At the same time, it is not entirely inappropriate to ask why Kant does not care about natural language. One searches in vain for many remarks about, let alone any kind of developed discussion of, language in Kant’s texts, a lacuna that becomes especially salient in the Critique of Pure Reason, particularly to those reading that text in the late twentieth century. Yet it is in this text, along with the Critique of Judgement, where one would expect to see a (...) discussion of language in Kant’s systematic works. Thus a puzzle emerges: on the one hand, Kant displayed a remarkably wide range of curiosity about philosophical and other questions; on the other hand, there is an almost equally remarkable lack of consideration of language in his writing—most specifically in the first Critique, where the topic seems fundamentally relevant and yet is utterly ignored. Can this apparent discrepancy be reconciled? Worse yet, does not the fact that Kant neglects the questions raised by natural language reveal a fundamental gap in his critical account of reason’s scope and limits, and raise doubts about Kant’s approach that becomes even more pressing with the advent of the so-called “linguistic turn” in philosophy? (shrink)

Abstract: In this article, two philosophical positions that structure distinct approaches in the history of metaphysics and epistemology are briefly characterized and contrasted. While one view, “naturalism,” rejects an a priori commitment to necessity, the other view, “transcendentalism,” insists on that commitment. It is shown that at the level of the fundamentals of thought, judgment, and reason, the dispute dissolves, and the naturalists' employment of “necessity for all practical purposes” is at best only nominally distinct from the transcendentalists' use of (...) the same concept. (shrink)

In the Critique of Pure Reason, Kant conceives of general logic as a set of universal and necessary rules for the possibility of thought, or as a set of minimal necessary conditions for ascribing rationality to an agent . Such a conception, of course, contrasts with contemporary notions of formal, mathematical or symbolic logic. Yet, in so far as Kant seeks to identify those conditions that must hold for the possibility of thought in general, such conditions must hold a fortiori (...) for any specific model of thought, including axiomatic treatments of logic and standard natural deduction models of first-order predicate logic. Kant's general logic seeks to isolate those conditions by thinking through – or better, reflecting on – those conditions that themselves make thought possible. (shrink)

In recent years, an approach within feminist philosophy of reason has emerged, for convenience called "gendered reason", that states that due to differences of sex and gender, women and men perceive, think, know, understand, judge, reason about, interact with others and (possibly) constitute the world in fundamentally distinct ways. On the basis of three distinct but interrelating arguments it is tried to show that there is a basic difficulty in maintaining at least some versions of this view; indeed that it (...) may be fundamentally incoherent. (shrink)

In recent years, an approach within feminist philosophy of reason has emerged, for convenience called "gendered reason", that states that due to differences of sex and gender, women and men perceive, think, know, understand, judge, reason about, interact with others and (possibly) constitute the world in fundamentally distinct ways. On the basis of three distinct but interrelating arguments it is tried to show that there is a basic difficulty in maintaining at least some versions of this view; indeed that it (...) may be fundamentally incoherent. (shrink)

Drawing on Kant's published and unpublished texts and a wide range of texts from the history of logic and philosophical inquiries into language, Mosser provides an interpretation of some of Kant's most complex arguments.

Kant’s reputation for making absolutist claims about universal and necessary conditions for the possibility of experience are put here in the broader context of his goals for the Critical philosophy. It is shown that within that context, Kant’s claims can be seen as considerably more innocuous than they are traditionally regarded, underscoring his deep respect for “common sense” and sharing surprisingly similar goals with Wittgenstein in terms of what philosophy can, and at least as importantly cannot, provide.

In an appendix to the Transcendental Analytic of the Critique of Pure Reason, Kant remarks.

In the Critique of Pure Reason, Kant uses the term “logic” in a bewildering variety of ways, at times making it close to impossible to determine whether he is referring to (among others) general logic, transcendental logic, transcendental analytic, a "special" logic relative to a specific science, a "natural" logic, a logic intended for the "learned" (Gelehrter), some hybrid of these logics, or even some still-more abstract notion that ranges over all of these uses. This paper seeks to come to (...) grips with Kant's complex use of "logic." Kant is standardly regarded as saying that since Aristotle, there need be no more concern about logic as a discipline or a field of study, and that Aristotle (with some minor embellishments, in terms of presentation) is the last word in logic. I argue here that, in spite of Hegel, Peirce, Strawson, and others, one must take into consideration Kant’s sophisticated critique of Aristotle’s logic in order to see Kant’s own conception of logic in contrast to that of Aristotle’s. In this way, Kant's strategy in the First Critique—grounded as it is in logic—becomes more plausible, defensible, and, consequently, more attractive. (shrink)

This exercise requires students—particularly in Introduction to Philosophy courses—to use Internet chatrooms in an “agonistic” fashion,actively seeking out others with whom to argue. Generally using topics in applied ethics, students develop skills in articulating their positions, providing evidence to support those positions, and presenting arguments. These Internet exchanges have resulted in improvement in students’ critical thinking skills, writing, and classroom discussion, and have revealed the value of defending a position with a dispassionate, well-reasoned argument.

This exercise requires students—particularly in Introduction to Philosophy courses—to use Internet chatrooms in an “agonistic” fashion,actively seeking out others with whom to argue. Generally using topics in applied ethics, students develop skills in articulating their positions, providing evidence to support those positions, and presenting arguments. These Internet exchanges have resulted in improvement in students’ critical thinking skills, writing, and classroom discussion, and have revealed the value of defending a position with a dispassionate, well-reasoned argument.

Although the Internet is often used to talk with those with whom one agrees, this paper presents an "agonistic" strategy designed to help students find discussion partners with whom they disagree. This "agonistic" strategy has a number of advantages, specifically helping students' skills in writing, reading, logic, and rhetoric, as well as helping them recognizes the values of these skills and the importance of being well-informed when one enters a debate. As a further benefit, this approach has improved classroom discussion (...) and improved the substance and form of those discussions. In contrast with those who fear that the Internet hasushered in an age where citizens may choose only to look at that information confirming views they already hold, this exercise helps show that the distance among intellectual sparring partners is more of a gap than a chasm, and that our debates are not fruitless, but in fact are essential to democracy and a conception of our lives as active, engaged citizens. (shrink)

In der Geschichte der Philosophie gibt es nur wenige Namen, mit denen sich so viel Ungewohnliches, aber auch Ungereimtes, ja Paradoxes verbindet wie mit dem Namen Wittgenstein. Fur den Mann auf der StraSSe meist ein ganzlich Unbekannter, ist Wittgenstein fur viele Fachleute der Philosoph schlechthin. ER zahlt zu den meistzitierten Denkern des 20. JAhrhunderts, obwohl er in seinem Leben nur einige Dutzend Seiten veroffentlicht hat: er wurde seit seinem Tode zum Star einer neuen philosophischen Tradition, wo gerade er uns doch (...) von der traditionellen Philosophie befreien wollte. EIne vollstandige Bibliographie der Wittgenstein-Literatur wurde mehrere tausend Titel umfassen, und standig werden neue Abhandlungen uber Wittgenstein und seine Philosophie veroffentlicht. (shrink)

Ogni tentativo di ripensare le nostre categorie politiche deve muovere dalla consapevolezza che della distinzione classica fra zoé e bios, tra vita naturale ed esistenza politica (o tra l'uomo come semplice vivente e l'uomo come soggetto politico), non ne sappiamo piú nulla. Nel diritto romano arcaico homo sacer era un uomo che chiunque poteva uccidere senza commettere omicidio e che non doveva però essere messo a morte nelle forme prescritte dal rito. È la vita uccidibile e insacrificabile dell' 'uomo sacro' (...) a fornire qui la chiave per una rilettura critica della nostra tradizione politica. Quando la vita diventa la posta in gioco della politica e questa si trasforma in biopolitica, tutte le categorie fondamentali della nostra riflessione, dai diritti dell'uomo alla democrazia alla cittadinanza, entrano in un processo di svuotamento e di dislocazione il cui risultato sta oggi davanti ai nostri occhi. Seguendo il filo del rapporto costitutivo fra nuda vita e potere sovrano, da Aristotele ad Auschwitz, dall'Habeas corpus alle Dichiarazioni dei diritti, il libro di Agamben cerca di decifrare gli enigmi - prima di tutti il fascismo e il nazismo - che il nostro secolo ha proposto alla ragione storica. Fino a vedere, nel campo di concentramento, il paradigma biopolitico nascosto della modernità in cui città e casa sono diventate indiscernibili e la possibilità di distinguere tra il nostro corpo biologico e il nostro corpo politico ci è stata tolta una volta per tutte. (shrink)

Foreword by Oliver Sacks Kurt Goldstein (1878-1965) was already an established neuropsychologist when he emigrated from Germany to the United States in the 1930s. This book, his magnum opus and widely regarded as a modern classic in psychology and biology, grew out of his dissatisfaction with traditional natural science techniques for analyzing living beings. It offers a broad introduction to the sources and ranges of application of the "holistic" or "organismic" research program that has since become a standard part (...) of biological thought. Goldstein was especially concerned with the breakdown of organization and the failure of central controls that take place in catastrophic responses to situations such as physical or mental illness. But he was equally attuned to the amazing powers of the organism to readjust to such catastrophic losses, if only by withdrawal to a more limited range that it could manage by a redistribution of its reduced energies, thus reclaiming as much wholeness as new circumstances allowed. Goldstein's theses in The Organism have had an important impact on philosophical and psychological thought throughout the twentieth century, as evidenced in the work of Maurice Merleau-Ponty, Georges Canguilhem, Ernst Cassirer, and Ludwig Binswanger. (shrink)

Mind perception entails ascribing mental capacities to other entities, whereas moral judgment entails labeling entities as good or bad or actions as right or wrong. We suggest that mind perception is the essence of moral judgment. In particular, we suggest that moral judgment is rooted in a cognitive template of two perceived minds—a moral dyad of an intentional agent and a suffering moral patient. Diverse lines of research support dyadic morality. First, perceptions of mind are linked to moral judgments: dimensions (...) of mind perception (agency and experience) map onto moral types (agents and patients), and deficits of mind perception correspond to difficulties with moral judgment. Second, not only are moral judgments sensitive to perceived agency and experience, but all moral transgressions are fundamentally understood as agency plus experienced suffering—that is, interpersonal harm—even ostensibly harmless acts such as purity violations. Third, dyadic morality uniquely accounts for the phenomena of dyadic completion (seeing agents in response to patients, and vice versa), and moral typecasting (characterizing others as either moral agents or moral patients). Discussion also explores how mind perception can unify morality across explanatory levels, how a dyadic template of morality may be developmentally acquired, and future directions. (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)

It is widely recognised that mainstream economics has failed to translate micro consistently into macro economics and to provide endogenous explanations for the continual changes in the economic system. Since the early 1980s, a growing number of economists have been trying to provide answers to these two key questions by applying an evolutionary approach. This new departure has yielded a rich literature with enormous variety, but the unifying principles connecting the various ideas and views presented are, as yet, not apparent. (...) This 2005 volume brings together fifteen original articles from scholars - each of whom has made a significant contribution to the field - in their common effort to reconstruct economics as an evolutionary science. Using meso economics as an analytical entity to bridge micro and macro economics as well as static and dynamic realms, a unified economic theory emerges. (shrink)

Many meta-ethicists have thought that rationality requires us to heed apparent normative reasons, not objective normative reasons. But what are apparent reasons? There are two kinds of standard answers. On de dicto views, R is an apparent reason for S to \ when it appears to S that R is an objective reason to \ . On de re views, R is an apparent reason for S to \ when R’s truth would constitute an objective reason for S to \ (...) , and it appears to S that R. De re views are currently more popular because they avoid overintellectualizing rationality. But they face problems owing to the way in which they do so. Some assume that we can escape these problems by requiring more information to be apparent or by appealing to defeat. But these strategies fail. So, I defend a new view: apparent reasons are apparent facts that agents are competently attracted to treat like objective reasons, where competence is indirectly defined in terms of objective reasons and a competence/performance distinction is honored. Since one can treat X like an F without having the concept of an F, the view does not overintellectualize rationality. But it is also strong enough to dodge the pitfalls of de re views. (shrink)

The beatific vision is widely perceived as a Roman Catholic doctrine. Many continue to view deification as a distinctively Eastern Orthodox doctrine incompatible with the Western theological tradition, especially its Protestant expressions. This essay will demonstrate that several Reformers of the first and second generation promoted a vision of redemption that culminates with deification and beatific vision. They affirmed these concepts without apology in confessional statements, dogmatic works, biblical commentaries, and polemical treatises. Attention will focus on figures in the Reformed (...) tradition though one could produce similar surveys for the Lutheran and Anglican branches of the Reformation as well. John Calvin will receive extended treatment because some scholars dispute whether he affirmed deification. This essay presents important evidence thus far overlooked which should settle the question. (shrink)

The only way to a peaceful and just world is, rejecting old and narrow national attitudes, nihilism and anarchy, to improve the institutions we already have.

According to Veritism, true belief is the sole fundamental epistemic value. Epistemologists often take Veritism to entail that all other epistemic items can only have value by standing in certain instrumental relations—namely, by tending to produce a high ratio of true to false beliefs or by being products of sources with this tendency. Yet many value theorists outside epistemology deny that all derivative value is grounded in instrumental relations to fundamental value. Veritists, I believe, can and should follow suit. After (...) setting the stage in §1, I explain in §2 why Veritism should not take an Instrumentalist form. Instrumentalist Veritism faces a generalized version of the swamping problem. But this problem undermines Instrumentalism, not Veritism: granting Instrumentalism, similar problems arise for any economical epistemic axiology. I show in §3 how Veritism can take a less narrow form and solve the swamping problem. After answering some objections in §4, I consider in §5 what some would regard as a less radical alternative solution and argue that it either fails or collapses into mine. I close in §6 by taking stock and re-evaluating the overall prospects for Veritism, suggesting that it is a highly promising epistemic axiology when divorced from Instrumentalism. (shrink)

According to a view I’ll call Epistemic Normativism, knowledge is normative in the same sense in which paradigmatically normative properties like justification are normative. This paper argues against EN in two stages and defends a positive non-normativist alternative. After clarifying the target in §1, I consider in §2 some arguments for EN from the premise that knowledge entails justification. I first raise some worries about inferring constitution from entailment. I then rehearse the reasons why some epistemologists reject the Entailment Thesis (...) and argue that a non-normativist picture provides the best explanation of all the intuitions surrounding this thesis, favorable and unfavorable. On this picture, human knowledge is a structured non-normative complex that has as one of its parts a justification-making property, analogous in role to good-making properties like pleasurableness. After giving three arguments against EN in §3 and answering an objection in §4, I turn in §5 to further develop the positive view sketched in §2. In §6, I take stock and conclude. (shrink)

First English translation of revolutionary paper that established that even in elementary parts of arithmetic, there are propositions which cannot be proved or disproved within the system. Introduction by R. B. Braithwaite.