After severe brain injury, one of the key challenges for medical doctors is to determine the patient’s prognosis. Who will do well? Who will not do well? Physicians need to know this, and families need to do this too, to address choices regarding the continuation of life supporting therapies. However, current prognostication methods are insufficient to provide a reliable prognosis. -/- Functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) holds considerable promise for improving the accuracy of prognosis in acute brain injury patients. Nonetheless, (...) research on functional MRI in the intensive care unit context is ethically challenging. These studies raise several ethical issues that have not been addressed so far. In this article, Prof. Charles Weijer and his co-workers provide a framework for researchers and ethics committees to design and review these studies in an ethically sound way. (shrink)

This work takes into account three Cartesian manuals diffused in 17th century France ; Jacques Rohault, Traité de physique ; Pierre-Sylvain Régis, Cours entier de philosophie, ou système general selon les principes de M. Descartes contenant la logique, la metaphysique, la physique et la morale ) in order to question if the development of an empirical attitude in the scientific research influenced their approaches to the study of motion. The article intends to deepen the role that these authors give to (...) God in the physical structure of the universe with the purpose of investigating whether their analysis of motion is untainted by the metaphysical component or on what terms it remains linked to it. (shrink)

This paper focuses on extant approaches to counteract the consumption of fake news online. Proponents of structural approaches suggest that our proneness to consuming fake news could only be reduced by reshaping the architecture of online environments. Proponents of educational approaches suggest that fake news consumers should be empowered to improve their epistemic agency. In this paper, we address a question that is relevant to this debate: namely, whether fake news consumers commit mistakes for which they can be criticized and (...) that they could easily avoid by reforming their doxastic conduct. Proponents of structural approaches, like R. Rini and B. Millar, have defended in different ways a negative answer to this question. In this paper, we criticize their views and suggest that individual users could improve on their epistemic practice by widening their information diet. (shrink)

In this work, I investigate the implications of reversing the common assumption of rationality on behalf of human agents typically underlying philosophical research. Instead, I assume that human agents can become rational only if they learn to edge against their dumbness. Specifically, I show that intelligence cannot be considered the opposite of dumbness. To this end, I embrace the difference among System 1, System 2, and System 1.5. On these grounds, I argue that System 2 can be considered the system (...) of intelligence, whereas Systems 1 and 1.5 can be viewed as the systems of rationality. More precisely, I argue that System 2 concerns theoretical reasoning, whereas System 1 and 1.5 concern practical reasoning. Accordingly, I show that people are dumber whenever they fail to have rational control over System 1 via System 1.5, whereas people become more rational whenever they manage to have rational control over System 1 via System 1.5. Interestingly, both cases can be considered the causes of two distinct social processes. On one side, when dumbness increases among individuals, social groups achieve coordination that detriments general welfare. On the other, when dumbness decreases among individuals, social groups achieve coordination that maximizes general welfare. (shrink)

Several studies have lately revealed that social media conceal at least three dangerous pitfalls. Firstly, social media can negatively impact sociopolitical processes in advanced liberal democracies by becoming vehicles for the spread of false information that augments political polarization (Lee et al. 2017; Ostillio 2018). Secondly, as a result of the first point, social mediacan rapidly become a source of incorrect beliefs for those subjects with low digital literacy (Guess et al. 2019). Thirdly, because of the first and second points, (...) intentionally deceitful manipulations of social media content are potent generators of information cascades that increase group polarizations across groups of vulnerable social media users (Jang and Kim2018, Wang et al. 2018, Colliander 2019). These findings support the claim that the circulation of biased content on social media potentially threatens sociopolitical stability in liberal Western democracies (Duffy 2018; Sunstein 2018). Although this claim is far from being speculative, as shown by the FacebookFile investigations (Wall Street Journal 2019) and the center for humane technology’s recen tresearch, it introduces a thorny dilemma regarding the founding principles of liberal Western democracies. Namely, should Western legislators limit free speech by introducing severe penalties for those who spread fake news and the likes on social media? Or should they let the free market autonomously produce efficient technology allowing people to identify biased social media content?In other words, is a libertarian solution to the plight of online fake news and the like preferable to adequate legislation that punishes those who spread such content? Though appealing, it is unrealistic to believe that the free market can resolve this problem. On the other hand, it is realistic to suppose that Western governments should engage in a merciless battle against biased social media content. For instance, following the publication of the Report of the independent High level Group on fake news and online disinformation in 2018, the European Union introduced new directives to limit the spread of fake news online in 2021, when the Covid19 pandemic started fading. Although initiatives as such might look like limitations of free speech, there is solid philosophical ground to defend such initiatives. To prove this contention, we resort to Hobbes’s (1651, Part II, §18 and §29) argument that humans can avoid falling back into the Hobbesian state of war only if they stipulate a covenant. Specifically, we appeal to Hobbes’s (1651) argument in favor of bestowing the sovereign the right to ban those seditious doctrines that might undermine peace and sociopolitical stability in the Hobbesian Commonwealth. In this regard, we show that the Hobbesian covenant resolves conflict among humans in the same way a correlated equilibrium limits noncooperation in game theory. Namely, like game theory players, citizens enjoy greater welfare whenever they observe rules that mitigate conflict (Slomp 2010). Accordingly, we argue that citizens would be better off only if Western governments introduced severe penalties for those who intentionally spread fake news. Notably, we argue that effective regulation would create disincentives for spreading biased content and incentives for spreading truthful content. Furthermore, we argue that effective regulation against online fake news would assuage the polarizing effects of online availability cascades on social networks. Importantly, we provide empirical evidence supporting these claims by showing that the lack of effective regulation led the American government to miserably fail to contain the devasting effects of the online infodemic (i.e., the epidemic of false online information)that took place during the first two waves of the Covid19 pandemic (Evanega et al. 2020, Milosh et al. 2020). (shrink)

Questo articolo prende in esame il fenomeno della proliferazione di fake news da un punto di vista filosofico—anzi, per meglio dire, prettamente epistemologico—con particolare attenzione a tre questioni fondamentali: cosa sono le fake news e come debbano essere definite; quali meccanismi ne favoriscono la proliferazione sui social media; chi debba essere ritenuto responsabile e degno di biasimo nel processo sotteso alla generazione, pubblicazione e diffusione di fake news. A partire dall'analisi dei principali lavori nella letteratura filosofica sul tema, ci proponiamo (...) di: offrire una definizione di fake news che eviti le obiezioni sollevate contro altre definizioni discusse dalla letteratura (§1); mettere in luce le principali cause della propagazione di fake news, con particolare riferimento ai bias cognitivi e alle strutture comunitarie in cui si organizzano gli utenti dei social media (§2); infine, presentare una analisi originale della responsabilità epistemica dei consumatori di fake news (§3). (shrink)

The Système de philosophie by Pierre Sylvain Régis can be considered as the achievement both of the scientific liveliness of the Académie des Sciences in the 17th century and of its fruitful relationship with the Royal Society. Since it aims to shape the new conception of the universe in terms of a system, the Système represents one of the most mature achievements of Cartesian philosophy and it is characterized by an empirical interpretation of Descartes’ thought. The Système therefore reflects two (...) important phenomena occurring in the Europe of the 17th century: the scientific revolution and the proliferation of Academies. In fact, this ambitious work could be undertaken with the support of the Académie des Sciences and the Journal des Sçavants. My paper will analyse the French context by focusing to outline the role which the Académie de France had both in France, as the medium of dissemination of the new philosophy despite censorship, and abroad, in particular through the relationship with the Royal Society in England. I aim to analyse the role of the Journal des Sçavants as a means to share ideas other than by correspondence and as a trait d’union between “rationalist France” and “empiricist England”. I intend to question whether it is possible to establish a connection between the empirical interpretation of French Cartesianism, the consolidation of the Académie de France and the employment of new means of academic communication. The paper will show that the second half of 17th century France represents a remarkable exception to the conventional picture, which states that in 17th century Europe, following the success of a mechanistic interpretation of reality, two philosophical school clashed: rationalism, predominating on the continent, and empiricism, in England. (shrink)

You reach for the bowl with ‘sugar’ written on it only to discover, from the bad taste of your coffee, that it contained salt. Mundane experiences like these show that epistemic justification does not necessarily hold stable across possible changes of information. One can be justified in believing a proposition at a certain time (that the bowl contains sugar) and cease to be justified at a later time, as one enlarges one’s epistemic perspective (as one drinks a salty coffee). When (...) this happens, one’s justification has been defeated. An epistemic defeater, broadly speaking, is that in terms of which the defeat of justification proceeds. The notion of an epistemic defeater is mostly associated with J. Pollock’s work on reasoning and inference. Pollock has provided the canonical definition of an epistemic defeater and proposed an influential taxonomy in terms of the way different types of defeaters induce their characteristic effects. The notion of an epistemic defeater has acquired a broader meaning in current epistemology, and several distinctions have been introduced that have contributed to a more nuanced understanding of the phenomenon of defeat as well as to complement Pollock’s original taxonomy. The correlated notion of a propositional defeater, defined in terms of would-be defeat of justification, is appealed to by the proponents of the defeasibility theory in the parallel debate about knowledge to explain what prevents a justified true belief from constituting knowledge in Gettier cases. (shrink)

One of the most mature achievements of the Cartesian philosophy is the aim to diffuse Descartes’ thought among a wider audience by presenting his philosophy in an encyclopedic way. A relevant contribution in this field is Pierre Sylvain Régis’s Système. Régis’s contribution consists both in reconciling the new scientific discoveries with les principes de Monsieur Descartes by combining them into a scholarly manual whose aim is to stimulate the ars inveniendi and in recognizing the relevance of Arnauld’s and Nicole’s L’art (...) de penser as manual of Cartesian logic. In an article published on the «Annali della Scuola Normale Superiore di Pisa», pp. 517-55: L’«Art de penser» nella logica del «Système» di Régis) I analysed Régis’s logic in order to point out that, even if L’art de penser represents its only source, La logique of the Système has not to be considered as a mere compendium of the Port-Royal Logique, but as a revision of the latter according to a specific philosophical system, characterized by the empirical interpretation of Descartes’s philosophy. In this paper I provide a synopsis of the comparison between the logic of the Système and the Logique of Port-Royal, in order to resume in a schematic way the results of my research. (shrink)

Wokeism—as an ideology—is a potent enabler of group polarization. Secondly, polarization among its upholders results from the fact that they often display those behavioral patterns typical of behavioral conformity. Thirdly, groupthink and behavioral conformity jointly lead the upholders of wokeism to disbelieve any view that question theirs.

Starting from the text Cibo ed etica by Franco Riva, this contribution intends to discuss the many questions raised by food ethics by questioning the thought of G.W.F. Hegel and F.W.J. Schelling. In dialogue with these two authors, the essay insists on the category of “hunger” as a characteristic trait of human ontology insofar as it is a figure of the original extroversion and openness to the other.

Catharine Trotter Cockburn (1679- 1749) fu poetessa, drammaturga e filosofa. La vivacità intellettuale e la forte determinazione le permisero di aggirare il pregiudizio di genere e di sottrarsi alle dinamiche di marginalizzazione femminile tipiche dell’età moderna. Pur celandosi dietro l’anonimato, Cockburn prese parte attiva al dibattito filosofico del tempo, intervenendo soprattutto in materia di morale. Le sue opere filosofiche, scritte in difesa di Locke o di Clarke, custodiscono, nonostante il dichiarato intento apologetico, tratti di originalità e indipendenza, particolarmente evidenti nella (...) teoria dell’obbligo morale, nell’interpretazione modale della dottrina lockeana d’identità personale, nell’ipotesi di una natura ontologica dello spazio. (shrink)

A groundbreaking text for the account of the problem of evil in German idealism. Here is a brief review for the German audience.

This chapter introduces a novel account of fake news and explains how it differs from other definitions on the market. The account locates the fakeness of an alleged news report in two main aspects related to its production, namely that its creators do not think to have sufficient evidence in favor of what they divulge and they fail to display the appropriate attitude towards the truth of the information they share. A key feature of our analysis is that it does (...) not require that fake news must be circulated with the intention to deceive one’s audience. In this way, our account overcomes a potential limitation of the current philosophical discussion about fake news, which appears to individuate the main problem with this phenomenon in the fact that fake news consumers are misled and misinformed. In contrast, the proposed analysis shows that an additional (and perhaps equally fundamental) problem uncovered by the spread of fake news is a widespread pathological relationship with information, one on which we consume information not to satisfy our interest in the truth but to strengthen our social identities and quench our hunger for social recognition. (shrink)

To say that evidence is normative is to say that what evidence one possesses, and how this evidence relates to any proposition, determines which attitude among believing, disbelieving and withholding one ought to take toward this proposition if one deliberates about whether to believe it. It has been suggested by McHugh that this view can be vindicated by resting on the premise that truth is epistemically valuable. In this paper, I modify the strategy sketched by McHugh so as to overcome (...) the initial difficulty that it is unable to vindicate the claim that on counterbalanced evidence with respect to P one ought to conclude deliberation by withholding on P. However, I describe the more serious difficulty that this strategy rests on principles whose acceptance commits one to acknowledging non-evidential reasons for believing. A way to overcome this second difficulty, against the evidentialists who deny this, is to show that we sometimes manage to believe on the basis of non-epistemic considerations. If this is so, one fundamental motivation behind the evidentialist idea that non-epistemic considerations could not enter as reason in deliberation would lose its force. In the second part of this paper I address several strategies proposed in the attempt to show that we sometimes manage to believe on the basis of non-epistemic considerations and show that they all fail. So, I conclude that the strategy inspired by McHugh to ground the normativity of evidence on the value of truth ultimately fails. (shrink)

According to Hartry Field, the mathematical Platonist is hostage of a dilemma. Faced with the request of explaining the mathematicians’ reliability, one option could be to maintain that the mathematicians are reliably responsive to a realm populated with mathematical entities; alternatively, one might try to contend that the mathematical realm conceptually depends on, and for this reason is reliably reflected by, the mathematicians’ (best) opinions; however, both alternatives are actually unavailable to the Platonist: the first one because it is in (...) tension with the idea that mathematical entities are causally ineffective, the second one because it is in tension with the suggestion that mathematical entities are mind-independent. John Divers and Alexander Miller have tried to reject the conclusion of this argument—according to which Platonism is inconsistent with a satisfactory epistemology for arithmetic—by redescribing the second horn of the dilemma in light of Crispin Wright’s notion of judgment-dependent truth; in particular they have contended that once arithmetical truth is conceived in this way the Platonist can have a substantial epistemology which does not conflict with the idea that the mathematical entities exist mind-independently. In this paper I analyze Wright’s notion of judgment-dependent truth, and reject Divers and Miller’s argument for the conclusion that arithmetical truth can be so characterized. In the final part, I address the worry that my argument generalizes very quickly to the conclusion that no area of discourse could be characterized as judgment-dependent. As against this conclusion, I indicate under what conditions—notably not satisfied in Divers and Miller’s case, but possibly satisfied in others—a discourse’s judgment-dependency can be successfully vindicated. (shrink)

The aim of this essay is to analyze the concept of ecstasy in F. W. J. Schelling's Erlangen Lectures. In particular, I intend to show how it constitutes a significant evolution with regard to the model of reminiscence and in particular that of Mitwissenschaft, as presented in the Weltalter. The essay focuses on three aspects of the notion of ecstasy: 1) its relation to temporality, 2) its relation to interiority, and 3) its noetic value and its moral dimension. In conclusion, (...) I will show how in Erlangen a movement of progressive de-historicization and de-theosophicization of ecstasy began, culminating in the Berliner Einleitung of 1842/43. (shrink)

First aim of this paper is to show that Evidentialism, when paired with a Psychologistic ontology of evidence, is unable to account for ordinary cases of inferential justification. As many epistemologists have maintained, however, when it is paired with a Propositionalist ontology of evidence, Evidentialism is unable to explain in a satisfactory way ordinary cases of perceptual justification. So, the Evidentialist is faced with a dilemma. Second aim of this paper is to give an argument in favour of Propositionalism about (...) evidence, and so to motivate the conclusion that perceptual justification must be accounted for in non-evidentialist terms. By this I do not mean to defend a strongly Non-Evidentialist epistemology, according to which there are doxastic attitudes which are unsupported by any justifier. More modestly, I aim to motivate the weakly Non-Evidentialist epistemology according to which a subject’s perceptual beliefs may be justified by non-evidential justifiers. I conclude the paper by explaining why I believe that Pryor's dogmatism supplies a model for the way in which an internalist who is persuaded by my argument might want to detail her weakly Non-Evidentialist account of perceptual justification. (shrink)

This dissertation attempts to settle some challenging historiographic issues concerning the origin and development of the concept of economic equilibrium. Specifically, our research goal is to identify the philosophical and historical drivers of the mathematization of economic theory. To this end, we attempt to answer three fundamental research questions. First, why (and not how) has economics become a mathematical science? Second, what are the major methodological blunders that lie at the foundations of Modern General Equilibrium Theory? Third, is the contemporary (...) criticism of Modern General Equilibrium Theory meaningful and well-founded? In order, chapters 1-3 address the first question, chapters 4 and 5 address the second, whereas chapter 6 addresses the third question. Regarding the first question, we investigate the methodological relationships between Modern Physics, Modern Philosophy, and Walras’s Theory of General Equilibrium. Interestingly, our findings reveal that while the study of motion in Modern Physics relies upon a clear distinction between static and dynamic equilibrium, early mathematical economics borrows its methodology from Modern Physics but relies upon an Aristotelian conception of equilibrium. Furthermore, we identify exciting analogies between Kant’s philosophy and Walras’s Elements. Finally, we show that the so-called Walras Paradox also features another unexplored dimension. Namely, Walras’s work overall relies upon a bottom-up approach to mathematics. Yet Walras’s work includes problems that require a top-down approach to mathematics to be solved. Regarding the second question, we delve into the tight relationship between the History of Mathematics in the 19th Century, the Philosophy of Mathematics in the 20th Century, and the development of Modern General Equilibrium Theory in the 20th Century. Notably, we find that the top-down approach to mathematics provides economists with a reliable methodology to resolve the problems in Walras’s original work. Hence, the mathematization of General Equilibrium Theory in the 20th Century is a child of its time that carries the inapplicability of pure mathematics to real-world problems along with itself. Therefore, although the mathematization of General Equilibrium Theory is an unprecedented milestone in economic theory, the foundations of Modern General Equilibrium Theory inherit the methodological shortcomings of Contemporary Mathematics. That is why the Sonnenschein-Mantel-Debreu does not overtake the Aristotelian conception of equilibrium. Accordingly, we rebut the claim that Debreu and colleagues' mathematization of General Equilibrium Theory resolves the fundamental methodological shortcomings of Walras’s original work. Eventually, we use our answers to our first and second research questions to address the contemporary criticism of General Equilibrium Theory. On the one hand, we show that the latter criticism does not account for the fact that General Equilibrium Theory inherits the scientific realism and determinism of Modern Physics. In other words, we argue that the inability of General Equilibrium models to manage uncertainty effectively has nothing to do with its mathematization in the 20th Century. Instead, it results from the unexplored dimension of the Walras Paradox, which we uncover. On the other hand, we show that common accusations of inconsistency, incompleteness, and undecidability in General Equilibrium Theory are ill-founded. That is because other rigorous alternatives to axiomatization in economics are not paradox-free. On these grounds, we conclude that a much better option is to employ a topic-neutral language to provide rigorous presentations of contested concepts in economics. Particularly, we show that formal mereology offers a convenient methodological framework to resolve the disagreement between the Neoclassical and Institutionalist economists’ respective definitions of the concept of the market. In this way, we show that the latter concept is definable as a process. But, more importantly, we note that formal mereology also offers a convenient framework to reformulate other economic concepts concisely and rigorously. In this regard, we observe that formal mereology might provide a resolution for Hayek’s Problem because it would enable economists to define general equilibrium as a perduring socioeconomic process. -/- In case you want a copy of my dissertation, please email me. (shrink)

This dissertation compares the notions of homo rationalis in Philosophy and homo oeconomicus in Economics. Particularly, in Part I, we claim that both notions are close methodological substitutes. Accordingly, we show that the constraints involved in the notion of economic rationality apply to the philosophical notion of rationality. On these premises, we explore the links between the notions of Kantian and Humean rationality in Philosophy and the constructivist and ecological approaches to rationality in economics, respectively. Particularly, we show that the (...) constraints involved in both approaches to rationality in economics apply to the notions of Kantian and Humean rationality. That is why we introduce the notion of minimal global rationality. In a nutshell, the latter links one’s rationality to one’s ability to make good use of their cognitive apparatus to process contextual variables. On this basis, in Part II, we present two empirical tests showing that minimal global rationality is at work in philosophical experiments because systematic manipulations of contextual variables predictably affect philosophical judgment in the Trolley Problem and in some Knobe-like vignettes. In the first case, the manipulation of the information provided to subjects predictably causes inconsistent judgments. More precisely, subjects’ response to information shocks predictably causes them to issue inconsistent judgments. Instead, in the second case, our experimental results reveal that the Knobe Effect activates only if the perpetrator of an action is likely to be perceived as evil and unfriendly. Besides, when the Knobe-like vignettes include probabilistic outcomes, the Knobe Effect does not activate or is reduced in magnitude. For these reasons, we maintain that the availability heuristic bias arguably affects one’s judgment in Knobe-like experiment settings. Eventually, in Part III, we survey the general implications of the findings presented in Part II. First and foremost, we show that when manned social media algorithms produce wide-ranging availability cascades, agents predictably respond to those cascades by herding around biased claims. Interestingly, we find that the exposure to similarly redundant online content makes new social groups emerge unhindered. That is why populists and conspiracy theorists obtain such a large follow-up online. Secondly, we find that manned social media algorithms can exploit the flaws of minimal global rationality at a faster pace than humans. Yet, given that latter algorithms cannot do so on their own, we argue that the Turing Test is still an open game. Specifically, we argue so because state-of-the-art technology can request a service to be supplied (e.g., Google Duplex) but cannot operate direct sales. This constraint of state-of-the-art technology is linked to its inability to exploit the flaws of global minimal rationality as well as humans can. Importantly, we show that if algorithms were able to do so, the involved sociopolitical risk would be high. Therefore, we argue that only some form of regulation over state-of-the-art technology can prevent and reduce such sociopolitical risks. -/- In case you want a copy of this dissertation, please email me. (shrink)

The paper aims to reconstruct the final configuration of Schelling’s philosophical system from the second half of the 1840s. Particular attention is given to the Darstellung der reinrationalen Philosophie, which, according to Schelling’s intentions, was to replace the so-called Berliner Einleitung. By analyzing the different use of the notion of critique and the concept of positive philosophy in the two texts under examination, the paper shows how Schelling’s philosophy undergoes significant changes in the very last years of his life.

L’usage de la raison et de la foy ou l’accord de la foy et de la raison (1704) by Pierre-Sylvain Régis can be considered his last attempt to defend the ‘new philosophy’ of René Descartes by vindicating its agreement with faith and protecting it from censorship. This contribution offers an analysis of the theories expounded by Régis in this treatise, showing how these evolved from those of his earlier Système de philosophie (1690), and arguing that both are characterized by a (...) reinterpretation of the Cartesian metaphysics on an empirical basis. In particular, Régis offered an empirical interpretation of the relations between substances, attributes and modes, by which he criticized Spinoza’s metaphysics and attempted to solve the riddle of Descartes’ dualism. (shrink)

The aim of this essay is to examine recent contributions to Schelling research that appeared in three miscellanies in 2020. Their common thread is Schelling’s philosophy of nature, which, because of its dynamic and processual characteristics, is considered relevant in the debate on realism, philosophy of biology and environmental ethics. In the historical-philosophical field, many contributions highlight Schelling’s debt to Kant and Spinoza and his close relationship with the Romantic movement. Lastly, the essay analyses contributions concerning the Spätphilosophie, showing how (...) Schelling’s philosophy is to be considered first and foremost as historical philosophy. (shrink)

In this paper we focus on transmission and failure of transmission of warrant. We identify three individually necessary and jointly sufficient conditions for transmission of warrant, and we show that their satisfaction grounds a number of interesting epistemic phenomena that have not been sufficiently appreciated in the literature. We then scrutinise Wright’s analysis of transmission failure and improve on extant readings of it. Nonetheless, we present a Bayesian counterexample that shows that Wright’s analysis is partially incoherent with our analysis of (...) warrant transmission and prima facie defective. We conclude exploring three alternative lines of reply: developing a more satisfactory account of transmission failure, which we outline; dismissing the Bayesian counterexample by rejecting some of its assumptions; reinterpreting Wright’s analysis to make it immune to the counterexample. (shrink)

A recent study by Castellani et al. (JAMA 302(23):2573–2579, 2009) describes the population-level effects of the choices of individuals who underwent molecular carrier screening for cystic fibrosis (CF) in Veneto, in the northeastern part of Italy, between 1993 and 2007. We discuss some of the ethical issues raised by the policies and individual choices that are the subject of this study. In particular, (1) we discuss the ethical issues raised by the acquisition of genetic information through antenatal carrier testing; (2) (...) we consider whether by choosing to procreate naturally these couples can harm the resulting child and/or other members of society, and what the moral implications of such harm would be; (3) we consider whether by choosing to avoid natural procreation carrier couples can harm current or future individuals affected by cystic fibrosis; (4) we discuss whether programs that make carrier testing available can be considered eugenic programs. (shrink)

This paper focuses on the rule of metaphor in Paul Ricoeur's philosophy of language. In his MultiDisciplinary Studies in the Creation of Meaning in Language (1975), the French philosopher shows the fundamental power of human language in constructing the world we perceive. He reveals the processes by which linguistic imagination creates and recreates meaning through metaphor. He develops a "linguistic philosophy of freedom," and a hermeneutics of the subject based on human capabilities. According to Ricoeur, to exist is to act: (...) speaking, doing, telling, and assuming responsibility for the act committed. The very "being" of human beings is to act and the effort to be. In this perspective, the human interiority is considered as dynamic production (enérgeia, conatus): it is a complex ontology of homo capax based on the human freedom and possibilities of language. Being as act and potentiality is the dominant meta-category that governs Ricoeur's philosophical anthropology, widely developed in the work Oneself as Another (1990). (shrink)

In this paper I analyze the postmodern condition with particular reference to the ethical and political spheres. Postmodernism attempts a radical break with all of the major strands of post-Enlightenment thought. For postmodernists as the French Jean-François Lyotard and the Italian Gianni Vattimo, the orthodox Enlightenment “meta-narrative” of progress and the “speculative” narrative of Hegel and Marx have lost their explanatory force. In particular, Lyotard speaks about five large meta-narratives of Western culture: 1) Christianity (understood also in the secularized form (...) which its values have taken into modernity); 2) Enlightenment; 3) Idealism as a “theory of progressive freedom in history”; 4) Marxism, and 5) Capitalism. According to Lyotard, one can consider “the incredulity” towards these meta-narratives (méta-récits or grands récits) as postmodern. He points out that after Auschwitz it is impossible to speak of rationality and progress in Western history: In the twentieth century the Nazi genocide showed that history is not a continuous ethical progress towards the best. From the philosophical point of view the precursor of postmodern atmosphere is Friedrich Nietzsche. This German philosopher elaborated a radically anti-metaphysical thought and proposed an ethic of emancipation. Postmodernists refer to Nietzsche’s thought and theorize ethical-political practices aimed at the emancipation of women and socially weak subjects. Postmodernism’s rejection of “totalizing” theories with universal pretentions is complemented by positive celebration of diversity or “difference” and emphasis on the ethical demands of “the other”: this is, for example, the ethical perspective of Michel Foucault. (shrink)

This paper analyses the interpretation of the Marxist dialectic proposed by three important French philosophers of the twentieth century: Maurice Merleau-Ponty (1908-1961), Jean-Paul Sartre (1905-1980) and Raymond Aron (1905-1983). Starting from different theoretical and political points of view, they criticize the historical determinism of the Marxist dialectic and propose three different “philosophies of freedom.” In the Adventures of the Dialectic (1955), Merleau-Ponty criticizes a theory of human history based only on economic structure, and denounces the violence of the Soviet communism. (...) He also accuses his friend Sartre – who had a more favourable attitude towards Soviet communism – of “ultrabolshevism.” Merleau-Ponty was subsequently active in the French non-communist Left. The existentialist philosopher Sartre always sympathized with the Left, and supported the French Communist Party (PCF) until the 1956 Soviet invasion of Hungary. In his Critique of Dialectical Reason (1960), Sartre also underlined the failure of the Soviet revolution, and criticized the violence of Marxist revolutionary thought. The last part of this paper deals with the philosopher and political sociologist Raymond Aron, who had a lifelong, sometimes fractious, friendship with Sartre. He always defended a “skeptical and anti-ideological” liberal position. In his best known book The Opium of the Intellectuals (1955), Aron argues that in post-war France, Marxism was the opium of the intellectuals. In this book, Aron chastised French intellectuals for what he described as their harsh criticism of capitalism and democracy and their simultaneous defense of Marxist oppression, atrocities, and intolerance. In opposition to the dialectical ideology of Marxism, Aron proposes an antitotalitarian philosophical and political theory based on the development of individual liberties. (shrink)

The Italian philosopher Augusto Del Noce (1910-1989) gave an original interpretation of the modern secular age. In this paper, I analyze the reasons why Del Noce saw in Descartes and in Rousseau two fundamental expressions of secularization: according to the two French philosophers, the human being is characterized by an original goodness (status naturae purae). Del Noce noted that this anthropological optimism, widespread in modernity, made superfluous the Christian faith: without the presence of original sin (an evil in human nature), (...) the redemption is no longer necessary. In the last part of the paper it is examined “the Rousseau problem”, i.e. the constitutive ambiguity of the Genevan thinker. Rightly Del Noce pointed out that Rousseau was, at the same time, a religious and revolutionary philosopher: on the one hand, Rousseau criticized modern rationalists and reevaluated the sphere of human feelings (including religious feelings), but on the other, he theorized a revolutionary and Jacobin thought. Therefore, Rousseau can be interpreted as a philosopher who emblematically expressed the ambiguities of the modern process of secularization. (shrink)

In this paper we argue that Michael Huemer’s phenomenal conservatism—the internalist view according to which our beliefs are prima facie justified if based on how things seems or appears to us to be—doesn’t fall afoul of Michael Bergmann’s dilemma for epistemological internalism. We start by showing that the thought experiment that Bergmann adduces to conclude that is vulnerable to his dilemma misses its target. After that, we distinguish between two ways in which a mental state can contribute to the justification (...) of a belief: the direct way and the indirect way. We identify a straightforward reason for claiming that the justification contributed indirectly is subject to Bergmann’s dilemma. Then we show that the same reason doesn’t extend to the claim that the justification contributed directly is subject to Bergmann’s dilemma. As is the view that seemings or appearances contribute justification directly, we infer that Bergmann’s contention that his dilemma applies to is unmotivated. In the final part, we suggest that our line of response to Bergmann can be used to shield other types of internalist justification from Bergmann’s objection. We also propose that seeming-grounded justification can be combined with justification of one of these types to form the basis of a promising version of internalist foundationalism. (shrink)

This paper analyses Ernst Nolte’s interpretation of Bolshevik revolution, and underlines the characteristics of his methodological approach to historical research. According to the German historian, the Russian revolution (1917) determined an ideological dialectics that characterized the first half of the 20th century: following the mechanism of “challenge and response” Nolte has interpreted the birth and the developments of Nazism as a response to Bolshevism, a violent and excessive response (Schreckbild). Thus, Nolte explains the historical development of the Nazi totalitarianism in (...) relationship to the Soviet totalitarianism, and speaks about a "European civil war" (europäische Bürgerkrieg 1917-1945). In this paper the criticisms that several historians have made to Nolte’s point of view are also discussed: this debate is known as “Historikerstreit.” I underline, therefore, the features and the limits of Nolte’s “deconstruction of revolutionary mythology.”. (shrink)

A subject S's belief that Q is well-grounded if and only if it is based on a reason of S that gives S propositional justification for Q. Depending on the nature of S's reason, the process whereby S bases her belief that Q on it can vary. If S's reason is non-doxastic––like an experience that Q or a testimony that Q––S will need to form the belief that Q as a spontaneous and immediate response to that reason. If S's reason (...) is doxastic––like a belief that P––S will need to infer her belief that Q from it. The distinction between these two ways in which S's beliefs can be based on S's reasons is widely presupposed in current epistemology but––we argue in this paper––is not exhaustive. We give examples of quite ordinary situations in which a well-grounded belief of S appears to be based on S's reasons in neither of the ways described above. To accommodate these recalcitrant cases, we introduce the notion of enthymematic inference and defend the thesis that S can base a belief that Q on doxastic reasons P1, P2, …, Pn via inferring enthymematically Q from P1, P2, …, Pn. (shrink)

L’epistemologia (detta anche filosofia della conoscenza o gnoseologia) è la disciplina filosofica che studia come gli esseri umani si rapportano da un punto di vista cognitivo alla realtà che li circonda. Le questioni fondamentali che la interessano sono principalmente di natura normativa. Riguardano il modo in cui dovremmo regolare le nostre credenze alla luce dell’informazione in nostro possesso, e la natura della conoscenza umana ed i suoi limiti. Questo capitolo è organizzato in modo corrispondente. La prima sezione tratta della nozione (...) di giustificazione epistemica, la seconda quella di conoscenza, e la terza introduce il problema filosofico dello scetticismo. (shrink)

Hubert Dreyfus has argued that cases of absorbed bodily coping show that there is no room for self-awareness in flow experiences of experts. In this paper, I argue against Dreyfus’ maxim of vanishing self-awareness by suggesting that awareness of agency is present in expert bodily action. First, I discuss the phenomenon of absorbed bodily coping by discussing flow experiences involved in expert bodily action: merging into the flow; immersion in the flow; emergence out of flow. I argue against the claim (...) that flow experience does not involve an awareness of agency for each of these features, while conceding that fluent agency does not involve self-awareness in the thetic sense. I challenge the assumption that the awareness of fluent agency must be understood in terms of a thetic awareness of agency. Instead, I develop an Anscombean account of the awareness of fluent agency in terms of the phenomenal character of knowing one’s aims. I respond to the challenge that if an Anscombean account of the awareness of agency is to succeed, then agents must be able to answer Anscombean questions. I consider the objection that awareness of agency is not a form of self-awareness by outlining an account of self-awareness as self-synthesis that is distinct from self-perception and self-ascription, but which makes room for self-awareness in expert bodily action. (shrink)

An important study that brings together the results of more than 30 years of work on Schelling and Pareyson by one of Italy's leading experts.

Philosophy of science in the 20th century is to be considered as mostly characterized by a fundamentally systematic heuristic attitude, which looks to mathematics, and more generally to the philosophy of mathematics, for a genuinely and epistemologically legitimate form of knowledge. Rooted in this assumption, the book provides a formal reconsidering of the dynamics of scientific theories, especially in the field of the physical sciences, and offers a significant contribution to current epistemological investigations regarding the validity of using formal (especially: (...) model-theoretic) methods of analysis, as developed principally by Stegmüller, Sneed, Suppes, Moulines, “to bring the airy flights of analytical philosophy back down to earth”, to borrow Stephan Hartmann’s provocative statement. At the same time, the volume represents a comprehensive account of the epistemic content of physical theories, the logic of theory change in science, and specific (inter-)theoretical core aspects of scientific progress, particularly in the form suggested informally by Thomas Kuhn. As C. Ulises Moulines writes in the preface, “there is no other example in present-day literature (in any language) on this topic, i.e. the formal analysis of the ideographic characterization of the dynamics of theories between Kuhn’s theory of science and structural epistemology, that is as systematic and complete as Perrone’s work”. (shrink)

In this contribution we will present a generalization of de Finetti's betting game in which a gambler is allowed to buy and sell unknown events' betting odds from more than one bookmaker. In such a framework, the sole coherence of the books the gambler can play with is not sucient, as in the original de Finetti's frame, to bar the gambler from a sure-win opportunity. The notion of joint coherence which we will introduce in this paper characterizes those coherent books (...) on which sure- win is impossible. Our main results provide geometric characterizations of the space of all books which are jointly coherent with a xed one. As a consequence we will also show that joint coherence is decidable. (shrink)

In this paper we focus on some new normativist positions and compare them with traditional ones. In so doing, we claim that if normative judgments are involved in determining whether a condition is a disease only in the sense identified by new normativisms, then disease is normative only in a weak sense, which must be distinguished from the strong sense advocated by traditional normativisms. Specifically, we argue that weak and strong normativity are different to the point that one ‘normativist’ label (...) ceases to be appropriate for the whole range of positions. If values and norms are not explicit components of the concept of disease, but only intervene in other explanatory roles, then the concept of disease is no more value-laden than many other scientific concepts, or even any other scientific concept. We call the newly identified position “value-conscious naturalism” about disease, and point to some of its theoretical and practical advantages. (shrink)

According to the so-called Lockean thesis, a rational agent believes a proposition just in case its probability is sufficiently high, i.e., greater than some suitably fixed threshold. The Preface paradox is usually taken to show that the Lockean thesis is untenable, if one also assumes that rational agents should believe the conjunction of their own beliefs: high probability and rational belief are in a sense incompatible. In this paper, we show that this is not the case in general. More precisely, (...) we consider two methods of computing how probable must each of a series of propositions be in order to rationally believe their conjunction under the Lockean thesis. The price one has to pay for the proposed solutions to the paradox is what we call “quasi-dogmatism”: the view that a rational agent should believe only those propositions which are “nearly certain” in a suitably defined sense. (shrink)

In much of the current academic and public discussion, conspiracy theories are portrayed as a negative phenomenon, linked to misinformation, mistrust in experts and institutions, and political propaganda. Rather surprisingly, however, philosophers working on this topic have been reluctant to incorporate a negatively evaluative aspect when either analyzing or engineering the concept conspiracy theory. In this paper, we present empirical data on the nature of the concept conspiracy theory from five studies designed to test the existence, prevalence and exact form (...) of an evaluative dimension to the ordinary concept conspiracy theory. These results reveal that, while there is a descriptive concept of conspiracy theory, the predominant use of conspiracy theory is deeply evaluative, encoding information about epistemic deficiency and often also derogatory and disparaging information. On the basis of these results, we present a new strategy for engineering conspiracy theory to promote theoretical investigations and institutional discussions of this phenomenon. We argue for engineering conspiracy theory to encode an epistemic evaluation, and to introduce a descriptive expression—such as ‘conspiratorial explanation’—to refer to the purely descriptive concept conspiracy theory. (shrink)

A remarkable feature of the philosophical work on conspiracy theory theory has been that most philosophers agree there is nothing inherently problematic about conspiracy theories (AKA the thesis of particularism). Recent work, however, has challenged this consensus view, arguing that there really is something epistemically wrong with conspiracy theorising (AKA generalism). Are particularism and generalism incompatible? By looking at just how much particularists and generalists might have to give away to make their theoretical viewpoints compatible, I will argue that particularists (...) can accept many of the concerns that motivate generalism because generalism can never be about ‘all’ conspiracy theories without being either ahistorical or apolitical. In the end generalist critiques are best seen as useful guidelines or considerations for the appraising of particular conspiracy theories. (shrink)