Robert Batterman’s ontological insights (2002, 2004, 2005) are apt: Nature abhors singularities. “So should we,” responds the physicist. However, the epistemic assessments of Batterman concerning the matter prove to be less clear, for in the same vein he write that singularities play an essential role in certain classes of physical theories referring to certain types of critical phenomena. I devise a procedure (“methodological fundamentalism”) which exhibits how singularities, at least in principle, may be avoided within the same classes of formalisms (...) discussed by Batterman. I show that we need not accept some divergence between explanation and reduction (Batterman 2002), or between epistemological and ontological fundamentalism (Batterman 2004, 2005). Though I remain sympathetic to the ‘principle of charity’ (Frisch (2005)), which appears to favor a pluralist outlook, I nevertheless call into question some of the forms such pluralist implications take in Robert Batterman’s conclusions. It is difficult to reconcile some of the pluralist assessments that he and some of his contemporaries advocate with what appears to be a countervailing trend in a burgeoning research tradition known as Clifford (or geometric) algebra. In my critical chapters (2 and 3) I use some of the demonstrated formal unity of Clifford algebra to argue that Batterman (2002) equivocates a physical theory’s ontology with its purely mathematical content. Carefully distinguishing the two, and employing Clifford algebraic methods reveals a symmetry between reduction and explanation that Batterman overlooks. I refine this point by indicating that geometric algebraic methods are an active area of research in computational fluid dynamics, and applied in modeling the behavior of droplet-formation appear to instantiate a “methodologically fundamental” approach. I argue in my introductory and concluding chapters that the model of inter-theoretic reduction and explanation offered by Fritz Rohrlich (1988, 1994) provides the best framework for accommodating the burgeoning pluralism in philosophical studies of physics, with the presumed claims of formal unification demonstrated by physicists choices of mathematical formalisms such as Clifford algebra. I show how Batterman’s insights can be reconstructed in Rohrlich’s framework, preserving Batterman’s important philosophical work, minus what I consider are his incorrect conclusions. (shrink)

Deliberate contextual vocabulary acquisition (CVA) is a reader’s ability to figure out a (not the) meaning for an unknown word from its “context”, without external sources of help such as dictionaries or people. The appropriate context for such CVA is the “belief-revised integration” of the reader’s prior knowledge with the reader’s “internalization” of the text. We discuss unwarranted assumptions behind some classic objections to CVA, and present and defend a computational theory of CVA that we have adapted to a new (...) classroom curriculum designed to help students use CVA to improve their reading comprehension. (shrink)

We discuss a research project that develops and applies algorithms for computational contextual vocabulary acquisition (CVA): learning the meaning of unknown words from context. We try to unify a disparate literature on the topic of CVA from psychology, first- and secondlanguage acquisition, and reading science, in order to help develop these algorithms: We use the knowledge gained from the computational CVA system to build an educational curriculum for enhancing students’ abilities to use CVA strategies in their reading of science texts (...) at the middle-school and college undergraduate levels. The knowledge gained from case studies of students using our CVA techniques feeds back into further development of our computational theory. Keywords: artificial intelligence, knowledge representation, reading, reasoning, science education, vocabulary acquisition. (shrink)

In this article we challenge the notion that diversity serves as a good proxy for educational justice. First, we maintain that the story about how diversity might be accomplished and what it might do for students and society is internally inconsistent. Second, we argue that a disproportionate share of the benefits that might result from greater diversity often accrues to those already advantaged. Finally, we propose that many of the most promising and pragmatic remedies for educational injustice are often rejected (...) by liberal proponents of “diversity first” in favor of remedies that in most cases are practically impossible, and often problematic on their own terms. We argue that schools that are by geography and demography not ethnically or socioeconomically diverse still can successfully confront the obstacles that their students face in creating a life they have reason to value. (shrink)

Shepard has supposed that the mind is stocked with innate knowledge of the world and that this knowledge figures prominently in the way we see the world. According to him, this internal knowledge is the legacy of a process of internalization; a process of natural selection over the evolutionary history of the species. Shepard has developed his proposal most fully in his analysis of the relation between kinematic geometry and the shape of the motion path in apparent motion displays. We (...) argue that Shepard has made a case for applying the principles of kinematic geometry to the perception of motion, but that he has not made the case for injecting these principles into the mind of the percipient. We offer a more modest interpretation of his important findings: that kinematic geometry may be a model of apparent motion. Inasmuch as our recommended interpretation does not lodge geometry in the mind of the percipient, the motivation of positing internalization, a process that moves kinematic geometry into the mind, is obviated. In our conclusion, we suggest that cognitive psychologists, in their embrace of internal mental universals and internalization may have been seduced by the siren call of metaphor. Key Words: apparent motion; imagery; internalization; inverse projection problem; kinematic geometry; measurement; metaphors of mind. (shrink)

Recently there have been several attempts in formal epistemology to develop an adequate probabilistic measure of coherence. There is much to recommend probabilistic measures of coherence. They are quantitative and render formally precise a notion—coherence—notorious for its elusiveness. Further, some of them do very well, intuitively, on a variety of test cases. Siebel, however, argues that there can be no adequate probabilistic measure of coherence. Take some set of propositions A, some probabilistic measure of coherence, and a probability distribution such (...) that all the probabilities on which A’s degree of coherence depends (according to the measure in question) are defined. Then, the argument goes, the degree to which A is coherent depends solely on the details of the distribution in question and not at all on the explanatory relations, if any, standing between the propositions in A. This is problematic, the argument continues, because, first, explanation matters for coherence, and, second, explanation cannot be adequately captured solely in terms of probability. We argue that Siebel’s argument falls short. (shrink)

Dretske’s theory of self-knowledge is interesting but peculiar and can seem implausible. He denies that we can know by introspection that we have thoughts, feelings, and experiences. But he allows that we can know by introspection what we think, feel, and experience. We consider two puzzles. The first puzzle, PUZZLE 1, is interpretive. Is there a way of understanding Dretske’s theory on which the knowledge affirmed by its positive side is different than the knowledge denied by its negative side? The (...) second puzzle, PUZZLE 2, is substantive. Each of the following theses has some prima facie plausibility: there is introspective knowledge of thoughts, knowledge requires evidence, and there are no experiences of thoughts. It is unclear, though, that these claims form a consistent set. These puzzles are not unrelated. Dretske’s theory of self-knowledge is a potential solution to PUZZLE 2 in that Dretske’s theory is meant to show how,, and can all be true. We provide a solution to PUZZLE 1 by appeal to Dretske’s early work in the philosophy of language on contrastive focus. We then distinguish between “Closure” and “Transmissibility”, and raise and answer a worry to the effect that Dretske’s theory of self-knowledge runs counter to Transmissibility. These results help to secure Dretske’s theory as a viable solution to PUZZLE 2. (shrink)

Dretske is a “conciliatory skeptic” on self-knowledge. Take some subject S such that S thinks that P and S knows that she has thoughts. Dretske’s theory can be put as follows: S has a privileged way of knowing what she thinks, but she has no privileged way of knowing that she thinks it. There is much to be said on behalf of conciliatory skepticism and Dretske’s defense of it. We aim to show, however, that Dretske’s defense fails, in that if (...) his defense of CS’s skeptical half succeeds, then his defense of CS’s conciliatory half fails. We then suggest a potential way forward. We suggest in particular that the correct way of being a Dretskean conciliatory skeptic is to deny that S has a privileged way of knowing about her thoughts, but to grant that she is nonetheless an authority on her thoughts. (shrink)

In this paper, we offer a Leftist critique of standard liberal defenses of the public school. We suggest that the standard arguments employed by mainstream liberal defenders of the public school are generally inadequate because they fail to provide a credible representation of their historical object, let alone effective remedies to our current problems. Indeed, many of these narratives, in our view, are grounded in fantasies about what public schools, or teaching and learning, are or could be, as much as (...) they are grounded in the historical realities of public schools or the realities of so-called privatization. We speculate whether the self identification of the proponents of this cause as ‘progressive’ is not part of this ideological construction and if the underlying political agenda is not in fact more conservative. (shrink)

For each positive n , two alternative axiomatizations of the theory of strings over n alphabetic characters are presented. One class of axiomatizations derives from Tarski's system of the Wahrheitsbegriff and uses the n characters and concatenation as primitives. The other class involves using n character-prefixing operators as primitives and derives from Hermes' Semiotik. All underlying logics are second order. It is shown that, for each n, the two theories are definitionally equivalent [or synonymous in the sense of deBouvere]. It (...) is further shown that each member of one class is synonymous with each member of the other class; thus that all of the theories are definitionally equivalent with each other and with Peano arithmetic. Categoricity of Peano arithmetic then implies categoricity of each of the above theories. (shrink)

It is a matter of fact that Europe is facing more and more crucial challenges regarding health and social care due to the demographic change and the current economic context. The recent COVID-19 pandemic has stressed this situation even further, thus highlighting the need for taking action. Active and Assisted Living technologies come as a viable approach to help facing these challenges, thanks to the high potential they have in enabling remote care and support. Broadly speaking, AAL can be referred (...) to as the use of innovative and advanced Information and Communication Technologies to create supportive, inclusive and empowering applications and environments that enable older, impaired or frail people to live independently and stay active longer in society. AAL capitalizes on the growing pervasiveness and effectiveness of sensing and computing facilities to supply the persons in need with smart assistance, by responding to their necessities of autonomy, independence, comfort, security and safety. The application scenarios addressed by AAL are complex, due to the inherent heterogeneity of the end-user population, their living arrangements, and their physical conditions or impairment. Despite aiming at diverse goals, AAL systems should share some common characteristics. They are designed to provide support in daily life in an invisible, unobtrusive and user-friendly manner. Moreover, they are conceived to be intelligent, to be able to learn and adapt to the requirements and requests of the assisted people, and to synchronise with their specific needs. Nevertheless, to ensure the uptake of AAL in society, potential users must be willing to use AAL applications and to integrate them in their daily environments and lives. In this respect, video- and audio-based AAL applications have several advantages, in terms of unobtrusiveness and information richness. Indeed, cameras and microphones are far less obtrusive with respect to the hindrance other wearable sensors may cause to one’s activities. In addition, a single camera placed in a room can record most of the activities performed in the room, thus replacing many other non-visual sensors. Currently, video-based applications are effective in recognising and monitoring the activities, the movements, and the overall conditions of the assisted individuals as well as to assess their vital parameters. Similarly, audio sensors have the potential to become one of the most important modalities for interaction with AAL systems, as they can have a large range of sensing, do not require physical presence at a particular location and are physically intangible. Moreover, relevant information about individuals’ activities and health status can derive from processing audio signals. Nevertheless, as the other side of the coin, cameras and microphones are often perceived as the most intrusive technologies from the viewpoint of the privacy of the monitored individuals. This is due to the richness of the information these technologies convey and the intimate setting where they may be deployed. Solutions able to ensure privacy preservation by context and by design, as well as to ensure high legal and ethical standards are in high demand. After the review of the current state of play and the discussion in GoodBrother, we may claim that the first solutions in this direction are starting to appear in the literature. A multidisciplinary debate among experts and stakeholders is paving the way towards AAL ensuring ergonomics, usability, acceptance and privacy preservation. The DIANA, PAAL, and VisuAAL projects are examples of this fresh approach. This report provides the reader with a review of the most recent advances in audio- and video-based monitoring technologies for AAL. It has been drafted as a collective effort of WG3 to supply an introduction to AAL, its evolution over time and its main functional and technological underpinnings. In this respect, the report contributes to the field with the outline of a new generation of ethical-aware AAL technologies and a proposal for a novel comprehensive taxonomy of AAL systems and applications. Moreover, the report allows non-technical readers to gather an overview of the main components of an AAL system and how these function and interact with the end-users. The report illustrates the state of the art of the most successful AAL applications and functions based on audio and video data, namely lifelogging and self-monitoring, remote monitoring of vital signs, emotional state recognition, food intake monitoring, activity and behaviour recognition, activity and personal assistance, gesture recognition, fall detection and prevention, mobility assessment and frailty recognition, and cognitive and motor rehabilitation. For these application scenarios, the report illustrates the state of play in terms of scientific advances, available products and research project. The open challenges are also highlighted. The report ends with an overview of the challenges, the hindrances and the opportunities posed by the uptake in real world settings of AAL technologies. In this respect, the report illustrates the current procedural and technological approaches to cope with acceptability, usability and trust in the AAL technology, by surveying strategies and approaches to co-design, to privacy preservation in video and audio data, to transparency and explainability in data processing, and to data transmission and communication. User acceptance and ethical considerations are also debated. Finally, the potentials coming from the silver economy are overviewed. (shrink)

This is an excellent collection of essays on introspection and consciousness. There are fifteen essays in total (all new except for Sydney Shoemaker’s essay). There is also an introduction where the editors explain the impetus for the collection and provide a helpful overview. The essays contain a wealth of new and challenging material sure to excite specialists and shape future research. Below we extract a skeptical argument from Fred Dretske’s essay and relate the remaining essays to that argument. Due to (...) space limitations we focus in detail on just a few of the essays. We regret that we cannot give them all the attention they merit. (shrink)

The comprehension of anaphoric relations may be guided not only by discourse, but also syntactic information. In the literature on online processing, however, the focus has been on audible pronouns and descriptions whose reference is resolved mainly on the former. This paper examines one relation that both lacks overt exponence, and relies almost exclusively on syntax for its resolution: adjunct control, or the dependency between the null subject of a non-finite adjunct and its antecedent in sentences such as Mickey talked (...) to Minnie before ___ eating. Using visual world eyetracking, we compare the time course of interpreting this null subject and overt pronouns (Mickey talked to Minnie before he ate). We show that when control structures are highly frequent, listeners are just as quick to resolve reference in either case. When control structures are less frequent, reference resolution based on structural information still occurs upon hearing the non-finite verb, but more slowly, especially when unaided by structural and referential predictions. This may be due to increased difficulty in recognizing that a referential dependency is necessary. These results indicate that in at least some contexts, referential expressions whose resolution depends on very different sources of information can be resolved approximately equally rapidly, and that the speed of interpretation is largely independent of whether or not the dependency is cued by an overt referring expression. (shrink)

As the federal government distributed remdesivir to some of the states COVID-19 hit hardest, policymakers scrambled to develop criteria to allocate the drug to their hospitals. Our state, Michigan, was among those states to receive an initial quantity of the drug from the U.S. government. The disparities in burden of disease in Michigan are striking. Detroit has a death rate more than three times the state average. Our recommendation to the state was that it should prioritize the communities that bear (...) a disproportionate burden of suffering in the allocation of the new potential treatment. This recommendation is justified not only for new drugs with uncertain effects, but also for drugs of certain benefit or vaccines. For states with significant health disparities, such as Michigan, this allocation priority may help to repair them. In fact, any other allocation strategy may make them worse. (shrink)

In the modern period, the most original and influential theories about law and politics were developed in connection with a set of far-reaching, interrelated questions about the definition of law, the purpose of law, the relationship between law and morality, and the existence of natural law and natural rights. In this entry I summarize the contributions of Charles-Louis de Secondat, Baron de La Brède et de Montesquieu; William Blackstone; Jeremy Bentham; and Immanuel Kant as exemplars of the history of modern (...) thought on law and politics. (shrink)

Cora Diamond has claimed that Wittgenstein’s Tractatus contains an early ‘private language argument’: an argument that private objects in other people’s minds can play no role in the language I use for talking about their sensations. She further claims that the Tractatus contains an early version of the later idea that an inner process stands in need of outward criteria. The paper argues against these claims, on the grounds that they depend on an unwarranted construal of the Tractatus’s notion of (...) use. It is further argued that Diamond’s interpretation makes a mystery of the relation between the Tractatus and Wittgenstein’s 1929 account of sensation language, set out in Philosophical Remarks and elsewhere. Finally, the paper considers and defends Michael Dummett’s contention that the Tractatus is a paradigm of semantic realism, in the light of Diamond’s claim that the Tractatus in fact suggests a form of anti-realism about sensation language. (shrink)

William Rowe has argued that if there is an infinite sequence of improving worlds then an essentially perfectly good being must actualize some world in the sequence and must not actualize any world in the sequence. Since that is impossible, there exist no perfectly good beings. I show that Rowe's argument assumes that the concept of a maximally great being is incoherent. Since we are given no reason to believe that the concept of a maximally great being is incoherent we (...) have no reason to believe Rowe's Argument from Improvability is sound. (shrink)

Mark Coeckelbergh starts his book with a very powerful picture based on a real incident: On the 9th of January 2020, Robert Williams was wrongfully arrested by Detroit police officers in front of his two young daughters, wife and neighbors. For 18 hours the police would not disclose the grounds for his arrest (American Civil Liberties Union 2020; Hill 2020). The decision to arrest him was primarily based on a facial detection algorithm which matched Mr. Williams’ driving license photo with (...) the picture of a man who was suspected of watch theft two years earlier. Not only did the computer ‘get it wrong’ as one of the detectives said, when Mr. Williams made them aware that the picture of the suspect obviously wasn’t resembling him, the probably unreliable algorithm very likely contributed to racial discrimination (Hill 2020). It is well documented that many available facial detection algorithms at this time had significant problems (e.g. a comparably high false positive rate) with respect to black persons, like Mr. Williams (NIST 2019). Multiple causes may exist, such as unbalanced training datasets and insufficient optimization. Coeckelbergh compares the disturbing case of Mr. Williams with a political interpretation of Franz Kafka’s The Trial, where the protagonist, Josef K., is accused of an unspecified crime by an opaque, oppressive and absurd bureaucracy: “In the 21st-century United States, Josef K. is black and is falsely accused by an algorithm, without explanation” (p. 2). (shrink)

Sceptical theists--e.g., William Alston and Michael Bergmann--have claimed that considerations concerning human cognitive limitations are alone sufficient to undermine evidential arguments from evil. We argue that, if the considerations deployed by sceptical theists are sufficient to undermine evidential arguments from evil, then those considerations are also sufficient to undermine inferences that play a crucial role in ordinary moral reasoning. If cogent, our argument suffices to discredit sceptical theist responses to evidential arguments from evil.

Anarchism is by far the least broadly understood ideology and the least studied academically. Though highly influential, both historically and in terms of recent social movements, anarchism is regularly dismissed. Anarchism: A Conceptual Approach is a welcome addition to this growing field, which is widely debated but poorly understood. Occupying a distinctive position in the study of anarchist ideology, this volume, authored by a handpicked group of established and rising scholars, investigates how anarchists often seek to sharpen their message and (...) struggle to determine what ideas and actions are central to their identity. Moving beyond defining anarchism as simply an ideology or political theory, this book examines the meanings of its key concepts, which have been divided into three categories: Core, Adjacent, and Peripheral concepts. Each chapter focuses on one important concept, shows how anarchists have understood the concept, and highlights its relationships to other concepts. Although anarchism is often thought of as a political topic, the interdisciplinary nature of Anarchism: A Conceptual Approach makes it of interest to students and scholars across the social sciences, liberal arts, and the humanities. (shrink)

Using William Shakespeare’s Hamlet and the play-within-the play, The Murder of Gonzago, as a case study, this essay argues that theatrical utterances constitute a special case of language usage not previously elucidated: the utterance of a statement with propositional content in theatre functions as an event. In short, the propositional content of a particular p (e.g. p1, p2, p3 …), whether or not it is true, is only understood—and understood to be true—if p1 is uttered in a particular time, place, (...) and situation (i.e. during a theatrical event); otherwise, the propositional content in those theatrical utterances can either be false or contingently true. (shrink)

Like William James before him, Huw Price has influentially argued that truth has a normative role to play in our thought and talk. I agree. But Price also thinks that we should regard truth-conceived of as property of our beliefs-as something like a metaphysical myth. Here I disagree. In this paper, I argue that reflection on truth's values pushes us in a slightly different direction, one that opens the door to certain metaphysical possibilities that even a Pricean pragmatist can love.

Property-identical divine-command theory (PDCT) is the view that being obligatory is identical to being commanded by God in just the way that being water is identical to being H2O. If these identity statements are true, then they express necessary a posteriori truths. PDCT has been defended in Robert M. Adams (1987) and William Alston (1990). More recently Mark C. Murphy (2002) has argued that property-identical divine-command theory is inconsistent with two well-known and well-received theses: the free-command thesis and the supervenience (...) thesis. I show that Murphy's argument is vitiated by mistaken assumptions about the substitutivity of metaphysical identicals in contexts of supervenience. The free-command thesis and the supervenience thesis therefore pose no serious threat to PDCT. (Published Online August 11 2004). (shrink)

The Growing Block Theory of time says that the metaphysical openness of the future should be understood in terms of there not being any future objects or events. But in a series of works, Ross Cameron, Elizabeth Barnes, and Robbie Williams have developed a competing view that understands metaphysical openness in terms of it being indeterminate whether there exist future objects or events. I argue that the three reasons they give for preferring their account are not compelling. And since the (...) notion of “indeterminate existence” suffers conceptual problems, the Growing Block is the preferable view. (shrink)

Michael Ryan's Literary Theory: A Practical Introduction, Second Edition introduces students to the full range of contemporary approaches to the study of literature and culture, from Formalism, Structuralism, and Historicism to Ethnic Studies, Gender Studies, and Global English. Introduces readings from a variety of theoretical perspectives, on classic literary texts. Demonstrates how the varying perspectives on texts can lead to different interpretations of the same work. Contains an accessible account of different theoretical approaches An ideal resource for use in (...) introductory courses on literary theory and criticism. Designed to function both as a stand-alone text and a companion to Rivkin and Ryan’s Literary Theory: An Anthology, Second Edition. (shrink)

In a recent paper, William Hasker has responded to a paper of mine criticizing his argument for theological incompatibilism. In his response, Hasker makes a small but important amendment to his account of freedom. Here I argue that Hasker’s amended account of freedom is false, that there is a plausible alternative account of freedom, and that the plausibility of this alternative account shows that Hasker’s argument for theological incompatibilism relies on a dubious premise.

In God, Time, and Knowledge, William Hasker presents a powerful argument against “theological compatibilism,” which, in this context, refers to the view that divine foreknowledge is compatible with libertarian free will. In this paper I show that Hasker’s views on free will, as expressed in God, Time, and Knowledge, are inconsistent with his own account of hard facts. I then consider four ways to remove the inconsistency and argue that the first two are untenable for the libertarian, while the remaining (...) two leave the theological compatibilist in a good position to respond to the dilemma of freedom and foreknowledge. Along the way, I attempt to defuse Hasker’s argument that Anselmian eternalism is “fatal to libertarian free will.”. (shrink)

Essay by Dr. Michael L. Riordan, the founder of Gilead Sciences, on the comparative utility of a medical versus legal education as preparation for public office.

Michael Walzer argues that except in cases involving genocide or mass slaughter, humanitarian intervention is unjustifiable because “citizens get the government they deserve, or, at least, the government for which they are ‘fit.’”Yet, if people are autonomous and deserve the government that rules over them, then it would seem that they are responsible for the government’s actions, including their nation’s wars of aggression.That line of thought undermines the doctrine of noncombatant immunity, which is perhaps the most important of Walzer’s (...) jus in bello principles. In this way, the concept of self-determination frustrates Walzer’s attempts to keep jus ad bellum and jus in bello considerations separate. (shrink)

This paper argues that Kant’s most famous objection to the ontological argument -- that existence is not a real predicate -- is not, in fact, his most effective objection, and that his ”neglected objection’ to the argument deserves to be better known. It shows that Kant clearly anticipates William Rowe’s later objection that the argument begs the question, and discusses why Kant himself seems to have overlooked the force of this criticism in his attempt to demolish the traditional proofs for (...) God’s existence. (shrink)

Some contemporary theologically inclined epistemologists, the reformed epistemologists, have attempted to show that belief in God is rational by appealing directly to a special kind of experience. To strengthen the appeal to this particular, and admittedly peculiar, type of experience these venture to draw a parallel between such experiences and normal perceptual experiences in order to show that, by parity of reasoning, if beliefs formed on the basis of the later are taken to be justified and rational to hold, then (...) beliefs formed on the basis of the former should also be regarded as justified and rational to hold. Such appeals to religious experience have been discussed and/or made by Robert Pargetter, Alvin Plantinga and William Alston and they claim that they provide sufficient warrant for religious beliefs, specifically for the belief that God exists. The main critical issue that will be raised here concerns the coherence of this notion of religious experience itself and whether such appeals to religious experience really provide justification for belief in the existence of God.<br><br>. (shrink)

Suppose you want to do as much good as possible. What should you do? According to members of the effective altruism movement—which has produced much of the thinking on this issue and counts several moral philosophers as its key protagonists—we should prioritise among the world’s problems by assessing their scale, solvability, and neglectedness. Once we’ve done this, the three top priorities, not necessarily in this order, are (1) aiding the world’s poorest people by providing life-saving medical treatments or alleviating poverty (...) itself, (2) preventing global catastrophic risks, such as those posed by nuclear war or rogue artificial intelligence, and (3) ending factory farming. These claims are both plausible and striking. If correct, they should prompt a stark revision of how we approach our altruistic activities. However, the project of determining how to do the most good—as opposed to say, whether we should do the most good—has only recently, within the last ten years, become the subject of serious academic attention. Many key claims have not yet been carefully scrutinised. This is a cause for concern: are effective altruists doing good badly? In this thesis, I critique and develop some of the latest claims about how individuals can do the most good. I do this in three areas: the value of saving lives (preventing premature deaths), how best to improve lives (making people happier during their lives), and cause prioritisation methodology (frameworks for determining which problems are the highest priorities). In each case, I raise novel theoretical considerations that, when incorporated, change the analysis. Roughly speaking, my main conclusions are (1) saving lives is not as straightforwardly good we tend to suppose, may not be good at all, and is not clearly a priority; (2) happiness can be measured through self-reports and, based on the self-reported evidence, treating mental health stands out as an overlooked problem that may be an even more cost-effective way to improve lives than alleviating poverty; (3) the cause prioritisation methodology proposed by effective altruists needs to be moderately reconceptualised and, when it is, it turns out it is not as illuminating a tool as we might have thought and hoped. (shrink)

Safety principles in epistemology are often hailed as providing us with an explanation of why we fail to have knowledge in Gettier cases and lottery examples, while at the same time allowing for the fact that we know the negations of sceptical hypotheses. In a recent paper, Sinhababu and Williams have produced an example—the Backward Clock—that is meant to spell trouble for safety accounts of knowledge. I argue that the Backward Clock case is, in fact, unproblematic for the more sophisticated (...) formulations of safety in the literature. However, I then proceed to construct two novel examples that turn out problematic for those formulations—one that provides us with a lottery-style case of safe ignorance and one that is a straightforward case of unsafe knowledge. If these examples succeed, then safety as it is usually conceived in the current debate cannot account for ignorance in all Gettier and lottery-style cases, and neither is it a necessary condition for knowledge. I conclude from these troublesome examples that modal epistemologists ought to embrace a much more simple and non-reductive version of safety, according to which the notion of similarity between possible worlds that determines in which worlds the subject must believe truly is an epistemic notion that cannot be defined or reduced to notions independent of knowledge. The resulting view is shown to also lead to desirable results with respect to lottery cases, certain quantum phenomena, and a puzzling case involving a cautious brain-in-a-vat. (shrink)

The case study presented by Winch and Sinnott (2011) shows not only how difficult it is for clinicians and researchers to identify conflicts of interest (COI), but also how damaging it can be when there are unin- formed and uncoordinated policy responses by senior administrators.

Philosophy is a discipline of grand abstractions. Truth, justice, knowledge, goodness, democracy, beauty, freedom, and other venerable ideas have been at the ce.

The purpose of this book is both scholarly and polemical: the author seeks not only to render an accurate picture of Fichte and Hegel on the issue of intersubjectivity, but also to correct contemporary misconceptions which have led to the dismissal of German Idealism as abstract, rationalistic, and ahistorical.

One of the leading exponents of W's ideas on the language games of inner and outer (the `Two Selves' operation of our personality or intentionality or EP etc.) is the prolific Daniel Hutto (DH). His approach is called `Radical Enactivism' and is well explained in numerous recent books and papers (see my review of Radicalizing Enactivism) and a new one is appearing as I write (Evolving Enactivism). It is a development of or version of the Embodied Mind ideas now current (...) and, cleansed of its jargon, it is a straightforward extension of W's 2nd and 3rd period writings (though Hutto seems only intermittently aware of this). Unfortunately in 2006 Hutto had not yet arrived at his Radical Enactivism, so much time is wasted on McDowell and Brandom and of course none of them to this day have totally digested the later W and his prescient analysis of automatic behavior-so fully in tune with contemporary research. Nor is there any discussion of Searle's groundbreaking and completely Wittgensteinian (unwittingly) disquisitions on the Construction of Social Reality. Thus his chapters 5 and 6 on Realism and Idealism etc., though superb for 2002, need a complete rewrite from a modern two systems viewpoint and I provide a start on that in my review. Much time is wasted on Davidson and Williams, etc. but one can endure them for Hutto's brilliant analyses and the frequent quotes from W. The last chapter gives his critic Rupert Read the counterblast he deserves and permits a slight update to 2006. Overall a lovely book and I eagerly await the third edition which I hope will ensue. -/- Those wishing a comprehensive up to date framework for human behavior from the modern two systems view may consult my book ‘The Logical Structure of Philosophy, Psychology, Mind and Language in Ludwig Wittgenstein and John Searle’ 2nd ed (2019). Those interested in more of my writings may see ‘Talking Monkeys--Philosophy, Psychology, Science, Religion and Politics on a Doomed Planet--Articles and Reviews 2006-2019 3rd ed (2019), The Logical Structure of Human Behavior (2019), and Suicidal Utopian Delusions in the 21st Century 4th ed (2019). (shrink)

One of the leading exponents of W's ideas on the language games of inner and outer (the `Two Selves' operation of our personality or intentionality or EP etc.) is the prolific Daniel Hutto (DH). His approach is called `Radical Enactivism' and is well explained in numerous recent books and papers (see my review of Radicalizing Enactivism) and a new one is appearing as I write (Evolving Enactivism). It is a development of or version of the Embodied Mind ideas now current (...) and, cleansed of its jargon, it is a straightforward extension of W's 2nd and 3rd period writings (though Hutto seems only intermittently aware of this). -/- Unfortunately, in 2006 Hutto had not yet arrived at his Radical Enactivism, so much time is wasted on McDowell and Brandom and of course none of them to this day have totally digested the later W and his prescient analysis of automatic behavior and the two systems of thought - so fully in tune with contemporary research. Nor is there any discussion of Searle's groundbreaking and completely Wittgensteinian (unwittingly) disquisitions on the Construction of Social Reality. Thus, his chapters 5 and 6 on Realism and Idealism etc., though superb for 2002, need a complete rewrite from a modern two systems viewpoint and I provide a start on that in my review. Much time is wasted on Davidson and Williams, etc. but one can endure them for Hutto's brilliant analyses and the frequent quotes from W. The last chapter gives his critic Rupert Read the counterblast he deserves and permits a slight update to 2006. Overall a lovely book and I eagerly await the third edition which I hope will ensue. -/- Those wishing a comprehensive up to date framework for human behavior from the modern two systems view may consult my book ‘The Logical Structure of Philosophy, Psychology, Mind and Language in Ludwig Wittgenstein and John Searle’ 2nd ed (2019). Those interested in more of my writings may see ‘Talking Monkeys--Philosophy, Psychology, Science, Religion and Politics on a Doomed Planet--Articles and Reviews 2006-2019 3rd ed (2019) and Suicidal Utopian Delusions in the 21st Century 4th ed (2019). (shrink)

According to Michael Friedman’s theory of explanation, a law X explains laws Y1, Y2, …, Yn precisely when X unifies the Y’s, where unification is understood in terms of reducing the number of independently acceptable laws. Philip Kitcher criticized Friedman’s theory but did not analyze the concept of independent acceptability. Here we show that Kitcher’s objection can be met by modifying an element in Friedman’s account. In addition, we argue that there are serious objections to the use that Friedman (...) makes of the concept of independent acceptability. (shrink)

Preprinted in God and the Problem of Evil (Blackwell 2001), ed. William Rowe. In this article, we reply to Bill Rowe's "Evil is Evidence Against Theistic Belief" in Contemporary Debates in Philosophy of Religion (Blackwell 2003).

Preprinted in God and the Problem of Evil(Blackwell 2001), ed. William Rowe. Many people deny that evil makes belief in atheism more reasonable for us than belief in theism. After all, they say, the grounds for belief in God are much better than the evidence for atheism, including the evidence provided by evil. We will not join their ranks on this occasion. Rather, we wish to consider the proposition that, setting aside grounds for belief in God and relying only on (...) the background knowledge shared in common by nontheists and theists, evil makes belief in atheism more reasonable for us than belief in theism. Our aim is to argue against this proposition. We recognize that in doing so, we face a formidable challenge. It’s one thing to say that evil presents a reason for atheism that is, ultimately, overridden by arguments for theism. It’s another to say that it doesn’t so much as provide us with a reason for atheism in the first place. In order to make this latter claim seem initially more plausible, consider the apparent design of the mammalian eye or the apparent fine-tuning of the universe to support life. These are often proposed as reasons to believe in theism. Critics commonly argue not merely that these supposed reasons for theism are overridden by arguments for atheism but rather that they aren’t good reasons for theism in the first place. Our parallel proposal with respect to evil and atheism is, initially at least, no less plausible than this proposal with respect to apparent design and theism. (shrink)

Helen Frowe (2006/2010) contends that there is a substantial moral difference between killing and letting die, arguing that in Michael Tooley's infamous machine case it is morally wrong to flip a coin to determine who lives or dies. Here I argue that Frowe fails to show that killing and letting die are morally inequivalent. However, I believe that she has succeeded in showing that it is wrong to press the button in Tooley's case, where pressing the button will change (...) who lives and dies. I argue that because killing and letting die are morally equivalent we have no reason to press the button in the machine case. Pressing the button in this case is morally wrong because there is no reason to do it; to press the button is to treat matters of life and death irreverently. (shrink)

In this paper we critically evaluate an argument put forward by William Lane Craig for the existence of God based on the assumption that if there were no God, there could be no objective morality. Contrary to Craig, we show that there are some necessary moral truths and objective moral reasoning that holds up whether there is a God or not. We go on to argue that religious faith, when taken alone and without reason or evidence, actually risks undermining morality (...) and is an unreliable source of moral truths. We recommend a viewpoint on morality that is based on reason and public consensus, that is compatible with science, and that cuts across the range of religious and non-religious positions. (shrink)

Providing the most thorough coverage available in one volume, this comprehensive, broadly based collection offers a wide variety of selections in four major genres, and also includes a section on film. Each of the five sections contains a detailed critical introduction to each form, brief biographies of the authors, and a clear, concise editorial apparatus. Updated and revised throughout, the new Fourth Edition adds essays by Margaret Mead, Russell Baker, Joan Didion, Annie Dillard, and Alice Walker; fiction by Nathaniel Hawthorne, (...) Ursula K. LeGuin, Anton Chekov, James Joyce, Katherine Mansfield, F. Scott Fitzgerald, William Faulkner, Alice Walker, Louise Erdrich, Donald Barthelme, and James McPherson; poems by John Donne, Robert Browning, Walt Whitman, Edwin Arlington Robinson, e.e. cummings, Langston Hughes, W.H. Auden, Philip Levine, and Louise Gluck; and plays by August Wilson, Marsha Norman, Wendy Wasserstein, and Vaclav Havel. The chapter devoted to film examines the relation of film to literature and gives the complete screenplay for Citizen Kane plus close analysis of a scene from the film. With its innovative structure, comprehensive coverage, and insightful and stimulating presentation of all kinds of literature, this is an anthology readers will turn to again and again. (shrink)

This interview was carried out on 13 December 2018 as Michael Williams was in Porto for a meeting of the Contextualism Network organised by the MLAG – Mind, Language, and Action Research Group (Institute of Philosophy of the University of Porto). We would like to thank him for his willingness to reply to our questions. -/- .

We revisit an important exchange on the problem of radical skepticism between Richard Rorty and Michael Williams. In his contribution to this exchange, Rorty defended the kind of transcendental approach to radical skepticism that is offered by Donald Davidson, in contrast to Williams’s Wittgenstein-inspired view. It is argued that the key to evaluating this debate is to understand the particular conception of the radical skeptical problem that is offered in influential work by Barry Stroud, a conception of the skeptical (...) problem which generates metaepistemological ramifications for anti-skeptical theories. In particular, we argue that, contra Williams, Rorty’s view that Davidson was offering a theoretical diagnosis of radical skepticism can be consistently maintained with his transcendental approach. (shrink)

A review of Robert. B. Stewart's edited volume concerning a discussion between William Dembski and Michael Ruse. Further contributions are included from William Lane Craig and others.