Subjective theories of well-being claim that how well our lives go for us is a matter of our attitudes towards what we get in life rather than the nature of the things themselves. This article explains in more detail the distinction between subjective and objective theories of well-being; describes, for each approach, some reasons for thinking it is true; outlines the main kinds of subjective theory; and explains their advantages and disadvantages.

According to what we will call subjectivity theories of consciousness, there is a constitutive connection between phenomenal consciousness and subjectivity: there is something it is like for a subject to have mental state M only if M is characterized by a certain mine-ness or for-me-ness. Such theories appear to face certain psychopathological counterexamples: patients appear to report conscious experiences that lack this subjective element. A subsidiary goal of this chapter is to articulate with greater precision both (...) subjectivity theories and the psychopathological challenge they face. The chapter’s central goal is to present two new approaches to defending subjectivity theories in the face of this challenge. What distinguishes these two approaches is that they go to great lengths to interpret patients’ reports at face value – greater length, at any rate, than more widespread approaches in the extant literature. (shrink)

This paper focuses on three theories of personal identity that incorporate the idea that personal identity is the result of a person’s adopting certain attitudes towards certain mental states and actions. I call these theories subjective theories of personal identity. I argue that it is not clear what the proponents of these theories mean by “personal identity”. On standard theories, such as animalism or psychological theories, the term “personal identity” refers to the numerical identity (...) of persons and its analysis provides the persistence conditions for persons. I argue that if the subjective theories purport to provide a criterion of numerical personal identity, they fail. A different interpretation may suggest that they purport to provide a non-numerical type of identity for the purpose of providing plausible analyses of certain identity-related practical concerns. I argue that the criteria the subjective theories provide fail to capture several of the identity-related concerns. As a result, this interpretation must be rejected as well. (shrink)

According to subjectivism about ill-being, the token states of affairs that are basically bad for you must be suitably connected, under the proper conditions, to your negative attitudes. This article explores the prospects for this family of theories and addresses some of its challenges. This article (i) shows that subjectivism about ill-being can be derived from a more general doctrine that requires a negatively valenced relationship between any welfare subject and the token states that are of basic harm to (...) that subject and (ii) responds to some objections, including the objection that subjectivists about ill-being cannot plausibly explain the badness of pain. (shrink)

Subjectivity theories of consciousness take self-reference, somehow construed, as essential to having conscious experience. These theories differ with respect to how many levels they posit and to whether self-reference is conscious or not. But all treat self-referencing as a process that transpires at the personal level, rather than at the subpersonal level, the level of mechanism. -/- Working with conceptual resources afforded by pre-existing theories of consciousness that take self-reference to be essential, several attempts have been (...) made to explain seemingly anomalous cases, especially instances of alien experience. These experiences are distinctive precisely because self-referencing is explicitly denied by the only person able to report them: those who experience them deny that certain actions, mental states, or body parts belong to self. The relevant actions, mental states, or body parts are sometimes attributed to someone or something other than self, and sometimes they are just described as not belonging to self. But all are referred away from self. -/- The cases under discussion here include somatoparaphrenia, schizophrenia, depersonalization, anarchic hand syndrome, and utilization behavior; the theories employed, Higher-Order Thought, Wide Intrinsicality, and Self-Representational. Below I argue that each of these attempts at explaining or explaining away the anomalies fails. Along the way, since each of these theories seeks at least compatibility with science, I sketch experimental approaches that could be used to adduce support for my position, or indeed for the positions of theorists with whom I disagree. -/- In a concluding section I first identify two presuppositions shared by all of the theorists considered here, and argue that both are either erroneous or misleading. Second, I call attention to divergent paths adopted when attempting to explain alienation experiences: some theorists choose to add a mental ingredient, while others prefer to subtract one. I argue that alienation from experience, action, or body parts could result from either addition or subtraction, and that the two can be incorporated within a comprehensive explanatory framework. Finally, I suggest that this comprehensive framework would require self-referencing of a sort, but self-referencing that occurs solely on the level of mechanism, or the subpersonal level. In adumbrating some features of this “subpersonal self,” I suggest that there might be one respect in which it is prior to conscious experience. (shrink)

Within much contemporary social ontology there is a particular methodology at work. This methodology takes as a starting point two or more asocial or atomic individuals. These individuals are taken to be perfectly functional agents, though outside of all social relations. Following this, combinations of these individuals are considered, to deduce what constitutes a social group. Here I will argue that theories which rely on this methodology are always circular, so long as they purport to describe the formation of (...) all social groups, as they must always presuppose a pre-existing collectivity. Such methodology also produces various distortions in our theories, such as voluntarism. I focus on the workings of Plural Subject Theory as laid out by Margaret Gilbert in On Social Facts. I show that the formation of a plural subject always requires communication, and that communication always requires a pre-existing collectivity. i examine the elements within Plural Subject Theory which protect gilbert from these accusations of circularity, and argue against them. I finalise by suggesting that what Plural Subject Theory, and social ontology in general, requires as a theoretical starting point is not atomic individuals and their combinations, but rather combinations of already socialised or embedded individuals. (shrink)

It is well-known that in the fifth of his Cartesian Meditations, Husserl puts forth a theory of intersubjectivity. Most commentators of Husserl have read his Cartesian Meditations as presenting a theory of intersubjectivity whose basis is empathy, in the form of a process of constituting the sense of “other” in one’s own experience, as the primary origin of the intersubjective layer of experience. In this paper, I claim that the structure of intersubjectivity as Husserl presents it in the Cartesian Meditations (...) is articulated as being governed by a logic of parts and wholes rather than that of a phenomenology of empathy, and that the articulation of this logic demonstrates that the transcendental ego is intrinsically intersubjective. My main philosophical claim in this regard is that the way Husserl’s account of transcendental empathy unfolds in the Cartesian Meditations implies a prior fundamental mereological structure of which the individual transcendental ego is only a part. That is, the transcendental ego has an eidetic a-priori intersubjective structure, in the sense of being a moment of an intersubjectively structured transcendental whole. In this sense, rather than being a singulare tantum, it is more fitting to say that transcendental subjectivity is actually a plurale tantum. (shrink)

As soon as you believe an imagination to be nonfictional, this imagination becomes your ontological theory of the reality. Your ontological theory (of the reality) can describe a system as the reality. However, actually this system is only a theory/conceptual-space/imagination/visual-imagery of yours, not the actual reality (i.e., the thing-in-itself). An ontological theory (of the reality) actually only describes your (subjective/mental) imagination/visual-imagery/conceptual-space. An ontological theory of the reality, is being described as a situation model (SM). There is no way to prove/disprove (...) that there is only one reality, or there are two realities (i.e., “subjective reality” and “objective reality”). So, every ontology talk/theory/imagination about the two realities is only a talk/theory/imagination – we will never know whether it is true or not. The conventionally-called “physical/objective reality/world” around my conventionally-called “physical/objective body” is actually a geometric mathematical model (being generated/mathematically-modeled by my brain) – it's actually a subset/component/part/element of my brain’s mind/consciousness/manifest-image. Our cosmos is an autonomous objective parallel computing automaton (aka state machine) which evolves by itself automatically/unintentionally – wave-particle duality and Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle can be explained under this SM of my brain. Each elementary particle (as a building block of our cosmos) is an autonomous mathematical entity itself (i.e., a thing in itself). Our cosmos has the same nature as a Game of Life system – both are autonomous objective parallel-computing automata. Cosmos (as a state machine) is indistinguishable from a digital simulation – my consciousness (as something nonphysical) is not cosmos (as a state machine). If we are happy to accept randomness/stochasticity, then it is obviously possible that all other worlds in the many-worlds interpretation (MWI) actually do not exist (objectively). As one metaphysical option, we can treat all other worlds as subjective only (even if they are actually objective). Under the context of this metaphysical option, we are only living in one world (i.e., the world we are currently living in; this world) – we are not living in many worlds at the same time parallelly. Under the context of this metaphysical option, there is only one possible future. The relationship among any number of elementary particles, is governed/described by Schrodinger equation. If (in theory) Schrodinger equation can’t be used to reliably forecast whether I will go to McDonald for dinner in this world (based on the current state of all elementary particles of the cosmos), then what can Schrodinger equation do? The conventionally-called “space” does not exist objectively. “Time” and “matter” are not physical. Consciousness is the subjective-form (aka quale) of the mathematical models (of the objective cosmos) which are intracorporeally/subjectively used by the control logic of a Turing machine’s program fatedly. A Turing machine’s mind/consciousness/manifest-image or deliberate decisions/choices should not be able to actually/objectively change/control/drive the (autonomous or fated) worldline of any elementary particle within this world (i.e., the world we are currently living in, under the context of MWI). Besides the Schrodinger equation (or another mathematical equation/function which is yet to be discovered) which is a valid/correct/factual causality of our cosmos/state-machine, every other causality (of our cosmos/state-machine) is either invalid/incorrect/counterfactual or can be proved by deductive inference based on the Schrodinger equation (or the aforementioned yet-to-be-discovered mathematical equation/function) only. Closed causality entails no causality. Consciousness plays no causal role (“epiphenomenalism”), or in other words, any cognitive/behavioural activity can in principle be carried out without consciousness (“conscious inessentialism”). If the “loop quantum gravity” theory is correct, then time/space does not actually/objectively exist in the objective-evolution of the objective cosmos, or in other words, we should not use the subjective/mental concept of “time”, “state” or “space” to describe/imagine the objective-evolution of our cosmos. (shrink)

Post-classical period witnessed intense debates on aspects of the Avicennan theory of science. Among them one set of discussions concerned the issue of subject matter (mabāhith al-mawdūʿ) in a science. They were raised by Ṣadr al-Sharīʿa (d. 747/1346) in the introduction of his al-Tawḍīh, a commentary on his legal theory text al-Tanqīḥ. Therein, he raised three questions: (1) whether the subject matter of a science can be multiple, (2) what restricting subject matter of a science means, and (3) whether one (...) thing can be the subject matter of multiple sciences. Taftāzānī (d. 792/1390), a proponent of the Avicennan theory, objected to Ṣadr al-Sharīʿa’s positions in his al-Talwīḥ, the most well-known supercommentary on al-Tawḍīh. The paper analyzes this debate on the issue of subject matter in sciences, and thus sheds light on the reception of an important aspect of the Avicennan theory of science in the postclassical period. (shrink)

The conception of subjectivity developed by the German philosopher Hermann Schmitz (1927-) is especially suitable for cross-cultural investigations because its foundations lie in human experiences that are basic and universal. The paper has two aims. Firstly, to give an outline of Schmitz’s theory. Secondly, to show its usefulness (and its limits) by interpreting some Greek and Indian philosophers which, at the same time, represent certain main approaches to the problem of subjectivity.

This paper evaluates Putnam’s argument in the first chapter of Reason, Truth and History, for the claim that we can know that we are not brains in a vat (of a certain sort). A widespread response to Putnam’s argument has been that if it were successful not only the world but the meanings of our words (and consequently our thoughts) would be beyond the pale of knowledge, because a causal theory of reference is not compatible with our having knowledge of (...) the meanings of our words. I argue that this is not so. I argue also, however, that given how Putnam argues (here) for the causal theory of reference, he cannot after all escape this consequence. (shrink)

This paper is intended to be a follow-up to our previous paper with title: "Reinterpreting Tlon, Uqbar, Orbis Tertius: On the antirealism tendency in modern physics." We will give more background for our propositions in the previous paper. Our message here is quite simple: allow us to remind fellow physicists and cosmologists to become more aware of Berkeley-idealism tendency, which can lead us to so many distractions instead of bringing us closer to the truth. We observe that much of the (...) progress of modern physics in the last few decades only makes us as confused as before, but at a much higher level. In the last section, we will give some examples of how we can do something better than existing practice of physics in the past. (shrink)

In his classic book “the Foundations of Statistics” Savage developed a formal system of rational decision making. The system is based on (i) a set of possible states of the world, (ii) a set of consequences, (iii) a set of acts, which are functions from states to consequences, and (iv) a preference relation over the acts, which represents the preferences of an idealized rational agent. The goal and the culmination of the enterprise is a representation theorem: Any preference relation that (...) satisfies certain arguably acceptable postulates determines a (finitely additive) probability distribution over the states and a utility assignment to the consequences, such that the preferences among acts are determined by their expected utilities. Additional problematic assumptions are however required in Savage's proofs. First, there is a Boolean algebra of events (sets of states) which determines the richness of the set of acts. The probabilities are assigned to members of this algebra. Savage's proof requires that this be a σ-algebra (i.e., closed under infinite countable unions and intersections), which makes for an extremely rich preference relation. On Savage's view we should not require subjective probabilities to be σ-additive. He therefore finds the insistence on a σ-algebra peculiar and is unhappy with it. But he sees no way of avoiding it. Second, the assignment of utilities requires the constant act assumption: for every consequence there is a constant act, which produces that consequence in every state. This assumption is known to be highly counterintuitive. The present work contains two mathematical results. The first, and the more difficult one, shows that the σ-algebra assumption can be dropped. The second states that, as long as utilities are assigned to finite gambles only, the constant act assumption can be replaced by the more plausible and much weaker assumption that there are at least two non-equivalent constant acts. The second result also employs a novel way of deriving utilities in Savage-style systems -- without appealing to von Neumann-Morgenstern lotteries. The paper discusses the notion of “idealized agent" that underlies Savage's approach, and argues that the simplified system, which is adequate for all the actual purposes for which the system is designed, involves a more realistic notion of an idealized agent. (shrink)

Theories of well-being are typically divided into subjective and objective. Subjective theories are those which make facts about a person’s welfare depend on facts about her actual or hypothetical mental states. I am interested in what motivates this approach to the theory of welfare. The contemporary view is that subjectivism is devoted to honoring the evaluative perspective of the individual, but this is both a misleading account of the motivations behind subjectivism, and a vision that dooms subjective (...) class='Hi'>theories to failure. I suggest that we need to revisit and reinstate certain features of traditional hedonism, in particular the idea that felt experience plays a role that no theory of welfare can afford to ignore. I then offer a sketch of a theory that is subjective in my preferred sense and avoids the worst sins of hedonism as well as the problems generated by the contemporary constraints of subjective theorists. (shrink)

Our topic is the theory of topics. My goal is to clarify and evaluate three competing traditions: what I call the way-based approach, the atom-based approach, and the subject-predicate approach. I develop criteria for adequacy using robust linguistic intuitions that feature prominently in the literature. Then I evaluate the extent to which various existing theories satisfy these constraints. I conclude that recent theories due to Parry, Perry, Lewis, and Yablo do not meet the constraints in total. I then (...) introduce the issue-based theory—a novel and natural entry in the atom-based tradition that meets our constraints. In a coda, I categorize a recent theory from Fine as atom-based, and contrast it to the issue-based theory, concluding that they are evenly matched, relative to our main criteria of adequacy. I offer tentative reasons to nevertheless favour the issue-based theory. (shrink)

In Rahul Banerjee and Bikas K. Chakrabarti (eds.), Progress in Brain Research, 168: 215-246. Amsterdam: Elsevier. Electronic offprint available upon request.

There are cases in which, intuitively, an agent’s action is both morally right in one sense, and morally wrong in another sense. Such cases (along with other intuitions about blameless wrongdoing and action-guidance) support distinguishing between the objective moral ‘ought’ and the subjective moral ‘ought.’ This chapter argues against drawing this distinction, on the grounds that the prescriptions delivered by an adequate objective moral theory must be sensitive to the mental states of agents. Specifically, an adequate theory of the objective (...) moral ‘ought’ must respect a strong ought-implies-can principle—morally ought implies agentially can—in order to prescribe actions to real-life agents. An agent’s mental states determine what is agentially possible for that agent; thus, what an agent objectively morally ought to do is in part determined by the agent’s mental states. This chapter describes the structure of a compelling non-ideal moral theory that is both objective and mental state-sensitive. This non-ideal theory illuminates the shortcomings of extant objectivist and subjectivist moral theories, and illustrates how we can dispense with the subjective moral ‘ought.’. (shrink)

This thesis explores and discusses foundational issues concerning the relationship between phenomenological philosophy and the enactive approach to cognitive science, with the aim of clarifying, developing, and promoting the project of enactive phenomenology. This project is framed by three general ideas: 1) that the sciences of mind need a phenomenological grounding, 2) that the enactive approach is the currently most promising attempt to provide mind science with such a grounding, and 3) that this attempt involves both a naturalization of phenomenology (...) and a phenomenologization of the concept of nature. More specifically, enactive phenomenology is the project of pursuing mutually illuminative exchanges between, on the one hand, phenomenological investigations of the structures of lived experience and embodied existence and, on the other, scientific accounts of mind and life – in particular those framed by theories of biological self-organization. The thesis consists of two parts. Part one is an introductory essay that seeks to clarify some of enactive phenomenology’s overarching philosophical commitments by tracing some of its historical roots. Part two is a compilation of four articles, each of which intervenes in a different contemporary debate relevant to the dissertation’s project. (shrink)

Twentieth century philosophers introduced the distinction between “objective rightness” and “subjective rightness” to achieve two primary goals. The first goal is to reduce the paradoxical tension between our judgments of (i) what is best for an agent to do in light of the actual circumstances in which she acts and (ii) what is wisest for her to do in light of her mistaken or uncertain beliefs about her circumstances. The second goal is to provide moral guidance to an agent who (...) may be uncertain about the circumstances in which she acts, and hence is unable to use her standard moral principle directly in deciding what to do. This paper distinguishes two important senses of “moral guidance”; proposes criteria of adequacy for accounts of subjective rightness; canvasses existing definitions for “subjective rightness”; finds them all deficient; and proposes a new and more successful account. It argues that each comprehensive moral theory must include multiple principles of subjective rightness to address the epistemic situations of the full range of moral decision-makers, and shows that accounts of subjective rightness formulated in terms of what it would reasonable for the agent to believe cannot provide that guidance. -/- . (shrink)

This chapter discusses how phenomenologies of pregnancy challenge traditional philosophical accounts of a subject that is seen as autonomous, rational, genderless, unified, and independent from other subjects. Pregnancy defies simple incorporation into such universal accounts since the pregnant woman and her unborn child are incapable of being subsumed into traditional theories of the subject. Phenomenological descriptions of the experience of pregnancy lead one to question if philosophy needs to reject the subject altogether as central, or rather to revise traditional (...) descriptions of the subject. The chapter examines both options and argues for the later. The exploration of pregnancy in feminist theory upholds the value of working from the subject’s lived experience, but indicates that it is possible without viewing the subject as a disembodied universal agent. Finally, it discusses how phenomenologies of pregnancy are attuned to discussing difference thereby aiding philosophies that take into account the political, historical, and cultural conditioning that shape experience and theory. (shrink)

CORCORAN RECOMMENDS COCCHIARELLA ON TYPE THEORY. The 1983 review in Mathematical Reviews 83e:03005 of: Cocchiarella, Nino “The development of the theory of logical types and the notion of a logical subject in Russell's early philosophy: Bertrand Russell's early philosophy, Part I”. Synthese 45 (1980), no. 1, 71-115 .

In this chapter I articulate and defend a basic principle capturing the underlying structure of an attractive sort of national reconciliation that accounts for a wide array of disparate judgments about the subject. There are extant theories of national reconciliation in the literature, most of which are informed by Kantian, liberal-democratic and similar perspectives. In contrast to these, I spell out a theory grounded on a comparatively underexplored sub-Saharan ethic. My foremost aim is to demonstrate how African ideals about (...) communal relationship, still largely unfamiliar to an international audience, do a promising job of providing a unified foundation for the roles of truth-telling, apology, forgiveness, compensation, amnesty and related practices often associated with national reconciliation. (shrink)

How do we ascribe subjective probability? In decision theory, this question is often addressed by representation theorems, going back to Ramsey (1926), which tell us how to define or measure subjective probability by observable preferences. However, standard representation theorems make strong rationality assumptions, in particular expected utility maximization. How do we ascribe subjective probability to agents which do not satisfy these strong rationality assumptions? I present a representation theorem with weak rationality assumptions which can be used to define or measure (...) subjective probability for partly irrational agents. (shrink)

An important theme running through D.H. Mellor’s work is his realism, or as I shall call it, his objectivism: the idea that reality as such is how it is, regardless of the way we represent it, and that philosophical error often arises from confusing aspects of our subjective representation of the world with aspects of the world itself. Thus central to Mellor’s work on time has been the claim that the temporal A-series (previously called ‘tense’) is unreal while the B-series (...) (the series of ‘dates’) is real. The A-series is something which is a product of our representation of the world, but not a feature of reality itself. And in other, less central, areas of his work, this kind of theme has been repeated: ‘Objective decision making’ (1980) argues that the right way to understand decision theory is as a theory of what is the objectively correct decision, the one that will actually as a matter of fact achieve your intended goal, rather than the one that is justified purely in terms of what you believe, regardless of whether the belief is true or false. ‘I and now’ (1989) argues against a substantial subjective conception of the self, using analogies between subjective and objective ways of thinking about time and subjective and objective ways of thinking about the self. And in the paper which shall be the focus of my attention here, ‘Nothing like experience’ (1992), Mellor contests arguments which try and derive anti-physicalist conclusions from reflections on the subjective character of experience. A common injunction is detectable: when doing metaphysics, keep the subjective where it belongs: inside the subject’s representation of the world. (shrink)

This paper was presented as the keynote address at the 2005 Philosophy Graduate Student Conference at the University of Memphis on “Limitations of Subjectivity.”.

Husserl’s theory of types is most often associated with his account of perception. Here, types operate as pre-predicative frames of experience that guide the perception of objects. In this paper, I will argue that Husserl’s theory of types is also central to his account of intersubjectivity. More specifically, I will show that a foundational kind of typical subjectivity is entailed by his discussion of the sphere of ownness. It is by way of this type that even a solitary subject (...) can tacitly anticipate the possibility of other subjects. It is also this type that is enriched through interactions between actual subjects. (shrink)

Andrea Westlund's account of love involves lovers becoming a Plural Subject mirroring Margaret Gilbert's Plural Subject Theory. However, while for Gilbert the creation of a plural will involves individuals jointly committing to pool their wills and the plural will directly normatively constraining those individuals, Westlund, in contrast, sees the creation of a plural will as a continual process thus rejecting the possibility of such direct normative constraint. This rejection appears to be required to explain the flexibility that allows for a (...) central place for reciprocity in loving relationships. However, this paper argues against the existence of such flexibility and presents instead the case that variance in the normative pain of rebelling against the collective will can be accommodated by replacing Gilbert's notion of all-or-nothing pooling of wills with an account that see wills as becoming entangled through levels of identification with the plural subject. (shrink)

The problem of other minds has a distinguished philosophical history stretching back more than two hundred years. Taken at face value, it is an epistemological question: it concerns how we can have knowledge of, or at least justified belief in, the existence of minds other than our own. In recent decades, philosophers, psychologists, neuroscientists, anthropologists and primatologists have debated a related question: how we actually go about attributing mental states to others (regardless of whether we ever achieve knowledge or rational (...) justification in this domain). Until the mid-nineties, the latter debate – which sometimes goes under the name of the “mindreading” debate – was characterized by a fairly clear-cut opposition between two theoretical outlooks: “theory-theory” (TT) and “simulation theory” (ST). Theory-theorists typically argued that we attribute mental states to others on the basis of a “theory of mind” that is either constructed in early infancy and subsequently revised and modified (Gopnik 1996), or else is the result of maturation of innate mindreading “modules” (Baron-Cohen 1995). (shrink)

Holly Smith has recently argued that Subjective Deontological Moral Theories (SDM theories) cannot adequately account for agents’ duties to gather information. I defend SDM theories against this charge and argue that they can account for agents’ duties to inform themselves. Along the way, I develop some principles governing how SDM theories, and deontological moral theories in general, should assign ‘deontic value’ or ‘deontic weight’ to particular actions.

The ascription of desires or beliefs to other people is a milestone of human sociality. It allows us to understand, explain, and predict human behaviour. During the last years, research on children's knowledge about the mental world, better known as theory of mind research, has become a central topic in developmental psychology and the role of cultural impact is subject of various theoretical yet hitherto few empirical accounts. This book is the result of intensive collaboration between anthropologists and psychologists in (...) the field of cross-cultural research on social cognitive development. Five interdisciplinary research teams, coming from the University of Heidelberg, were investigating five Pacific Island societies. All together, they were interested in the question of how and when children in these different cultures come to assign mental states to others. This unique research project combines sound ethnography of different Pacific cultures with thoroughly conducted experimental work, done by developmental psychologists; it presents a shared, thoughtful analysis of the results and provides deeper insight into current debates on the ontogeny of theory of mind competencies. (shrink)

The subject’s perspective objection (SPO) is an objection against externalist theories of justification, warrant, and knowledge. In this article, I show that externalists can accommodate the SPO while remaining externalist. So, even if the SPO is successful, it does not motivate internalism, and the primary motivation for internalism has been lost. After this, I provide an explanation for why so many people find cases that motivate the SPO convincing.

Bayesianism is the position that scientific reasoning is probabilistic and that probabilities are adequately interpreted as an agent's actual subjective degrees of belief, measured by her betting behaviour. Confirmation is one important aspect of scientific reasoning. The thesis of this paper is the following: if scientific reasoning is at all probabilistic, the subjective interpretation has to be given up in order to get right confirmation—and thus scientific reasoning in general. The Bayesian approach to scientific reasoning Bayesian confirmation theory The example (...) The less reliable the source of information, the higher the degree of Bayesian confirmation Measure sensitivity A more general version of the problem of old evidence Conditioning on the entailment relation The counterfactual strategy Generalizing the counterfactual strategy The desired result, and a necessary and sufficient condition for it Actual degrees of belief The common knock-down feature, or ‘anything goes’ The problem of prior probabilities. (shrink)

It is well known that classical, aka ‘sharp’, Bayesian decision theory, which models belief states as single probability functions, faces a number of serious difficulties with respect to its handling of agnosticism. These difficulties have led to the increasing popularity of so-called ‘imprecise’ models of decision-making, which represent belief states as sets of probability functions. In a recent paper, however, Adam Elga has argued in favour of a putative normative principle of sequential choice that he claims to be borne out (...) by the sharp model but not by any promising incarnation of its imprecise counterpart. After first pointing out that Elga has fallen short of establishing that his principle is indeed uniquely borne out by the sharp model, I cast aspersions on its plausibility. I show that a slight weakening of the principle is satisfied by at least one, but interestingly not all, varieties of the imprecise model and point out that Elga has failed to motivate his stronger commitment. (shrink)

Christian von Ehrenfels was a student of both Franz Brentano and Carl Menger and his thinking on value theory was inspired both by Brentano’s descriptive psychology and by the subjective theory of economic value advanced by Menger, the founder of the Austrian school of economics. Value, for Ehrenfels, is a function of desire, and we ascribe value to those things which we either do in fact desire, or would desire if we were not convinced of their existence. He asserts that (...) the needed theoretical understanding of values is to be achieved by generalizing economic laws of valuation to apply to value in general. The law of marginal utility, for example, is a law to the effect that the n+1st sample of a good which I receive is ceteris paribus less valuable than the nth sample (imagine that the samples in question are, for example, a series of identical ham sandwiches). The essay describes how Ehrenfels provides on this basis an account of the different types of values, both intrinsic and non-intrinsic. It outlines also Ehrenfels views on the problem of interpersonal value-comparisons and on the struggle for survival between different values of different types. (shrink)

Things strike me in a variety ways. F and F# sound slightly different, ripe and unripe tomatoes neither look nor taste nor smell the same, and silk feels smoother than corduroy. In each case, I distinguish an experience of something on the basis of what it is like to be its subject. That is to say, in philosophical parlance, if not quite the vernacular, its “quale,” leads me to categorize it and, thus, respond appropriately to its stimulus. The function of (...) a quale being established, we must define it along with its subject and, as Sartre maintained, their relation. How should we understand the subject and predicate terms and the copula in sentences such as ‘He is listening to Chopin’ or ‘She is seeing the sights of Paris’? Elaborating upon adverbialism, I shall argue that the subject of experiencing is a hylomorphic compound that is temporarily identical to the 'accidental compound' that it forms along with a qualified passion. I begin by explicating the adverbialist’s treatment of qualitative consciousness and defending it against the charge of circularity. (shrink)

As with terms such as “human rights”, “democracy”, and “equality”, the notion of “freedom” has an emblematic character with highly normative overtones. After the declaration of universal human rights, one might argue that freedom is – at least formally – a universal entitlement belonging to every human being. However, this universalist structure is built upon a conflictual foundation, as the juridico-political meaning of freedom is determined by the boundaries of national citizenship, statehood, and territorial sovereignty. This chapter examines refugeehood as (...) a normal by-product of the post-colonial world order, embodying the counter-history of nation-states whose internal borders, walls, and external fortifications are growingly being militarised and reinforced. Refugeehood represents an anomalous juridico-political condition that cannot be elucidated by colonial-racial binaries such as inclusion versus exclusion or rightlessness versus national citizenship. The central idea of this chapter is that, for refugees, the meaning of freedom and unfreedom are intertwined and should be approached as a dynamic relationship characterising the state of (non)-subjectivity. As political (non)-subjects, refugees call structural determinations of unfreedom into question. Refugees’ freedom is expressed in the act of flight and border crossing, irregular migratory movement, language games of resistance, and other emancipatory signifying practices by which they claim a place of refuge in the world. (shrink)

Where does the impetus towards ethical theory come from? What drives humans to make values explicit, consistent, and discursively justifiable? This paper situates the demand for ethical theory in human life by identifying the practical needs that give rise to it. Such a practical derivation puts the demand in its place: while finding a home for it in the public decision-making of modern societies, it also imposes limitations on the demand by presenting it as scalable and context-sensitive. This differentiates strong (...) forms of the demand calling for theory from weaker forms calling for less, and contexts where it has a place from contexts where it is out of place. In light of this, subjecting personal deliberation to the demand turns out to involve a trade-off. (shrink)

In this dissertation, I construct scientifically and practically adequate moral analogs of cognitive heuristics and biases. Cognitive heuristics are reasoning “shortcuts” that are efficient but flawed. Such flaws yield systematic judgment errors—i.e., cognitive biases. For example, the availability heuristic infers an event’s probability by seeing how easy it is to recall similar events. Since dramatic events, such as airplane crashes, are disproportionately easy to recall, this heuristic explains systematic overestimations of their probability (availability bias). The research program on cognitive heuristics (...) and biases (e.g., Daniel Kahneman’s work) has been scientifically successful and has yielded useful error-prevention techniques—i.e., cognitive debiasing. I attempt to apply this framework to moral reasoning to yield moral heuristics and biases. For instance, a moral bias of unjustified differences in the treatment of particular animal species might be partially explained by a moral heuristic that dubiously infers animals’ moral status from their aesthetic features. While the basis for identifying judgments as cognitive errors is often unassailable (e.g., per violating laws of logic), identifying moral errors seemingly requires appealing to moral truth, which, I argue, is problematic within science. Such appeals can be avoided by repackaging moral theories as mere “standards-of-interest” (a la non-normative metrics of purportedly right-making features/properties). However, standards-of-interest do not provide authority, which is needed for effective debiasing. Nevertheless, since each person deems their own subjective morality authoritative, subjective morality (qua standard-of-interest and not moral subjectivism) satisfies both scientific and practical concerns. As such, (idealized) subjective morality grounds a moral analog of cognitive biases—namely, subjective moral biases (e.g., committed anti-racists unconsciously discriminating). I also argue that "cognitive heuristic" is defined by its contrast with rationality. Consequently, heuristics explain biases, which are also so defined. However, such contrasting with rationality is causally irrelevant to cognition. This frustrates the presumed usefulness of the kind, heuristic, in causal explanation. As such, in the moral case, I jettison the role of causal explanation and tailor categories solely for contrastive explanation. As such, “moral heuristic” is replaced with "subjective moral fallacy," which is defined by its contrast with subjective morality and explains subjective moral biases. The resultant subjective moral biases and fallacies framework can undergird future empirical research. (shrink)

In this paper I argue for a syncretistic theory of depiction, which combines the merits of the main paradigms which have hitherto faced themselves on this issue, namely the perceptualist and semioticist approaches. The syncretistic theory indeed takes from the former its stress on experiential factors and from the latter its stress on conventional factors. But the theory is even more syncretistic than this, for the way it accounts for the experiential factor vindicates several claims defended by different perceptualist (...) class='Hi'>theories. In a nutshell, according to the syncretistic theory a picture depicts its subject iff i) it is transformed into an entity-cum-meaning and ii) one has the twofold experience of seeing that subject in the picture qua noninterpreted entity, the image, just in case one consciously misrecognizes it in consciously seeing that image, for that subject resembles the image in some grouping properties (originally labelled Gestalt-qualities in psychology). By appealing to objective resemblance in grouping properties, the theory can vindicate what are nowadays taken to be the most neglected doctrines in the perceptualist camp: objective resemblance theories. By appealing, moreover, to conscious misrecognition, the theory not only squares with both the seeing-in and the recognition theories of depiction, but it also shows the grain of truth in illusion theories of depiction, since conscious misrecognition is a kind of perceptual illusion. (shrink)

This paper explores the events surrounding a string of robberies from the homes of young celebrities living in Los Angeles County by a group of teenagers referred to by the media as “The Bling Ring.” It argues that the group demonstrates the intersections of desire and materiality under the conditions of a culture driven by idolization of the celebrity, referring to the works of Jean Baudrillard, Pierre Bourdieu, and French collective Tiqqun. It further examines the events as a moment where (...) subjects were able to escape the life-narratives imposed upon them by the State. Rather than adhering to the norms of regular adolescent life, reproduced and enforced through what Michael Shapiro identifies as “national-time,” members of the Bling Ring endeavored to create their own lives according to what I refer to as “celebrity-time,” revealing processes of becoming in the work of Gilles Deleuze, and plasticity in that of Catherine Malabou. (shrink)

My concern in this paper is the role of subjectivity in the pursuit of the good. I propose that subjective thought as well as a subjective mental process underappreciated in philosophical psychology – contemplation – are instrumental for discovering and apprehending a whole range of value. In fact, I will argue that our primary contact with these values is through experience and that they could not be properly understood in any other way. This means that subjectivity is central (...) to our evaluative lives. (shrink)

In this article I argue for a novel theory of representational content, which I call ‘subjective externalism’. The view combines an internal, subjective constraint on the attribution of thought content which traditionally underpins internalist theories of thought, and an external, objective constraint on the attribution of thought content which traditionally underpins externalist theories of thought. While internalism and externalism are mutually inconsistent, the constraints to which each theory is committed are not. It is this realization that opens up (...) the conceptual space for subjective externalism, according to which the correct attribution of thought content to an individual is essentially constrained by her nonrepresentational relations to objective manifest properties in her wider reality. (shrink)

For generations of scholars the emergence of the notion of human subjectivity has marked the shift to philosophical modernity. Mainly traced back to Descartes’s founding of philosophy on the Cogito and to Kant’s ‘Copernican Revolution’, the rise of subjectivity has been linked to the rise of the modern age in terms of a reconsideration of reality starting from an analysis of the human self and consciousness. Consequently, it has been related to long-standing issues of identity, individuation and individuality (...) as a foremost topic on the agenda of the philosophers. Only in recent times, however, have comprehensive studies on early modern theories of subjectivity and individuality become available to scholars. […] Since the complexity of these topics and of their historiographical treatment is increasing, the only way to shed light on them is to intensify the debate itself. As a multi-authored collection of essays, the present issue of Society and Politics is not aimed at addressing or endorsing a particular position in these debates: rather, it questions and calls attention to the issues of subjectivity and individuality in their historical development, encouraging the debate on topics recently analysed. (shrink)

I respond to an argument presented by Daniel Povinelli and Jennifer Vonk that the current generation of experiments on chimpanzee theory of mind cannot decide whether chimpanzees have the ability to reason about mental states. I argue that Povinelli and Vonk's proposed experiment is subject to their own criticisms and that there should be a more radical shift away from experiments that ask subjects to predict behavior. Further, I argue that Povinelli and Vonk's theoretical commitments should lead them to accept (...) this new approach, and that experiments which offer subjects the opportunity to look for explanations for anomalous behavior should be explored. (shrink)

Most moral theories share certain features in common with other theories. They consist of a set of propositions that are universal, general, and hence impartial. The propositions that constitute a typical moral theory are (1) universal, in that they apply to all subjects designated as within their scope. They are (2) general, in that they include no proper names or definite descriptions. They are therefore (3) impartial, in that they accord no special privilege to any particular agent's situation (...) which cannot be justified under (2) and (3). These three features do not distinguish moral theories from other theories, nor indeed from most general categorical propositions we assert. Yet, in recent years, these features of moral theories have been the target of a certain concerted and sustained criticism, namely, that to be committed to such a moral theory, or to aspire to act in accordance with its requirements, results in what has come to be known as moral alienation. Moral alienation, according to this criticism, consists in (i) viewing one's ground projects from an impersonal, "moral point of view" engendered by one's acceptance of the theory; (ii) being prepared to sacrifice these projects to the requirements of moral principle; and (iii) making such a sacrifice specifically and self-consciously in order to conform to these requirements. Moral alienation is said to manifest itself in one (or both) of two ways, depending on the nature of the project thus susceptible to sacrifice. One may be alienated from oneself, if the project consists of tastes, convictions, or aspirations that are centrally definitive of one's self. In this case one's commitment to the project can be at best conditional on its congruence with one's moral theory. It is claimed that this must make for a rather tepid and unenthusiastic commitment indeed. Alternatively, one may be alienated from others, if the project is an interpersonal relationship such as a friendship, marriage, or collegial relationship. In this case one's responses to the other are motivated by one's awareness of what one's moral theory requires. It is claimed that this obstructs a genuine and unmediated emotional response to the other as such. My aim here will be to argue that this very compelling criticism - call it the moral-alienation criticism - is nevertheless misdirected. The real culprit is not any particular moral theory, but rather a certain familiar personality type that may or may not adopt it. (shrink)

Coastal protection is crucial to human development since the ocean has many values associated with the economy, ecosystem, and culture. However, most ocean protecting efforts are currently ineffective due to the burdens of finance, lack of appropriate management, and international cooperation regimes. For aiding bottom-up initiatives for ocean protection support, this study employed the Mindsponge Theory to examine how the public’s perceived economic and cultural values influence their willingness to support actions to protect the ocean. Analyzing the European-Union-Horizon-2020-funded dataset of (...) 709 respondents from 42 countries, we discovered that perceived economic values have negative effects on the tendency of ocean protection supports (i.e., food, transportation, renewable energy, oil and gas, and recreation). In contrast, certain perceived cultural values can help increase the willingness to do so (i.e., mental well-being and sense of identity). However, the effects of perceived cultural values are only moderately reliable. These findings suggest that designing cultural information delivery campaigns can help promote coastal reserve supports, such as fundraisings and preserving the oceans from the community. (shrink)

The deduction of categories in the 1781 edition of the Critique of the Pure Reason (A Deduction) has “two sides”—the “objective deduction” and the “subjective deduction”. Kant seems ambivalent about the latter deduction. I treat it as a significant episode of Kant’s thinking about categories that extended from the early 1770s to around 1790. It contains his most detailed answer to the question about the origin of categories that he formulated in the 1772 letter to Marcus Herz. The answer is (...) that categories are generated a priori through a kind of intellectual “epigenesis”. This account leaves unexplained why precisely such and such categories should be generated. While this observation caused Kant to worry about the hypothetical status of the subjective deduction in 1781, he would come to acquiesce in the recognition that the ground of the possibility of categories is itself inscrutable. I call this his “methodological skepticism”. (shrink)

Error theories about morality often take as their starting point the supposed queerness of morality, and those resisting these arguments often try to argue by analogy that morality is no more queer than other unproblematic subject matters. Here, error theory (as exemplified primarily by the work of Richard Joyce) is resisted first by arguing that it assumes a common, modern, and peculiarly social conception of morality. Then error theorists point out that the social nature of morality requires one to (...) act against one's self-interest while insisting on the categorical, inescapable, or overriding status of moral considerations: they argue that morality requires magic, then (rightly) claim that there is no such thing as magic. An alternate eudaimonist conception of morality is introduced which itself has an older provenance than the social point of view, dating to the ancient Greeks. Eudaimonism answers to the normative requirements of morality, yet does not require magic. Thus, the initial motivation for error theory is removed. (shrink)