The primary aim of this paper is to critically evaluate the deductive model of ethical applications, which is based on normative ethical theories like deontology and consequentialism, and to show why a number of models have failed to furnish appropriate resolutions to practical moral problems. Here, for the deductive model, I want to call it a “Linear Mechanical Model” because the basic assumption of this model is that if a normative theory is sacrosanct, then the case is as it is. (...) The conclusion derived from the case will also be correct, true and acceptable. However, traditional ethicists used to apply their ethical theories, but they did not know which moral theory was effective on the ground level of reality. The study will show readers how ethical theories are in conflict with each other in the case of euthanasia. In more precise words, “which ethical theories are said to be applied, meta-ethical or normative, or both for the resolution of ethical problems? If normative theories are said to be applied, how the application can take place when it is contrary to our experience, that (then) in a situation of moral crises, no one really applies a theory?” For that, my argument is the linear model has failed because it is rigid, often ignores the agents’ intrinsic values, and has no space to amend it, no matter how bizarre the consequence is. Its alternative is the Inductive model. For that, the paper will take three moral principles (autonomy, beneficence including maleficence, and justice) of Beauchamp & Childress. This suggests us for resolving value-laden moral problems, we should consider some steps such as a) recognising moral issues to start with; b) developing the moral imagination; c) sharpening analytical/critical skills; d) testing out disagreements; e) effecting decisions and behavior; and f) implementation, closure, and process are of vital importance, in other words, it starts with the free and informed consensus of all interested parties, but this model also has been failed because the model could not give a systematic organization to their way of resolution. Here, my argument is that the inductive model provides resolution of the practical problem but ignores what is ethically obligatory, permissible, or wrong in that situation, and there are no appropriate suggestions in the case of a moral crisis. (shrink)

[On the Ethics of Euthanasia Again: A Reply to Critics] The article is a reply to three critics of a previous piece on the ethics of euthanasia in which I defended physician-assisted suicide. According to Ingrid Strobachová it is necessary to give a greater attention to the significance of pain, which, she claims, may benefit from a phenomenological description. According to Marta Vlasáková my argument is not valid because two principles on which it is founded – i.e. the (...) conception of life as of fundamental value and the autonomy of the patient – are not in mutual harmony. Jakub Jirsa criticises the very concept of assisted suicide and the moral legitimacy and need for the legalisation of assisted suicide. To Dr Strobachová I reply that phenomenological description is as acceptable a method as any other – as long, that is, as it is not only a verbal game, but constitutes a real source of knowledge. To Dr. Vlasáková I argue that a more charitable reading of my argument is possible. The arguments of Dr. Jirsa against assisted suicide are beset with various inconsistencies, including the fact that he himself allows that doctors should tolerate suicide by the refusal of food and drink. Such an act does not, however, differ in any relevant way from doctor-assisted suicide. (shrink)

The self-indication assumption (SIA) claims that given that one exists, one should think that the universe has many people, for a universe that has more people is more likely to contain any particular person. SIA is attractive to many because it diffuses the infamous doomsday argument, and avoids the problems of its main rival, the self-sampling assumption (SSA), which instructs one to reason as if they’re randomly selected from the people in their reference class. Here, I will go further than (...) the traditional argument for SIA from its ability to avoid the doomsday argument: I will show that any view other than SIA must accept the soundness of the doomsday argument and certain even stranger conclusions. Additionally, I’ll argue that the main objection to SIA, the presumptuous philosopher case, is unconvincing. Together then, these considerations give one a strong reason to adopt SIA. (shrink)

Philosophers, and students of philosophy, are often advised to interpret other philosophers charitably. In this paper, I present an alternative to interpreting charitably. I call it “the simple-model technique” and use H.L.A. Hart responding to John Rawls to illustrate it.

Suppose that we think it important that people have the chance to enjoy autonomous lives. An obvious corollary of this thought is that people should, if they want it, have control over the time and manner of their deaths, either ending their own lives, or by securing the help of others in doing so. So, generally, and even if we overall think that the practice should not be legalized on other grounds, it looks like common sense to think that considerations (...) of autonomy tell at least somewhat in favour of legalizing at least some acts of suicide and voluntary euthanasia. In this paper, I argue that, in fact, when we scrutinize the reasons for most end of life decisions, it turns out that they are seriously problematic from the point of view of autonomy. Full autonomy requires that we are responsible for the consequences of our decisions, and responsibility is precluded by non-voluntariness, which is to say decisions made because there are no acceptable alternatives. Since most end of life decisions are made for precisely this reason, it looks as though most such decisions are non-voluntary, and therefore undermine our autonomy: a discomforting and paradoxical claim. I argue that we should respond by taking the paradox to illuminate the context required by an autonomy-respecting framework for legalizing assisted suicide and euthanasia. People should have a legal right to a reasonable choice about when and how to die. However, this must go hand in hand with institutions that ensure, as far as possible, that such choices are made against a background which ensures, as far as possible, that people choose death clear-sightedly and not because nothing else is acceptable. (shrink)

Higher-order thought theories (or HOT theories) state that a mental state is conscious only when it is accompanied by a higher-order thought (HOT). -/- The thought that makes a state conscious is not conscious in itself, but having that thought is what make the state of which it is about conscious. If there is no HOT about a mental state, then that state is not a conscious state. On this view, a state can only be a conscious state if we (...) are aware of that state, or, have a HOT about that state. -/- Fred Dretske, on the otherhand, believes that mental states can be conscious without the subject being aware of those states. For Dretske, what makes a mental state conscious is not the subject's awareness of the state, rather, it is the way in which the state makes the subject conscious of something in the world. When we look at an object, we are not conscious of our experience of looking at the object, we are conscious of the object itself. -/- In this paper, I will suggest that HOT theories lead to a cluttered picture of the mind. I will then offer Dretske's account of consciousness as an alternative to the HOT theories. My goal will be to show that Dretske's model of consciousness should be the preferred option. (shrink)

The Schwarzschild solution (Schwarzschild, 1915/16) to Einstein’s General Theory of Relativity (GTR) is accepted in theoretical physics as the unique solution to GTR for a central-mass system. In this paper I propose an alternative solution to GTR, and argue it is both logically consistent and empirically realistic as a theory of gravity. This solution is here called K-gravity. The introduction explains the basic concept. The central sections go through the technical detail, defining the basic solution for the geometric tensor, the (...) Christoffel symbols, Ricci tensor, Ricci scalar, Einstein tensor, stress-energy tensor and density-pressure for the system. The density is integrated, and some consistency properties are demonstrated. A notable feature is the disappearance of the event horizon singularity, i.e. there are no black holes. So far this is for a single central mass. A generalization of the solution for multiple masses is then proposed. This is required to support K-gravity as a viable general interpretation of gravity. Then the question of empirical tests is discussed. It is argued that current observational data is almost but not quite sufficient to verify or falsify K-gravity. The Pioneer spacecraft trajectory data is of particular interest, as this is capable of providing a test; but the data (which originally showed anomalies that match K-gravity) is now uncertain. A new and very practical experiment is proposed to settle the matter. This would provide a novel test of GTR, and a novel test of the cause of the Pioneer anomalies. In conclusion, K-gravity has extensive ramifications for gravitational physics and for the philosophy of GTR and space-time. (shrink)

Some moral disagreements are so persistent that we suspect they are deep : we would disagree even when we have all relevant information and no one makes any mistakes. The possibility of deep disagreement is thought to drive cognitivists toward relativism, but most cognitivists reject relativism. There is an alternative. According to divergentism, cognitivists can reject relativism while allowing for deep disagreement. This view has rarely been defended at length, but many philosophers have implicitly endorsed its elements. I will defend (...) it. (shrink)

In this paper, we analyse the Wittgensteinian critique of the orthodoxy in animal ethics that has been championed by Cora Diamond and Alice Crary. While Crary frames it as a critique of “moral individualism”, we show that their criticism applies most prominently to certain forms of moral individualism (namely, those that follow hedonistic or preference-satisfaction axiologies), and not to moral individualism in itself. Indeed, there is a concrete sense in which the moral individualistic stance cannot be escaped, and we believe (...) that it is this particular limitation that justified Crary’s later move to a qualified version of moral individualism. At the same time, we also argue that there are significant merits to the Wittgensteinian critique of moral individualism, which pertain to its attack on the rationalism, naturalism, and reductionism that characterise orthodox approaches to animal ethics. We show that there is much of value in the Wittgensteinians’ call for an ethics that is more human; an ethics that fully embraces the capacities we are endowed with and one that pays heed to the richness and complexity of our moral lives. (shrink)

The primary goal of this paper is to provide substantial motivation for exploring an Acquaintance account of phenomenal consciousness, on which what fundamentally explains phenomenal consciousness is the relation of acquaintance. Its secondary goal is to take a few steps towards such an account. Roughly, my argument proceeds as follows. Motivated by prioritizing naturalization, the debate about the nature of phenomenal consciousness has been almost monopolized by representational theories. Among them, Self-Representationalism is by far the most antecedently promising. However, on (...) thorough inspection, Self-Representationalism turns out not explanatorily or theoretically better than the Acquaintance account. Indeed, the latter seems to be superior in at least some important respects. Therefore, at the very least, there are good reasons to take the Acquaintance account into serious consideration as an alternative to representational theories. The positive contribution of this paper is a sketch of an account of consciousness on which phenomenal consciousness is explained partly in representationalist terms, but where a crucial role is played by the relation of acquaintance. (shrink)

As a slew of recent work in epistemology has brought out, there is a range of cases where there's a strong temptation to say that prudential and (especially) moral considerations affect what we ought to believe. There are two distinct models of how this can happen. On the first, “reasons pragmatist” model, the relevant prudential and moral considerations constitute distinctively practical reasons for (or against) belief. On the second, “pragmatic encroachment” model, the relevant prudential and moral considerations affect what one (...) is epistemically justified in believing. The pragmatic encroachment model appears to have several advantages over reasons pragmatism, and this has led many recent philosophers to endorse the former. However, in this paper we argue that a version of reasons pragmatism can be (at least largely) saved from these purported disadvantages once paired with an independently plausible permissivism about epistemically justified outright belief. This hybrid view—“permissivist pragmatism”—holds that when there is more than one epistemically permitted doxastic attitude, practical (including moral) considerations can determine which epistemically permitted doxastic attitude one all-things-considered ought to have. This view avoids both the problems faced by simple versions of reasons pragmatism, and those that distinctively attend pragmatic encroachment, while preserving the advantages of each view. (shrink)

This article argues that the Phaedo is written as a new sort of story of how a hero faces death; this story provides an alternative to existing tragedy, as understood by Plato. The opening of the Phaedo makes clear that two features that Plato closely associates with tragedy, pity and lamentation, are inappropriate responses to Socrates’ impending death, and that tuchē (chance) did not affect his happiness. This is the first step in the dialogue’s sustained engagement with tragedy. Tragedy for (...) Plato falls under the category of stories about heroes and gods. Plato wrote the Phaedo so that we would see Socrates as a philosophical hero, a replacement for traditional heroes such as Theseus or Heracles. I argue that in fact the Phaedo meets every requirement in Republic Books 2–3 for how to tell stories about heroes and gods and so belongs to the same broad category as tragedy. Within this framework, it tells its new story of how the true hero faces death. (shrink)

In this article, the author analyzes dominating contemporary approaches to the study of esotericism including those of W. Hanegraaff that is popular today among European scholars and its alternatives developing in the USA and the United Kingdom. The author argues that these methodologies should be understood as competitive „research programmes‟ inside the complex field of the academic study of esotericism and can‟t be described in terms of „old‟ and „new‟ paradigms like Hanegraaff tends to do it.

Normative discourse includes statements which appear to be truth-apt expressions of normative beliefs. But normative oughts do not seem to fit cleanly amongst the natural facts. This makes many naturalistically inclined philosophers sympathetic to some form of expressivist view that normative statements get their meaning from how they express desire-like attitudes. However, there are a serious semantic challenges for expressivism, which lead others to accept the idea that normative statements are representational of reality after all. This paper presents another option (...) that derives from the general program in the theory of meaning to emphasize the commissive role of language over any descriptive or expressive roles. Here this emphasis is used to sketch a version of metaethical inferentialism and contrast it with expressivism. I conclude with some observations about new perspectives this view offers on three other issues in metaethics. (shrink)

A problem for dialogue models of argumentation is to specify a set of conditions under which an opponent’s claims, offered in support of a standpoint under dispute, ought to be challenged. This project is related to the issue of providing a set of acceptability conditions for claims made in a dialogue. In this paper, we consider the conditions of suspicion and trust articulated by Jacobs (Alta, 2003), arguing that neither are acceptable as general conditions for challenge. We propose a third (...) condition that attempts to mark a middle ground between suspicion and trust. (shrink)

Objective: To evaluate the potential of arterial spin labeling (ASL) as an alternative to FDG-PET in the diagnosis of disorders of consciousness (DOC), we conducted a comparative study of the two modalities. Methods: A total of 36 DOC patients (11 female; mean age = 49.67 ± 14.54 years) and 17 healthy control (HC) participants (9 female; mean age = 31.9 ± 9.6 years) underwent both FDG-PET scans that measure metabolism via glucose uptake and ASL scans that measure cerebral blood flow (...) (CBF). CBF and metabolism in DOC and HC were compared, globally and for seven functional networks. Comparability of the two modalities was estimated using Spearman partial correlation for both global and network levels. Furthermore, a support vector machine (SVM) algorithm was used to train two classifiers to distinguish DOC patients from HC with normalized CBF or metabolism values from the seven networks. Performance of these classifiers was first evaluated through leave-one-subject-out (LOSO) cross-validation within their respective modalities. Subsequently, cross-modal validation was conducted: testing the ASL-trained classifier with PET data (ASL-to-PET validation) and vice versa (PET-to-ASL validation). Performance of each classifier was assessed using receiver operating characteristic (ROC) analysis, with area under the curve (AUC) as the metric. Results: Both modalities showed agreement in decreased CBF and metabolism in DOC patients compared to HC, at both global and network levels. The global brain and most networks showed significant positive partial correlation between CBF and metabolism. SVM classifiers, utilizing activity from seven networks as features, performed well in the both LOSO cross-validation (ASL-trained classifier: accuracy = 83.02%, AUC = 0.95; PET-trained classifier: accuracy = 98.12%, AUC = 0.98) and cross-modal validation (ASL-to-PET validation: accuracy = 84.90%, AUC =0.92; PET-to-ASL validation: accuracy = 73.58%, AUC = 0.93). Conclusion: Our results demonstrate that ASL provides information comparable to FDG-PET for DOC patients; moreover, classifiers trained on ASL data perform comparably well to those trained on FDG-PET data. Therefore, ASL could be a valuable alternative to FDG-PET in the clinical diagnosis of DOC, especially in light of its advantages: ease of acquisition, avoidance of radiation exposure, brevity of scanning time, and lower-cost. (shrink)

In The Construction of Social Reality, John Searle develops a theory of institutional facts and objects, of which money, borders and property are presented as prime examples. These objects are the result of us collectively intending certain natural objects to have a certain status, i.e. to ‘count as’ being certain social objects. This view renders such objects irreducible to natural objects. In this paper we propose a radically different approach that is more compatible with standard economic theory. We claim that (...) such institutional objects can be fully understood in terms of actions and incentives, and hence the Searlean apparatus solves a non-existent problem. (shrink)

This paper’s primary purpose is to show that there is a peculiar alternative to scientism whose central thesis is not about sources of knowledge or the existence of various objects, but it aims at setting out a strategy to help decide which of the two mutually exclusive beliefs is the better one to adopt. Scientophilia, to coin a term, recommends preferring, without any discussion, a position consistent with the consensus of credible and reliable experts in a given domain. In case (...) there is no such agreement, mainly because peers disagree with each other, or experts are difficult to identify, it is recommended for a scientophile to suspend judgment. Scientophilia is not a position on science or human knowledge boundaries, but it deals with the practical side of belief change. Verdicts made by this approach are partially similar to those offered by mild scientism, as scientophilia puts scientific knowledge as one of the most reliable sources. However, it is also consistent with mild antiscientism, as in some particular cases (for example, Moorean truths), it assigns reliable expertise to non-scientific experts. Therefore it is a third way. (shrink)

Must we choose between reducing material substances to collections of properties, a’ la Berkeley and Hume or positing bare particulars, in the manner of Locke? Having repudiated the notion that a substance could simply be a collection of properties existing on their own, is there a viable alternative to the Lockean notion of a substratum, a being essentially devoid of character? E.J. Lowe and Michael Loux would answer here in the affirmative. Both recommend hylomorphism as an upgrade on the metaphysics (...) of the British empiricists: treating a material substance as its essential 'form,' this embodied 'substance' universal being, in turn, the substratum in which its 'accidents' inhere. Here, I evaluate this Aristotelian metaphysics, identifying the advantages it enjoys over the empiricist's alternatives pertaining to dependence, unity, identity, change, and the distinction between essential and accidental properties. I also develop solutions to the two problems that Loux sees it posing. (shrink)

Criticism of Larry Laudan's views on disagreement and progress in science.

Edouard Machery has argued that the notion of concept should be eliminated from scientific theorising about cognition on the grounds that what psychologists call concepts do not form a natural kind and that keeping this notion would encumber scientific progress. His view is that the class of concepts really divides into three distinct yet co-referential kinds of bodies of knowledge typically used in distinct cognitive processes. The main purpose of this paper is to challenge Machery’s eliminativist conclusion on the grounds (...) that his alternative to concepts fails to be combined with any prominent account of content determination. As a case of philosophical scrutiny of a psychological proposal, the paper also intends to show how philosophical and psychological interests in concepts can be brought together. (shrink)

Easy-road mathematical fictionalists grant for the sake of argument that quantification over mathematical entities is indispensable to some of our best scientific theories and explanations. Even so they maintain we can accept those theories and explanations, without believing their mathematical components, provided we believe the concrete world is intrinsically as it needs to be for those components to be true. Those I refer to as “mathematical surrealists” by contrast appeal to facts about the intrinsic character of the concrete world, not (...) to explain why our best mathematically imbued scientific theories and explanations are acceptable in spite of having false components, but in order to replace those theories and explanations with parasitic, nominalistically acceptable alternatives. I argue that easy-road fictionalism is viable only if mathematical surrealism is and that the latter constitutes a superior nominalist strategy. Two advantages of mathematical surrealism are that it neither begs the question concerning the explanatory role of mathematics in science nor requires rejecting the cogency of inference to the best explanation. (shrink)

In Franceschi (2002), I exposed a theory which aims to constitute an alternative to the classification proposed by Greimas in the field of paradigmatic analysis. In the present article, I proceed to draw the consequences of this latter theory by applying it to the technique of conception of a plan. Regarding the dialectic plan, the current paradigm is in effect a plan of the type..

Michael Strevens offers an account of causal explanation according to which explanatory practice is shaped by counterbalanced commitments to representing causal influence and abstracting away from overly specific details. In this paper, I challenge a key feature of that account. I argue that what Strevens calls explanatory frameworks figure prominently in explanatory practice because they actually improve explanations. This suggestion is simple but has far-reaching implications. It affects the status of explanations that cite multiply realizable properties; changes the explanatory role (...) of causal factors with small effect; and undermines Strevens’ titular explanatory virtue, depth. This results in greater coherence with explanatory practice and accords with the emphasis that Strevens places on explanatory patterns. Ultimately, my suggestion preserves a tight connection between explanation and the creation of understanding by taking into account explanations’ role in communication. (shrink)

This paper shall begin by exploring the work of R. Bourne and his concept of transnationalism. The case shall be made for its advantages in contrast to the melting-pot theory but this essay shall further argue that it alone is not a sufficient alternative. Instead, the paper shall shift its focus to H. Kallen and his notions of cultural pluralism. In conjunction with one another, they will be used to argue against the melting-pot theory and more specifically, against Samuel Huntington (...) and his assertions regarding contemporary Mexican and Latino immigrants. (shrink)

Surrealism holds that observables behave as if T were true, whereas scientific realism holds that T is true. Surrealism and scientific realism give different explanations of why T is empirically adequate. According to surrealism, T is empirically adequate because observables behave as if it were true. According to scientific realism, T is empirically adequate because it is true. I argue that the surrealist explanation merely clarifies the concept of empirical adequacy, whereas the realist explanation makes an inductive inference about T. (...) Therefore, the surrealist explanation is a conceptual one, whereas the realist explanation is an empirical one, and the former is not an alternative to the latter. (shrink)

This paper is based on a proposition concerning the origins of the universe that would not hold without the following principles: (1) the big bang did not emerge from nothing, without a primordial cause; (2) the unempirical nature of Isaac Newton’s laws of inertia are unempirical lead to the conclusion that motion is inherent in the universe (3) gravity is a function of celestial objects falling and rotating around other objects as their natural motion gets obstructed; (4) Albert Einstein’s curvature (...) of spacetime is not uniform. It follows that the massive cosmic explosion from the singularity event neither started spacetime, nor did it generate matter from nothing. The Spatial Discs Model (SDM) proposed here argues that all matter in our universe is finite, unstationary, and contained within interconnected spatial discs, that transfer the totality of the matter they contain to one other in a sequential manner. Hence, big bang explosions. Finally, because the nature of spatial discs is discrete and flexible, the universe will not expand forever. (shrink)

Medical assistance in dying, which includes voluntary euthanasia and assisted suicide, is legally permissible in a number of jurisdictions, including the Netherlands, Belgium, Switzerland and Canada. Although medical assistance in dying is most commonly provided for suffering associated with terminal somatic illness, some jurisdictions have also offered it for severe and irremediable psychiatric illness. Meanwhile, recent work in the philosophy of psychiatry has led to a renewed understanding of psychiatric illness that emphasises the role of the relation between the (...) person and the external environment in the constitution of mental disorder. In this paper, I argue that this externalist approach to mental disorder highlights an ethical challenge to the practice of medical assistance in dying for psychiatric illness. At the level of the clinical assessment, externalism draws attention to potential social and environmental interventions that might have otherwise been overlooked by the standard approach to mental disorder, which may confound the judgement that there is no further reasonable alternative that could alleviate the person’s suffering. At the level of the wider society, externalism underscores how social prejudices and structural barriers that contribute to psychiatric illness constrain the affordances available to people and result in them seeking medical assistance in dying when they otherwise might not have had under better social conditions. (shrink)

I argue that rights-forfeiture by itself is no path to permissibility at all (even barring special circumstances), neither in the case of self-defense nor in the case of punishment. The limiting conditions of self-defense, for instance – necessity, proportionality (or no gross disproportionality), and the subjective element – are different in the context of forfeiture than in the context of justification (and might even be absent in the former context). In particular, I argue that a culpable aggressor, unlike an innocent (...) aggressor, forfeits rights against proportionate defense, including unnecessary defense (as well as rights against the infliction of proportionate non-defensive harm). Yet, I demonstrate that this stance need not lead to the abandonment of the necessity condition of justified self-defense in the case of a culpable aggressor. Since justification and liability are not the same, there is no reason to assume that the necessity condition of justified self-defense must be explained under an appeal to the aggressor’s rights. Parallel arguments apply to the other limiting conditions of permissible self-defense as well as to the limiting conditions of permissible punishment. Accordingly, I also sketch alternative explanations of the proportionality requirement and the subjective element. All these alternative explanations appeal to a principle of precaution: instead of explaining the unjustifiability of unnecessarily harming a culpable attacker or wrongdoer by an appeal to the rights of the attacker or wrongdoer himself, one can also, and better, explain it by a requirement to take reasonable precautions against violating the rights of innocent people. (shrink)

In a world of more than 7 billion people, 80% live on less than $10 per day. Five (5) percent of global income is generated by the poorest 40 percent of the world’s population; while the wealthiest 20% of the population generates 75 percent of world income. Economics attempts to define or describe behavior and it ventures into the realm of predicting. Economics should therefore accept responsibility for controlling/directing realities. If we can understand, define and predict behavior, we should accept (...) the responsibility for changing behavior, and as economists, bring that to bear on material upliftment of the greater majority of the earth’s populace. . Since 1847, numerous role-players have debated and worked tirelessly to promote the welfare of those who are marginalised from mainstream society. To what avail? Exactly one hundred and fifty eight years later, one of the iconic statesmen of the twentieth century, Nelson Mandela, stated: “Massive poverty and obscene inequality are such terrible scourges of our time – times in which the world boasts breathtaking advances in science, technology, industry and wealth accommodation – that they have to rank alongside slavery and apartheid as social evils” (as quoted in Green 2009:2).Clearly, significant progress in addressing the issue has not been made. A concerted drive by the United Nations led to the adoption of the Millennium Development Goals in September 2000, and was endorsed by 189 world leaders. Some progress has been made during the past decade, but it is apparent that many countries are not going to be able to reach their goals. Hence, in order to address poverty at its root, attention is increasingly focused on the contribution of the informal sector and small, medium and micro enterprises. This paper explores such and offers alternatives to combat the spectres of structural unemployment and poverty. (shrink)

Analytic philosophers of religion typically take God to be ‘the personal omniGod’ – a person who is omnipotent, omniscient and omnibenevolent, and who creates and sustains all else that exists. Analytic philosophers also tend to assume that the personal omniGod is the God of ‘classical’ theism. Arguably, this is a mistake. To be consistent, a classical theist or her supporter must deny that God is literally a person. They need not, however, deny the aptness of using personal language, or of (...) thinking of God as a person or personal at the level of religious psychology. (shrink)

Aesthetic value empiricism claims that the aesthetic value of an object is grounded in the value of a certain kind of experience of it. The most popular version of value empiricism, and a dominant view in contemporary philosophical aesthetics more generally, is aesthetic hedonism. Hedonism restricts the grounds of aesthetic value to the pleasure enjoyed in the right kind of experience. But hedonism does not enjoy any clear advantage over a more permissive alternative version of value empiricism. This alternative is (...) aesthetic liberalism. On this view, an object’s aesthetic value is fully grounded in any value—not just the hedonic value—of a correct and complete experience of its sensory features. To demonstrate the advantages of liberalism over hedonism, I apply both views to analyze the aesthetic value of the Spring Temple Buddha and Anselm Kiefer’s Seraphim. I detail four advantages of liberalism over hedonism, and I conclude by defending liberalism from two kinds of objection. (shrink)

Phenomenological Pluralism (PP), grounded in the existential phenomenology of Maurice Merleau-Ponty, offers a novel approach to religious pluralism by emphasizing the unique and irreducible experiences individuals and communities have with the divine. Central to PP is the concept of "My (personal) God," which acknowledges that each person's encounter with the divine is uniquely personal and contextually grounded without a genuinely polytheistic implication. Unlike Universalist Pluralism (UP), which seeks common theological ground, and Particularist Pluralism (PaP), which focuses on cultural context, PP (...) asserts that each religion operates within its own distinct reality. This approach fosters deeper interfaith dialogue by appreciating the diversity of spiritual narratives and promoting empathy and inclusivity. PP's practical implications extend to conflict resolution, social integration, and educational advancement, making it a robust framework for understanding and managing religious diversity. By validating the unique spiritual experiences of all participants, PP creates an inclusive environment conducive to genuine interfaith dialogue and societal cohesion. (shrink)

Effective Altruism is a popular social movement that encourages individuals to donate to organizations that effectively address humanity’s most severe poverty. However, because Effective Altruists are committed to doing the most good in the most effective ways, they often argue that it is wrong to help those nearest to you. In this paper, I target a major subset of Effective Altruists who consider it a moral obligation to do the most good possible. Call these Obligation-Oriented Effective Altruists (OOEAs), and their (...) movement Obligation-Oriented Effective Altruism (OOEA). I argue that insofar as this variety of OOEA seems to commit us to refrain from helping the people right in front of us, there is something intuitively wrong about it. In response, I introduce an alternative model that embraces partiality: Mutual Aid. Mutual Aid is a network of community members, usually from the same geographical region, who share a commitment to offer, receive, and exchange material goods, wealth, and social support. I recommend Mutual Aid as a liberatory model, which—through empathy, solidarity, and care—mobilizes community building and provides a catalyst for community advocacy. As such, we should resist the claims of OOEAs that partially distributing our funds to people or causes we care about is morally wrong or even less than ideal. We do not have a moral obligation to use our funds “effectively;” rather, we have a broader obligation to address human suffering, and Mutual Aid is one moral alternative for discharging this duty. (shrink)

Standard linguistic analysis of syntax uses the T-model. This model requires the ordering: D-structure > S-structure > LF, where D-structure is the sentences deep structure, S-structure is its surface structure, and LF is its logical form. Between each of these representations there is movement which alters the order of the constituent words; movement is achieved using the principles and parameters of syntactic theory. Psychological analysis of sentence production is usually either serial or connectionist. Psychological serial models do not accommodate the (...) T-model immediately so that here a new model called the P-model is introduced. The P-model is different from previous linguistic and psychological models. Here it is argued that the LF representation should be replaced by a variant of Frege'sA three qualities (sense, reference, and force), called the FregeA representation or F-representation. In the F-representation the order of elements is not necessarily the same as that in LF and it is suggested that the correct ordering is: F-representation > D-structure > S-structure. This ordering appears to lead to a more natural view of sentence production and processing. Within this framework movement originates as the outcome of emphasis applied to the sentence. The requirement that the F-representation precedes the D-structure needs a picture of the particular principles and parameters which pertain to movement of words between representations. In general this would imply that there is a preferred or optimal ordering of the symbolic string in the F-representation. The standard ordering is retained because the general way of producing such an optimal ordering is unclear. In this case it is possible to produce an analysis of movement between LF and D-structure similar to the usual analysis of movement between S-structure and LF. The necessity of analyzing corrupted data suggests that a maximal amount of information about a language's grammar and lexicon is stored. (shrink)

In lieu of Abstract: With inequality of various sorts ballooning worldwide, a critique of democracy has come of age, and a change of political ethos is underway. Against this background, the critique of democracy becomes not only possible but also popular, and examples in China and many Western democracies abound. It is no exaggeration to say, in this context, that sufficient momentum has gathered to qualify the situation as "democratic recession," despite people may have different understandings as to the exact (...) nature of this recession and how long it will last. Accompanying this recession, Confucian political meritocracy, whose aim is to correct the wrongs of democracy, is constructed as an alternative to liberal democracy. Many argue that the end of history is not nigh but will continue in and by Confucian political meritocracy... (shrink)

Some moral realists claim that moral facts are a species of natural fact, amenable to scientific investigation. They argue that these moral facts are needed in the best explanations of certain phenomena and that this is evidence that they are real. In this paper I present part of a biological account of the function of morality. The account allows the identification of a plausible natural kind that could play the explanatory role that a moral kind would play in naturalist realist (...) theories. It is therefore a candidate for being the moral kind. I argue, however, that it will underdetermine the morally good, that is, identifying the kind is not sufficient to identify what is good. Hence this is not a natural moral kind. Its explanatory usefulness, however, means that we do not have to postulate any further (moral) facts to provide moral explanations. Hence there is no reason to believe that there are any natural moral kinds. (shrink)

Lucid dreaming (LD) is a fun and interesting activity, but most participants have difficulties in attaining lucidity, retaining it during the dream, concentrating on the needed task and remembering the results. This motivates to search for a new way to enhance lucid dreaming via different induction techniques, including chemicals and electric brain stimulation. However, results are still unstable. An alternative approach is to reach the lucid dreaming-like states via altered state of consciousness not related to dreaming. Several methods such as (...) guided visualization, internal dialog, creative writing, hypnosis, hypnagogia, daydreaming, DMT trips, voice dialog, shamanic journey, rebirthing, and “forcing” tulpas can help in attaining such states. One of the most promising of them is Jungian “active imagination” (AIM) technique, which allows unconscious content to build up inside some mental frames. This article explores the hypothesis of replacing lucid dreaming research with active imagination, and the conditions and ways to accomplish it. Method: An open label pilot experiment was performed in 2004-2005 in Moscow, Russia with 100 participants. Results: The results show that there are two groups of people: ones with “visual imagination screen” and others have “mental imagination screen”. AIM works perfectly as a replacement for lucid dreams only for the first group of people. For the second group, it created interesting content, but not visual or emotional intensity equal to enter lucid dreaming like state. No known instruments helped to move the person from one group to another. The first group consisted of young females, while the second mostly contained males with rational and mathematical type of personality. Conclusion: AIM partly works as a replacement for LD, as it works great only for half of people, and it requires a sitter. However, AIM outperforms LD in reliability and availability in any circumstance: it could be performed even by text chat or in a crowd. It is also better than LD in retaining concentration on topic and the easiness of memorizing the results (which could be recorded). Self-performed AIM is less effective. AIM can be improved by intelligent chat bots as sitters and weak brain stimulation that can increase the probability of attaining something like hypnogogic state. (shrink)

The book attempts to conceptualize the “ancient” issues of human death and human mortality in connection to the timely and vital subject of euthanasia. This subject forces the meditation to actually consider those ideological, ethical, deontological, legal, and metaphysical frameworks which guide from the very beginning any kind of approach to this question. This conception – in dialogue with Heideggerian fundamental ontology and existential analytics – reveals that, on the one hand, the concepts and ethics of death are originally (...) determined by the ontology of death, and, on the other hand, that, on this account, the question of euthanasia can only be authentically discussed in the horizon of this ontology. It is only this that may reveal to whom dying – our dying – pertains, while it also reveals our relationship to euthanasia as a determined human potentiality or final possibility. Thus euthanasia is outlined in the analysis as the possibility of becoming a mortal on the one hand, while on the other hand it appears in relation to the particularities of its existential structure, which essentially differ from the existential and ontological structure of any other possibility of dying. This is why it should not be mixed up with, or mistaken for, any of these. (shrink)

The aim of this paper is to present and discuss the issue of the adequacy of the Minimum Intelligent Signal Test (MIST) as an alternative to the Turing Test. MIST has been proposed by Chris McKinstry as a better alternative to Turing’s original idea. Two of the main claims about MIST are that (1) MIST questions exploit commonsense knowledge and as a result are expected to be easy to answer for human beings and difficult for computer programs; and that (2) (...) the MIST design aims at eliminating the problem of the role of judges in the test. To discuss these design assumptions we will present Peter D. Turney’s PMI-IR algorithm which allows for MIST-type questions to be answered. We will also present and discuss the results of our own study aimed at the judge problem for MIST. (shrink)

Whilst India has been debating how to regulate 'surrogacy' the UK has undergone a major consultation on increasing the amount of 'expenses'paid to egg 'donors', while France has recently finished debating its entire package of bioethics regulation and the role of its Biomedicine Agency. Although it is often claimed that there is no alternative to the neo-liberal, market-based approach in regulating (or not) reproductive medicine--the ideology prevalent in both India and the UK--advocates of that position ignore the alternative model offered (...) by France's tighter regulation, as well as its overarching concern with protecting the vulnerable and ensuring social justice. Whilst the concepts underpinning the French model of regulation also have their provenance in Western political philosophy and not in the developed world, they embody a very different attitude and suggest that there is indeed an alternative to letting the market decide. However, even in France that alternative is highly contested. (shrink)

This article examines whether Nietzschean agonistic democracy theory can be a plausible alternative to Chantal Mouffe’s model. Agonistic democracy theory has Carl Schmitt or Nietzsche as its philosophical source. In the case of Mouffe, she constructed her model based on Schmitt. However, her Schmitt-based model is vulnerable to four criticisms. First, the distinction between ‘worthy opponents’ and ‘enemy’ is ambiguous. Second, it is inconsistent to simultaneously claim ‘the ontological fundamentality of antagonism’ and ‘agonism without antagonism.’ Third, her agonism can not (...) capture the pluralistic world, since it is trapped in the telos of self-preservation. Fourth, there are no theoretical factors to maintain her agonism, and there is no explanation for the degree of conflict that can sustain her model. Unlike Mouffe, Nietzschean like Connolly and Owen provides agonistic democracy theories based on Nietzsche. After analyzing and reconstructing Nietzsche’s text and Nietzschean’s discussions, I will argue that the Nietzschean model can overcome some thresholds of Mouffe’s model. (shrink)

Recent trends in psychiatry involve a transition from categorical to dimensional frameworks, in which the boundary between health and pathology is understood as a difference in degree rather than as a difference in kind. A major tenet of dimensional approaches is that no qualitative distinction can be made between health and pathology. As a consequence, these approaches tend to characterize such a threshold as pragmatic or conventional in nature. However, dimensional approaches to psychopathology raise several epistemological and ontological issues. First, (...) we review major sources of evidence usually recruited in support of the dimensional trend (focusing on clinical observation and biological data), and we show that these are connected to different conceptualizations of how dimensional traits extend across health and pathology. Second, we criticize two unquestioned assumptions that stand at the core of the dimensional trend: a) that there is continuity from health to pathology at the symptomatic level; b) that such continuity reflects an underlying continuity in the genetic liability for pathological conditions. Third, we argue against the idea of a conventional threshold by showing that such a view implies a linear relationship between the genotype and the phenotype. Fourth, drawing on epigenetics and developmental biology, we offer a characterization of mental disorders as stable and dynamic constellations of multi-level variables that differ qualitatively from ‘healthy states’. We conclude by showing that our account has several theoretical advantages over both categorical and dimensional approaches. Notably, it provides crucial insights into psychological development over time and individual differences, with major implications in terms of intervention and clinical decision-making. (shrink)

In this article, I offer the figure of the snake-bridge as (a) the coiled central metaphor in Gloria Anzaldúa’s masterpiece, Borderlands/La Frontera, (b) the interpretive bridge connecting the early (This Bridge Called My Back) middle (Borderlands) and late (Light in the Dark) periods of her oeuvre, and (c) an alternate unifying metaphor to mestizaje. My first section offers a close reading of Borderlands, locating snake-bridge in the east-west snake of the Rio Grande that queer Chicana borderlanders cross north and south (...) like snakes, while wrestling earthward with snake demons and skyward with snake goddesses. And my second section autopsies the dismembered snake-bridge in Light in the Dark, calling for a healing thereof in pursuit of a coalitional social justice politics that preserves the strengths of mestizaje without its dangers. (shrink)

Substantially increased wealth inequality across the developed world has prompted many philosophers, economists and legal theorists to support comprehensive taxes on all forms of wealth. Proposals include levying taxes on the basis of total wealth, or alternatively the change in the value of capital holdings measured from year-to-year. This contrasts with most existing policies that tax capital assets at the point they are transferred from one beneficiary to another through sale or gifts. Are these tax reforms likely to meet their (...) aims of greater economic and political equality? We argue that these policies are likely to fail because, following neoclassical economic theory, they are based on a conception of capital as possessing given values in what amounts to a static equilibrium. This mischaracterizes the dynamic and subjective character of market economies and the contested value of real instantiations of capital goods. This makes them very difficult, often impossible, to value apart from at the point of voluntary transfer or profit realization. This means most taxes levied on a mark-to-market basis will be arbitrary and unfair. We propose alternative policies based on an income realization approach to taxation that are more likely to curb excessive wealth holdings. This includes introducing international treaties that prohibit preferential tax treatment for individual companies and specific sectors, and broadening the income tax base to include the imputed rent of personal housing wealth. (shrink)

This paper responds to Kathleen Stock’s attempt to explain a puzzling fact, at least from her standpoint: widespread assertions that some people who are biologically male are women and some people who are biologically female are men. She regards these assertions as made while immersed in a fiction. Stock rejects an alternative explanation – that a lot of these people have read Judith Butler or 1970s feminism. Clarifying that explanation reveals it to be not so easy to dismiss.

To morally defer is to form a moral belief on the basis of some credible authority's recommendation rather than on one’s own moral judgment. Many philosophers have suggested that the sort of knowledge yielded by moral deference is deficient in various ways. To better appreciate its possible deficiencies, I propose that we look at a centuries-long philosophical discourse that made much of the shortcomings of this sort of knowledge, which is the discourse about “getting it oneself” (zide 自得) in the (...) later (post-classical) Confucian tradition. In this chapter, I offer the first sustained philosophical account of “getting it oneself,” as conceived by its most influential proponents—Cheng Hao, Cheng Yi, and Zhu Xi. I describe its most notable features, including its tendency to enhance epistemic confidence and what I call “self-discovery aspects” of the phenomenon. I then focus on the Neo-Confucian claim that some parts of the deliberative process should be spontaneous or unforced, which, I argue, they saw as necessary for an unbiased appreciation of the inferential force of the reasons for one’s moral conclusions. I conclude by pointing to some of the broader implications of my reading for both the history of philosophy and current debates about moral deference. (shrink)