Abstract It would be puzzling if the morally best agents were not so good after all. Yet one prominent account of the morally best agents ascribes to them the exact motivational defect that has famously been called a “fetish.” The supposed defect is a desire to do the right thing, where this is read de dicto . If the morally best agents really are driven by this de dicto desire, and if this de dicto desire is really a fetish, then (...) the morally best agents are moral fetishists. This is puzzling. I resolve the puzzle by showing that on a proper understanding of the interaction between de dicto and de re moral motivation, it is not only not fetishistic, but quite possibly desirable, to be motivated by a de dicto desire to do the right thing. My argument relies partly on an appeal to a non-buck-passing account of moral rightness, according to which rightness is itself an additional reason-giving property over and above the right-making properties of an action. If this account of moral rightness is correct, then we would expect the morally best agents to exhibit de dicto moral motivation. However, since their de dicto desire acts in concert with de re desires, there is no reason to consider it a fetish. Content Type Journal Article Pages 1-19 DOI 10.1007/s11098-011-9825-z Authors Vanessa Carbonell, Philosophy Department, University of Cincinnati, P.O. Box 210374, Cincinnati, OH 45221-0374, USA Journal Philosophical Studies Online ISSN 1573-0883 Print ISSN 0031-8116. (shrink)

One of the most plausible and widely discussed examples of strong emergence is molecular structure. The only detailed account of it, which has been very influential, is due to Robin Hendry and is formulated in terms of downward causation. This paper explains Hendry’s account of the strong emergence of molecular structure and argues that it is coherent only if one assumes a diachronic reflexive notion of downward causation. However, in the context of this notion of downward causation, the strong emergence (...) of molecular structure faces three challenges that have not been met and which have so far remained unnoticed. First, the putative empirical evidence presented for the strong emergence of molecular structure equally undermines supervenience, which is one of the main tenets of strong emergence. Secondly, it is ambiguous how the assumption of determinate nuclear positions is invoked for the support of strong emergence, as the role of this assumption in Hendry’s argument can be interpreted in more than one way. Lastly, there are understandings of causation which render the postulation of a downward causal relation between a molecule’s structure and its quantum mechanical entities, untenable. (shrink)

The moral community is a social community, and as such it is vulnerable to social problems and pathologies. In this essay I identify a particular way in which participation in the moral community can be constrained by social factors. I argue that features of the social world—including power imbalances, oppression, intergroup conflict, communication barriers, and stereotyping—can make it nearly impossible for some members of the moral community to hold others responsible for wrongdoing. Specifically, social circumstances prevent some marginalized people from (...) engaging in what Stephen Darwall calls “felicitous moral address” (Darwall 2006). We should think of some members of the moral community as having “second-class moral citizenship” in ways that parallel second-class political citizenship. The injustice of second-class moral citizenship can be understood by drawing an analogy with Miranda Fricker’s notion of “epistemic injustice” (Fricker 2007). Fricker’s account of how people can be undermined in their capacity as knowers can be extended to show how people can be undermined in their capacity as makers of moral claims, which can be called “claimant injustice”. (shrink)

Holobionts are symbiotic assemblages composed by a macrobe host plus its symbiotic microbiota. In recent years, the ontological status of holobionts has created a great amount of controversy among philosophers and biologists: are holobionts biological individuals or are they rather ecological communities of independent individuals that interact together? Chiu and Eberl have recently developed an eco-immunity account of the holobiont wherein holobionts are neither biological individuals nor ecological communities, but hybrids between a host and its microbiota. According to their account, (...) the microbiota is not a proper part of the holobiont. Yet, it should be regarded as a set of scaffolds that support the individuality of the host. In this paper, we approach Chiu and Eberl’s account from a metaphysical perspective and argue that, contrary to what the authors claim, the eco-immunity account entails that the microorganisms that compose the host’s microbiota are proper parts of the holobiont. Second, we argue that by claiming that holobionts are hybrids, and therefore, not biological individuals, the authors seem to be assuming a controversial position about the ontology of hybrids, which are conventionally characterized as a type of biological individual. In doing so, our paper aligns with the contemporary tendency to incorporate metaphysical resources to shed light on current biological debates and builds on that to provide additional support to the consideration of holobionts as biological individuals from an eco-immunity perspective. (shrink)

There is a persisting debate about what chemical bonds are and whether they exist. I argue that chemical bonds are real patterns of interactions between subatomic particles. This proposal resolves the problems raised in the context of existing understandings of the chemical bond and provides a novel way to defend the reality of chemical bonds.

Edgar A. Singer Jr. is largely forgotten. Yet in the early twentieth century he was one of the most persistent proponents for a theory of "mind as behavior." This essay explores Singer's theory of mind as a form of experimentally-definable behavior. This interpretation of mind is derived from Singer's "philosophy of experiment," which delimits the forms of questions that can have meaningful answers. Valid questions, according to Singer's theory, must appeal to phenomena that are public in some sense and which (...) have verifiable effects on our "mechanical images" of nature (which is not to say that such phenomena are themselves solely mechanical). From this perspective, Singer is able to give behavioral criteria for attributing "mind" to organisms and for such "mental faculties" as purpose, sensation, consciousness, and thought. It might be wondered how Singer's experimental concept of mind compares with B. F. Skinner's better-known concept of private events. Although there are difficulties involved in the interpretation of each, it would seem that Singer and Skinner are largely in agreement, although they emphasize different factors in the behavioral interpretation of mind. (shrink)

En los debates actuales sobre ética y filosofía política, a menudo se acusa a autores de tradiciones tan distintas como Gianni Vattimo, Paul K. Feyerabend y Richard Rorty de pecar de un mismo vicio: el relativismo en su idea de lo que es la racionalidad (tanto epistémica como moral). Nuestra tesis en este escrito es doble: en primer lugar, defendemos que ninguno de ellos es (ni se considera) relativista; sino que, bien al contrario, su pensamiento podría considerarse como un ejercicio (...) de "antirrelativismo". En segundo lugar, puntualizaremos que este antirrelativismo no les lleva a identificarse con el universalismo (epistémico o moral); sino que, de algún modo, logran recuperar una vía intermedia entre estos dos extremos para apostar a favor de una idea de racionalidad práctica que cifra en el diálogo sin apriorismos sus esperanzas. (shrink)

From the point of view of a theorist in ethics, the interest in public policy usually centres on the policy outcomes. But this point of view does not take much account of the roles and practices through which public policies are enacted. What additional ethical focuses for the policy agent might these entail? I outline four features of policy making, centred on the agent's performance of their role in the process, that raise ethical issues. These features are: the nature of (...) the policy process; the definition of the public; the treatment of policy agents; and accounting for public policy decisions. Brief examples are used to illustrate the nature of the issues and support the conclusion that these present additional ethical focuses for agents in public policy roles. (shrink)

Propomos o uso do Panóptico como a mais eficaz arma no combate a pandemias. Revisamos a literatura e inovamos aplicando-a ao enfrentamento da Covid-19. Dividimos o Panóptico em dois: o Superpanóptico, em toda a sociedade, e o Pós Panóptico Tecnológico, dentro dos hospitais. Sendo, o primeiro, um sistema de vigilância baseado na alta tecnologia que perpassa a tudo e a todos, a todo tempo. E, o segundo, os locais físicos que melhor reproduzem a lógica do Panóptico na contemporaneidade. Da pesquisa (...) de notícias, concluímos que o Panóptico está mais vivo do que nunca e que as nossas propostas teóricas refletem o que já está em funcionamento, tanto na sociedade, quanto nos hospitais. E que seu uso é altamente eficaz porque reduz o número de novas infecções, garante a maior segurança possível a todos, com grande redução de custos e, principalmente, de perdas humanas. (shrink)

I argue for the existence of a ‘ratcheting-up effect’: the behavior of moral saints serves to increase the level of moral obligation the rest of us face. What we are morally obligated to do is constrained by what it would be reasonable for us to believe we are morally obligated to do. Moral saints provide us with a special kind of evidence that bears on what we can reasonably believe about our obligations. They do this by modeling the level of (...) sacrifice a person can realistically bear. Exposure to moral saints thus ‘ratchets-up’ our obligations by combating a type of ignorance that would otherwise defeat those obligations. (shrink)

Holobionts are symbiotic assemblages composed by a host plus its microbiome. The status of holobionts as individuals has recently been a subject of continuous controversy, which has given rise to two main positions: on the one hand, holobiont advocates argue that holobionts are biological individuals; on the other, holobiont detractors argue that they are just mere chimeras or ecological communities, but not individuals. Both parties in the dispute develop their arguments from the framework of the philosophy of biology, in terms (...) of what it takes for a “conglomerate” to be considered an interesting individual from a biological point of view. However, the debates about holobiont individuality have important ontological implications that have remained vaguely explored from a metaphysical framework. The purpose of this paper is to cover that gap by presenting a metaphysical approach to holobionts individuality. Drawing upon a conception of natural selection that puts the focus on the transgenerational recurrence of the traits and that supports the thesis that holobionts are units of selection, we argue that holobionts bear emergent traits and exert downward powers over the entities that compose them. In this vein, we argue, a reasonable argument can be made for conceiving holobionts as emergent biological individuals. (shrink)

Susan Wolf famously claimed that the life of the moral saint is unattractive from the “point of view of individual perfection.” I argue, however, that the unattractive moral saints in Wolf’s account are self-defeating on two levels, are motivated in the wrong way, and are called into question by real-life counter-examples. By appealing to a real-life case study, I argue that the best life from the moral point of view is not necessarily unattractive from the individual point of view.

Here is something puzzling. Still Lifes can be expressive. Expression involves movement. Hence, (some) Still Lifes move. This seems odd. I consider a novel explanation to this ‘static-dynamic’ puzzle from Mitchell Green (2007). Green defends an analysis of artistic expressivity that is heavily indebted to work on intermodal perception. He says visual stimuli, like colours and shapes, can elicit experienced resemblances to sounds, smells and feelings. This enables viewers to know how an emotion feels by looking at the picture. The (...) hypothesis is intriguing, but I show that his suggestion that we empathize with the pictorial content is implausible and that this exposes a flaw in the way his argument moves from experiential mappings to experiential-affective mappings. Consequently, I register some reservations about the way Green supposes we detect these cross-modal qualities. (shrink)

El pensamiento de Gianni Vattimo como entrecruzamiento de política, filosofía y religión.

Descripción de cómo las élites del mundo actual han traicionado al resto de la población en un proyecto global que ya solo beneficia a ellas.

Increasing empirical research on productivity supports the use of statistical or ‘rational’ discrimination in hiring. The practice is legal for features of job applicants not covered by human rights discrimination laws, such as being a smoker, residing in a particular neighbourhood or being a particular height. The practice appears largely morally innocuous under existing philosophical accounts of wrongful discrimination. This paper argues that lawful statistical discrimination treats job applicants in a way that may be considered degrading, and is likely to (...) constrain people’s freedoms in relation to employment, thus giving us reason for moral concern. (shrink)

In this paper, I discuss Jenefer Robinson’s personalist account of pictorial expression. [1] According to personalism, a picture possesses the expressive properties we attribute to it because we take it that someone expresses E in the work. Robinson’s particular strategy exploits the concept of an implied persona who ‘unifies’ and ‘specifies’ what is expressed. [2] Dominic Lopes challenges this view by attacking what he takes to be a flawed assumption motivating the personalist account: the priority of figure expression. [3] Once (...) we acknowledge this flaw, he argues, there is no good reason to prefer personalism to an impersonalist theory. I will argue that Robinson qua personalist can pre-empt this strike by clarifying the relation between (a) what a picture expresses and (b) what is depicted as expressing in the picture. Rather than leading with the idea that personalism unifies or determines the meaning, I argue that impersonalism diminishes it and that, should it be accepted, we would be left with an impoverished view of what specific art pieces can mean. (shrink)

The purpose of cultural competence education for medical professionals is to ensure respectful care and reduce health disparities. Yet as Berger and Miller (2021) show, the cultural competence framework is dated, confused, and self-defeating. They argue that the framework ignores the primary driver of health disparities—systemic racism—and is apt to exacerbate rather than mitigate bias and ethnocentrism. They propose replacing cultural competence with a framework that attends to two social aspects of structural inequality: health and social policy, and institutional-system activity; (...) and two psychological aspects of structural inequality: the clinical encounter, and the epistemic. -/- We agree with the structural approach. To that end, we think it would be fruitful to include attention to physical contributors to structural inequality, namely the material artifacts used in medicine. Devices, tools, and technologies can materialize biases, perpetuate oppression, and contribute to health disparities. Granted, not everything that interests philosophers can be squeezed into medical education. Nevertheless, there are compelling reasons for including the study of material artifacts in education designed to reduce health disparities. First, devices and tools often carry forward biases from the past, and keep biases hidden from plain sight. Second, by studying these artifacts, future clinicians can begin to see themselves as part of a larger sociotechnical system. Finally, as medicine becomes increasingly tech-laden, it’s important for clinicians to see how material artifacts (including algorithms) connect individuals to structures. This will help to undermine oversimplified narratives according to which objective tools and technologies can correct for the bias and subjectivity of flawed human beings. (shrink)

Una importante amenaza para la comunicación intercultu-ral es el relativismo: la idea de que cada cultura es tan diferente a las demás que resulta imposible entender nada de una de ellas desde cualquier otra. Se trata, de hecho, de una noción que cobró cierto éxito en diversas áreas del saber durante el siglo XX. Para oponerse a ella, los filósofos a menudo han intentado encontrar qué es lo que sí tienen todas las culturas en común, con el propósito de que (...) sirva de punto de apoyo para la comprensión mutua. En este artículo, empero, intentamos mostrar cómo cabe refutar las ideas del relativismo sin tener a la vez que comprometerse con una u otra idea de lo que presunta-mente puedan tener todas las culturas en común. El pensamiento de Richard Rorty será el que nos sirva de guía para ello. Veremos por qué, según este autor, el relativismo puede considerarse en realidad una idea incomprensible y, por tanto, que puede ser abandonada; y por qué, aunque nos confesemos etnocéntricos (como él se confesaba), ello no nos cierra a la comunicación con otras culturas, sino que, bien al con-trario, nos invita a entenderlas y a ampliar con ello nuestra propia comprensión de nosotros mismos. El uso de argumentos filosóficos tomados tanto de la epistemología elaborada por Donald Davidson, como de la historia del liberalismo político, nos resultarán fecundos en ambos empeños. (shrink)

Der Beitrag widmet sich einer Erkundung des schöpferischen Eigen- potenzials von Ausdrucksgeschehen, dem entlang von Maurice Merleau-Pontys Phänomenologie der Expressivität nachgespürt wird. Expressivität zeigt sich hier als ein Übergangsphänomen, das in seinem Entstehen und seiner Prozessua- lität nachvollzogen wird. Indem Ausdrucksgeschehen in seiner Ereignishaftigkeit erkundet wird, rekurriert der Beitrag auf eine Form der Medialität, die einem reinen Tätigsein sowie einer starren Passivität bereits vorgelagert ist. Das Ar- gument kulminiert in der Theorie eines relationalen Gefüges von Subjektivität, Sinn, sozio-kultureller Welt und (...) Expressivität. (shrink)

Contemporary biological research has suggested that some host–microbiome multispecies systems (referred to as “holobionts”) can in certain circumstances evolve as unique biological individual, thus being a unit of selection in evolution. If this is so, then it is arguably the case that some biological adaptations have evolved at the level of the multispecies system, what we call hologenomic adaptations. However, no research has yet been devoted to investigating their nature, or how these adaptations can be distinguished from adaptations at the (...) species-level (genomic adaptations). In this paper, we cover this gap by investigating the nature of hologenomic adaptations. By drawing on the case of the evolution of sanguivory diet in vampire bats, we argue that a trait constitutes a hologenomic adaptation when its evolution can only be explained if the holobiont is considered the biological individual that manifests this adaptation, while the bacterial taxa that bear the trait are only opportunistic beneficiaries of it. We then use the philosophical notions of emergence and inter-identity to explain the nature of this form of individuality and argue why it is special of holobionts. Overall, our paper illustrates how the use of philosophical concepts can illuminate scientific discussions, in the trend of what has recently been called metaphysics of biology. (shrink)

In this topical section, we highlight the next step of research on modeling aiming to contribute to the emerging literature that radically refrains from approaching modeling as a scientific endeavor. Modeling surpasses “doing science” because it is frequently incorporated into decision-making processes in politics and management, i.e., areas which are not solely epistemically oriented. We do not refer to the production of models in academia for abstract or imaginary applications in practical fields, but instead highlight the real entwinement of science (...) and policy and the real erosion of their boundaries. Models in decision making – due to their strong entwinement with policy and management – are utilized differently than models in science; they are employed for different purposes and with different constraints. We claim that “being a part of decision-making” implies that models are elements of a very particular situation, in which knowledge about the present and the future is limited but dependence of decisions on the future is distinct. Emphasis on the future indicates that decisions are made about actions that have severe and lasting consequences. In these specific situations, models enable not only the acquisition of knowledge (the primary goal of science) but also enable deciding upon actions that change the course of events. As a result, there are specific ways to construct effective models and justify their results. Although some studies have explored this topic, our understanding of how models contribute to decision making outside of science remains fragmentary. This topical section aims to fill this gap in research and formulate an agenda for additional and more systematic investigations in the field. (shrink)

Existe una aparente incongruencia entre, por una parte, la gran distancia que Ludwig Wittgenstein detectaba entre sus objetivos filosóficos y los de los pragmatistas y, por otra, el acercamiento que posteriormente se ha producido en la historia de la recepción de la filosofía wittgensteiniana entre esta y el (neo)pragmatismo. Con afán de tratar de arrojar algo de luz sobre tal discordancia, nos ocuparemos aquí de modo privilegiado en las reflexiones de Wittgenstein en torno al cumplimiento de reglas (es decir, sobre (...) el fenómeno de la normatividad), y la solución que a este respecto dan diversos autores pragmatistas, para comprobar si efectivamente es similitud o más bien radical disparidad (o tal vez, si se nos permite la manida referencia, simplemente un «parecido de familia») la que se da entre el proyecto filosófico wittgensteiniano y el pragmatista. Pero el objetivo fundamental de este escrito no es, con todo, una simple determinación exegética de cuáles son las verdaderas intenciones de unos y otros (esfuerzo intencionalista que combinaría bastante mal, por lo demás, con las nociones tanto wittgensteinianas como pragmatistas acerca de la normatividad); sino que de lo que se tratará será principalmente de ver qué tesis resultan, a la postre, más plausibles si queremos hacernos con una idea filosóficamente coherente del fenómeno de lo normativo: si las de un pragmatismo estereotipado (que Wittgenstein repudia ferviente), o bien las de un pensamiento que se quiere no filosófico (como el del propio vienés), o bien las mucho más matizadas consideraciones procedentes del neopragmatismo. (shrink)

Whether or not quantum physics can account for molecular structure is a matter of considerable controversy. Three of the problems raised in this regard are the problems of molecular structure. We argue that these problems are just special cases of the measurement problem of quantum mechanics: insofar as the measurement problem is solved, the problems of molecular structure are resolved as well. In addition, we explore one consequence of our argument: that claims about the reduction or emergence of molecular structure (...) cannot be settled independently of the choice of a particular resolution to the measurement problem. Specifically, we consider how three standard putative solutions to the measurement problem inform our under- standing of a molecule in isolation, as well as of chemistry’s relation to quantum physics. (shrink)

El artículo analiza hasta que punto puede equipararse la labor del traductor con la de realizar una interpretación de los textos sobre los que trabaja. Utilizaremos para ello instrumental tanto de la tradición de la filosofía hermenéutica (especialmente Hans-Georg Gadamer) como de la inspirada en la obra de Ludwig Wittgenstein. La conclusión intenta mostrar las fuertes diferencias que existen entre traducir e interpretar, y con ello entender mejor qué quiere decir realmente la idea de "universalidad hermenéutica" que funda la citada (...) tradición de filosofía ídem. (shrink)

The purpose of this essay is to make the case that the ethical issues raised by the current U.S. practice of direct-to-consumer prescription drug advertising are worthy of study in philosophy courses, and to provide instructors with some ideas for how they might approach teaching the topic, despite the current relative scarcity of philosophical literature published on it. This topic presents a unique opportunity to cover ground in ethics, critical thinking, and scientific literacy simultaneously. As a case study, the practice (...) of DTC advertising is both theoretically rich and universally relevant to students’ lives. The nature of these ads—numerous, diverse, visually and thematically entertaining—makes them delicious fodder for in-class activities, small group work, discussion-based learning, creative projects, and customizable essay topics. I offer a set of suggestions for approaching the study of DTC drug ads that is informed by my own experience doing so in bioethics courses. Ultimately, including this topic on your syllabus not only contributes to students’ philosophical skills and knowledge, but also helps them become better informed as citizens and potential “consumers” of health care. (shrink)

It is well-known that racism is encoded into the social practices and institutions of medicine. Less well-known is that racism is encoded into the material artifacts of medicine. We argue that many medical devices are not merely biased, but materialize oppression. An oppressive device exhibits a harmful bias that reflects and perpetuates unjust power relations. Using pulse oximeters and spirometers as case studies, we show how medical devices can materialize oppression along various axes of social difference, including race, gender, class, (...) and ability. Our account uses political philosophy and cognitive science to give a theoretical basis for understanding materialized oppression, explaining how artifacts encode and carry oppressive ideas from the past to the present and future. Oppressive medical devices present a moral aggregation problem. To remedy this problem, we suggest redundantly layered solutions that are coordinated to disrupt reciprocal causal connections between the attitudes, practices, and artifacts of oppressive systems. (shrink)

The text addresses the question of whether and to what extent a theorization of experience provides a basis for socio-critical theories. Following the ideology-critical diagnosis of an immediate involvement of lived experience in ideological constitutive structures, the argument is made that a critical and ›left‹ phenomenology in particular can address the manner in which experience as a ›mediated immediacy‹ manifests as a medial condition for ideological processes.

Malicious moral envy is an aversive reaction to a rival’s moral properties or accomplishments, accompanied by a tendency to level-down the target by morally tarnishing or sabotaging them. In this essay I give an account of malicious moral envy, showing how it is a sub-type of envy more generally. I describe Donald Trump’s behaviors toward Barack Obama and Anthony Fauci as a case study of malicious moral envy. I argue that malicious moral envy is puzzling, first because it is self-defeating, (...) and then—more interestingly—because it betrays an ambivalence about morality and moral requirements. I explore how malicious moral envy relates to other issues in the literature on moral ambivalence, including moral exemplars, moral saints, admirable immorality, and the pathologizing of moral outliers. Ultimately I suggest that mild forms of malicious moral envy may play an important role in helping agents navigate the socially complex and constantly changing landscape of moral requirements. (shrink)