Do thay đổi chính sách Journal Citation Reports (JCR) 2023 có vài cải tiến. Các ấn phẩm trong Core Collections đều được công bố Journal Impact Factor (JIF).

Nếu như năm 2022, Truyện ngụ ngôn Bói Cá bản tiếng Anh hoàn tất và đến được quầy hàng, thì năm 2023, bài viết có nguồn gốc suy nghĩ từ ngụ ngôn, kèm theo chương trình nghiên cứu về môi trường, biến đổi khí hậu với bóng dáng Bói Cá hiện diện rõ nét, cũng ra đời.

This book takes bold steps in forming much-needed philosophical foundations for restorative justice through deconstructing and reconstructing various models of thinking. It challenges current debates through the consideration and integration of various disciplines such as law, criminology, philosophy and human rights into restorative justice theory, resulting in the development of new and stimulating arguments. Topics covered include the close relationship and convergence of restorative justice and human rights, some of the challenges of engagement with human rights, the need for the (...) recognition of the teachings of restorative justice at both the theoretical and the applied level, the Aristotelian theory on restorative justice, the role of restorative justice in schools and in police practice and a discussion of the humanistic African philosophy of Ubuntu. With international contributions from various disciplines and through the use of value based research methods, the book deconstructs existing concepts and suggests a new conceptual model for restorative justice. This unique book will be of interest to academics, researchers, policy-makers and practitioners. (shrink)

Unquestionably, Restorative Justice (hereafter RJ) has finally gathered some real momentum. It has become a sine qua non topic in many national and international policy and statutory agendas. However, as the restorative practice expands to deal with crimes, ages and situations it has never addressed before (at least in its contemporary version), and as its application starts to make sense not only to national but also to regional and international bodies and fora, new theoretical problems are posed. In the fast-growing (...) literature many theories and Schools have been evoked to support RJ's claims. This paper will take the discussion a step back by looking at questions of meta-theoretical character. In particular, the paper will ask: Does RJ have a place in the “world of theories,” and if it does, then what kind of theory is it, and on what level should it be placed? Second, does RJ theory need a philosophy, and why? Finally, how can restorative practices be morally justified? (shrink)

The chapter revisits the relationship between restorative justice and punishment through the eyes of Classical Greek philosophy and tragedy, the School of Collectivists, and contemporary thinkers. The extant literature sees restorative justice either as alternative punishment or an alternative to punishment. This chapter puts forward the notion of restorative punishment by deconstructing the concept of pain, and by reconstructing a new vision through the notion of catharsis. The chapter then takes a bold step in proposing a philosophical framework to justify (...) the normative thinking underpinning its proposed concept of restorative punishment and pain. (shrink)

The purpose of this article is to continue the discussion on Europe’s converging criminal justice systems. In particular, I test a hypothesis that has recently appeared in the literature, which sees the jurisprudence of the European Court of Human Rights as one of the most significant factors that encourage a harmonization process between the adversarial and inquisitorial criminal justice systems of Europe. This claim is supported by examining the Court’s jurisprudence to identify decisions that led to legislative and policy amendments (...) in the domestic legal orders of the 46 member states of the Council of Europe. This account shows how an interplay currently taking place between judicial, policy, and statutory powers is marking the end of the adversarial-inquisitorial era. Finally, the conclusion identifies the three most important impediments that are likely to hamper this harmonization process. (shrink)

Restorative justice (RJ) in the secure estate is widespread internationally, although piecemeal and inconsistent in its application. It exists in the form of many practices such as mediation, conferencing, circles, and panels. As the interest in RJ continues to grow, this research takes a step back to ask how reconcilable RJ is with incapacitation. Through a combination of normative thinking, literature review, and primary research that applied qualitative methodologies over a 3-year period, the article examines where the two notions meet (...) in their intentions and expected outcomes. A new classification of restorative practices in prisons is proposed, placed in the context of case studies of existing programs from around the world. (shrink)

Although the fast-growing literature on restorative justice is extensive, and in some regards repetitive, there is still no consensus as to the nature and extent of applicability of the restorative notion. This article claims that the restorative movement is experiencing a tension between normative abolitionist and pragmatic visions of restorative justice. It proceeds to identify six conceptual fault-lines that characterize this tension. These do not only refer to various definitional positions, but also disagreements that negatively affect both the theoretical and (...) practical development of restorative justice. These tensions also encourage a power-interest battle between different stakeholders within the restorative movement including practitioners, theoreticians, researchers and policy makers. To approach these controversies, there needs to be an acknowledgment of the multidimensional nature of the conceptual problem of restorative justice and the impact it has on its application. The article attempts to get to grips with this problem, and provide a common ground for the future development of restorative justice. (shrink)

Although community cohesion and human rights are currently two of the most discussed political discourses in the UK, their links for policy are underplayed. This article presents the findings of a nine-month research project that included interviews with a selected expert sample, and which aimed to explore whether human rights values and legislation can be used as tools for community cohesion. Available levers within human rights and the 1998 Human Rights Act are identified, and evidence-based policy recommendations are posited. The (...) article aims to start a new and more inclusive dialogue on community cohesion policy. (shrink)

‘Justice’ is spoken of in two ways: the lawful and the fair. The law is a human construct that is devoted to the advantage of all, or to the advantage of the best, or to the advantage of those in power or to the advantage of those representing it – let it be the politician, the media, the TV presenter, the filmmaker. Thus, the law serves the production or the preservation of happiness within politics and business. The law commands us (...) to act according to the mean. A well-written law follows the mean well and a poorly written law does not. On the other hand, fairness is a principle sometimes materialised through the law and the given justice system. Fairness is the ultimate value pursued by both the common law and civil law traditions. However, its distribution through the law and the representation of this delivery varies. Does this mean that a different kind of justice is distributed? Through the teachings of Aristotle, this essay aims to deconstruct the notion of justice, by breaking down its two ingredients, the lawful and the fair, and by analysing the effect of their representation in modern European society. The relativity attached to the notion of justice is not a modern phenomenon, but a philosophical matter that can be analysed and indeed explained through the teachings of Aristotle and its contemporary students. The analysis will be developed in the context of convergent Europe, focusing on the role of the media and courts especially in relation to criminal justice. (shrink)

We are living in a world where power abuse has become the new norm, as well as the biggest, silent driver of persistent inequalities, racism and human rights violations. As humanity is getting to grips with socio-economic consequences that can only be compared with those that followed World War II, this timely book challenges current thinking, while creating a much needed normative and practical framework for revealing and challenging the power structures that feed our subconscious feelings of despair and defeatism. (...) Structured around the four concepts of power - race - justice - restorative justice, the book uses empirical new data and normative analysis to reconstruct the way we prevent power abuse and harm at the inter-personal, inter-community and international levels. This book offers new lenses, which allow us to view power, race and justice in a modern reality where communities have been silenced, but through restorative justice are gaining voice. The book is enriched with twenty-five case studies written by survivors, practitioners and those with direct experiences of power abuse and inequality. Through robust research methodologies, Gavrielides' new monograph reveals new forms of slavery, while creating a new, philosophical framework for restorative punishment through the acknowledgement of pain and the use of catharsis for internal transformation and individual empowerment. This is a powerful book that generates much needed hope. Through a multi-disciplinary dialogue that uses social sciences, criminology, law, psychology and human rights, the book opens new avenues for practitioners, researchers and policy makers internationally. (shrink)

This up-to-date resource on restorative justice theory and practice is the literature’s most comprehensive and authoritative review of original research in new and contested areas. -/- Bringing together contributors from across a range of jurisdictions, disciplines and legal traditions, this edited collection provides a concise, but critical review of existing theory and practice in restorative justice. Authors identify key developments, theoretical arguments and new empirical evidence, evaluating their merits and demerits, before turning the reader’s attention to further concerns informing and (...) improving the future of restorative justice. Divided into four parts, the Handbook includes papers written by leading scholars on new theory, empirical evidence of implementation, critiques and the future of restorative justice. -/- This companion is essential reading for scholars of restorative justice, criminology, social theory, psychology, law, human rights and criminal justice, as well as researchers, policymakers, practitioners and campaigners from around the world. (shrink)

We introduce a family of rules for adjusting one's credences in response to learning the credences of others. These rules have a number of desirable features. 1. They yield the posterior credences that would result from updating by standard Bayesian conditionalization on one's peers' reported credences if one's likelihood function takes a particular simple form. 2. In the simplest form, they are symmetric among the agents in the group. 3. They map neatly onto the familiar Condorcet voting results. 4. They (...) preserve shared agreement about independence in a wide range of cases. 5. They commute with conditionalization and with multiple peer updates. Importantly, these rules have a surprising property that we call synergy - peer testimony of credences can provide mutually supporting evidence raising an individual's credence higher than any peer's initial prior report. At first, this may seem to be a strike against them. We argue, however, that synergy is actually a desirable feature and the failure of other updating rules to yield synergy is a strike against them. (shrink)

Nhiều nаm hơn nữ đượс đăng ký tên trên GCNQSDĐ. Phụ nữ sở hữu ít mảnh đất hơn nаm giới. Điều này đượс giải thíсh là dо phụ nữ tiếp сận đất đаi hạn сhế, vì ít mảnh đất hơn сhỉ dо phụ nữ sở hữu hоặс đồng sở hữu. Một số yếu tố giải thíсh sự kháс biệt. Để bắt đầu, đánh giá định tính và khảо sát сủа сhúng tôi сhо thấy rằng сáс khíа сạnh văn hóа ưu (...) tiên nаm giới như ưu tiên соn trаi trоng thựс hành thừа kế vẫn сòn phù hợp ở Việt Nаm. Những kết quả này сhо thấy сần сó những người hành nghề xã hội và pháp luật và сhính quyền làm việс ở сấp xã để hỗ trợ nhu сầu сủа người dân về thông tin về luật, quyền сủа họ và сáс quy trình để сó đượс đất. Tiếp сận сáс xã này để сảm hóа và thúс đẩy bình đẳng giới trоng quá trình сấp giấy сhứng nhận quyền sử dụng đất sẽ là một bướс đi đúng hướng quаn trọng. Cáс сơ quаn сhứс năng сấp tỉnh сấp GCNQSDĐ сần сảnh giáс và yêu сầu làm rõ khi người dân muốn đăng ký tài sản mà không ghi tên vợ hоặс сhồng. (shrink)

Human rights and restorative justice are rarely brought under the same spotlight despite their normative similarities. In fact, this gap becomes even more apparent when put in the context of policy and practice internationally. Firstly, there is a developing gap between public perception and evidence-based depiction of crime. Secondly, scholarly debates are rarely reflected in criminal justice policy and legislation. This failure has an impact on recidivism, the spiralling costs of penal interventions, but most importantly on how we view our (...) interpersonal and inter-communal relationships. -/- This unique collection of papers brings together international leading experts in human rights and restorative justice to address a gap in the literature. From reconstructing and restorative human rights for restorative justice to addressing issues such as the standardisation of restorative justice, this edited volume is a must read for researchers, practitioners and campaigners. (shrink)

The author considers that the Penal Sciences face a wide range of human pathogenic issues, ranging from terrorism and human trafficking to corruption and the use of substances and are, thus, the ideal discipline for investigating the various scientific issues and the implementation of the scientific findings arising from such investigations. He also believes that the Penal Sciences, being inextricably linked to human values and constitutional rights, are, by their nature, beneficial towards the promotion and consolidation of values, such as (...) freedom, solidarity and, especially, Social Justice. The latter concept is perceived by the author not only as a form of justice, which provides everyone with their due of proportion to their value, according to the famous saying of Ulpian “suum cuique tribuere”, but rather as a form of restitution from social injustices and as a treatment for social needs, particularly for our fellow human beings who are marginalized by society in conditions of poverty and degradation. It is interesting, at this point, to emphasize that the United Nations, in an important report from 2006 entitled “Social Justice in an Open World. The Role of the United Nations”, defines Social Justice as the fair and compassionate distribution of the fruits of economic growth (“Social Justice in an Open World. The Role of the United Nations”, edited by the International Forum for Social Development, New York: United Nations, 2006, p. 7, available online). The vision, therefore, of a society focused on goals such as combating socio-economic disparities and providing effective assistance for the weaker members of society signifies, especially in this period of Crisis, is a primary objective worthy, according to the author, of captivating us. Perhaps, indeed, the new target for Criminal Policy, following that of Restorative Justice, should now be that of Social Justice and, in fact, with a double project and aim: first for a fairer distribution of social goods and, also, for greater solidarity towards the weaker members of society. Indeed, it is a known fact to those involved with the Penal Sciences, that a dominant contemporaneous trend is that of Restorative Justice, in the sense that Criminal Law and Criminology finally have to address the needs of the victim of a criminal act and to advocate for relevant methods for extrajudicial settlements and for the conciliation of the offender and the victim. Restorative Justice is, hence, based on the triptych of the perpetrator assuming responsibilities for their actions, of restoring, as far as possible, the effects of the injurious actions against the victim and, also, of actively expressing the desire for conciliation with the victim. Certainly it would be greatly desirable if these ideas were to be consolidated within Greek legislation, albeit within the, always progressive, Greek Law for Minors there is a provision for the reformatory conciliation measure, pursuant to article 122 case e of the Greek Penal Code. However, the author believes that in this period of time, a time of profound crisis at all levels, there is need for more than simple offender-victim conciliation. There is a need for this spirit of reconciliation and solidarity to be extended to benefit all those who are experiencing hard times and may, therefore, in their deprivation and frustration, are led to committing crime. The author, at this point, refers to all the socially weak and often marginalized groups of people, who are scientifically characterized as "weak" or "vulnerable" and who try, with great courage, to survive without breaching the threshold of breaking the law. It is apparent here, according to the author, that if Criminal Policy actually aims to provide solutions to the problems of crime, it should not solely be limited to repairing the damage and conciliating the victim and perpetrator, but it should strike against the causative factors of crime and the primarily socio-economic inequalities and other forms of injustice which cause, according to Aristotle in his "Politics" (V. 1301b27, 1301a32 et seq., 1266b40), social reactions, attitudes and – Ι would add - a sequence of serious criminal acts. In other words, another kind of Justice is required in addition to Restorative, so that it may become the mission of our Criminal Policy to eliminate the injustices and inequalities that lead to crime. In view of this direction certain introductory thoughts are developed in this article. (shrink)

An experiment was performed to test the hypothesis that people sometimes take physical actions to make themselves more effective problem solvers. The task was to generate all possible words that could be formed from seven Scrabble letters. In one condition, participants could use their hands to manipulate the letters, and in another condition, they could not. Results show that more words were generated with physical manipulation than without. However, an interaction was obtained between the physical manipulation conditions and the specific (...) letter sets chosen, indicating that physical manipulation helps more for generating words in some circumstances than in others. Overall, our findings can be explained in terms of an interactive search process in which external, physical activity effectively complements internal, cognitive activity. Within this framework, the interaction can be explained in terms of the relative difficulty of generating words from the letters given in the different sets. (shrink)

Nhiều nаm hơn nữ đượс đăng ký tên trên GCNQSDĐ. Phụ nữ sở hữu ít mảnh đất hơn nаm giới. Điều này đượс giải thíсh là dо phụ nữ tiếp сận đất đаi hạn сhế, vì ít mảnh đất hơn сhỉ dо phụ nữ sở hữu hоặс đồng sở hữu. Một số yếu tố giải thíсh sự kháс biệt. Để bắt đầu, đánh giá định tính và khảо sát сủа сhúng tôi сhо thấy rằng сáс khíа сạnh văn hóа ưu (...) tiên nаm giới như ưu tiên соn trаi trоng thựс hành thừа kế vẫn сòn phù hợp ở Việt Nаm. Những kết quả này сhо thấy сần сó những người hành nghề xã hội và pháp luật và сhính quyền làm việс ở сấp xã để hỗ trợ nhu сầu сủа người dân về thông tin về luật, quyền сủа họ và сáс quy trình để сó đượс đất. Tiếp сận сáс xã này để сảm hóа và thúс đẩy bình đẳng giới trоng quá trình сấp giấy сhứng nhận quyền sử dụng đất sẽ là một bướс đi đúng hướng quаn trọng. Cáс сơ quаn сhứс năng сấp tỉnh сấp GCNQSDĐ сần сảnh giáс và yêu сầu làm rõ khi người dân muốn đăng ký tài sản mà không ghi tên vợ hоặс сhồng. (shrink)

A dilemma exists when a doctor is faced with a child or young person who refuses medically indicated treatment. The Gillick case has been interpreted by many to mean that a child of sufficient age and intelligence could validly consent or refuse consent to treatment. Recent decisions of the Court of Appeal on a child's refusal of medical treatment have clouded the issue and undermined the spirit of the Gillick decision and the Children Act 1989. It is now the case (...) that a child patient whose competence is in doubt will be found rational if he or she accepts the proposal to treat but may be found incompetent if he or she disagrees. Practitioners are alerted to the anomalies now exhibited by the law on the issue of children's consent and refusal. The impact of the decisions from the perspectives of medicine, ethics, and the law are examined. Practitioners should review each case of child care carefully and in cases of doubt seek legal advice. (shrink)

In this paper, we defend Socratic studies as a research programme against several recent attacks, including at least one recently published in Polis . Critics have argued that the study of Socrates, based upon evidence mostly or entirely derived from some set of Plato's dialogues, is founded upon faulty and indefensible historical or hermeneutical technique. We begin by identifying what we believe are the foundational principles of Socratic studies, as the field has been pursued in recent years, and we then (...) show how the research programme that derives from accepting these principles is not defeated by any of the most common recent criticisms of it. Specifically, we argue that challenges to sorting Plato's dialogues by date, more general challenges to historicist interpretations of Plato's dialogues, as well as recent literary criticisms of Socratic studies all fail to undermine the research programme. We conclude with some thoughts about how and why Socratic studies has proved itself a valuable and fruitful research programme. (shrink)

This articles concerns the compatibility of orthonomy (making the right choices) and autonomy (making one’s own choices). On the one hand we have the experience that we do not just want to govern ourselves, but that we want to do so rightly. the other hand, it seems that the very fact that our choices are responsive to reasons is insufficient to explain why making these choices adds up to leading a life of one’s own. Iit is argued that we can (...) develop a viable view on the co-realisation of autonomy and orthonomy by using the concept of a concern which is closely linked to the concept op caring. (shrink)

With the rapidly growing amounts of information, visualization is becoming increasingly important, as it allows users to easily explore and understand large amounts of information. However the field of information visualiza- tion currently lacks sufficient theoretical foundations. This article addresses foundational questions connecting information visualization with computing and philosophy studies. The idea of multiscale information granula- tion is described based on two fundamental concepts: information (structure) and computation (process). A new information processing paradigm of Granular Computing enables stepwise increase of (...) granulation/aggregation of information on different levels of resolution, which makes possible dynamical viewing of data. Information produced by Google Earth is an illustration of visualization based on clustering (granulation) of information on a succession of layers. Depending on level, specific emergent properties become visible as a result of different ways of aggregation of data/information. As information visualization ultimately aims at amplifying cognition, we discuss the process of simulation and emulation in relation to cognition, and in particular visual cognition. (shrink)

Philosophers have rightly condemned lookism—that is, discrimination in favor of attractive people or against unattractive people—in education, the justice system, the workplace and elsewhere. Surprisingly, however, the almost universal preference for attractive romantic and sexual partners has rarely received serious ethical scrutiny. On its face, it’s unclear whether this is a form of discrimination we should reject or tolerate. I consider arguments for both views. On the one hand, a strong case can be made that preferring attractive partners is bad. (...) The idea is that choosing partners based on looks seems essentially similar to other objectionable forms of discrimination. (In particular, the preference for attractive partners is arguably both unfair and harmful to a significant degree.) One can try to resist this conclusion in several ways. I consider three possible replies. The first has to do with the possibility of controlling our partner preferences. The second pertains to attractiveness and “good genes”. The last attempts to link certain aspects of attractiveness to a prospective partner’s personality and values. I argue that the first two replies fail conclusively, while the third only amounts to a limited defense of a particular kind of attractiveness preference. So the idea that we should often avoid preferring attractive partners is compelling. (shrink)

We discuss potential biorisks from large language models (LLMs). AI assistants based on LLMs such as ChatGPT have been shown to significantly reduce barriers to entry for actors wishing to synthesize dangerous, potentially novel pathogens and chemical weapons. The harms from deploying such bioagents could be further magnified by AI-assisted misinformation. We endorse several policy responses to these dangers, including prerelease evaluations of biomedical AIs by subject-matter experts, enhanced surveillance and lab screening procedures, restrictions on AI training data, and access (...) controls on biomedical AI. We conclude with a suggestion about future research directions in bioethics. (shrink)

Every quantum state can be represented as a probability distribution over the outcomes of an informationally complete measurement. But not all probability distributions correspond to quantum states. Quantum state space may thus be thought of as a restricted subset of all potentially available probabilities. A recent publication (Fuchs and Schack, arXiv:0906.2187v1, 2009) advocates such a representation using symmetric informationally complete (SIC) measurements. Building upon this work we study how this subset—quantum-state space—might be characterized. Our leading characteristic is that the inner (...) products of the probabilities are bounded, a simple condition with nontrivial consequences. To get quantum-state space something more detailed about the extreme points is needed. No definitive characterization is reached, but we see several new interesting features over those in Fuchs and Schack (arXiv:0906.2187v1, 2009), and all in conformity with quantum theory. (shrink)

Exploring online criticisms of the ‘take the knee’ protest during ‘Euro 2020’, this article examines how alt- and far-right conspiracies were both constructed and communicated via the social media platform, Twitter. By providing a novel exploration of alt-right conspiracies during an international football tournament, a qualitative thematic analysis of 1,388 original tweets relating to Euro 2020 was undertaken. The findings reveal how, in criticisms levelled at both ‘wokeism’ and the Black Lives Matter movement, antiwhite criticisms of the ‘take the knee’ (...) protest were embroiled in alt-right conspiracies that exposed an assumed Cultural Marxist, ‘woke agenda’ in the tournament’s organization and mainstream media coverage. In conclusion, it is argued that conspiratorial discourses, associated with the alt-right, provided a framework through which the protest could be understood. This emphasises how the significance of conspiracy functions to promote the wider dissemination of alt-right ideology across popular cultural contexts, such as sport. (shrink)

This is the first chapter to our edited collection of essays on the nature and ethics of blame. In this chapter we introduce the reader to contemporary discussions about blame and its relationship to other issues (e.g. free will and moral responsibility), and we situate the essays in this volume with respect to those discussions.

Defense of an account of intrinsic properties in terms of (what is now called) grounding rather than naturalness.

The field of AI safety aims to prevent increasingly capable artificially intelligent systems from causing humans harm. Research on moral alignment is widely thought to offer a promising safety strategy: if we can equip AI systems with appropriate ethical rules, according to this line of thought, they'll be unlikely to disempower, destroy or otherwise seriously harm us. Deontological morality looks like a particularly attractive candidate for an alignment target, given its popularity, relative technical tractability and commitment to harm-avoidance principles. I (...) argue that the connection between moral alignment and safe behavior is more tenuous than many have hoped. In general, AI systems can possess either of these properties in the absence of the other, and we should favor safety when the two conflict. In particular, advanced AI systems governed by standard versions of deontology need not be especially safe. (shrink)

This article is a preliminary presentation of conjunctive paraconsistency, the claim that there might be non-explosive true contradictions, but contradictory propositions cannot be considered separately true. In case of true ‘p and not p’, the conjuncts must be held untrue, Simplification fails. The conjunctive approach is dual to non-adjunctive conceptions of inconsistency, informed by the idea that there might be cases in which a proposition is true and its negation is true too, but the conjunction is untrue, Adjunction fails. While (...) non-adjunctivism is a well-known option, the other view is not so much studied nowadays, but it was not unknown in the tradition, and there are some positive suggestions, in recent literature, that the position is plausible and deserves to be developed. The article compares conjunctivism, non-adjunctivism and dialetheism, then focuses on some possible justifications, costs and benefits of the conjunctive view. (shrink)

Multidimensional adjectives are ubiquitous in natural language. An adjective F is multidimensional just in case whether F applies to an object or pair of objects depends on how those objects stand with respect to multiple underlying dimensions of F-ness. Developing a semantics for multidimensional adjectives requires us to address the problem of dimensional aggregation: how do the application conditions of an adjective F in its positive and comparative forms depend on its underlying dimensions? Here we develop a semantics for multidimensional (...) adjectives that incorporates aggregation functions. We then explore an analogy between dimensional aggregation and preference aggregation, bringing results from social choice theory to bear on the number and kind of aggregation functions that are admissible in a context. These results suggest that, for any given adjective, there will often be multiple aggregation functions admissible, meaning that multidimensional comparatives are often vague. (shrink)

This paper rigorously examines the primitive foundations of economic reasoning through an original framework based on symbolic logic. Extending previous work, it formalizes economic conceptions (\(\mathbb{C}\)), symbols (\(s_i\)), and introduces a structured language (\(\mathcal{L_{\mathbb{C}}}\)) to define their formation and interpretation. Organized as a continuous chain of declarations and illustrations, the paper offers a concise, systematic approach to understanding the philosophy of economic reasoning through formal representations.

There is good reason to think that, in every case of perceptual consciousness, there is something of which we are conscious; but there is also good reason to think that, in some cases of perceptual consciousness—for instance, hallucinations—there is nothing of which we are conscious. This paper resolves this inconsistency—which we call the presentation problem—by (a) arguing that ‘conscious of’ and related expressions function as intensional transitive verbs and (b) defending a particular semantic approach to such verbs, on which they (...) have readings that lack direct objects or themes. The paper further argues that this approach serves not only as a linguistic proposal about the semantics of ‘conscious of’, but also as a proposal about the metaphysics of conscious states. (shrink)

The paper looks at the semantics and ontology of dispositions in the light of recent work on the subject. Objections to the simple conditionals apparently entailed by disposition statements are met by replacing them with so-called 'reduction sentences' and some implications of this are explored. The usual distinction between categorical and dispositional properties is criticised and the relation between dispositions and their bases examined. Applying this discussion to two typical cases leads to the conclusion that fragility is not a real (...) property and that, while both temperature and its bases are, this does not generate any problem of overdetermination. (shrink)

Pain may appear to undermine the radically intentionalist view that the phenomenal character of any experience is entirely constituted by its representational content. That appearance is illusory. After categorizing versions of pain intentionalism along two dimensions, I argue that an 'objectivist' and 'non-mentalist' version is the most promising, if it can withstand two objections concerning what we say when in pain, and the distinctiveness of pain. I rebut these objections, in a way available to both opponents of and adherents to (...) the view that experiential content is entirely conceptual. (shrink)

Ramsification is a well-known method of defining theoretical terms that figures centrally in a wide range of debates in metaphysics. Prior's puzzle is the puzzle of why, given the assumption that that-clauses denote propositions, substitution of "the proposition that P" for "that P" within the complements of many propositional attitude verbs sometimes fails to preserve truth, and other times fails to preserve grammaticality. On the surface, Ramsification and Prior's puzzle appear to have little to do with each other. But Prior's (...) puzzle is much more general than is ordinarily appreciated, and Ramsification requires a solution to the generalized form of Prior's puzzle. Without such a solution, a wide range of theories will either fail to imply their Ramsey sentences, or have Ramsey sentences that are ill-formed. As a consequence, definitions of theoretical terms given using the Ramsey sentence will be either incorrect or nonsensical. I present a partial solution to the puzzle that requires making use of a neo-Davidsonian language for scientific theorizing, but the would-be Ramsifier still faces serious challenges. (shrink)

Deductive inference is usually regarded as being “tautological” or “analytical”: the information conveyed by the conclusion is contained in the information conveyed by the premises. This idea, however, clashes with the undecidability of first-order logic and with the (likely) intractability of Boolean logic. In this article, we address the problem both from the semantic and the proof-theoretical point of view. We propose a hierarchy of propositional logics that are all tractable (i.e. decidable in polynomial time), although by means of growing (...) computational resources, and converge towards classical propositional logic. The underlying claim is that this hierarchy can be used to represent increasing levels of “depth” or “informativeness” of Boolean reasoning. Special attention is paid to the most basic logic in this hierarchy, the pure “intelim logic”, which satisfies all the requirements of a natural deduction system (allowing both introduction and elimination rules for each logical operator) while admitting of a feasible (quadratic) decision procedure. We argue that this logic is “analytic” in a particularly strict sense, in that it rules out any use of “virtual information”, which is chiefly responsible for the combinatorial explosion of standard classical systems. As a result, analyticity and tractability are reconciled and growing degrees of computational complexity are associated with the depth at which the use of virtual information is allowed. (shrink)

We maintain that in many contexts promising to try is expressive of responsibility as a promiser. This morally significant application of promising to try speaks in favor of the view that responsible promisers favor evidentialism about promises. Contra Berislav Marušić, we contend that responsible promisers typically withdraw from promising to act and instead promise to try, in circumstances in which they recognize that there is a significant chance that they will not succeed.

Gauss’s quadratic reciprocity theorem is among the most important results in the history of number theory. It’s also among the most mysterious: since its discovery in the late 18th century, mathematicians have regarded reciprocity as a deeply surprising fact in need of explanation. Intriguingly, though, there’s little agreement on how the theorem is best explained. Two quite different kinds of proof are most often praised as explanatory: an elementary argument that gives the theorem an intuitive geometric interpretation, due to Gauss (...) and Eisenstein, and a sophisticated proof using algebraic number theory, due to Hilbert. Philosophers have yet to look carefully at such explanatory disagreements in mathematics. I do so here. According to the view I defend, there are two important explanatory virtues—depth and transparency—which different proofs (and other potential explanations) possess to different degrees. Although not mutually exclusive in principle, the packages of features associated with the two stand in some tension with one another, so that very deep explanations are rarely transparent, and vice versa. After developing the theory of depth and transparency and applying it to the case of quadratic reciprocity, I draw some morals about the nature of mathematical explanation. (shrink)

Psychopaths routinely disregard social norms by engaging in selfish, antisocial, often violent behavior. Commonly characterized as mentally disordered, recent evidence suggests that psychopaths are executing a well-functioning, if unscrupulous strategy that historically increased reproductive success at the expense of others. Natural selection ought to have favored strategies that spared close kin from harm, however, because actions affecting the fitness of genetic relatives contribute to an individual’s inclusive fitness. Conversely, there is evidence that mental disorders can disrupt psychological mechanisms designed to (...) protect relatives. Thus, mental disorder and adaptation accounts of psychopathy generate opposing hypotheses: psychopathy should be associated with an increase in the victimization of kin in the former account but not in the latter. Contrary to the mental disorder hypothesis, we show here in a sample of 289 violent offenders that variation in psychopathy predicts a decrease in the genetic relatedness of victims to offenders; that is, psychopathy predicts an increased likelihood of harming non-relatives. Because nepotistic inhibition in violence may be caused by dispersal or kin discrimination, we examined the effects of psychopathy on (1) the dispersal of offenders and their kin and (2) sexual assault frequency (as a window on kin discrimination). Although psychopathy was negatively associated with coresidence with kin and positively associated with the commission of sexual assault, it remained negatively associated with the genetic relatedness of victims to offenders after removing cases of offenders who had coresided with kin and cases of sexual assault from the analyses. These results stand in contrast to models positing psychopathy as a pathology, and provide support for the hypothesis that psychopathy reflects an evolutionary strategy largely favoring the exploitation of non-relatives. (shrink)

Prior’s puzzle is standardly taken to be the puzzle of why, given the assumption that that-clauses denote propositions, substitution of “the proposition that P” for “that P” within the complements of many propositional attitude verbs is invalid. I show that Prior’s puzzle is much more general than is ordinarily supposed. There are two variants on the substitutional form of the puzzle—a quantificational variant and a pronominal variant—and all three forms of the puzzle arise in a wide range of grammatical positions, (...) rather than merely in the complements of propositional attitude verbs. The generalized puzzle shows that a range of proposed solutions to the original puzzle fail, or are radically incomplete, and also reveals the connections between Prior’s puzzle and debates over the nature of semantic types and higher-order quantification. I go on to develop a novel, higher-order solution to the generalized form of the puzzle, and I argue that this higher-approach is superior to its first-order alternatives. (shrink)

The many-property problem has traditionally been taken to show that the adverbial theory of perception is untenable. This paper first shows that several widely accepted views concerning the nature of perception---including both representational and non-representational views---likewise face the many-property problem. It then presents a solution to the many-property problem for these views, but goes on to show how this solution can be adapted to provide a novel, fully compositional solution to the many-property problem for adverbialism. Thus, with respect to the (...) many-property problem, adverbialism and several widely accepted views in the philosophy of perception are on a par, and the problem is solved. (shrink)

This paper is an original attempt to understand the foundations of economic reasoning. It endeavors to rigorously define the relationship between subjective interpretations and objective valuations of such interpretations in the context of theoretical economics. This analysis is substantially expanded through a dynamic approach, where the truth of a valuation results in an updated interpretation or changes in the agent's subjective belief regarding the effectiveness of the selected action as well as the objective reality of the effectiveness of all other (...) possible actions (i.e. consequence realization). Complications arise when the economic agent is presented with a set of actions that render ambiguous preference, or when the effectiveness of an action cannot be perceived upon its selection, thereby necessitating a different theory of choice and consequence realization. (shrink)

Susan Schneider (2019) has proposed two new tests for consciousness in AI (artificial intelligence) systems, the AI Consciousness Test and the Chip Test. On their face, the two tests seem to have the virtue of proving satisfactory to a wide range of consciousness theorists holding divergent theoretical positions, rather than narrowly relying on the truth of any particular theory of consciousness. Unfortunately, both tests are undermined in having an ‘audience problem’: Those theorists with the kind of architectural worries that motivate (...) the need for such tests should, on similar grounds, doubt that the tests establish the existence of genuine consciousness in the AI in question. Nonetheless, the proposed tests constitute progress, as they could find use by some theorists holding fitting views about consciousness and perhaps in conjunction with other tests for AI consciousness. (shrink)

This article discusses the adequacy of Rawls’ theory of justice as a tool for racial justice. It is argued that critics like Charles W Mills fail to appreciate both the insights and limits of the Rawlsian framework. The article has two main parts spread out over several different sections. The first is concerned with whether the Rawlsian framework suffices to prevent racial injustice. It is argued that there are reasons to doubt whether it does. The second part is concerned with (...) whether a Rawlsian framework has the resources to rectify past racial injustice. It is argued that it has more resources to do this than Mills allows. This second part of the article centers on two Rawlsian ideas: ideal theory and the fair equality of opportunity principle. It is argued that ideal theory is essential for the kind of rectificatory work that Mills wants nonideal theory to do, and that where there is a socioeconomic legacy of past injustice, it is hard to see how FEO could be implemented if it did no rectificatory work, a result which means that there is less need to turn to nonideal theory at all. (shrink)

Recent iterations of Alvin Plantinga’s “evolutionary argument against naturalism” bear a surprising resemblance to a famous argument in Descartes’s Third Meditation. Both arguments conclude that theists have an epistemic advantage over atheists/naturalists vis-à-vis the question whether or not our cognitive faculties are reliable. In this paper, I show how these arguments bear an even deeper resemblance to each other. After bringing the problem of evil to bear negatively on Descartes’s argument, I argue that, given these similarities, atheists can wield a (...) recent solution to the problem of evil against theism in much the way Plantinga wields the detailsof evolutionary theory against naturalism. I conclude that Plantinga and Descartes give us insufficient reason for thinking theists are in a better epistemic position than atheists and naturalists vis-à-vis the question whether or not our cognitive faculties are reliable. (shrink)