The philosophical discussion about logical constants has only recently moved into the substructural era. While philosophers have spent a lot of time discussing the meaning of logical constants in the context of classical versus intuitionistic logic, very little has been said about the introduction of substruc-tural connectives. Linear logic, affine logic and other substructural logics offer a more fine-grained perspective on basic connectives such as conjunction and disjunction, a perspective which I believe will also shed light on debates in the (...) philosophy of logic. In what follows I will look at one particularly interesting instance of this: The development of the position known as logical inferentialism in view of substructural connectives. I claim that sensitivity to structural properties is an interesting challenge to logical inferentialism, and that it ultimately requires revision of core notions in the inferentialist litera-ture. Specifically, I want to argue that current definitions of proof theoretic harmony give rise to problematic nonconservativeness as a result of their insensitivity to substructurality. These nonconservativeness results are undesirable because they make it impossible to consistently add logical constants that are of independent philosophical interest. (shrink)

The model-theoretic analysis of the concept of logical consequence has come under heavy criticism in the last couple of decades. The present work looks at an alternative approach to logical consequence where the notion of inference takes center stage. Formally, the model-theoretic framework is exchanged for a proof-theoretic framework. It is argued that contrary to the traditional view, proof-theoretic semantics is not revisionary, and should rather be seen as a formal semantics that can supplement model-theory. Specifically, there are formal resources (...) to provide a proof-theoretic semantics for both intuitionistic and classical logic. We develop a new perspective on proof-theoretic harmony for logical constants which incorporates elements from the substructural era of proof-theory. We show that there is a semantic lacuna in the traditional accounts of harmony. A new theory of how inference rules determine the semantic content of logical constants is developed. The theory weds proof-theoretic and model-theoretic semantics by showing how proof-theoretic rules can induce truth-conditional clauses in Boolean and many-valued settings. It is argued that such a new approach to how rules determine meaning will ultimately assist our understanding of the apriori nature of logic. (shrink)

Logical consequence is the relation that obtains between premises and conclusion(s) in a valid argument. Orthodoxy has it that valid arguments are necessarily truth-preserving, but this platitude only raises a number of further questions, such as: how does the truth of premises guarantee the truth of a conclusion, and what constraints does validity impose on rational belief? This volume presents thirteen essays by some of the most important scholars in the field of philosophical logic. The essays offer ground-breaking new insights (...) into the nature of logical consequence; the relation between logic and inference; how the semantics and pragmatics of natural language bear on logic; the relativity of logic; and the structural properties of the consequence relation. (shrink)

Recent work in philosophical logic has taken interesting and unexpected turns. It has seen not only a proliferation of logical systems, but new applications of a wide range of different formal theories to philosophical questions. As a result, philosophers have been forced to revisit the nature and foundation of core logical concepts, chief amongst which is the concept of logical consequence. This essay sets the contributions of the volume in context and identifies how they advance important debates within the philosophy (...) of logic. (shrink)

Logic isn’t special. Its theories are continuous with science; its method continuous with scientific method. Logic isn’t a priori, nor are its truths analytic truths. Logical theories are revisable, and if they are revised, they are revised on the same grounds as scientific theories. These are the tenets of anti-exceptionalism about logic. The position is most famously defended by Quine, but has more recent advocates in Maddy, Priest, Russell, and Williamson. Although these authors agree on many methodological issues about logic, (...) they disagree about which logic anti-exceptionalism supports. Williamson uses an anti-exceptionalist argument to defend classical logic, while Priest claims that his anti-exceptionalism supports nonclassical logic. This paper argues that the disagreement is due to a difference in how the parties understand logical theories. Once we reject Williamson’s deflationary account of logical theories, the argument for classical logic is undercut. Instead an alternative account of logical theories is offered, on which logical pluralism is a plausible supplement to anti-exceptionalism. (shrink)

Introduction to this special issue of The Australasian Journal of Logic.

Logic, Logical connectives, Verbal disputes, Proof theory, Non-classical logic.

Anti-exceptionalism about logic is the Quinean view that logical theories have no special epistemological status, in particular, they are not self-evident or justified a priori. Instead, logical theories are continuous with scientific theories, and knowledge about logic is as hard-earned as knowledge of physics, economics, and chemistry. Once we reject apriorism about logic, however, we need an alternative account of how logical theories are justified and revised. A number of authors have recently argued that logical theories are justified by abductive (...) argument (e.g. Gillian Russell, Graham Priest, Timothy Williamson). This paper explores one crucial question about the abductive strategy: what counts as evidence for a logical theory? I develop three accounts of evidential confirmation that an anti-exceptionalist can accept: (1) intuitions about validity, (2) the Quine-Williamson account, and (3) indispensability arguments. I argue, against the received view, that none of the evidential sources support classical logic. (shrink)

Logical pluralism has been in vogue since JC Beall and Greg Restall 2006 articulated and defended a new pluralist thesis. Recent criticisms such as Priest 2006a and Field 2009 have suggested that there is a relationship between their type of logical pluralism and the meaning-variance thesis for logic. This is the claim, often associated with Quine 1970, that a change of logic entails a change of meaning. Here we explore the connection between logical pluralism and meaning-variance, both in general and (...) for Beall and Restall's theory specifically. We argue that contrary to what Beall and Restall claim, their type of pluralism is wedded to meaning-variance. We then develop an alternative form of logical pluralism that circumvents at least some forms of meaning-variance. (shrink)

ABSTRACT What do we disagree about when we disagree about logic? On the face of it, classical and nonclassical logicians disagree about the laws of logic and the nature of logical properties. Yet, sometimes the parties are accused of talking past each other. The worry is that if the parties to the dispute do not mean the same thing with ‘if’, ‘or’, and ‘not’, they fail to have genuine disagreement about the laws in question. After the work of Quine, this (...) objection against genuine disagreement about logic has been called the meaning-variance thesis. We argue that the meaning-variance thesis can be endorsed without blocking genuine disagreement. In fact, even the type of revisionism and nonapriorism championed by Quine turns out to be compatible with meaning-variance. (shrink)

In bilateral systems for classical logic, assertion and denial occur as primitive signs on formulas. Such systems lend themselves to an inferentialist story about how truth-conditional content of connectives can be determined by inference rules. In particular, for classical logic there is a bilateral proof system which has a property that Carnap in 1943 called categoricity. We show that categorical systems can be given for any finite many-valued logic using $n$-sided sequent calculus. These systems are understood as a further development (...) of bilateralism—call it multilateralism. The overarching idea is that multilateral proof systems can incorporate the logic of a variety of denial speech acts. So against Frege we say that denial is not the negation of assertion and, with Mark Twain, that denial is more than a river in Egypt. (shrink)

Nonclassical theories of truth have in common that they reject principles of classical logic to accommodate an unrestricted truth predicate. However, different nonclassical strategies give up different classical principles. The paper discusses one criterion we might use in theory choice when considering nonclassical rivals: the maxim of minimal mutilation.

ABSTRACTWhat do we disagree about when we disagree about logic? On the face of it, classical and nonclassical logicians disagree about the laws of logic and the nature of logical properties. Yet, s...

Motivated by weaknesses with traditional accounts of logical epistemology, considerable attention has been paid recently to the view, known as anti-exceptionalism about logic, that the subject matter and epistemology of logic may not be so different from that of the recognised sciences. One of the most prevalent claims made by advocates of AEL is that theory choice within logic is significantly similar to that within the sciences. This connection with scientific methodology highlights a considerable challenge for the anti-exceptionalist, as two (...) uncontentious claims about scientific theories are that they attempt to explain a target phenomenon and prove their worth through successful predictions. Thus, if this methodological AEL is to be viable, the anti-exceptionalist will need a reasonable account of what phenomena logics are attempting to explain, how they can explain, and in what sense they can be said to issue predictions. This paper makes sense of the anti-exceptionalist proposal with a new account of logical theory choice, logical predictivism, according to which logics are engaged in both a process of prediction and explanation. (shrink)

It is sometimes held that rules of inference determine the meaning of the logical constants: the meaning of, say, conjunction is fully determined by either its introduction or its elimination rules, or both; similarly for the other connectives. In a recent paper, Panu Raatikainen (2008) argues that this view - call it logical inferentialism - is undermined by some "very little known" considerations by Carnap (1943) to the effect that "in a definite sense, it is not true that the standard (...) rules of inference" themselves suffice to "determine the meanings of [the] logical constants" (p. 2). In a nutshell, Carnap showed that the rules allow for non-normal interpretations of negation and disjunction. Raatikainen concludes that "no ordinary formalization of logic ... is sufficient to `fully formalize' all the essential properties of the logical constants" (ibid.). We suggest that this is a mistake. Pace Raatikainen, intuitionists like Dummett and Prawitz need not worry about Carnap's problem. And although bilateral solutions for classical inferentialists - as proposed by Timothy Smiley and Ian Rumfitt - seem inadequate, it is not excluded that classical inferentialists may be in a position to address the problem too. (shrink)

The historical consensus is that logical evidence is special. Whereas empirical evidence is used to support theories within both the natural and social sciences, logic answers solely to a priori evidence. Further, unlike other areas of research that rely upon a priori evidence, such as mathematics, logical evidence is basic. While we can assume the validity of certain inferences in order to establish truths within mathematics and test scientifi c theories, logicians cannot use results from mathematics or the empirical sciences (...) without seemingly begging the question. Appeals to rational intuition and analyticity in order to account for logical knowledge are symptomatic of these commitments to the apriority and basicness of logical evidence. This chapter argues that these historically prevalent accounts of logical evidence are mistaken, and that if we take logical practice seriously we fi nd that logical evidence is rather unexceptional, sharing many similarities to the types of evidence appealed to within other research areas. (shrink)

La cobertura universal de salud está en el centro de la acción actual para fortalecer los sistemas de salud y mejorar el nivel y la distribución de la salud y los servicios de salud. Este documento es el informe fi nal del Grupo Consultivo de la OMS sobre la Equidad y Cobertura Universal de Salud. Aquí se abordan los temas clave de la justicia (fairness) y la equidad que surgen en el camino hacia la cobertura universal de salud. Por lo (...) tanto, el informe es pertinente para cada agente que infl uye en ese camino y en particular para los gobiernos, ya que se encargan de supervisar y guiar el progreso hacia la cobertura universal de salud. (shrink)

This report from the WHO Consultative Group on Equity and Universal Health Coverage offers advice on how to make progress fairly towards universal health coverage.

Progress towards Universal Health Coverage (UHC) requires making difficult trade-offs. In this journal, Dr. Margaret Chan, the WHO Director-General, has endorsed the principles for making such decisions put forward by the WHO Consultative Group on Equity and UHC. These principles include maximizing population health, priority for the worse off, and shielding people from health-related financial risks. But how should one apply these principles in particular cases and how should one adjudicate between them when their demands conflict? This paper by some (...) members of the Consultative Group and a diverse group of health policy professionals addresses these questions. It considers three stylized versions of actual policy dilemmas. Each of these cases pertains to one of the three principal dimensions of progress towards UHC: which services to cover first, which populations to prioritize for coverage, and how to move from out-of-pocket expenditures to pre-payment with pooling of funds. Our cases are simplified to highlight common trade-offs. While we make specific recommendations, our primary aim is to demonstrate both the form and substance of the reasoning involved in striking a fair balance between competing interests on the road to UHC. (shrink)

In this article, we propose the Fair Priority Model for COVID-19 vaccine distribution, and emphasize three fundamental values we believe should be considered when distributing a COVID-19 vaccine among countries: Benefiting people and limiting harm, prioritizing the disadvantaged, and equal moral concern for all individuals. The Priority Model addresses these values by focusing on mitigating three types of harms caused by COVID-19: death and permanent organ damage, indirect health consequences, such as health care system strain and stress, as well as (...) economic destruction. It proposes proceeding in three phases: the first addresses premature death, the second long-term health issues and economic harms, and the third aims to contain viral transmission fully and restore pre-pandemic activity. -/- To those who may deem an ethical framework irrelevant because of the belief that many countries will pursue "vaccine nationalism," we argue such a framework still has broad relevance. Reasonable national partiality would permit countries to focus on vaccine distribution within their borders up until the rate of transmission is below 1, at which point there would not be sufficient vaccine-preventable harm to justify retaining a vaccine. When a government reaches the limit of national partiality, it should release vaccines for other countries. -/- We also argue against two other recent proposals. Distributing a vaccine proportional to a country's population mistakenly assumes that equality requires treating differently situated countries identically. Prioritizing countries according to the number of front-line health care workers, the proportion of the population over 65, and the number of people with comorbidities within each country may exacerbate disadvantage and end up giving the vaccine in large part to wealthy nations. (shrink)

Impairments in executive functioning are prevalent in chronic pain conditions, with cognitive inflexibility being the most frequently reported. The current randomized, cross-over trial, piloted a computerized cognitive training program based on Relational Frame Theory, targeting improvement in cognitive flexibility. At baseline, 73 chronic pain patients completed testing on pre-selected outcomes of executive functioning, alongside IQ measures. When tested three times over the course of 5 months, there was a drop-out rate of 40% at the third time point, leaving 44 patients (...) who had data at all time points. The results showed that there was a substantial learning effect from the MINDFLEX training and a substantial time-dependent improvement on the primary outcomes of increased flexibility, but that this could not be tied to active training. In conclusion, this small study indicated a learning effect as well as improvement on primary outcomes. Based on the current results, a larger trial with improved feasibility of training is warranted. (shrink)

Med afsæt i Niklas Luhmanns systemteori og med eksempler inden for videnskab, kunst, økonomi m.m. argumenterer forfatteren for at der i dag ikke findes et etisk regelsæt som kan fortælle os hvad vi skal gøre og ikke gøre.

A Philosophical Study of T. S. Eliot's Four Quartets By MartinWarner. The Edwin Mellen Press. 1999. xi + 138.

In a metaphorical sense, a thing is complex if it comprehends a magnitude of homogeneous or different things. However, it depends on the kind of comprehension, if we conceive something that consists of many things as complex or not. It is perhaps most distinctive for complex phenomena that their properties and behavior aren't reducible to the properties and behavior of their elements. This poses some challenging metaphysical problems. The articles in this anthology don't follow a leitmotif - aside from all (...) essays having a look at complexity problems in different areas of scientific research and showing in which ways the challenges of complexity can be answered. (Series: Applied Philosophy / Anvendt Filosofi - Vol. 4). (shrink)

These days there are many different understandings and definitions of the term aesthetics. Sometimes it is regarded as identical to the pleasing or the sensual, other times it has a more workaday meaning, being associated with e.g. a well-stocked lunch table. The common denominator, however, is that aesthetics is understood as something that can be recorded in the real world, having been assigned an independent existence. The concept has thus undergone ‘ontological dumping’, by which we understand that an analytical concept (...) has become a “thing in the world”, i.e. an epistemological state has been transformed into an ontological state. The problem with this is that what can potentially be used to understand has instead turned into something to be understood. In the endeavour not to downgrade the epistemological dimension in favour of the experiential dimension, we attempt in this article to re-establish aesthetics as an analytical concept: Something to be seen with – instead of something that is seen. In addition, we put it into perspective alongside culture and art, which we feel has undergone the same ontological dumping. The article concludes with some reflections on the implications this may have for educational practice. As its theoretical springboard, the article takes the philosopher Jean-François Lyotard, drawing its exemplary material from the Norwegian author Karl Ove Knausgård. (shrink)

While anti-exceptionalism about logic is now a popular topic within the philosophy of logic, there’s still a lack of clarity over what the proposal amounts to. currently, it is most common to conceive of AEL as the proposal that logic is continuous with the sciences. Yet, as we show here, this conception of AEL is unhelpful due to both its lack of precision, and its distortion of the current debates. Rather, AEL is better understood as the rejection of certain traditional (...) properties of logic. The picture that results is not of one singular position, but rather a cluster of often connected positions with distinct motivations, understood in terms of their rejection of clusters of the various traditional properties. In order to show the fruitfulness of this new conception of AEL, we distinguish between two prominent versions of the position, metaphysical and epistemological AEL, and show how the two positions need not stand or fall together. (shrink)

According to Ole Hjortland, Timothy Williamson, Graham Priest, and others, anti-exceptionalism about logic is the view that logic “isn’t special”, but is continuous with the sciences. Logic is revisable, and its truths are neither analytic nor a priori. And logical theories are revised on the same grounds as scientific theories are. What isn’t special, we argue, is anti-exceptionalism about logic. Anti-exceptionalists disagree with one another regarding what logic and, indeed, anti-exceptionalism are, and they are at odds with naturalist philosophers (...) of logic, who may have seemed like natural allies. Moreover, those internal battles concern well-trodden philosophical issues, and there is no hint as to how they are to be resolved on broadly scientific grounds. We close by looking at three of the founders of logic who may have seemed like obvious enemies of anti-exceptionalism—Aristotle, Frege, and Carnap—and conclude that none of their positions is clearly at odds with at least some of the main themes of anti-exceptionalism. We submit that, at least at present, anti-exceptionalism is too vague or underspecified to characterize a coherent conception of logic, one that stands opposed to more traditional approaches. (shrink)

In some philosophical arguments an important role is played by the claim that certain situations differ from each other with respect to phenomenology. One class of such arguments are minimal pair arguments. These have been used to argue that there is cognitive phenomenology, that high-level properties are represented in perceptual experience, that understanding has phenomenology, and more. I argue that facts about our mental lives systematically block such arguments, reply to a range of objections, and apply my critique to some (...) examples from the literature. (shrink)

In this thesis I seek to advance our understanding of what intuitions are. I argue that intuitions are experiences of a certain kind. In particular, they are experiences with representational content, and with a certain phenomenal character. -/- In Chapter 1 I identify our target and provide some important reliminaries. Intuitions are mental states, but which ones? Giving examples helps: a person has an intuition when it seems to her that torturing the innocent is wrong, or that if something is (...) red it is coloured. We can also provide an initial characterisation of the state by saying that it has representational content, often causes belief, and appears to justify belief. In addition, there is something it is like to have an intuition: intuition has a certain phenomenal character. -/- Some argue that intuition does not explain anything which cannot be explained by other mental states. One version of this view takes intuition to reduce to belief. In Chapter 2 I argue that this entails that agents are rationally criticisable in situations where we know they are not, and that such views are therefore untenable. A parallel argument shows that the corresponding approach to perception fails. This suggests a similarity in nature: both intuition and perception are experiences. -/- Others take intuition to reduce to a disposition to have a belief. In Chapter 3 I consider a line of argument against such views, find it unsuccessful, and present two new arguments. One is likely to be dialectically ineffective. The other suffers no such weakness: it shows that the proposed reduction fails. As before, the argument also applies to perception, and suggests that intuition and perception are both experiences. -/- In the remainder of the thesis I develop an account of intuition as an experience. I distinguish between content-specific and attitude-specific phenomenology, and argue that intuition lacks the former (Chapter 4), but has the latter (Chapter 5). This allows us to say what intuition is: it is is an experience with representational content and with attitude-specific phenomenology of a certain kind. -/- In Chapter 6 I put this account of intuition to use. When a person has a perceptual or intuitional experience, I argue that simply having the experience is what makes the subject justified in believing what the experience represents. Moreover, what explains that intuition and perception can justify belief in this way is precisely their phenomenal character. (shrink)

Rational addiction theories illustrate how absurd choice theories in economics get taken seriously as possibly true explanations and tools for welfare analysis despite being poorly interpreted, empirically unfalsifiable, and based on wildly inaccurate assumptions selectively justified by ad-hoc stories. The lack of transparency introduced by poorly anchored mathematical models, the psychological persuasiveness of stories, and the way the profession neglects relevant issues are suggested as explanations for how what we perhaps should see as displays of technical skill and ingenuity are (...) allowed to blur the lines between science and games. (shrink)

A common argument against prostitution states that selling sex is harmful because it involves selling something deeply personal and emotional. More and more of us, however, believe that sexual encounters need not be deeply personal and emotional in order to be acceptable—we believe in the acceptability of casual sex. In this paper I argue that if casual sex is acceptable, then we have few or no reasons to reject prostitution. I do so by first examining nine influential arguments to the (...) contrary. These arguments purport to pin down the alleged additional harm brought about by prostitution by appealing to various aspects of its practice, such as its psychology, physiology, economics and social meaning. For each argument I explain why it is unconvincing. I then weight the costs against the benefits of prostitution, and argue that, in sum, prostitution is no more harmful than a long line of occupations that we commonly accept without hesitation. (shrink)

The Buddhist philosopher Dignaga (around 500 CE) centers his philosophy of language on the theorem of verbal meaning as "exclusion of other referents" (anyapoha). This is the topic of the fifth chapter in his summarizing last work, the Pramanasamuccayavrtti. Since a word tells its hearer something about the object to which it refers in the same way that a logical reason tells its observer something about the object of which it is a property, Dignaga's apoha thesis is a crucial complement (...) to his theory of inference. The original Sanskrit text of this work is no longer extant. Except for a few Sanskrit fragments and two highly problematic Tibetan translations it is only the since recently available unique Sanskrit manuscript of the mid-8th century CE commentary, the Pramanasamuccayatika, by Jinendrabuddhi that allows for a faithful English translation. Jinendrabuddhi's text has been used throughout and, in parts, critically edited for the first time. On the basis of these sources it was possible to provide the translation with a restoration as far as possible of the original Sanskrit text of Dignaga's work. In his introduction, Pind surveys his methodology, discusses the sources, the context and historical position, and the character of this chapter, and he also deals with Jinendrabuddhi's commentary, his sources and its restoration. Moreover, he presents the essential features of the apoha thesis in detail. The translation of this rather difficult text is richly annotated and provides all philological information in support of the text's restoration as well as extensive explanations and discussions of the content. It is in the notes that Pind provides the background of Indian grammatical analysis and theory (Bhartrhari and others) and documents the context of the rival philosophical traditions such as those of the Nyaya and Mimasa. Pind is also particularly aware of the influences on Jinendrabuddhi's interpretation that derive from Dharmakirti's interpretation of Dignaga's tenets and consistently analyses the differences occurring. Several appendices conclude this study by presenting a number of notes separated because of their size. After Richard Hayes' study and translation of the first part of this chapter (1988), this is the first comprehensive presentation of Dignaga's philosophy of language. (shrink)

The aim of this paper is to contribute to an understanding of the school strikes for climate, initiated in August 2018 by the Swedish student Greta Thunberg, soon to become a global social movement involving hundreds of thousands of students. I examine 10 speeches of Thunberg as recontextualizations of environmental ethical values that have been formulated within the context of United Nations. With this approach, guided by an ethical and educational interest grounded in moral education, and informed by conceptions of (...) Seyla Benhabib, this paper demonstrates how students become democratic citizens appropriating the concern for future generations as a cosmopolitan claim in a resistance to exclusions from current politics. (shrink)

Prioritarianism is an ethical theory that gives extra weight to the well-being of the worse off. In contrast, dominant policy-evaluation methodologies, such as benefit-cost analysis, cost-effectiveness analysis, and utilitarianism, ignore or downplay issues of fair distribution. Based on a research group founded by the editors, this important book is the first to show how prioritarianism can be used to assess governmental policies and evaluate societal conditions. This book uses prioritarianism as a methodology to evaluate governmental policy across a variety of (...) policy domains: taxation, health policy, risk regulation, education, climate policy, and the COVID-19 pandemic. It is also the first to demonstrate how prioritarianism improves on GDP as an indicator of a society's progress over time. Edited by two senior figures in the field with contributions from some of the world's leading economists, this volume bridges the gap from the theory of prioritarianism to its practical application. (shrink)

ABSTRACT Norway has a complex, even paradoxical, relationship to the United Nations Agenda 2030 and its 17 Sustainable Development Goals. It makes considerable financial contributions to the United Nations and has strongly supported the establishment of the sustainability agenda aimed at promoting global equity and mitigating the ecological and climate crises. Norway is also a prominent petroleum-producing nation. The Norwegian position is explored using an approach that emphasizes justice and education in the sustainability agenda. Three key texts are studied. The (...) first is the objectives clause in the Education Act, the second is an address by then prime minister Erna Solberg at the annual conference of the Confederation of Norwegian Enterprise, and the third are educational assignments published by the Norwegian Petroleum Museum addressing sustainability and climate change. What is decisive is how specific facets of justice are emphasized in ways that detach Norway from tensions, contradictions, and dilemmas involved. (shrink)

When people talk about anarchism, what they have in mind is typically political anarchism, that is, the view that there should be no state. As the philosopher and anarchism scholar David Miller observes, however, anarchism itself is a more general view, namely the view that there should be no rulers. Miller writes that “although the state is the most distinctive object of anarchist attack, it is by no means the only object. Any institution which, like the state, appears to anarchists (...) coercive, punitive, exploitative or destructive is condemned in the same way”—including, for example, religious institutions, schools, or economic systems (Miller 1984: 8). In this sense, one can be an anarchist about different things. Relationship anarchy is anarchism about personal relationships. -/- Several thinkers in the anarchist tradition have held views on personal relationships (e.g., Godwin 1793; Bakunin 1866; Goldman 1910). In what follows, however, our focus is not on the general issue of anarchist views on relationships, but on the ideas of the contemporary movement of self-identifying relationship anarchists. -/- The ideas of relationship anarchy in this sense—hereafter RA—have been developed in queer and countercultural communities over the last two decades. Rather than focusing primarily on mechanisms of political power, RA theorists have been concerned with understanding and challenging the power dynamics at play in close personal relationships. Andie Nordgren, the movement’s central, founding theorist, describes RA as a radical commitment “to avoid defining relationships by attempts to exercise power over each other” (Nordgren 2018). -/- Our aim is to give a concise presentation and defense of RA. We will approach RA as a theory in applied ethics—in particular, as a theory in sexual ethics and relationship ethics—and relate it to ongoing debates in these areas. We, the authors, are both queer men with a background in countercultures where RA is widely practiced and discussed. One of us is an activist working on trans- and sex workers’ rights (Sørlie), the other is a philosophy professor (Moen). Although we make several claims about the scope, content, and justification of RA, we do not claim to speak with any special authority on the issue. Moreover, many of the points that we make here, while not attributable to a specific source, are not original to us, but are the result of several years of fruitful discussion with others in the RA community. -/- We start by considering the cases where, from an RA perspective, current mainstream relationship norms are too restrictive. Then we turn to the cases where current norms are too permissive. Our views on what counts as “mainstream” relationship norms are, no doubt, influenced by the fact that we are writing from a Scandinavian perspective. -/- We then proceed to consider the relationship between RA and polyamory. We argue that RA is compatible with some, but not all, forms of polyamorous practice. We also argue that, from an RA perspective, the increasingly popular term “consensual non-monogamy” is a misleading term that should be avoided. In the conclusion, we explain how RA, as a position in applied ethics, can be justified within consequentialist, deontological, and virtue ethical frameworks alike. -/- We have restricted our scope, in what follows, to chosen relationships between adults. Thus, we are not dealing with, for example, kinship relationships into which one is born, nor relationships between adults and minors. Although many issues and arguments deserve to be explored in greater depth than we can do here, we hope, nevertheless, to be able to convey the main nature and thrust of RA. (shrink)

Bitcoin is a peer-to-peer electronic payment system that operates as an independent currency. This paper is a philosophical investigation of the ontological constitution of Bitcoin. Using Slavoj Žižek’s ontological triad of the real, the symbolic and the imaginary, the paper distinguishes between three ideal typical theories of money: commodity theory, fiat theory, and credit theory. The constitution of Bitcoin is analysed by comparing the currency to each of these ideal types. It is argued that Bitcoin is commodity money without gold, (...) fiat money without a state, and credit money without debt. In conclusion, it is suggested that Bitcoin poses an ideological challenge to conventional forms of money in so far as it not only provokes sedimented beliefs about money but also exposes the forms of exploitation, risk and even violence inherent in the existing system of state authorized credit money. (shrink)