Virtue epistemology (VE) suggests that S knows just in case S’s true belief is creditable to S’s competence. While Lackey’s ( 2007, 2009 ) objection from testimonial knowledge had raised concerns that VE is too strong, some virtue epistemologists (Sosa 2007, Pritchard 2012 ) adopted a weaker condition requiring only partial credit on agent’s part. This paper, however, argues that in addition to the creditable relation, the agent’s competence manifestation could be partial too—in the sense that only part of his/her (...) whole competence regarding the cognitive task is manifested. Interesting consequences follow as we explore this new way of dissecting cognitive agency—in particular, difficult cases for VE arise when one’s cognitive competence is partly apt and partly Gettiered. (shrink)

This paper offers an account of propositional absurdity and investigates its connection to falsity. I propose that instances of absurdity just are cases of what I call maximal abnormality. In light of the works of Smith (2016) and Pietroski and Rey (1995) on normic conditionals which link normality to explanatory demands, I suggest that absurdity also has a close tie with explanations (more precisely, the lacking thereof). Interesting consequences follow under such an account – first, I argue that we should (...) see absurdity as ceteris paribus guide to falsehood – what is absurd is expected to be false, unless further evidence suggests otherwise; second (and relatedly), when further evidence indeed suggests otherwise, absurd propositions would not cease to be absurd. (shrink)

This paper offers an account of propositional absurdity and investigates its connection to falsity. I propose that instances of absurdity just are cases of what I call maximal abnormality. In light of the works of Smith (2016) and Pietroski and Rey (1995) on normic conditionals which link normality to explanatory demands, I suggest that absurdity also has a close tie with explanations (more precisely, the lacking thereof). Interesting consequences follow under such an account – first, I argue that we should (...) see absurdity as ceteris paribus guide to falsehood – what is absurd is expected to be false, unless further evidence suggests otherwise; second (and relatedly), when further evidence indeed suggests otherwise, absurd propositions would not cease to be absurd. (shrink)

This paper offers an account of propositional absurdity and investigates its connection to falsity. I propose that instances of absurdity just are cases of what I call maximal abnormality. In light of the works of Smith (2016) and Pietroski and Rey (1995) on normic conditionals which link normality to explanatory demands, I suggest that absurdity also has a close tie with explanations (more precisely, the lacking thereof). Interesting consequences follow under such an account – first, I argue that we should (...) see absurdity as ceteris paribus guide to falsehood – what is absurd is expected to be false, unless further evidence suggests otherwise; second (and relatedly), when further evidence indeed suggests otherwise, absurd propositions would not cease to be absurd. (shrink)

Consciousness is currently a thriving area of research in psychology and neuroscience. While this is often attributed to events that took place in the early 1990s, consciousness studies today are a continuation of research that started in the late 19th century and that continued throughout the 20th century. From the beginning, the effort built on studies of animals to reveal basic principles of brain organization and function, and of human patients to gain clues about consciousness itself. Particularly important and our (...) focus here is research in the 1950s, 1960s, and 1970s involving three groups of patients—amnesia, split brain, and blindsight. Across all three groups, a similar pattern of results was found—the patients could respond appropriately to stimuli that they denied seeing (or in the case of amnesiacs, having seen before). These studies paved the way for the current wave of research on consciousness. The field is, in fact, still grappling with the implications of the findings showing that the ability to consciously know and report the identity of a visual stimulus can be dissociated in the brain from the mechanisms that underlie the ability to behave in a meaningful way to the same stimulus. (shrink)

Philosophers generally agree that gratitude, the called-for response to benevolence, includes positive feelings. In this paper, I argue against this view. The grateful beneficiary will have certain feelings, but in some contexts, those feelings will be profoundly negative. Philosophers overlook this fact because they tend to consider only cases of gratitude in which the benefactor’s sacrifice is minimal, and in which the benefactor fares well after performing an act of benevolence. When we consider cases in which a benefactor suffers severely, (...) we see the feelings associated with gratitude can be negative, and even quite painful. I conclude with a discussion of the implications negative feelings of gratitude have for the normative question of when gratitude is owed, and for the descriptive claim in positive psychology that gratitude enhances wellbeing. (shrink)

This document collects natural derivation systems for logics described in Priest, An Introduction to Non-Classical Logic [4]. It provides an alternative or supplement to the semantic tableaux of his text. Except that some chapters are collapsed, there are sections for each chapter in Priest, with an additional, final section on quantified modal logic. In each case, (i) the language is briefly described and key semantic definitions stated, (ii) the derivation system is presented with a few examples given, and (iii) soundness (...) and completeness are proved. There should be enough detail to make the parts accessible to students would work through parallel sections of Priest. (shrink)

This is an exploration of recent trends in metaphysics, including deflationary and experimental metaphysics.

Involving as it does impossible worlds and the like, the Routley-Meyer worlds semantics for relevant logic has seemed unmotivated to some. I set a version of relevant semantics in a context to make sense of its different elements. Suppose a view which makes room for structured properties — or related entities which combine in arbitrary ways to form structured ones. Then it may seem natural to say entailment supervenes upon the structures, so that P entails Q just when part of (...) the condition for being p is being q. If P stands in this relation to Q, a result is that there is no possible world where P but not Q, so that P classically entails Q. But the conditions are not equivalent. For all possible worlds, but not all properties, are maximal and consistent. I suggest that relevant semantics is naturally seen as modeling entailment grounded in property structure and makes sense insofar as it reflects this fundamental and intuitive notion. (shrink)

In this short paper, I discuss certain aspects of a “common-sense” approach to truth and falsity. It is my experience that many will object to what I have to say. As you read, if you have objections, try to formulate them carefully, and ask yourself whether I attempt a reply.

In this short paper, I introduce two central notions for argument evaluation. The presentation is completely informal. It is possible to develop formal methods for working with validity and souneness, but it is also possible to apply the informal notions directly to problems in philosophy and beyond. In either case, it is important to understand the basic notions, in order to understand what is accomplished in reasoning. Exercises are included, with answers to selected exercises at the end.

Clarifies the character and fundamental structures of 'political economy' as an intellectual discipline in the texts of Adam Smith. This title is suitable for historians of economic thought and philosophers of social science.

Novels and thought experiments can be pathways to different kinds of knowledge. We may, however, be hard pressed to say exactly what can be learned from novels but not from thought experiments. Headway on this matter can be made by spelling out their respective conditions for epistemic failure. Thought experiments fail in their epistemic role when they neither yield propositional knowledge nor contribute to an argument. They are largely in the business of ‘knowing that’. Novels, on the other hand can (...) be an epistemic success by yielding ‘knowledge how’. They can help us to improve our competences. (shrink)

Plagiarism by students is a common and worldwide phenomenon with a significant impact on our society. Numerous studies on the pervasive nature of plagiarism among students have focused on the behavioral aspects of plagiarism and how to prevent it. Based on an empirical study of a sample of 463 eighth graders in Hong Kong, this article offers an analytical model to understand the ethical decision-making process in plagiarism among students. Using this model, students' plagiaristic behavior can be analyzed in terms (...) of their moral judgment, moral intensity, and perceived risks. (shrink)

Is there a duty to prosecute grave international crimes? Many have thought so, even if they recognize the obligation to be defeasible. However, the theoretical literature frequently leaves the grounds for such a duty inadequately specified, or unsystematically amalgamated, leaving it unclear which considerations should drive and shape processes of criminal accountability. Further, the circumstance leaves calls to end impunity vulnerable to skeptical worries concerning the risks and costs of punishing perpetrators. I argue that a qualified duty to prosecute can (...) be substantiated on the basis of a single class of reasons, though also that standard justifications of international criminal law (as currently conceived) are not up to the task. The account exploits the expressive dimension of punishment, but locates the central good of criminal accountability in its capacity to appropriately enable an agential stance on the part of subjects in transitional circumstances. It can legitimate, in a way to be specified, hope. The approach also displays the cynicism of an anti‐impunity ethos in the absence of a robust commitment to securing basic human rights in transitional circumstances. (shrink)

I argue that there is nothing wrong with perfect voyeurism , covert watching or listening that is neither discovered nor publicized. After a brief discussion of privacy I present attempts from Stanley Benn, Daniel Nathan, and James Moor to show that the act is wrong. I argue that these authors fail to make their case. However, I maintain that, if detected or publicized, voyeurism can do grave harm and to that extent should be severely punished. I conclude with some thoughts (...) on the stubborn intuition that perfect voyeurism is wrong despite the absence of harm. (shrink)

The article investigates the sociocultural implications of the changing modern workplace and of pharmacological cognitive enhancement as a potential adaptive tool from the viewpoint of social niche construction. We will attempt to elucidate some of the sociocultural and technological trends that drive and influence the characteristics of this specific niche, and especially to identify the kind of capabilities and adaptations that are being promoted, and to ascertain the capabilities and potentialities that might become diminished as a result. In this context, (...) we will examine what PCE is, and how and why it might be desirable as a tool for adaptation within the workplace. As human beings are, or at least should be allowed to be, more than merely productive, able-bodied and able-minded workers, we will further examine how adaptation to the workplace niche could result in problems in other domains of modern societal life that require the same or other cognitive capabilities. In this context we will also focus on the concept of responsibility and how it pertains to PCE and the modern workplace niche. This will shed some light on the kind of trends related to workplace niche construction, PCE and capability promotion that we can expect in the future, and on the contexts in which this might be either beneficial or detrimental to the individual as a well-rounded human being, and to other members of society. (shrink)

The aim of this essay is to contribute to the development of a paradigmatic shift in how design is understood, transformed and practiced in the Global South. It does this by establishing the case for building a strong contextual relation between design, colonialism, and the mobilised counter-agency of decoloniality. Thereafter, design for/by the Global South is presented within a critical epistemological reframing subordinate to a situated imperative of the ‘Sustainment’.

Many find it plausible that for a given beneficiary, Y, benefactor, R, and action, ϕ, Y’s being grateful to R for ϕ-ing implies Y’s being grateful that R ϕ-ed. According to some philosophers who hold this view, all instances of gratitude to, or “prepositional gratitude,” are also instances of gratitude that, or “propositional gratitude.” These philosophers believe there is a single unified concept of gratitude, a phenomenon that is essentially gratitude that, and whose manifestations sometimes have additional features that make (...) them instances of gratitude to as well. In this article, I show that view to be mistaken. I base my argument on two hypothetical cases, in each of which a beneficiary, Y, is grateful to a benefactor, R, for ϕ-ing, but not grateful that R ϕ-ed. Generalizing from those cases and other cases of gratitude, I argue that prepositional gratitude is the proper response to benevolence-motivated action and propositional gratitude consists in a beneficiary’s judging a state of affairs to be valuable for himself and welcoming that state of affairs. Because not every instance of a benefactor’s acting benevolently toward a beneficiary is something that beneficiary finds valuable for himself and welcomes, it is possible to be grateful to a benefactor for ϕ-ing but not grateful that she ϕ-ed. Prepositional gratitude and propositional gratitude can each occur without the other and are thus two distinct phenomena. I conclude by explaining the importance of accurately understanding the relationship between prepositional gratitude and propositional gratitude. (shrink)

ABSTRACT In the ‘Cook Ding cutting up an ox’ parable, Zhuangzi advanced a doctrine on craft and its relationship with Dao. With reference to Merleau-Ponty’s philosophy in conjunction with an analysis of Zhuangzi’s epistemological position, we argue that Zhuangzi understood craft as involving the supersession of the cognitive. In craft, the relationship between human and world is non-cognitive and ‘pre-objective’, the living of this kind of relationship gives rise to a non-cognitive ‘practical sense’ which enables the craftsman’s movements to spontaneously (...) constitute wuwei. Zhuangzi’s ideal is that this kind of relationship is generalized to life as a whole, thereby enabling human actions to spontaneously constitute wuwei generally. This is why he stipulated ‘doing away with knowing’ as a self-cultivation technique required for attaining Dao. Thus, craft constitutes an embodiment of Dao in the double-sense of wuwei and the non-cognitive and ‘pre-objective’ relationship between human and world which enables wuwei. (shrink)

Ethics, communication skills, and the law ('practice skills') are important in all aspects of modern health care. Doctors and nurses must be sensitive to the ethical aspects of their work and understand the legal framework within which clinical decisions are made. Well developed skills of communication, with patients, their relatives and other members of the clinical team, are a key feature of good clinical practice Until recently, the important of practice skills has been relatively neglected in health care education. This (...) situation is changing. The UK General Medical Council, for example, has recently identified three aspects as part of the core of the medical course, and the move to degree courses in nursing has led to an increasing focus of practice skills in nurse education. The Oxford Practice Skills Project (OPSP) team have developed a course, within the University of Oxford Clinical School, which covers the teaching of practice skills in an integrated manner. This course is widely recognized as one of the most systematic developments of education in these areas. This manual describes the OPSP course in detail and provides teaching materials. Although developed initially for medical students, it should be helpful to all those involved in teaching ethics, communication skills, and law in health care. Each Seminar is described in detail Tutors' guides are provided Student handouts are included Contains guidelines for introducing 'practice skills' into a busy clinical curriculum Includes over forty case histories for teaching and examination Gives details of many useful sources and resources Details a variety of teaching methods together with their advantages and disadvantages Provides an ethics teaching toolkit for clinical teachers new to this area Readers are welcome to photocopy any part of this manual for their own teaching. (shrink)

Arash Abazari's Hegel's Ontology of Power is a superb study of the relevance of Hegel's logic to Marx's theory. Hegel is often dismissed by Marxists as an ‘idealist’ denying the reality of the world, as if Hegel were Bishop Berkeley with a German accent.1 Abazari recognizes this is not the case: ‘(T)he logical categories are not self-standing, but shadow, or track, the empirical world’ (Abazari 2020: 7). But the world in its full actuality does not simply consist of the objects (...) we sense or perceive. It is intrinsically intelligible, and its intelligibility can be comprehended only in thought. When it is, the ‘idealist’ thesis of the identity (in difference) of thought and being holds. Anyone asserting a truth claim implicitly asserts this identity. In so far as Marx asserts that Capital comprehends the capitalist mode of production, he too is an ‘idealist’ in the Hegelian sense of the term. (shrink)

Great bliss clarified -- Six verses on co-emergence -- Utterly clear teaching of unification -- Definitive teaching on dreams -- Clear teaching on utter non-dwelling -- Full teaching of suchness -- Six verses on Madhyamaka.

It was most often Engels who had the task of presenting the future society, by commenting and developing the indications by Marx, and then, after the death of this latter, in making corrections of great importance. The aim of the article is to show that Engels did not defend just one single notion of socialism, but several. Inhis mind they corresponded to different stages in the construction of communism. For the period of transition following the coming to power of the (...) proletariat, he envisaged a state controlled market socialism. For the period of socialism, as such, he recommended integral planning, abolishing the market. But later he moved away from this idea and approached an associative socialism, more in tune with the aims of communism: in brief, co-operatives, and a plan of orientation, which correspond to two levels of democracy. Finally, the article presents a certain number of critical commentaries in the light of past history and of current research on models of socialism. (shrink)

In its most fundamental, constructive parts devoted to descriptive theory, The Wealth of Nations is first and foremost an account of the causes of economic growth and development. Smith’s theory of economic development gives primary place, at least as the proximate determinants of development, to labour productivity growth and capital accumulation. This chapter examines successively, under six heads, the key dimensions of Smith’s treatment of labour and capital, and the relations between the two, both in The Wealth of Nations and (...) other writings: division of labour, the concept of capital, capital accumulation and economic development, productive versus unproductive labour, the theory of real wages and of profit rates, and economic policy in relation to labour and capital. There are some concluding reflections on Smith’s legacy in relation to these matters. (shrink)

The definition and measurement of filial piety in existing research primarily focuses on the narrow conceptualizations of Asian filial piety, which would inflate cultural differences and undermine cultural universals in how people approach caring for their elderly parents. Employing the Dual Filial Piety Model, this study aimed to examine the relationship between filial piety and attitude toward caring for elderly parents beyond the Asian context. In our study, we found that reciprocal filial piety does not differ across cultures while authoritarian (...) filial piety does. We also found that collectivism, rather than ethnicity, predicted RFP and AFP, which in turn predicted positive attitude toward caring for elderly parents. Our work demonstrates the cross-cultural applicability of the DFPM and highlights the universal and culture-specific aspects of filial piety. (shrink)

This book presents the concept of ‘unstaging’ war as a strategic response to the failure of the discourse and institutions of peace. This failure is explained by exploring the changing character of conflict in current and emergent global circumstances, such as asymmetrical conflicts, insurgencies, and terrorism. Fry argues that this pluralisation of war has broken the binary relation between war and peace: conflict is no longer self-evident, and consequentially the changes in the conditions, nature, systems, philosophies and technologies of war (...) must be addressed. Through a deep understanding of contemporary war, Fry explains why peace fails as both idea and process, before presenting ‘Unstaging War’ as a concept and nascent practice that acknowledges conflict as structurally present, and so is not able to be dealt with by attempts to create peace. Against a backdrop of increasingly tense relations between global power blocs, the beginnings of a new nuclear arms race, and the ever-increasing human and environmental impacts of climate change, a more viable alternative to war is urgently needed. Unstaging War is not claimed as a solution, but rather as an exploration of critical problems and an opening into the means of engaging with them. (shrink)

In the present article, I attempt to relate Saul Kripke's “sceptical paradox” to some issues about the self; specifically, the relation between the self and its mental states and episodes. I start with a brief reconstruction of the paradox, and venture to argue that it relies crucially on a Cartesian model of the self: the sceptic regards the Wittgensteinian “infinite regress of interpretation” as the foundation of his challenge, and this is where he commits the crucial mistake. After the diagnosis, (...) I attempt to sketch my own model of the self and its mental states and episodes. This tentative picture binds meaning and the self together, stressing the subjective aspect of meaning without committing the same fallacy. The solution ventured here is relatively independent of the secondary literatures on the sceptical paradox of following rules, for it aims to provide a new angle to understand and meet the challenge presented by the sceptic. (shrink)

This paper develops the situational model of primate beliefs from the Prior-Lurz line of thought. There is a strong skepticism concerning primate beliefs in the analytic tradition which holds that beliefs have to be propositional and non-human animals do not have them. The response offered in this paper is twofold. First, two arguments against the propositional model as applied to other animals are put forward: an a priori argument from referential opacity and an empirical argument from varieties of working memory. (...) Second, the Prior-Lurz situational model based on state of affairs as opposed to propositions is introduced and defended with two significant modifications. With this model of primate beliefs we can make progress in understanding how other primates can have certain mindreading capacity. (shrink)

In those parts of his paper that have the clearest bearing upon mycontributions, Simon Deichsel 1) elaborates various conceptions ofrealism; 2) declares himself an anti-realist of a specific sort; 3) seeks toidentify and criticise pragmatic aspects of my justification for adoptinga realist orientation; and 4) argues that his anti-realist perspective ispreferable to realism.An immediate problem with Deichsel’s project, if intended as acritique of my own realist orientation, is that the sort of realism againstwhich his anti-realism is oppositionally defined is not (...) the versionof realism I maintain. In fact the only one of Deichsel’s formulationsthat I unambiguously accept as a version of realism is ontological realism. Realism as I understand the term is about existence.It is ontological in nature. At its most basic, it posits the existence of an‘external’ reality.1So understood, realism is not a theory of knowledge, or of language,or even of truth. Indeed so formulated it says nothing about knowledgeor truth.2In particular it does not commit anyone to the correspondencetheory of truth, or indeed to any other theory or conception of truth.In fact it is not a semantic theory at all. (shrink)

The title of this paper is intended as a provocative reference to Ursula Coope 's recent article 'Why Does Aristotle Say That There Is No Time Without Change?', which provides much of the impetus for the present paper.1 For although Coope 's strategy in answering this question is admirable, and although I think that her criticisms of the standard interpretation of the argument that opens Physics IV 11 hit their mark, I believe that her own interpretation fails and that something (...) rather like the standard interpretation is correct. In the first section, I rehearse Coope 's treatment of the standard interpretation and critically evaluate her alternative to it. In the second section, I present an interpretation of the argument that seems to me to succeed where the others fail and also to hold the promise of being quite fruitful in reconstructing the rest of Aristotle's temporal theory. While such a reconstruction lies well beyond the scope of this paper, I shall conclude by mentioning a few of the more significant points that fall out of the interpretation developed here. (shrink)

The first text of Justinian’s sixth century Digest records that Ulpian, the leading lawyer from Syria and counsellor to successive emperors of the Severan age (AD 193-235), related the term ‘law’ to four elements: art, religion, ethics and philosophy.2 Law is the art of the good and equitable, of which lawyers can well be called priests. They cultivate justice and the knowledge of right and wrong, and aim, unless Ulpian is mistaken, at the true philosophy.3 He goes on to say (...) that private law is collected from three sources: natural law,4 the law common to all communities (ius gentium) and the law specific to each community (civil law).5 Gaius, a generation earlier, listed two sources: the civil law of each community and the ius gentium.6 He recognized, however, the existence of natural law which, so far as performing a ‘natural obligation’ is concerned, cannot be changed by civil law.7 At times he identifies natural law with ius gentium. (shrink)

This paper analyzes and compares the doctrines of categories of Aristotle, Kant and Hegel, each of which is first discussed separately. The paper explains the essential double perspective of the problem, showing how a logico-linguistic analysis of the form of rational discourse serves for them as an important clue to ontological problems. Although Aristotle and Kant’s doctrines differ significantly, they both endorse a kind of isomorphism between language/thought and reality. By contrast, Hegel, who takes a critical attitude toward the capability (...) of human language and discursive thinking, rejects the possibility of deriving the structure of reality from the forms of predication or judgment. Nevertheless, the forms of judgment do play an equally crucial role in Hegel’s doctrine, though in a very different way from his predecessors. It is the structural “deficiency” of the judgmental form that turns out to be the driving force for the dialectical movement of the Concept. By shifting the primary concern from the categories themselves to the transitions between them, Hegel opens up the possibility of a dynamic system of categories. (shrink)

This article discusses the concept of epistemic authority in the context of English law relating to expert testimony. It distinguishes between two conceptions of epistemic authority, one strong and one weak, and argues that only the weak conception is appropriate in a legal context, or in any other setting where reliance on experts can be publicly justified. It critically examines Linda Zagzebski's defence of a stronger conception of epistemic authority and questions whether epistemic authority is as closely analogous to practical (...) authority as she maintains. Zagzebski elucidates a kind of deference that courts generally, and rightly, try to avoid. Her concept of ‘first person reasons’, however, does capture an important aspect of the deliberations of conscientious legal actors. (shrink)

Psychology and philosophy have maintained a special relationship since very long ago. Nowadays, many psychologists stay away from philosophy and focus on the empirical methods in their studies. The...

In “A conceptual framework for consciousness,” Michael Graziano provides a substantive conceptual framework for explaining consciousness. In this commentary I will focus on the way Graziano sets up the issue, which fails to capture the opposition accurately. The opponent of Graziano’s approach is no mysticism, but non-cognitive theories exemplified by, e.g., Ned Block’s Overflow thesis. Without identifying the opponent accurately, its significance cannot be fully appreciated. In this commentary I attempt to capture the real disagreement to facilitate further communications. ER (...) -. (shrink)