In this paper, I aim to do three things. First, I introduce the distinction between the Uniqueness Thesis (U) and what I call the Conditional Uniqueness Thesis (U*). Second, I argue that despite their official advertisements, some prominent uniquers effectively defend U* rather than U. Third, some influential considerations that have been raised by the opponents of U misfire if they are interpreted as against U*. The moral is that an appreciation of the distinction between U and U* (...) helps to clarify the contours of the uniqueness debate and to avoid a good deal of talking past each other. (shrink)

The paper provides a critical review of the debate on the foundations of Computer Ethics (CE). Starting from a discussion of Moor’s classic interpretation of the need for CE caused by a policy and conceptual vacuum, five positions in the literature are identified and discussed: the “no resolution approach”, according to which CE can have no foundation; the professional approach, according to which CE is solely a professional ethics; the radical approach, according to which CE deals with absolutely unique (...) issues, in need of a unique approach; the conservative approach, according to which CE is only a particular applied ethics, discussing new species of traditional moral issues; and the innovative approach, according to which theoretical CE can expand the metaethical discourse with a substantially new perspective. In the course of the analysis, it is argued that, although CE issues are not uncontroversially unique, they are sufficiently novel to render inadequate the adoption of standard macroethics, such as Utilitarianism and Deontologism, as the foundation of CE and hence to prompt the search for a robust ethical theory. Information Ethics (IE) is proposed for that theory, as the satisfactory foundation for CE. IE is characterised as a biologically unbiased extension of environmental ethics, based on the concepts of information object/infosphere/entropy rather than life/ecosystem/pain. In light of the discussion provided in this paper, it is suggested that CE is worthy of independent study because it requires its own application-specific knowledge and is capable of supporting a methodological foundation, IE. (shrink)

In this article, against the background of a notion of ‘assembled’ truth, the evolutionary progressiveness of a theory is suggested as novel and promising explanation for the success of science. A new version of realism in science, referred to as ‘naturalised realism’ is outlined. Naturalised realism is ‘fallibilist’ in the unique sense that it captures and mimics the self-corrective core of scientific knowledge and its progress. It is argued that naturalised realism disarms Kyle Stanford’s anti-realist ‘new induction’ threats by showing (...) that ‘explanationism’ and his ‘epistemic instrumentalism’ are just two positions among many on a constantly evolving continuum of options between instrumentalism and full-blown realism. In particular it is demonstrated that not only can naturalised realism redefine the terms of realist debate in such a way that no talk of miracles need enter the debate, but it also promises interesting defenses against inductive- and under-determination-based anti-realist arguments. (shrink)

Is morality uniquely human or does morality exist in at least some non-human animals? Are animals full-fledged moral creatures or do they merely exhibit proto-morality—evolutionary building blocks or precursors to morality, but not quite the genuine article? Such questions, prompted by remarkable advances in empirical research into the social and emotional lives of non-human animals, have aroused much recent interest amongst scientists, philosophers, and in the popular media, not least for their apparent bearing on questions of human uniqueness, evolution, (...) and the ethical status of animals. The debate over animal morality has produced many valuable contributions and stimulated new areas for empirical and theoretical research. However, focusing on these questions has led researchers to talk at cross-purposes and down some unproductive paths. The problem concerns the terms ‘morality’ and ‘moral’. (shrink)

Biological individuality is a notoriously thorny topic for biologists and philosophers of biology. In this paper we argue that biological individuality presents multiple, interconnected questions for biologists and philosophers that together form a problem agenda. Using a case study of an interdisciplinary research group in ecology, behavioral and evolutionary biology, we claim that a debate on biological individuality that seeks to account for diverse practices in the biological sciences should be broadened to include and give prominence to questions about (...) uniqueness and temporality. We show that broadening the problem agenda of biological individuality draws attention to underrecognized philosophical issues and discussions and thereby organizes and enriches the existing debate. (shrink)

Waters’s (2007) actual difference making and Weber’s (2013, 2017) biological normality approaches to causal selection have received many criticisms, some of which miss their target. Disagreement about whether Waters’s and Weber’s views succeed in providing criteria that uniquely singles out the gene as explanatorily significant in biology has led philosophers to overlook a prior problem. Before one can address whether Waters’s and Weber’s views successfully account for the explanatory significance of genes, one must ask whether either view satisfactorily meets the (...) necessary conditions for causal selection in the first place. An adequate defense of causal selection must meet two desiderata. First, there must be an explanatory property that sets some causes apart from others. Second, the property identified must be one that is recognized by biologists as relevant to their domain(s) of inquiry. I argue that both fall short of meeting the second condition. I demonstrate this by showing how many of the biological technologies crucial to experimentation do not fit either view very well. I offer a more adequate proposal that accommodates non-actual and artificial causal variables. A consequence of my view is the following: When analyzing the causal selection practices of biologists, philosophers should consider the explanatory targets relevant to a research program – including ones whose explanans must appeal to biological technologies. I then explain how this proposal can inform the existing debate between Weber (2017) and Griffiths et al. (2015). (shrink)

David Furley's work on the cosmologies of classical antiquity is structured around what he calls "two pictures of the world." The first picture, defended by both Plato and Aristotle, portrays the universe, or all that there is (to pan), as identical with our particular ordered world-system. Thus, the adherents of this view claim that the universe is finite and unique. The second system, defended by Leucippus and Democritus, portrays an infinite universe within which our particular kosmos is only one of (...) countless kosmoi. Aristotle's argument in De caelo I.9 that the world is necessarily unique is an important contribution to this debate. This argument holds interest because it shows Aristotle wrestling with an apparent inconsistency in his own philosophy, as deeply-held convictions within his cosmology collide with an equally deeply-held conviction within his metaphysics. The following three principles, each of which Aristotle appears committed to, are inconsistent: -/- The cosmic uniqueness principle. The world is necessarily unique. The cosmic form principle. The world is an ordered, structured unity. As such, the world has a form. The possibility of multiple instantiation principle. For all F, if F is a form, it is possible that there exist multiple Fs. In De caelo I.9, Aristotle argues that we can establish the uniqueness of the universe, reject the multiple instantiation principle, yet still retain the distinction between 'this world' and 'world in general,' if the following is true (as it is): the world takes up all the matter that exists. Aristotle illustrates this argument with one of the stranger analogies in his corpus: imagine an aquiline nose that takes up all the flesh in the universe. If this were so, then there could not exist any other aquiline objects whatsoever. (For this reason, we dub the De caelo I.9 argument the 'Cosmic Nose argument.') This paper is an interpretation of how this argument is supposed to proceed and an assessment of its success. The first section states the problem Aristotle is confronted with, sorts through Aristotle's various statements of the Cosmic Nose argument, which exhibit some sloppiness, and reconstructs charitably a single argument. We also spend some time examining the significance of Aristotle's example of a gigantic aquiline nose. We argue that, even charitably reconstructed, the argument appears to commit a serious modal fallacy. The remainder of the paper explores whether this modal fallacy can be overcome. We conclude that, although not a cogent argument for the uniqueness of the world (as this would require a significant revision of our current astronomy), the Cosmic Nose argument does succeed on its own terms. However, it should not be regarded as a free-standing argument for the uniqueness of the world. Instead, it depends crucially on the earlier argument in De caelo I.8 for the universe's uniqueness; De caelo I.9 should be viewed as an attempt to extend the conclusion of De caelo I.8 and to show how this conclusion can be made consistent with Aristotle's metaphysical principles about the nature of form. (shrink)

The recent news of a 13-year-old Singaporean prodigy graduating from an Australian university has sparked discussion about Singapore’s approach to nurturing exceptional young talents, especially after it was revealed that the boy had been previously rejected by a local university because of his young age. Some have called for an increased flexibility to allow such young people to skip levels in Singapore - parents of intellectually advanced children often cite concerns that their children are disengaged and bored at school. The (...) fear is real - keeping these students at the same level as their peers could potentially squander their potential and impede their growth. Yet, on the flip side, accelerating their academic journey could potentially jeopardise their social and emotional development, which could negatively impact their ability to connect and work well with their peers in their adulthood. Nonetheless, this debate brings to light the need for more effective strategies to meaningfully engage students with diverse abilities and learning paces. (shrink)

The most important problem of modern political philosophy is the loss of politics’ independence from other spheres of human activity. Since the beginning of the last century, philosophers have sought to justify the uniqueness of political being and to update the modern politicalphilosophical vocabulary by redefining the categories of antiquity (e.g. τὸ ᾰ̓γᾰθόν, φῐλία, παρρησία, etc.). The article is devoted to the approach to the rehabilitation of the political sphere based on the political-philosophical experience of the ancient Greeks. The (...) theoretical basis of the study is H. Arendt’s solution of the issue of depoliticization in the context of her reminiscences of the ancient heritage. The author turns to the notion of civic friendship, which largely determines Arendt’s contribution to the discussions on the rehabilitation of politics and acts as a practice endowing the community with political potential. On the basis of Arendt’s interpretation of the political philosophy of Socrates, Plato and Aristotle, the author justifies the appeal to this notion and shows the connection of civic friendship with other categories of ancient thought (truth, opinion, Maieutics). The analysis reveals that the requirement borrowed from Socrates to eliminate truth from the sphere of human affairs puts Arendt’s philosophy in opposition to the tradition of political thought, and the use of political-philosophical categories to describe the human lifeworld allows us to consider it as a version of the hermeneutics of the subject. The author concludes that the justification of politics by means of ancient thought has an original anthropological dimension. It consists in the recognition of the significance of political action for the orientation of man in the world and the assertion of his identity in the community. (shrink)

Feelings of marginalisation impact the lives of LGBT+ people in a fundamental way, but for those who have an intellectual disability, and are gay, there is a heightened sense of alienation. This article examines the unique oppression faced by these individuals in a heteronormative and ableist world, where a long history of extreme control of sexual intimacy has resulted in harsh forms of social exclusion. Although moves have been made to empower service users who are intellectually disabled and identify as (...) LGBT+ to participate fully in life, there is also a need to assess the relationship between rights, responsibility, and risk. This article further explores whether by drawing upon government social policy, barriers are being dismantled through the development of innovative local strategies that aim to deliver non-discriminatory person-centred services. (shrink)

Whether non-human animals can have episodic memories remains the subject of extensive debate. A number of prominent memory researchers defend the view that animals do not have the same kind of episodic memory as humans do, whereas others argue that some animals have episodic-like memory—i.e., they can remember what, where and when an event happened. Defining what constitutes episodic memory has proven to be difficult. In this paper, I propose a dual systems account and provide evidence for a distinction (...) between event memory and episodic memory. Event memory is a perceptual system that evolved to support adaptive short-term goal processing, whereas episodic memory is based on narratives, which bind event memories into a retrievable whole that is temporally and causally organized around subject’s goals. I argue that carefully distinguishing event memory from episodic memory can help resolve the debate. (shrink)

The debate between Uniqueness and Permissivism concerns whether a body of evidence sometimes allows multiple doxastic attitudes towards a proposition. An important motivation for Uniqueness is the so-called ‘arbitrariness argument,’ which says that Permissivism leads to some unacceptable arbitrariness with regard to one's beliefs. An influential response to the argument says that the arbitrariness in beliefs can be avoided by invoking epistemic standards. In this paper, I argue that such a response to the arbitrariness argument is unsuccessful. (...) Then I defend a new response: contrary to common conception, the arbitrariness resulted by Permissivism is acceptable. The basic idea is that the arbitrariness resulted by Permissivism is analogous to the arbitrariness in permissive actions and the latter arbitrariness is intuitively acceptable. I answer three possible objections against this analogy, which are all motivated by the thought that beliefs aim at the truth. In addressing the last objection, I draw inspiration from the recent debate on transformative experience. (shrink)

Permissivism is the thesis that, for some body of evidence and a proposition p, there is more than one rational doxastic attitude any agent with that evidence can take toward p. Proponents of uniqueness deny permissivism, maintaining that every body of evidence always determines a single rational doxastic attitude. In this paper, we explore the debate between permissivism and uniqueness about evidence, outlining some of the major arguments on each side. We then consider how permissivism can be (...) understood as an underdetermination thesis, and show how this moves the debate forward in fruitful ways: in distinguishing between different types of permissivism, in dispelling classic objections to permissivism, and in shedding light on the relationship between permissivism and evidentialism. (shrink)

One famous debate in contemporary epistemology considers whether there is always one unique, epistemically rational way to respond to a given body of evidence. Generally speaking, answering “yes” to this question makes one a proponent of the Uniqueness thesis, while those who answer “no” are called “permissivists”. Another influential recent debate concerns whether non-truth-related factors can be the basis of epistemic justification, knowledge, or rational belief. Traditional theories answer “no”, and are therefore considered “purists”. However, more recently (...) many theorists have argued to the contrary, claiming that impurist factors, such as practical stakes, can sometimes encroach or even override truth-related considerations. This paper bridges the two debates by presenting and defending what I call “Impurist Permissivism”. I support Impurist Permissivism by showing how it can resist Roger White’s famous Argument from Arbitrariness (2005). (shrink)

Though there is a wide and varied literature on ethical supererogation, there has been almost nothing written about its epistemic counterpart, despite an intuitive analogy between the two fields. This paper seeks to change this state of affairs. I will begin by showing that there are examples which intuitively feature epistemically supererogatory doxastic states. Next, I will present a positive theory of epistemic supererogation that can vindicate our intuitions in these examples, in an explanation that parallels a popular theory of (...) ethical supererogation. Roughly, I will argue that a specific type of epistemic virtue—the ability to creatively think up plausible hypotheses given a body of evidence—is not required of epistemic agents. Thus, certain exercises of this virtue can result in supererogatory doxastic states. In presenting this theory, I will also show how thinking about epistemic supererogation can provide us a new way forward in the debate about the uniqueness thesis for epistemic rationality. (shrink)

Epistemologists often appeal to the idea that a normative theory must provide useful, usable, guidance to argue for one normative epistemology over another. I argue that this is a mistake. Guidance considerations have no role to play in theory choice in epistemology. I show how this has implications for debates about the possibility and scope of epistemic dilemmas, the legitimacy of idealisation in Bayesian epistemology, uniqueness versus permissivism, sharp versus mushy credences, and internalism versus externalism.

The biological race debate is at an impasse. Issues surrounding hereditarianism aside, there is little empirical disagreement left between race naturalists and anti-realists about biological race. The disagreement is now primarily semantic. This would seem to uniquely qualify philosophers to contribute to the biological race debate. However, philosophers of race are reluctant to focus on semantics, largely because of their worries about the ‘flight to reference’. In this paper, I show how philosophers can contribute to the debate (...) without taking the flight to reference. Drawing on the theory of reference literature and the history of meaning change in science, I develop some criteria for dealing with cases where there is uncertainty about reference. I then apply these criteria to the biological race debate. All of the criteria I develop for eliminating putative kinds are met in the case of ‘race’ as understood by twentieth century geneticist Theodosius Dobzhansky and his contemporary proponents, suggesting that we should eliminate it from our biological ontology. (shrink)

Cognitive scientists have been debating how the folk concept of intentional action works. We suggest a simple account: people consider that an agent did X intentionally to the extent that X was causally dependent on how much the agent wanted X to happen (or not to happen). Combined with recent models of human causal cognition, this definition provides a good account of the way people use the concept of intentional action, and offers natural explanations for puzzling phenomena such as the (...) side-effect effect. We provide empirical support for our theory, in studies where we show that people’s causation and intentionality judgments track each other closely, in everyday situations as well as in scenarios with unusual causal structures. Study 5 additionally shows that the effect of norm violations on intentionality judgments depends on the causal structure of the situation, in a way uniquely predicted by our theory. Taken together, these results suggest that the folk concept of intentional action has been difficult to define because it is made of cognitive building blocks, such as our intuitive concept of causation, whose logic cognitive scientists are just starting to understand. (shrink)

Political protests, debates on college campuses, and social media tirades make it seem like everyone is speaking their minds today. Surveys, however, reveal that many people increasingly feel like they're walking on eggshells when communicating in public. Speaking your mind can risk relationships and professional opportunities. It can alienate friends and anger colleagues. Isn't it smarter to just put your head down and keep quiet about controversial topics? In this book, Hrishikesh Joshi offers a novel defense of speaking your mind. (...) He explains that because we are social creatures, we never truly think alone. What we know depends on what our community knows. And by bringing our unique perspectives to bear upon public discourse, we enhance our collective ability to reach the truth on a variety of important matters. Speaking your mind is also important for your own sake. It is essential for developing your own thinking. And it's a core aspect of being intellectually courageous and independent. Joshi argues that such independence is a crucial part of a well-lived life. The book draws from Aristotle, John Stuart Mill, Friedrich Nietzsche, Bertrand Russell, and a range of contemporary thinkers to argue that it's OK to speak your mind. Key Features Shows that we have not just a right but a moral duty to publicly share what we know. Argues that discussing your unique ideas with others is essential for developing as a critical thinker. Explores the value of intellectual honesty and independence in the writings of John Stuart Mill and Friedrich Nietzsche and connects their thinking to contemporary problems. Argues that avoiding cultural blind spots today is important for the fate of future generations. (shrink)

The current debate concerning musical profundity was instigated, and set up by Peter Kivy in his book Music Alone (1990) as part of his comprehensive defense of enhanced formalism, a position he championed vigorously throughout his entire career. Kivy’s view of music led him to maintain utter skepticism regarding musical profundity. The scholarly debate that ensued centers on the question whether or not (at least some) music can be profound. In this study I would like to take the (...) opportunity to relate Wittgenstein’s ideas on music to this current debate, thereby achieving a twofold goal: not only to reintroduce Wittgenstein’s ideas into the current debate, but also to use the current debate as a foil to better appreciating Wittgenstein’s otherness as a philosopher of music. I argue that Wittgenstein’s unique philosophical response to the Romantic framing of the discourse concerning musical profundity —specifically, its threefold emphasis on the specificity, aboutness, and artistically exalted status of music— occasioned a view, which was bound to be glossed over by a philosophical tradition, whose origins had made it inimical to Wittgenstein’s original philosophical insights. I conclude that, in a sense, Wittgenstein occasions a paradigm shift by his philosophical thrust to undo the gravitational forces which form the current debate: the very idea of aboutness pertaining to music, and the very idea that a clear line could ever be drawn between music and language. (shrink)

This essay offers a uniquely feminist interpretation of Book III in Aristotle's Nicomachean Ethics by examining the relevance of Aristotle's ethical framework to modern intersectional debates. I begin with an analysis of Aristotle's distinctions between involuntary, voluntary, mixed, and nonvoluntary actions, along with his nuanced discussion of ignorance. I then examine the implications of these concepts in contemporary social issues, and emphasize their potential to make intersectionality more accessible and fostering a constructive dialogue on prejudice. These concepts are then applied (...) through a modern lens to reveal the blameworthy and inexcusable nature of conservative ignorance towards intersectional issues in our current socio-political landscape. I assert that Aristotle provides a framework for intersectional feminists to address socio-political ignorance and discrimination, and argue for the importance of evaluating beliefs and actions to ensure their positive contribution to ones character. (shrink)

There is ongoing debate on whether Juche (주체/主體), the North Korean state ideology, is indigenous, Marxist-Leninist, or Confucian—or if it’s a real philosophy at all. In this article, I introduce Juche and show how characteristics that philosophers identify to be unique or pronounced in premodern Korean philosophy can be found in Juche as well. Intellectual adaptation, pragmaticism, and an emphasis on continual improvement are prominent in both premodern Korean thought and Juche. Juche should be understood as a politically inflected (...) outgrowth that is embedded within the larger context of Korean philosophy. (shrink)

The contemporary debate in the philosophy of literature is strongly shaped by the anticognitivist challenge, according to which works of literary fiction (that contain propositions that are neither literally true nor affirmed by the author) cannot impart (relevant) knowledge to the readers or enrich their worldly understanding. Anti-cognitivists appreciate works of literary fiction for their aesthetic values and so risk to reduce them to mere ornaments that are entertaining, but eventually useless. Many philosophers have reacted to this challenge by (...) pointing at ways in which works of literary fiction can be informative even though they lack worldly reference: it has been argued, for example, that works of fictions are thought experiments; that they add not to our theoretical knowledge, but to our know-how or to our phenomenal knowledge; or that that they help readers to understand the perspectives of others. A stubborn defense of literary cognitivism, however, risks to collapse into an instrumental understanding of literature. In my paper I suggest that both sides in the debate focus too narrowly on semantic features of the works in question that is tied to what I will call the “referential picture” of language. A shift perspective is needed: for one, we ought to fully appreciate that the term “literature” does not refer to a homogeneous phenomenon, but rather to a very heterogeneous and multifarious set of works that are read by many different readers for many different reasons in many different ways. Second, we need to understand that these works have in common much more than the semantic peculiarity of lacking worldly reference: they are a unique means of communication between authors and readers – and in particular the role of the latter is often neglected in contemporary debate. These two points should help us to get a more comprehensive understanding of the practice of literature and the vast range of values we can find works of literary fiction – and the interplay between them. (shrink)

An ongoing debate in the philosophy of action concerns the prevalence of moral luck: instances in which an agent’s moral responsibility is due, at least in part, to factors beyond his control. I point to a unique problem of moral luck for agents who depend upon Brain Computer Interfaces (BCIs) for bodily movement. BCIs may misrecognize a voluntarily formed distal intention (e.g., a plan to commit some illicit act in the future) as a control command to perform some overt (...) behavior now. If so, then BCI-agents may be deserving of punishment for the unlucky but foreseeable outcomes of their voluntarily formed plans, whereas standard counterparts who abandon their plans are not. However, it seems that the only relevant difference between BCI-agents and their standard counterparts is just a matter of luck. I briefly sketch different solutions that attempt to avoid this type of moral luck, while remaining agnostic on whether any succeeds. If none of these solutions succeeds, then there may be a unique type of moral luck that is unavoidable with respect to deserving punishment for certain BCI-mediated behaviors. (shrink)

Moral reasoning traditionally distinguishes two types of evil:moral (ME) and natural (NE). The standard view is that ME is the product of human agency and so includes phenomena such as war,torture and psychological cruelty; that NE is the product of nonhuman agency, and so includes natural disasters such as earthquakes, floods, disease and famine; and finally, that more complex cases are appropriately analysed as a combination of ME and NE. Recently, as a result of developments in autonomous agents in cyberspace, (...) a new class of interesting and important examples of hybrid evil has come to light. In this paper, it is called artificial evil (AE) and a case is made for considering it to complement ME and NE to produce a more adequate taxonomy. By isolating the features that have led to the appearance of AE, cyberspace is characterised as a self-contained environment that forms the essential component in any foundation of the emerging field of Computer Ethics (CE). It is argued that this goes someway towards providing a methodological explanation of why cyberspace is central to so many of CE's concerns; and it is shown how notions of good and evil can be formulated in cyberspace. Of considerable interest is how the propensity for an agent's action to be morally good or evil can be determined even in the absence of biologically sentient participants and thus allows artificial agents not only to perpetrate evil (and fort that matter good) but conversely to `receive' or `suffer from' it. The thesis defended is that the notion of entropy structure, which encapsulates human value judgement concerning cyberspace in a formal mathematical definition, is sufficient to achieve this purpose and, moreover, that the concept of AE can be determined formally, by mathematical methods. A consequence of this approach is that the debate on whether CE should be considered unique, and hence developed as a Macroethics, may be viewed, constructively,in an alternative manner. The case is made that whilst CE issues are not uncontroversially unique, they are sufficiently novel to render inadequate the approach of standard Macroethics such as Utilitarianism and Deontologism and hence to prompt the search for a robust ethical theory that can deal with them successfully. The name Information Ethics (IE) is proposed for that theory. Itis argued that the uniqueness of IE is justified by its being non-biologically biased and patient-oriented: IE is an Environmental Macroethics based on the concept of data entity rather than life. It follows that the novelty of CE issues such as AE can be appreciated properly because IE provides a new perspective (though not vice versa). In light of the discussion provided in this paper, it is concluded that Computer Ethics is worthy of independent study because it requires its own application-specific knowledge and is capable of supporting a methodological foundation, Information Ethics. (shrink)

Much of contemporary political philosophy revolves around debates over perfectionism, which is the view that the state may, or should, promote valuable conceptions of the good life and discourage conceptions that are worthless or bad. Collis Tahzib has recently proposed a unique theory of perfectionism. I examine two central aspects of his theory: the amalgamation of public reason and perfectionism, and the employment of the Rawlsian lexical priority. I argue that Tahzib’s idea of perfectionist public reason has certain serious problems. (...) Additionally, Tahzib, like many other perfectionists, has neglected that many excellences are at once personal and civic. I sketch a perfectionist account of civic virtue, with the hope of opening up space for defending and justifying perfectionism. (shrink)

Moral reasoning traditionally distinguishes two types of evil: moral and natural. The standard view is that ME is the product of human agency and so includes phenomena such as war, torture and psychological cruelty; that NE is the product of nonhuman agency, and so includes natural disasters such as earthquakes, floods, disease and famine; and finally, that more complex cases are appropriately analysed as a combination of ME and NE. Recently, as a result of developments in autonomous agents in cyberspace, (...) a new class of interesting and important examples of hybrid evil has come to light. In this paper, it is called artificial evil and a case is made for considering it to complement ME and NE to produce a more adequate taxonomy. By isolating the features that have led to the appearance of AE, cyberspace is characterised as a self-contained environment that forms the essential component in any foundation of the emerging field of Computer Ethics. It is argued that this goes some way towards providing a methodological explanation of why cyberspace is central to so many of CE’s concerns; and it is shown how notions of good and evil can be formulated in cyberspace. Of considerable interest is how the propensity for an agent’s action to be morally good or evil can be determined even in the absence of biologically sentient participants and thus allows artificial agents not only to perpetrate evil but conversely to ‘receive’ or ‘suffer from’ it. The thesis defended is that the notion of entropy structure, which encapsulates human value judgement concerning cyberspace in a formal mathematical definition, is sufficient to achieve this purpose and, moreover, that the concept of AE can be determined formally, by mathematical methods. A consequence of this approach is that the debate on whether CE should be considered unique, and hence developed as a Macroethics, may be viewed, constructively, in an alternative manner. The case is made that whilst CE issues are not uncontroversially unique, they are sufficiently novel to render inadequate the approach of standard Macroethics such as Utilitarianism and Deontologism and hence to prompt the search for a robust ethical theory that can deal with them successfully. The name Information Ethics is proposed for that theory. It is argued that the uniqueness of IE is justified by its being non-biologically biased and patient-oriented: IE is an Environmental Macroethics based on the concept of data entity rather than life. It follows that the novelty of CE issues such as AE can be appreciated properly because IE provides a new perspective. In light of the discussion provided in this paper, it is concluded that Computer Ethics is worthy of independent study because it requires its own application-specific knowledge and is capable of supporting a methodological foundation, Information Ethics. (shrink)

In The World as Will and Representation (Vol. I, Book 3, § 52) by Arthur Schopenhauer we find the following, striking words: It is just this universality that belongs uniquely to music, together with the most precise distinctness, that gives it that high value as the panacea of all our sorrows. (p. 262) Accordingly, music ... is in the highest degree a universal language ... Yet its universality is by no means that empty universality of abstraction, but is of quite (...) a different kind; it is united with thorough and unmistakable distinctness. (p. 262) ... music expresses in an exceedingly universal language, in a material, that is, in mere tones, and with the greatest distinctness and truth, the inner being, the in-itself, of the world, which we think of under the concept of will (p. 264). These quotations contain an outright paradox: the meanings of music should be at the same time universal in the highest degree and characterised by the greatest distinctness. As it turns out this paradox does not follow merely from Schopenhauer's liking for brilliant, rethorical formulations. For it occurs in many contexts concerned with the expressive meaning of art, and especially music. Other occurrences of the dilemma are to be found in the writings of Felix Mendelssohn-Bartholdy and in the aesthetic theory of Susanne Langer formulated in chapter VIII, >On the Significance in Music of her book Philosophy in a New Key and it would be possible to quote many other sources. The persistently recurring nature of this paradox confirms that the issue will be central to any attempt at a complete theory of musical meaning. Furthermore, it may be essential for it to be resolved first if one aims to make sense of the relationship between musical and linguistic forms of meaning and, consequent upon this, to address the much debated question of whether music itself can be considered to be a language of the emotions. An attempt at a solution to the paradox in question constitutes the subject of this paper. For this purpose the framework and some notions of Langer's theory are used. The solution which I propose takes the form of distinguishing between two distinct notions of generality (which I will term 'generality' and 'abstractness'), as well as two distinct notions of particularity (which I will term 'specificity' and 'concreteness'), and involves assigning technically precise meanings to these with a view to constructing two relatively independent oppositions: on the one hand the concrete versus the abstract and, on the other, the specific versus the general. (Hints at such a solution are to be found both in Schopenhauer and in Langer). With the help of these notions it is, I believe, then possible to show that the arguments often quoted to the effect that musical meanings possess a certain generality in fact justify no more than their abstractness, while arguments usually thought to demonstrate that they possess a certain particularity in fact show only their specificity (but not concreteness). Consequently, musical meanings are shown to be abstract but specific, which does not entail any contradiction since these notions are independent and not opposed to each other. At the same time, musical meanings may then be contrasted with linguistic meanings, which themselves are abstract and general. If, however, each of the notions of abstractness and generality is understood as also permitting gradations, it will be the case that whereas linguistic meanings may be said to be more general (i.e. less specific) than musical ones, the latter are without any doubt more abstract than the former. (shrink)

Despite the recent backlash against epistemic consequentialism, an explicit systematic alternative has yet to emerge. This paper articulates and defends a novel alternative, Epistemic Kantianism, which rests on a requirement of respect for the truth. §1 tackles some preliminaries concerning the proper formulation of the epistemic consequentialism / non-consequentialism divide, explains where Epistemic Kantianism falls in the dialectical landscape, and shows how it can capture what seems attractive about epistemic consequentialism while yielding predictions that are harder for the latter to (...) secure in a principled way. §2 presents Epistemic Kantianism. §3 argues that it is uniquely poised to satisfy the desiderata set out in §1 on an ideal theory of epistemic justification. §4 gives three further arguments, suggesting that it (i) best explains the objective normative significance of the subject's perspective in epistemology, (ii) follows from the kind of axiology needed to solve the swamping problem together with modest assumptions about the relation between the evaluative and the deontic, and (iii) illuminates certain asymmetries in epistemic value and obligation. §5 takes stock and reassesses the score in the debate. (shrink)

Any adequate semantics of generic sentences (e.g., “Philosophers evaluate arguments”) must accommodate both what we call the positive data and the negative data. The positive data consists of observations about what felicitous interpretations of generic sentences are available. Conversely, the negative data consists of observations about which interpretations of generic sentences are unavailable. Nguyen argues that only his pragmatic neo-Gricean account and Sterken’s indexical account can accommodate the positive data. Lee and Nguyen have advanced the debate by arguing that (...) the negative data is a problem for both Nguyen’s and Sterken’s accounts; these two accounts seem to incorrectly predict that generics have felicitous interpretations that they, in fact, fail to have. In this paper, we advance this debate—and, more generally, the task of developing an adequate formal semantics of generics—by arguing that a neglected class of theories are compatible with both the positive data and the negative data. Specifically, we argue that treating the generic operator GEN as a relative gradable expression with a positive, upper- and lower- bounded scale helps accommodate the positive data and the negative data. While developing this view, we show how several previously developed semantics of generics may systematically accommodate both sets of data. One broad contribution of this paper is to show that, while they generate important desiderata, the positive and negative data cannot determine a unique semantics for generics. A further contribution of this paper is to highlight previously unnoted ways in which degree semantics may inform semantic theories of generic meaning. (shrink)

Scientific progress in recent neurofeedback research may bring about a new type of moral neuroenhancement, namely, neurofeedback-based moral enhancement; however, this has yet to be examined thoroughly. This paper presents an ethical analysis of the possibility of neurofeedback-based moral enhancement and demonstrates that this type of moral enhancement sheds new light on the moral enhancement debate. First, I survey this debate and extract the typical structural flow of its arguments. Second, by applying structure to the case of neurofeedback-based (...) moral enhancement, I examine the ethical, legal, and social issues to show that this technique is unique and traditionalist, which makes it compatible with almost all our conservative notions, so that it, accordingly, can be seen as an ethically acceptable option. Third, by rejecting the premise in the moral enhancement debate that bio/neuro-enhancement has its unique ELSI that traditional methods would never create, I demonstrate that, by virtue of its traditional or conservative features, neurofeedback-based moral enhancement can be incorporated into the traditional moral education network. Finally, I conclude that, being a part of the traditional moral education network, neurofeedback-based moral enhancement can be a unique and ethically acceptable option of moral neuroenhancement. (shrink)

Truth pluralists say that there are many ways to be true. Aaron Cotnoir (“Pluralism and Paradox” in: Pedersen and Wright (eds) Truth and pluralism: current debates, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2013) has suggested a “uniquely pluralist response to the liar”. The basic idea is to maintain that, if a sentence says of itself that it is not true in a certain way, then that sentence is not apt to be true in that way, but is instead apt to be true (...) in a different way. While this is consistent with the basic tenets of truth pluralism, it is an open question whether or not it is amenable to any actual pluralist theory. The primary goal of this paper is to argue that Cotnoir's proposal is amenable to form-based pluralism, rather than domain-based pluralism. In particular, in Section 1, I argue that there are several serious obstacles in the way of the domain-based pluralist who wishes to endorse Cotnoir's proposal; in Section 2, I show how the form-based pluralist can overcome these difficulties. The secondary goal of the paper is to argue that most, if not all, substantivists about truth should find form-based pluralism independently attractive. As such, the possibility of a form-based pluralist solution to the liar is not merely a technical curiosity, but something in which substantivists about truth have a vested interest. (shrink)

Religion’s persistent and new visibility in political life has prompted a significant global debate. One of its key features concerns the nature and impact of secularization. This book intervenes in two ways. Firstly, it provides summative accounts of the history, culture and legal interactions that have informed Australia’s unique example. Secondly, it critically analyzes secular political theory concerning the public sphere, deliberative politics and democratic practices. The compendium aims to propel the debate in new directions and promote urgently (...) needed public understanding. My own contribution focused on hermeneutics in deliberative democracies. (shrink)

In this paper I elicit a prediction from structural realism and compare it, not to a historical case, but to a contemporary scientific theory. If structural realism is correct, then we should expect physics to develop theories that fail to provide an ontology of the sort sought by traditional realists. If structure alone is responsible for instrumental success, we should expect surplus ontology to be eliminated. Quantum field theory (QFT) provides the framework for some of the best confirmed theories in (...) science, but debates over its ontology are vexed. Rather than taking a stand on these matters, the structural realist can embrace QFT as an example of just the kind of theory SR should lead us to expect. Yet, it is not clear that QFT meets the structuralist's positive expectation by providing a structure for the world. In particular, the problem of unitarily inequivalent representations threatens to undermine the possibility of QFT providing a unique structure for the world. In response to this problem, I suggest that the structuralist should endorse pluralism about structure. (shrink)

The paper is a contribution to the debate on the epistemological status of thought experiments. I deal with the epistemological uniqueness of experiments in the sense of their irreducibility to other sources of justification. In particular, I criticize an influential argument for the irreducibility of thought experiments to general arguments. First, I introduce the radical empiricist theory of eliminativism, which considers thought experiments to be rhetorically modified arguments, uninteresting from the epistemological point of view. Second, I present objections (...) to the theory, focusing on the critique of eliminativism by Tamar Szabó Gendler based on the reconstruction of famous Galileo's Pisa experiment. I show that her reconstruction is simplistic and that more elaborate reconstruction is needed for an appropriate assessment of the epistemic power of general argument. I propose such a reconstruction and demonstrate that general version of Pisa experiment is epistemically equal to the particular one. Thus, from an epistemological perspective, Galileo's thought experiment is reducible to a straightforward argument without particular premises. (shrink)

Observations of animals engaging in apparently moral behavior have led academics and the public alike to ask whether morality is shared between humans and other animals. Some philosophers explicitly argue that morality is unique to humans, because moral agency requires capacities that are only demonstrated in our species. Other philosophers argue that some animals can participate in morality because they possess these capacities in a rudimentary form. Scientists have also joined the discussion, and their views are just as varied as (...) the philosophers’. Some research programs examine whether animals countenance specific human norms, such as fairness. Other research programs investigate the cognitive and affective capacities thought to be necessary for morality. There are two sets of concerns that can be raised by these debates. They sometimes suffer from there being no agreed upon theory of morality and no clear account of whether there is a demarcation between moral and social behavior; that is, they lack a proper philosophical foundation. They also sometimes suffer from there being disagreement about the psychological capacities evident in animals. Of these two sets of concerns—the nature of the moral and the scope of psychological capacities—we aim to take on only the second. In this chapter we defend the claim that animals have three sets of capacities that, on some views, are taken as necessary and foundational for moral judgment and action. These are capacities of care, capacities of autonomy, and normative capacities. Care, we argue, is widely found among social animals. Autonomy and normativity are more recent topics of empirical investigation, so while there is less evidence of these capacities at this point in our developing scientific knowledge, the current data is strongly suggestive. (shrink)

This paper examines the debate between permissive and impermissive forms of Bayesianism. It briefly discusses some considerations that might be offered by both sides of the debate, and then replies to some new arguments in favor of impermissivism offered by Roger White. First, it argues that White’s (Oxford studies in epistemology, vol 3. Oxford University Press, Oxford, pp 161–186, 2010) defense of Indifference Principles is unsuccessful. Second, it contends that White’s (Philos Perspect 19:445–459, 2005) arguments against permissive views (...) do not succeed. (shrink)

This paper explores the connection between two philosophical debates concerning the nature of properties. The first metaethical debate is about whether normative properties are ordinary natural properties or some unique kind of non-natural properties. The second metaphysical debate is about whether properties are sets of objects, transcendent or immanent universals, or sets of tropes. I argue that nominalism, transcendent realism, and immanent realism are not neutral frameworks for the metaethical debate but instead lead to either metaethical naturalism (...) or non-naturalism. We can therefore investigate the metaethical question on its own terms only within the framework of trope theory. (shrink)

What is a game? What are we doing when we play a game? What is the value of playing games? Several different philosophical subdisciplines have attempted to answer these questions using very distinctive frameworks. Some have approached games as something like a text, deploying theoretical frameworks from the study of narrative, fiction, and rhetoric to interrogate games for their representational content. Others have approached games as artworks and asked questions about the authorship of games, about the ontology of the work (...) and its performance. Yet others, from the philosophy of sport, have focused on normative issues of fairness, rule application, and competition. The primary purpose of this article is to provide an overview of several different philosophical approaches to games and, hopefully, demonstrate the relevance and value of the different approaches to each other. Early academic attempts to cope with games tried to treat games as a subtype of narrative and to interpret games exactly as one might interpret a static, linear narrative. A faction of game studies, self-described as “ludologists,” argued that games were a substantially novel form and could not be treated with traditional tools for narrative analysis. In traditional narrative, an audience is told and interprets the story, where in a game, the player enacts and creates the story. Since that early debate, theorists have attempted to offer more nuanced accounts of how games might achieve similar ends to more traditional texts. For example, games might be seen as a novel type of fiction, which uses interactive techniques to achieve immersion in a fictional world. Alternately, games might be seen as a new way to represent causal systems, and so a new way to criticize social and political entities. Work from contemporary analytic philosophy of art has, on the other hand, asked questions whether games could be artworks and, if so, what kind. Much of this debate has concerned the precise nature of the artwork, and the relationship between the artist and the audience. Some have claimed that the audience is a cocreator of the artwork, and so games are a uniquely unfinished and cooperative art form. Others have claimed that, instead, the audience does not help create the artwork; rather, interacting with the artwork is how an audience member appreciates the artist's finished production. Other streams of work have focused less on the game as a text or work, and more on game play as a kind of activity. One common view is that game play occurs in a “magic circle.” Inside the magic circle, players take on new roles, follow different rules, and actions have different meanings. Actions inside the magic circle do not have their usual consequences for the rest of life. Enemies of the magic circle view have claimed that the view ignores the deep integration of game life from ordinary life and point to gambling, gold farming, and the status effects of sports. Philosophers of sport, on the other hand, have approached games with an entirely different framework. This has lead into investigations about the normative nature of games—what guides the applications of rules and how those rules might be applied, interpreted, or even changed. Furthermore, they have investigated games as social practices and as forms of life. (shrink)

Molyneux’s question, whether the newly sighted might immediately recognize tactilely familiar shapes by sight alone, has produced an array of answers over three centuries of debate and discussion. I propose the first pluralist response: many different answers, both yes and no, are individually sufficient as an answer to the question as a whole. I argue that this is possible if we take the question to be cluster concept of sub-problems. This response opposes traditional answers that isolate specific perceptual features (...) as uniquely applicable to Molyneux’s question and grant viability to only one reply. Answering Molyneux’s question as a cluster concept may also serve as a methodology for resolving other philosophical problems. (shrink)

Social scientists appeal to various “structures” in their explanations including public policies, economic systems, and social hierarchies. Significant debate surrounds the explanatory relevance of these factors for various outcomes such as health, behavioral, and economic patterns. This paper provides a causal account of social structural explanation that is motivated by Haslanger (2016). This account suggests that social structure can be explanatory in virtue of operating as a causal constraint, which is a causal factor with unique characteristics. A novel causal (...) framework is provided for understanding these explanations–this framework addresses puzzles regarding the mysterious causal influence of social structure, how to understand its relation to individual choice, and what makes it the main explanatory (and causally responsible) factor for various outcomes. (shrink)

Purpose: Some enigmatic remarks and behaviors of Socrates have been a subject of debate among scholars. We investigated the possibility of underlying epilepsy in Socrates by analyzing pathographic evidence in ancient literature from the viewpoint of the current understanding of seizure semiology. Methods: We performed a case study from a literature survey. Results: In 399 BCE, Socrates was tried and executed in Athens on the charge of “impiety.” His charges included the “introduction of new deities” and “not believing in (...) the gods of the state,” because he publicly claimed that he was periodically and personally receiving a “divine sign,” or daimonion, that directed him in various actions. We found textual evidence that his daimonion was probably a simple partial seizure (SPS) of temporal lobe origin. It was a brief voice that usually prohibited Socrates from initiating certain actions. It started when he was a child, and it visited Socrates unpredictably. Moreover, we found at least two descriptions of Socrates’ unique behavior that are consistent with complex partial seizures (CPSs). The fact that Socrates had been experiencing both SPSs and CPSs periodically since childhood makes the diagnosis of temporal lobe epilepsy (TLE) likely. Conclusions: We hypothesize that Socrates had a mild case of TLE without secondary generalization. This is the first report in 2,400 years to present a pathographic diagnosis of TLE in Socrates based on specific diagnostic features in the ancient textual evidence. Our study demonstrates that the knowledge of modern epileptology could help understand certain behaviors of historic figures. (shrink)

There is an expansion of empirical research that at its core is an attempt to quantify the "feely" aspects of living in raced (and other stigmatized) bodies. This research is offered as part concession, part insistence on the reality of the "special" circumstances of living in raced bodies. While this move has the potential of making headway in debates about the character of racism and the unique nature of the harms of contemporary racism--through an analysis of stereotype threat research, microaggression (...) research, and the reception of both discourses--I will argue that this scientization of the phenomenology of race and racism also stalls progress on the most significant challenges for the current conversation about race and racism: how to listen and how to be heard. (shrink)

This essay considers the theoretical disagreement between Isaiah Berlin and Hannah Arendt on the meaning and value of freedom. Berlin thinks that negative liberty as non-interference is commendable because it is attuned to the implication of value pluralism that man is a choice-making creature and cannot be otherwise. By contrast, the political freedom to act is in Arendt’s view a more fulfilling ideal because it is only in political action that man’s potentiality is actualised, his unique identity manifested and his (...) being-in-the-world-with-others reaffirmed. What lies beneath the two thinkers’ dispute over the most satisfactory meaning of freedom, I argue, is a deeper disagreement over human nature itself. The implication of this analysis for the contemporary debate between pluralist liberals and their agonistic critics is briefly discussed in conclusion. (shrink)

In 1995, the publication of Marleen Rozemond’s paper, Descartes’s Case for Dualism, triggered the revival of the discussion on his argument in favor of the real distinction between body and soul among the Anglo-Saxon scholars. In particular, the discussion then resumed on the necessity of introducing a hidden premise (the so-called attribute premise) in order to regain its probatory character. This debate has reflected on the Cartesian studies in Brazil, and my objective in this text is to bring to (...) the debate two texts still unexplored in relation to this interpretative problem. My hypothesis is that the attempts to justify the thesis that the substance has exactly one principal attribute have not yet succeeded because they underestimated the contribution brought about by the transformation of the notion of nature entailed by the introduction of the concept of principal attribute. Understanding the Cartesian proof of substantial dualism, and more particularly the "attribute premise", would involve, I suggest, the thesis according to which the concept of principal attribute, insofar as it expresses the essence of the substance, is not, and cannot be, according to Descartes, an abstract universal, but rather one of a particular nature. (shrink)

This article is about the special, subjective concepts we apply to experience, called “phenomenal concepts”. They are of special interest in a number of ways. First, they refer to phenomenal experiences, and the qualitative character of those experiences whose metaphysical status is hotly debated. Conscious experience strike many philosophers as philosophically problematic and difficult to accommodate within a physicalistic metaphysics. Second, PCs are widely thought to be special and unique among concepts. The sense that there is something special about PCs (...) is very closely tied up with features of the epistemic access they afford to qualia. When we deploy phenomenal concepts introspectively to some phenomenally conscious experience as it occurs, we are said to be acquainted with our own conscious experiences. Accounts of PCs either have to explain the acquaintance relation, or acquaintance with our phenomenal experiences has to be denied. PCs have received much attention in recent philosophy of mind mainly because they figure in arguments for dualism and in physicalist responses to these arguments. The main topic of this paper is to explore different accounts of phenomenal concepts and their role in recent debates over the metaphysical status of phenomenal consciousness. (shrink)

This article develops an account of local epistemic practices on the basis of case studies from ethnobiology. I argue that current debates about objectivity often stand in the way of a more adequate understanding of local knowledge and ethnobiological practices in general. While local knowledge about the biological world often meets criteria for objectivity in philosophy of science, general debates about the objectivity of local knowledge can also obscure their unique epistemic features. In modification of Ian Hacking’s suggestion to discuss (...) “ground level questions” instead of objectivity, I propose an account that focuses on both epistemic virtues and vices of local epistemic practices. (shrink)

The problem of evil poses a challenge for traditional theists by asking how they could rationally believe in the existence of an omnipotent and wholly good God given that the world is filled with evil manifested in such events as wars, crimes, and natural disasters. This is widely considered one of the most significant challenges to belief in God and has evoked many responses from traditional theists. However, it is not my aim in this book to propose another response to (...) the problem or to evaluate the effectiveness of existing responses at length. I deliberately refrain from such endeavours. Instead, I take a step back from the ongoing debate surrounding the problem and adopt a unique perspective which transcends the familiar perennial debate between traditional theists and atheists. The thesis that the problem of evil is a problem beyond traditional theism is radical enough. Yet, I argue for an even more radical thesis in this book: supernaturalist theists enjoy advantages that naturalist atheists/non-theists lack when responding to the problem of evil because there is greater hope that the problem can be solved when supernaturalist resources are in place. This thesis, I argue, entails an additional interesting thesis: the problem of evil is a more significant challenge for atheists/non-theists than for traditional theists. (shrink)

This article is about the special, subjective concepts we apply to experience, called “phenomenal concepts”. They are of special interest in a number of ways. First, they refer to phenomenal experiences, and the qualitative character of those experiences whose metaphysical status is hotly debated. Conscious experience strike many philosophers as philosophically problematic and difficult to accommodate within a physicalistic metaphysics. Second, PCs are widely thought to be special and unique among concepts. The sense that there is something special about PCs (...) is very closely tied up with features of the epistemic access they afford to qualia. When we deploy phenomenal concepts introspectively to some phenomenally conscious experience as it occurs, we are said to be acquainted with our own conscious experiences. Accounts of PCs either have to explain the acquaintance relation, or acquaintance with our phenomenal experiences has to be denied. PCs have received much attention in recent philosophy of mind mainly because they figure in arguments for dualism and in physicalist responses to these arguments. The main topic of this article is to explore different accounts of phenomenal concepts and their role in recent debates over the metaphysical status of phenomenal consciousness. (shrink)

The role of reason, and its embodiment in philosophical-scientific theorizing, is always a troubling one for religious traditions. The deep emotional needs that religion strives to satisfy seem ever linked to an attitudes of acceptance, belief, or trust, yet, in its theoretical employment, reason functions as a critic as much as it does a creator, and in the special fields of metaphysics and epistemology its critical arrows are sometimes aimed at long-standing cherished beliefs. Understandably, the mere approach to these beliefs (...) through organized philosophical activity, however well-intended, is viewed with suspicion by ecclesiastical authorities and the devout. The attitude towards philosophical inquiry on the part of the Islamic religious community might be thought to typify this reaction. As one of the great prophetic religions, the self-avowed image of Islam is of a tradition which already possesses the truth as set forth in the divine revelation of the Qur'an. What need is there for philosophizing on fundamental matters, e.g., the ultimate nature of reality, the foundations of morality, the modes whereby the divine is connected with the temporal? The structure of creation is already made clear, the "straight path" for living already manifest. how can philosophical activity be anything but a source of divisive controversy, for as it turns its gaze to the foundations upon which the Shari`a' (Islamic Law) rests, or to the grounds for religious belief itself, it cannot avoid turning up alternative viewpoints, different perspectives on divine revelation, noting various weaknesses in received 1 interpretations? In short, isn't the practice of philosophy a threat to Islam's promise of providing a comprehensive way of living devoid of skepticism and uncertainty about the place of a human in God's creation and his or her role in the 'umma (Islamic community)? This problem is not unique to Islam, nor is it a new one within Islam. We know that it has been debated by Islamic thinkers since the translations of the Greek philosophers began to appear in an organized Islamic world during the 8th Century A.. (shrink)