodology understands his experimentalism solely in terms of reducing epistemic statements to private sensory impressions accessible via introspection. My aim is to revise this interpretation by means of criticizing the connection it establishes between the maxim of not going beyond experience and the copy principle. I will show that this interpretation is inconsistent with the way Hume conceives the experimental method, since there is textual evidence to affirm that experience should not be understood in (...) terms of sensory impressions only, and that the science of human nature is not restricted to the study of the mental contents only, but it is nourished in the same way by the observation of social interaction. Finally, I will argue that the method Hume proposes does not prevent intersubjective verification of the empirical evidence, since the principle of sympathy enables the communication of mental states, which makes them devoid of their private character. (shrink)

En la segunda mitad del siglo XVIII tuvo lugar un debate entre Thomas Reid y Joseph Priestley acerca de la naturaleza de la mente y su interacción con el cuerpo. En el marco de la defensa de la religión cristiana y en nombre de principios metodológicos experimentalistas y newtonianos, los autores defienden propuestas radicalmente diferentes acerca de la relación entre la mente y la materia. Sus divergencias se vinculan con la interpretación del método newtoniano y su concepción de la materia, (...) lo que delineará dos actitudes: una dualista, de carácter más conservador por parte de Reid y una materialista, heterodoxa e innovadora por parte de Priestley. (shrink)

The belief that obese people ought to lose weight and keep it off is widespread, and has a profound negative impact on the lives of the obese. I argue in this paper that most obese people have no such obligation, even if obesity is bad, and caused by calorie input exceeding output. Obese people do not have an obligation to achieve long-term weight loss if this is impossible for them, is worse than the alternative, or requires such an enormous effort (...) in relation to what stands to be gained that this option is supererogatory rather than obligatory. It is highly plausible that most obese people fall into one of these three groups. Politicians may still have obligations to fight obesity, but they ought to do so through progressive politics rather than blaming and shaming. (shrink)

En este trabajo me ocuparé de las resonancias que tuvo el modo en el que Hume aborda la cuestión de la materialidad de la mente en uno de los materialistas más notables de las Islas Británicas del siglo XVIII, Joseph Priestley. La influencia que ejerció el enfoque humeano acerca del materialismo en la obra de Priestley no ha sido suficientemente puesta de relieve o ha sido desestimada. En buena medida, esto se debe a que Priestley tienen una actitud crítica hacia (...) las consecuencias escépticas y ateas que se desprenden de la filosofía de Hume, por lo que generalmente se tiende a presentarlo como uno de sus adversarios. Sin embargo, existen dos grandes puntos de contacto entre sus propuestas que estudiaré en lo que sigue: (1) ambos abordan la cuestión del origen del pensamiento, haciendo a un lado la cuestión de la naturaleza de la sustancia de la que estaría compuesta la mente —por ser inaccesible a nuestro conocimiento— y preguntándose por la causa del pensamiento, y (2) Priestley se sirve de una concepción de la causalidad inspirada en buena medida por la de Hume y la emplea como uno de los pilares de su materialismo, al sostener que la conjunción constante entre características mentales y organismos con un cerebro funcional nos da la mayor seguridad posible de que existe una relación causal entre ambos. (shrink)

In its recent statement 'Sex Selection and Preimplantation Genetic Diagnosis', the Ethics Committee of the American Society of Reproductive Medicine concluded that preimplantation genetic diagnosis for sex selection for non-medical reasons should be discouraged because it poses a risk of unwarranted gender bias, social harm, and results in the diversion of medical resources from genuine medical need. We critically examine the arguments presented against sex selection using preimplantation genetic diagnosis. We argue that sex selection should be available, at least within (...) privately funded health care. (shrink)

Derk Pereboom’s Free Will, Agency and Meaning in Life (Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2014, pp. 219) follows quite closely in the steps of his Living Without Free Will (2001). Pereboom argues for “hard incompatibilism” in both – the thesis that regardless of whether determinism is true, the kind of free will required for desert-entailing moral responsibility is unlikely to exist. In Free Will…, however, he pays more attention to issues other than moral responsibility. This, I think, is a great strength (...) of the book. It has furthermore been suggested that Free Will… differs from Living… in being less radical; that Pereboom’s hard incompatibilism has softened up over the years. I believe this view is mistaken. It is true that Free Will… contains several passages where Pereboom writes that he is happy to take on board important elements of moral responsibility theories usually labelled “compatibilist”. However, Living… never states the contrary position. Living, rather, has a different focus – on other sceptical views, and how they differ from Pereboom’s own. (shrink)

O presente manual tem como intenção constituir um guia para uma disciplina introdutória de filosofia da linguagem. Foi elaborado a partir da leccionação da disciplina de Filosofia da Linguagem I na Faculdade de Letras da Universidade do Porto desde 2001. A disciplina de Filosofia da Linguagem I ocupa um semestre lectivo e proporciona aos estudantes o primeiro contacto sistemático com a área da filosofia da linguagem. Pretende-se que este manual ofereça aos estudantes os instrumentos necessários não apenas para acompanhar uma (...) iniciação ao campo da filosofia da linguagem mas também para o estudo e a investigação autónomos posteriores. Para isso é percorrido um trajecto que conduz das intuições pré-teóricas acerca de linguagem, de que todos dispomos, até um conhecimento disciplinar específico, histórico e temático, da filosofia da linguagem. Em termos práticos, são considerados como precedentes da disciplina de Filosofia da Linguagem I – mesmo se, pelo existem actualmente precedências em sentido estrito – as disciplinas de Lógica I e II e de Filosofia do Conhecimento I e II. Os programas dessas disciplinas nos últimos anos estiveram presentes por trás da elaboração do manual. (shrink)

Catharine Trotter Cockburn’s metaphysics dissolves the necessary relationship between immateriality, immortality and thought. While in her youth this leads her to admit the possibility of thinking matter, in her mature work, it allows her to conceive space as non-thinking immaterial substance that links non-thinking material substance and thinking immaterial substance. To ground this conception of space, she draws on the thesis of the great chain of being. However, the possibility of thinking matter is not consistent with the hierarchy of beings, (...) because within this frame matter occupies the lowest place. My aim is to evaluate whether there is any alternative within Trotter's philosophy to solve this contradiction. -/- La metafísica de Catharine Trotter Cockburn disuelve la relación necesaria entre inmaterialidad, inmortalidad y pensamiento. Mientras que en su juventud esto la lleva a admitir la posibilidad de la materia pensante, en su madurez le permite concebir al espacio como sustancia inmaterial no pensante que oficia como eslabón entre la sustancia material no pensante y la sustancia inmaterial pensante. Para ello, apela también a la tesis de la gran cadena del ser. Sin embargo, la posibilidad de la materia pensante no es consistente con la tesis de la jerarquía de seres, porque en ella la materia ocupa el lugar más bajo. Me propongo estudiar si existe alguna alternativa dentro de la filosofía de Trotter que permita resolver esta contradicción. (shrink)

My response to Rashed's critique of my account as theorizing instead of showing what it is like.

Preconception sex selection for nonmedical reasons raises important moral, legal, and social issues. The main concern is based upon the assumption that a widely available service for sex selection will lead to a socially disruptive imbalance of the sexes. For a severe sex ratio distortion to occur, however, at least two conditions have to be met. First, there must be a significant preference for children of a particular sex, and second, there must be a considerable interest in employing sex selection (...) technology. Our objective was to ascertain such demand and preferences among the United States general population. (shrink)

Saul Smilansky’s theory of free will and moral responsibility consists of two parts; dualism and illusionism. Dualism is the thesis that both compatibilism and hard determinism are partly true, and has puzzled many philosophers. I argue that Smilansky’s dualism can be given an unquestionably coherent and comprehensible interpretation if we reformulate it in terms of pro tanto reasons. Dualism so understood is the thesis that respect for persons gives us pro tanto reasons to blame wrongdoers, and also pro tanto reasons (...) not to blame them. These reasons must be we ighed against each other (and against relevant consequentialist reasons) in order to find out what we all things considered ought to do. (shrink)

Published on Daily Philosophy 2021-10-18 Why do we have a criminal justice system? What could possibly justify the state punishing its citizens? Philosophers, scholars of law, politicians and others have proposed different justifications, one of them being retributivism: the view that we ought to give offenders the suffering that they deserve for harming others. However, intentionally harming other people and making them suffer is serious business. If we are to do this in the name of what’s right and good, we (...) better be very certain that what we do really is right and good. The so-called Epistemic Argument Against Retributivism calls this certainty into question. (shrink)

En este trabajo nos proponemos hacer un aporte para esclarecer el sentido y la función de la experiencia en el marco de la teoría del conocimiento de Hume. Para ello examinaremos dos interpretaciones que pueden reconstruirse en la literatura secundaria: la que la entiende como impresiones simples de sensación y la que la concibe como patrones de percepciones conectadas. Consideramos que la primera perspectiva no es adecuada para comprender el rol epistémico de la experiencia, lo que nos inclina hacia la (...) segunda interpretación. Sin embargo, esta última no ha sido lo suficientemente desarrollada por los autores que la sugieren. Nuestro propósito es llevar a cabo esa tarea pendiente, ofreciendo una serie de precisiones que la hacen más robusta a los fines de elucidar por qué para Hume la experiencia es la piedra de toque en el conocimiento sobre cuestiones de hecho. Así, mostraremos que el sentido que adquiere la experiencia en las inferencias causales es el de casos que recogemos mediante la observación y organizamos en colecciones o patrones, los que funcionan como evidencia para establecer o justificar enunciados epistémicos. Por último, para comprender la especificidad de su función en este tipo de inferencias, distinguiremos la experiencia de las impresiones y del hábito. (shrink)

In this article I focus on Cavell’s theme of finding one’s voice, as it is articulated with reference to the philosophies of language of Wittgenstein and Austin. I start by spelling out Cavell’s Wittgensteinian-Austinian view of culture as the background for his approach to aesthetics and ethics. I then set out to explore the work done by the theme in aesthetics and ethics around the notion claim. I argue that Cavell’s effort to counter the pull of non-cognitivism in aesthetics and (...) ethics, building on the notion claim, is not only illuminating of his unique way of inheriting the history of analytic philosophy but also gives us a glimpse of where and how Continental and analytic philosophy may again cross paths in the future. (shrink)

BACKGROUND: -/- Preconception sex selection for non-medical reasons raises serious moral, legal and social issues. The main concern is based on the assumption that a freely available service for sex selection will distort the natural sex ratio and lead to a severe gender imbalance. However, for a severe gender imbalance to happen, at least two conditions have to be met. First, there must be a significant preference for children of a particular sex, and second, there must be a considerable demand (...) for preconception sex selection. To ascertain whether or not these two conditions are met, we have conducted a survey in Germany. METHODS: -/- As a representative sample of the German population, 1094 men and women aged 18-45 years were asked about their gender preferences and whether or not they could imagine selecting the sex of their children through flow cytometric separation of X- and Y-bearing sperm followed by intrauterine insemination. RESULTS: -/- 58% of respondents stated that they do not care about the sex of their offspring. 30% wish to have a family with an equal number of boys and girls. 4% would like to have more boys than girls, 3% more girls than boys, 1% only boys and 1% only girls. For first-borns, however, there is still a preference for boys over girls. While 75.6% claimed to have no gender preference, 14.2% would like their first child to be a boy and 10.1% would like their first child to be a girl. Whereas 6% could imagine taking advantage of preconception sex selection, 92% found this to be out of the question. Even in the hypothetical case that a medication for sex selection were ever to become available, 90% stated that they would not want to use it. CONCLUSION: -/- Given that a majority does not seem to care about the sex of their offspring and only a minority seem to be willing to select the sex of their children, a freely available service for preconception sex selection for non-medical reasons is rather unlikely to cause a severe gender imbalance in Germany. (shrink)

Preconception sex selection for non-medical reasons raises serious moral, legal and social issues. The main concerns include the threat of a sex ratio distortion due to a common preference for boys over girls, the charge of sexism, the danger of reinforcing gender stereotypical behaviour in sex selected children, and the fear of a slippery slope towards creating designer babies. This paper endeavours to show that none of the objections to preconception sex selection is conclusive and that there is no justification (...) for denying parents the right to choose the sex of their prospective children. (shrink)

A diagnosis based exclusively on the so-called scientifi c evidence does not take into account the problem of the theoryladenness, widely debated in Twentieth Century epistemology. The theory of knowledge developed by Ludwik Fleck, physician and philosopher active in the 30s, can still be useful for shedding light on how psychiatric diagnoses are infl uenced by a specifi c thought style that directs the observations and affects the development of knowledge and the formation of connections between concepts.

This brief paper summarizes a series of postal investigations on the acceptance of selection for X or Y spermatozoa. These were conducted mainly in Germany but also in the UK, the Netherlands and the US. Selected families were approached with a series of questions about their wish to use sperm selection, and their choice of boys or girls. In general, large majorities opposed this approach for family balancing or sex selection on the basis of cost and inconvenience of the treatment. (...) The view was expressed that its use in medicine was more acceptable. Care was taken to compose a series of open questions to particular sections of the population, e.g.men versus women, differing ages, and families with imbalanced sex ratios. More favourable responses arose, for example in pregnant women. Overall, all four nations had large majorities against the use of sex selection. (shrink)

In this paper, we argue that there are reasons to believe that an implicit bias for normalcy influences what are considered medically necessary treatments in psychiatry. First, we outline two prima facie reasons to suspect that this is the case. A bias for ‘the normal’ is already documented in disability studies; it is reasonable to suspect that it affects psychiatry too, since psychiatric patients, like disabled people, are often perceived as ‘weird’ by others. Secondly, psychiatry's explicitly endorsed values of well-being (...) and function are hard to measure directly, which is why we see simpler box-ticking conceptions of recovery used in large research studies. This need not be problematic, but might lead to researchers and clinicians focusing too much on treatments that promote easy-to-measure proxies for recovery, instead of what actually matters to psychiatric patients themselves. Next, we provide examples of treatments and treatment decisions within two areas – self-injury and psychosis – which are hard to explain unless we assume that an implicit and harmful normalcy bias is at work. We conclude with some suggestions for clinicians and future research. (shrink)

O que é a «harmonia universal»? Uma causa, um efeito, um estado-de-coisas? Como Leibniz escreve a este respeito numa carta a Magnus Wedderkopf, a última razão para o intelecto divino e, consequentemente, a vontade de Deus, é a harmonia. Porém, como razão última, nada existe para lá da própria harmonia. Segundo o raciocínio leibniziano, a harmonia pode assim ser perspetivada não só como um estado-de-coisas, mas também como causa da própria organização das coisas. Muito embora a harmonia possa ser perspetivada (...) de diferentes modos, que manifestam uma unidade entre si, o foco desta análise incide justamente sobre a possibilidade de «perceber», «percecionar», ou melhor, «compreender» a harmonia universal. (shrink)

We propose an extension of Discourse Respresentation Theory (DRT) for analyzing pictorial narratives. We test drive our PicDRT framework by analyzing the way authors represent characters’ mental states and perception in comics. Our investigation goes beyond Abusch and Rooth (2017) in handling not just free perception sequences, but also a form of apparent perspective blending somewhat reminiscent of free indirect discourse.

Within the next parliamentary term, the German government is expected to replace the current Embryo Protection Act with a new Human Reproductive Technology Act. Before introducing new legislation, policy makers may want to survey public attitudes towards novel applications of reproductive technology. In order to assess opinions and concerns about preconception sex selection for non-medical reasons, a social survey has been conducted in Germany. As a representative sample of the German population, 1005 men and women 18 years and older were (...) asked whether or not preconception sex selection should be made available. Of the respondents, 32% held that sex selection should be strictly prohibited, be it for medical or non-medical reasons, and 54% accepted the use of preconception sex selection for medical purposes. Only a minority of 11% approved of the use of preconception sex selection for non-medical reasons. The widespread opposition to a freely available service for non-medical sex selection is based on several claims: 87% of respondents hold that 'children are a gift and deserve to be loved regardless of any characteristics such as beauty, intelligence or sex'; 79% argue that choosing the sex of children is 'playing God'; 76% are opposed because it is seen as 'unnatural'; 49% are afraid that it is 'skewing the natural sex ratio'; and 40% consider it to be 'sexist'. (shrink)

Many people look to religion to help resolve the serious moral and legal issues associated with assisted reproductive technologies. Doing so presupposes that religion is the cornerstone of ethics, but this assumption is not well founded. While various faiths are entitled to articulate their views on matters of human reproduction, the contradictions involved in doing so make it unwise to rely on religion in the formulation of law and policy. These contradictions – such as the indeterminacy about what revealed truths (...) means – make moral secular philosophy a better guide for the protection of human welfare. (shrink)

Trope theory is the view that the world consists (wholly or partly) of particular qualities, or tropes. This admittedly thin core assumption leaves plenty of room for variation. Still, most trope theorists agree that their theory is best developed as a one-category theory according to which there is nothing but tropes. Most hold that ‘sameness of property’ should be explained in terms of resembling tropes. And most hold that concrete particulars are made up from tropes in compresence (for an overview, (...) including an introduction to some alternative versions of the view, cf. Maurin, 2014). D. M. Armstrong disagrees. He thinks the world is a world of immanent universals, the thin particulars in which those universals are instantiated, and the states of affairs that—thereby—exist. He holds that ‘sameness of property’ should be explained in terms of numerically identical universals or—if the resembling things are the universals themselves—in terms of partially identical universals. And he believes that concrete particulars are made up from ‘thin particulars’ in which a (sufficient) number of universals are instantiated. In spite of their disagreements, proponents of tropes owe Armstrong a debt of gratitude. First, for being one of the theory’s earliest, most serious, and—not least—most prominent, critics (Armstrong for the first time considers, and rejects, what he then labels ‘particularism’, in his 1978a). But also for being one of the theory’s most ardent champions. Already in his 1989a, Armstrong regrets his 1978-rejection of the view. Equivalence classes of exactly resembling tropes, he now admits, for most purposes “serve as an excellent substitute for universals” (Armstrong 1989a, 122). But then why isn’t Armstrong a trope theorist? In this paper, Armstrong’s main reasons for rejecting the trope view are critically scrutinized. All of them, it is maintained, fail to convince. If this argument is accepted, Armstrong seems to have no—or, at least, no good—reason for not accepting the existence of tropes. But, then, ought Armstrong to have been a trope theorist? If the ‘best’ version of the trope view turns out to be ontologically more parsimonious than Armstrong’s own theory of universals, then, yes. That there is a version of the trope view, a version that is not (or, at least not seriously) considered by Armstrong, that is ontologically more parsimonious than the universals view, is argued in the next section. Why none of Armstrong’s reasons for preferring universals to tropes manage to convince, is explained in the section after that. First, however, and in order to avoid a common misunderstanding of the trope view and, as a consequence, of why one ought to reject it, a few more words about the core-difference between tropes and universals, and about how this difference matters (as well as does not matter) to what—and how well—these theories explain. (shrink)

The concept of expression has always held an important place in Fernando Gil’s thought. The author’s reflection on the idea of expression is well reflected among his writings – either in his early essays or throughout his entire work –, attaining a special focus in the lectures that he gave at Johns Hopkins University during the years of 2002, 2003 and 2004. Actually, these lectures represent the strongest testimony of the relevancy given by Fernando Gil to this concept. However, despite (...) being a concept which crosses all his work, clearly having a central place in his thought, Fernando Gil never got to write a systematic theory on the concept of expression. Thus, closely following the author’s works, the main purpose of this study is to suggest a personal vision of what could have been Fernando Gil’s theory on expression. Combining some of the main ideas of Johns Hopkins lectures to some fundamental notions of Fernando Gil’s thought, we will try to show that Fernando Gil’s theory on expression is a theory on the ordination of thought, on cognitive construction and, above all, a theory on the elevation of thought to what shall be considered its higher modality, the aesthetical thought. In fact, our major hypothesis is that Fernando Gil’s theory on expression is not only a cognitive theory but also an aesthetical one. As such, its major guidelines shall be: to explain the adequacy of expression to its objects; to show how expression evolves according to the cognitive development of the subject; and, finally, to explain and to justify the elevation of thought to universality, harmony and beauty. (shrink)

This paper explores the concept of moral expertise in the contemporary philosophical debate, with a focus on three accounts discussed across moral epistemology, bioethics, and virtue ethics: an epistemic authority account, a skilled agent account, and a hybrid model sharing key features of the two. It is argued that there are no convincing reasons to defend a monistic approach that reduces moral expertise to only one of these models. A pluralist view is outlined in the attempt to reorient the discussion (...) about moral expertise. (shrink)

In its recent report Human Reproductive Technologies and the Law, the House of Commons’ Select Committee on Science and Technology insisted that the United Kingdom ‘does not take a purely insular view’ on sex selection but to carefully consider the impact on other countries before allowing changes to current legislation. True, no country is an island, not even the British Isles. Still, outlawing a harmless practice in Great Britain because of its alleged harmful effects in other countries is bad public (...) policy. (shrink)

Broadly speaking, “empiricism” is a label that usually denotes an epistemological view that emphasizes the role that experience plays in forming concepts and acquiring and justifying knowledge. In contemporary philosophy, there are some authors who call themselves as empiricists, although there are differences in the way they define what experience consists in, how it is related to theory, and the role experience plays in discovering and justifying knowledge, etc. (e.g., Ayer 1936; Van Fraassen 2002). In contrast, in the early modern (...) period, empiricism was not a label that philosophers traditionally characterized until nowadays as empiricists (most famously, John Locke, George Berkeley, and David Hume) used to describe their doctrines. Indeed, as attributed to early modern philosophical authors, empiricism is not an actor’s category, but an analytic historiographical category retrospectively applied to them and confronted to rationalism, whose main representatives were considered to be Rene Descartes, Baruch Spinoza, and G.W. Leibniz. Such a narrative began to be established by the late nineteenthcentury and described early modern empiricism as an epistemological stance maintaining (1) that the origin of all mental contents lies in experience (a genetic statement), and (2) that knowledge can only be justified a posteriori (an epistemic statement). This entails that empiricists deny the existence of innate mental contents and the possibility of a purely a priori knowledge. In the history of early modern science such a dichotomy has been usually rendered in terms of the opposition between continental rationalist Cartesian science vs British empiricist Newtonian science. In the last four decades, many aspects of this traditional narrative have been criticized, and the meaning of early modern empiricism is subject of renewed studies. (shrink)