Locke’s theory of personal identity was philosophically groundbreaking for its attempt to establish a non-substantial identity condition. Locke states, “For the same consciousness being preserv’d, whether in the same or different Substances, the personal Identity is preserv’d” (II.xxvii.13). Many have interpreted Locke to think that consciousness identifies a self both synchronically and diachronically by attributing thoughts and actions to a self. Thus, many have attributed to Locke either a memory theory or an appropriation theory of personal identity. But the former (...) stumble on circularity and the latter is insufficient for Locke’s moral theory insofar as he is committed to a theory of divine rectification. The common problem is that Locke’s theory seems to demand an objective, or metaphysical, fact of a continuing consciousness that does not appeal to a traditional notion of substance for the continuity. I’m suggesting something new. In II.xxvii of the Essay, we see an ambiguity in Locke’s use of the term ‘consciousness’. Locke seems to see consciousness as both a mental state by means of which we are aware of ourselves as perceiving and as the ongoing self we are aware of in these conscious states. First, I make the textual argument why we should read Locke as having a conception of a metaphysical fact of a continuing consciousness that does not appeal to thinking or bodily substance to establish its continuity. I then argue that the metaphysical fact of an enduring consciousness is revealed to us as a phenomenological fact of experience. Due to the nature of certain kinds of perceptual situations we have an experience of ourselves as temporally extended. Although the text bears out that Locke seemed to think there is a fact of an ongoing consciousness, I argue that it is consistent with his reluctance elsewhere that he makes no further epistemological or ontological claims about it. Finally, I provide an account of Locke’s understanding of memory and its relation to consciousness that supports the claim that consciousness is something ontologically distinct from either thinking or bodily substance. (shrink)

Locke has been accused of failing to have a coherent understanding of consciousness, since it can be identical neither to reflection nor to ordinary perception without contradicting other important commitments. I argue that the account of consciousness is coherent once we see that, for Locke, perceptions of ideas are complex mental acts and that consciousness can be seen as a special kind of self-referential mental state internal to any perception of an idea.

The increased visibility of feminism in mainstream culture has recently been noted, with the presence of both online and offline campaigns embedding feminist claims in a variety of everyday spaces. By granting recognition to women’s experiences, these campaigns continue the feminist practice of generating critical knowledge on the basis of gendered experience. In the post-truth era, however, the norms governing claims-making are being significantly reconstructed, with significant consequences for critiques of gender inequality. It is argued here that these norms are (...) linked directly to a wider context of anti-feminism in which dismissing women’s claims is consistent with the goal that opponents of gender equality have of seeking and consolidating epistemic power in the face of what is perceived as systemic male disadvantage and victimhood. Returning to earlier debates within feminism, it is argued that the kinds of post-truth rhetoric used to dismiss women’s experience provide a challenge that feminism must confront. This rhetoric is often grounded in the authenticity of individual experience; however, experience cannot provide unmediated access to truth and, therefore, cannot provide the foundation for feminist claims. On the other hand, experience cannot merely offer one of many contested versions of ‘reality’. The excesses of both foundationalist and anti-foundationalist epistemology are countered with the argument that cognition is a human practice mediated by theoretical propositions which illuminate the question of what can be known. This is the role played by feminist theory in defending the role of experience. (shrink)

Introduced into the philosophical lexicon during the Eighteenth Century, the term ‘aesthetic’ has come to be used to designate, among other things, a kind of object, a kind of judgment, a kind of attitude, a kind of experience, and a kind of value. For the most part, aesthetic theories have divided over questions particular to one or another of these designations: whether artworks are necessarily aesthetic objects; how to square the allegedly perceptual basis of aesthetic (...) judgments with the fact that we give reasons in support of them; how best to capture the elusive contrast between an aesthetic attitude and a practical one; whether to define aesthetic experience according to its phenomenological or representational content; how best to understand the relation between aesthetic value and aesthetic experience. But questions of more general nature have lately arisen, and these have tended to have a skeptical cast: whether any use of ‘aesthetic’ may be explicated without appeal to some other; whether agreement respecting any use is sufficient to ground meaningful theoretical agreement or disagreement; whether the term ultimately answers to any legitimate philosophical purpose that justifies its inclusion in the lexicon. The skepticism expressed by such general questions did not begin to take hold until the later part of the 20th century, and this fact prompts the question whether (a) the concept of the aesthetic is inherently problematic and it is only recently that we have managed to see that it is, or (b) the concept is fine and it is only recently that we have become muddled enough to imagine otherwise. Adjudicating between these possibilities requires a vantage from which to take in both early and late theorizing on aesthetic matters. (shrink)

Malcolm Budd speaks for many when he locates the "principal weakness" of Hume's account of the standard of taste in Hume's "blithe optimism about the uniformity of response of his true judges of artistic value". I argue that Hume's optimism is not blithe. I argue, in particular, that it follows from Hume's definition of a true judge that true judges will never disagree, and that it follows from his appeal to the test of time that true judges will agree often (...) enough to support the kind of standard Hume has in mind. (shrink)

If you were Monica Lewinski's mother, how would you describe Linda Tripp? Remember that Linda Tripp is the woman who tapped her own phone conversations with Monica and then used them to incriminate President Clinton. Marcia Lewis, Monica's actual mother, chose the following expression: "She is like a meddlesome witch, a praying mantis." This expression conveys a multiple analogy, a comparison in which several sources are likened to a target. In this case, the first source tells us that Marcia thinks (...) of Linda as a disagreeable woman who entices youngsters into her confidence in order to ensnare them for her own purposes, much like the witch who trapped Hansel and Gretel. The second source tells us that Marcia thinks of Linda as a creature that ambushes others out of an inhuman lust for prey. ;This example shows the usefulness of multiple analogies in satisfying certain cognitive goals, such as constructing an adequate explanation of Linda Tripp and her behavior. Multiple analogies have also proven to be very useful in satisfying other kinds of cognitive goals, such as those of philosophers and scientists. However, no cognitive model of multiple analogies has yet been proposed or explored. This dissertation presents an exploration of multiple analogies as found in the literature of evolutionary biology, archaeology, and philosophy with the aim of proposing a cognitive model of this interesting mode of reasoning. This model is based upon the Multiconstraint theory of analogies, which is extended for the purpose, and also contrasted with previous theories of analogy. (shrink)

In the following essay I explore some implications of Kieran Cashell’s notably original recent book Aftershock. This is a searching examination of how we might treat transgressive artwork by exploring certain shortcomings of the aesthetic tradition and equally certain shortcomings of those who speak with artistic authority (critics, commentators, and artists themselves). Cashell cuts through a grossly impacted volume of subterfuge in order to advance arguments that question how we have come to appreciate artwork and which show how some transgressive (...) artwork challenges conventional ways of considering art. This he achieves by deploying an impressive roster of theorists, commentators, critics and artists, dismissing various kinds of hyperbole and revealing what is left standing after a vigorous clearance. Cashell strikes at the foundations of the aesthetic tradition and locates some instances of transgressive art in a pivotal position where they may be appreciated not through the aesthetic tradition of disinterestedness but through the traditionally compromising (for aesthetics) paradigm of ethics. I illustrate this with specific reference to Cashell’s Chapter Two where he discusses Marcus Harvey’s publicly and critically reviled painting Myra. Cashell defends this painting, not through any appeal to the liberal-minded ‘freedom-of-speech’ principle, but for its sheer resistance to processing via the traditional idea of aesthetic disinterest. He recommends that the painting be regarded – without any loss of aesthetic worth – as immoral and disturbing and for just this reason as inviting us to join in human solidarity with those who were affected by the crimes associated with Myra Hindley. By thus merging ethical consideration with the response to an aesthetic artform the merits of the painting are preserved while its full force is sustained against the morally enfeebling aspect of Kantian aesthetic disinterest. (shrink)

Statistical learning enables humans to involuntarily process and utilize different kinds of patterns from the environment. However, the cognitive mechanisms underlying the simultaneous acquisition of multiple regularities from different perceptual modalities remain unclear. A novel multidimensional serial reaction time task was developed to test 40 participants’ ability to learn simple first‐order and complex second‐order relations between uni‐modal visual and cross‐modal audio‐visual stimuli. Using the difference in reaction times between sequenced and random stimuli as the index of domain‐general statistical learning, a (...) significant difference and dissociation of learning occurred between the initial and final learning phases. Furthermore, we used a negative and positive occurrence‐frequency‐and‐reaction‐time correlation to indicate implicit and explicit learning, respectively, and found that learning simple uni‐modal patterns involved an implicit‐to‐explicit segue, while acquiring complex cross‐modal patterns required an explicit‐to‐implicit segue, resulting in a X‐shape crossing of regularity learning. Thus, we propose an X‐way hypothesis to elucidate the dynamic interplay between the implicit and explicit systems at two distinct stages when acquiring various regularities in a multidimensional probability space. (shrink)

Many contemporary philosophers favor coherence theories of knowledge (Bender 1989, BonJour 1985, Davidson 1986, Harman 1986, Lehrer 1990). But the nature of coherence is usually left vague, with no method provided for determining whether a belief should be accepted or rejected on the basis of its coherence or incoherence with other beliefs. Haack's (1993) explication of coherence relies largely on an analogy between epistemic justification and crossword puzzles. We show in this paper how epistemic coherence can be understood in terms (...) of maximization of constraint satisfaction, in keeping with computational models that have had a substantial impact in cognitive science. A coherence problem can be defined in terms of a set of elements and sets of positive and negative constraints between pairs of those elements. Algorithms are available for computing coherence by determining how to accept and reject elements in a way that satisfies the most constraints. Knowledge involves at least five different kinds of coherence - explanatory, analogical, deductive, perceptual, and conceptual - each requiring different sorts of elements and constraints. (shrink)

This essay begins by examining the rhetorical significance of the guillotine, an important symbol during the Romantic Period. Lacefield argues that the guillotine symbolized a range of modern ontological juxtapositions and antinomies during the period. Moreover, she argues that the guillotine influenced Mary Shelley’s novel Frankenstein through Giovanni Aldini, a scientist who experimented on guillotined corpses during the French Revolution and inspired Shelley’s characterization of Victor Frankenstein. Given the importance of the guillotine as a powerful metaphor for anxieties (...) emergent during this period, Lacefield employs it as a clue signaling a labyrinth of modern meanings embedded in Shelley’s novel, as well as the films they anticipated. In particular, Lacefield analyzes the significance of the guillotine slice itself—the uneasy, indeterminate line that simultaneously separates and joins categories such as life/death, mind/body, spirit/matter, and nature/technology. Lacefield’s interdisciplinary analysis analyzes motifs of decapitation/dismemberment in Frankenstein and then moves into a discussion of the novel’s exploration of the ontological categories specified above. For example, Frankenstein’s Creature, as a kind of cyborg, exists on the contested theoretical “slice” within a number of antinomies: nature/tech, human/inhuman, matter/spirit, etc. These are interesting juxtapositions that point to tensions within each set of categories, and Lacefield discusses the relevance of such dichotomies for questions of modernity posed by materialist theory and technological innovation. Additionally, she incorporates a discussion of films that fuse Shelley’s themes with appeals to twentieth-century and post-millennium audiences. (shrink)

My study of Mary Shelley and father includes her husband because Percy Shelley’s obsessions with patriarchy, with “ ‘GOD, AND KIND, AND LAW,’ ” influenced profoundly Mary’s* art and life. Percy’s idealizations of father in The Revolt of Islam and Prince Athanase indicated ways or resolving familial antagonisms which Mary adopted and developed her later fiction. Percy’s relationship with Frankenstein is still more intricate. Recognizing that her husband’s obsessions with father and self-creation were contributing to the deterioration (...) of their marriage, Mary represents these obsessions in Victor Frankenstein—partly to vent in art the anger which would have further damaged the marriage, and party to show Percy before it was too late the errors of his ways. It was too late. Percy responded to Frankenstein in Prometheus Unbound and The Cenci with a reaffirmation of sonship which has been largely unrecognized by scholars.Father looms so large for both Mary and Percy Shelley that no one critical approach can account for him fully. At their most idealistic—and thus most traditional—the Shelleys encourage a critical methodology which integrates the traditional disciplines of biographical and close textual analyses. By taking this approach to Mary’s later fiction and to Percy’s The Revolt of Islam, I can not only confirm the prominence of father for the Shelleys but also establish the ideal against which their most subversive and important art was created. Reading this indirect, overdetermined art in light of the negative Oedipus will help answer important questions about Frankenstein, Prometheus Unbound, and The Cenci and will, I hop, add to our understanding of the vexed role of father in the Romantic period and in subsequent generations whose children we are. William Veeder, professor of English at the University of Chicago, has published books on Yeats, Henry James, and Victorian feminism. His Mary Shelley and “Frankenstein”: The Fate of Androgyny will appear in December 1985. The Art of Criticism: Henry James on the Theory and the Practice of Fiction, coedited with Susan M. Griffin, and Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde: The Centenary, a collection of new essays on Stevenson’s novel, are also forthcoming . He is currently at work on The Serpent’s Tale: Anglo-American Gothic Fiction, 1885-1914. (shrink)

Shelley Weinberg argues that the idea of consciousness as a form of non-evaluative self-awareness helps solve some of the thorniest issues in Locke's philosophy: in his philosophical psychology, and his theories of knowledge, personal identity, and moral agency. The model of consciousness set forth here binds these key issues with a common thread.

According to the perspective developed in this article, widely shared, hegemonic cultural beliefs about gender and their impact in what the authors call “social relational” contexts are among the core components that maintain and change the gender system. When gender is salient in these ubiquitous contexts, cultural beliefs about gender function as part of the rules of the game, biasing the behaviors, performances, and evaluations of otherwise similar men and women in systematic ways that the authors specify. While the biasing (...) impact of gender beliefs may be small in any one instance, the consequences cumulate over individuals’ lives and result in substantially different outcomes for men and women. After describing this perspective, the authors show how it sheds newlight on some defining features of the gender system and illustrate its implications for research into specific questions about gender inequality. (shrink)

Serena Olsaretti brings together new essays by leading moral and political philosophers on the nature of desert and justice, their relations with each other and with other values.

Visual images are widely used in medical and patient education to enhance spoken or written explanations. This paper considers the role of such illustrations in shaping conceptions of the body; specifically, it addresses depictions of variant sexual anatomy and their part in the discursive production of intersex bodies. Visual language—even didactic, ‘factual’ visual language—carries latent as well as manifest content, and influences self-perceptions and social attitudes. In the case of illustrations about atypical sex development, where the need for non-stigmatising communication (...) is crucial, it is especially important to consider the implicit messages conveyed by imagery and compositional strategies. (shrink)

In two studies, we used the Ethics Position Questionnaire (EPQ) to investigate the relationship between individual differences in moral philosophy, involvement in the animal rights movement, and attitudes toward the treatment of animals. In the first, 600 animal rights activists attending a national demonstration and 266 nonactivist college students were given the EPQ. Analysis of the returns from 157 activists and 198 students indicated that the activists were more likely than the students to hold an "absolutist" moral orientation (high idealism, (...) low relativism). In the second study, 169 students were given the EPQ with a scale designed to measure attitudes toward the treatment of animals. Multiple regression showed that gender and the EPQ dimension of idealism were related to attitudes toward animal use. (shrink)

The systems of belief by the ancient Hebrews of the Old Testament and the current Kenyan tribe of Torobo demonstrate both ancient and modern tribal world view in which the religious is interconnected to all aspects of personal existence within each individual. The most important word in the vocabulary of biblical Hebrew and Torobo anthropology is ‘heart’. Lēḇ (Hebrew ‘heart’) and oltau (Torobo ‘heart’) are divinely ordained conceptual catalysts representing the composite nature of humanity. This paper will explore the concept (...) of heart as the principal, unifying object of attention employed throughout biblical Hebrew and Torobo world view that integrates psychical elements of Self as a cohesive medium for supernatural interaction and moral deportment. (shrink)

In this article, I aim to demonstrate that moral responsibility theory produces, legitimates, and even magnifies the considerable social injustice that accrues to disabled people insofar as it implicitly and explicitly promotes a depoliticized ontology of disability that construes disability as a naturally disadvantageous personal characteristic or deleterious property of individuals rather than identifies it as an effect of power, an apparatus. In particular, I argue that the methodological tools of “analytic” philosophy that philosophers of moral responsibility theory employ to (...) establish the philosophical domain in which they engage have distinctly detrimental effects on disabled people. (shrink)

Locke’s account of personal identity has been highly influential because of its emphasis on a psychological criterion. The same consciousness is required for being the same person. It is not so clear, however, exactly what Locke meant by ‘consciousness’ or by ‘having the same consciousness’. Interpretations vary: consciousness is seen as identical to memory, as identical to a first personal appropriation of mental states, and as identical to a first personal distinctive experience of the qualitative features of one’s own thinking. (...) There is wide agreement, however, that Locke’s theory of personal identity is meant to complement his moral and theological commitments to a system of divine punishment and reward in an afterlife. But these commitments seem to require also a metaphysical criterion, and Locke is insistent that it cannot be substance. The difficulty reconciling the psychological and metaphysical requirements of the theory has led, at worst, to charges of incoherence and, at best, to a slew of interpretations, none of which is widely accepted. (shrink)

This book offers a detailed study of political argument in early eighteenth-century England, a time in which the politics of virtue were vigorously pursued - and just as vigorously challenged. In tracing the emergence of a privately orientated conception of civic virtue from the period’s public discourse, this book not only challenges the received notions of the fortunes of virtue in the early modern era but provides a promising critical perspective on the question of what sort of politics of virtue (...) is possible or desirable today. (shrink)

The default theory of aesthetic value combines hedonism about aesthetic value with strict perceptual formalism about aesthetic value, holding the aesthetic value of an object to be the value it has in virtue of the pleasure it gives strictly in virtue of its perceptual properties. A standard theory of aesthetic value is any theory of aesthetic value that takes the default theory as its theoretical point of departure. This paper argues that standard theories fail because they theorize from the default (...) theory. (shrink)

This essay explores some of the implications of microchip technology for children's development. It examines the relevant research literature from an "ecological perspective," meaning that attention is paid to the consequences of microchip technology for the settings in which children develop, for the interconnections between these settings, and for the role of parents, teachers, and other socializing agents as "translators" of the rapidly changing environment to the developing child.

If, as Richard Wollheim says, the Acquaintance Principle is ‘a well-entrenched principle in aesthetics,’ it would be surprising if there were not something true at which those who have asserted it have been aiming. I argue that the Acquaintance Principle cannot be true on any traditional epistemic interpretation, nor on any usability interpretation of the sort Robert Hopkins has recently suggested. I then argue for an interpretation of the principle that treats acquaintance as the end to which judgments of aesthetic (...) value are the means as opposed to the other way around. (shrink)

in their famous correspondence, Stillingfleet objects that Locke's definition of knowledge, by limiting certainty to the perception of the agreement or disagreement of ideas, lessens the credibility of faith. Locke replies that his definition of knowledge does not affect the credibility of an article of faith at all, for faith and knowledge are entirely different cognitive acts: The truth of the matter of fact is in short this, that I have placed knowledge in the perception of the agreement or disagreement (...) of ideas. This definition of knowledge, your lordship said, "might be of dangerous consequence to that article of faith, which you have endeavored to defend." This I denied, and gave this reason for it, viz.... (shrink)

Global migration raises important ethical issues. One of the most significant is the question of whether liberal democratic societies have strong moral obligations to admit immigrants. Historically, most philosophers have argued that liberal states are morally free to restrict immigration at their discretion, with few exceptions. Recently, however, liberal egalitarians have begun to challenge this conventional view in two lines of argument. The first contends that immigration restrictions are inconsistent with basic liberal egalitarian values, including freedom and moral equality. The (...) second maintains that affluent, liberal democratic societies are morally obligated to admit immigrants as a partial response to global injustices, such as poverty and human rights violations. This article surveys the main philosophical arguments for these positions on immigration and discusses the critical responses to these arguments. (shrink)

Arthur Danto argued from the premiss that artworks are essentially cognitive to the conclusion that they are incidentally aesthetic. I wonder why Danto, and the very many of us he persuaded, came to believe that the cognitive and the aesthetic oppose one another. I argue, contrary to Danto’s historical claims, that the cognitive and the aesthetic did not come into opposition until the late nineteenth or early twentieth century, and that they were brought into opposition for reasons of art-critical expediency (...) rather than philosophical necessity. I conclude that a robustly cognitive notion of the aesthetic remains an option for us. (shrink)

Shelley Burtt,Jérémie Duhamel | : Quelles sont les sources psychologiques de la vertu civique dans la tradition républicaine? Cet article en identifie trois : l’éducation des passions, la manipulation des intérêts et la contrainte du devoir. L’auteure explore chacune de ces sources et conclut qu’une meilleure appréciation de ce qui les distingue est porteuse de nouvelles possibilités pour raviver la vertu républicaine dans le monde moderne. | : What are the psychological sources of civic virtue in the republican tradition? (...) This article identifies three: the education of the passions, the manipulation of interests, and the compulsion to duty. The author explores each and concludes that an appreciation of their distinctions suggests possibilities for reviving republican virtue in the modern world. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Journal of the History of Ideas 61.1 (2000) 1-17 [Access article in PDF] The Influence of Folk Meteorology in the Anaximander Fragment Cameron Shelley * Introduction No scholars doubt that the pre-Socratic philosophers, especially the Milesians, were concerned with meteorology. Their works abound with accounts of wind, rain, thunder, lightning, meteorites, waterspouts, whirlwinds, and so on. Through examination of the fragments of the pre-Socratics, we can trace this (...) interest in meteorology from each philosopher to his predecessors right back to Anaxi-mander. 1 Thales might at first seem to be the most obvious candidate as the man who introduced meteorology into philosophy, but Kirk et al. argue persuasively that Thales was more interested in near-eastern mythology. 2 Thus, we must take Anaximander, Thales's protégé, to be the philosopher who made meteorology a topic of philosophical interest.This situation leaves us with an obvious question: where did Anaximander come by his interest and ideas about meteorology if not from Thales? Modern scholarship unanimously points to the Greek mythological tradition of Anaxi-mander's time as recorded primarily by Homer and Hesiod. Gilbert confidently asserts that any inquiry into the origin of Greek meteorology must begin with the stories recorded by these poets, and modern scholars generally echo this opinion. 3 Kahn notes that in classical Athens the Milesian-style, non-mythological accounts of meteorology were treated as direct challenges to the Olympic religion, [End Page 1] as demonstrated by Aristophanes in The Clouds. 4 But to conclude on this basis that Anaximander himself saw his project as the construction of theories by the removal of deities from myths is to mistake the result for the cause. Kirk et al. simply point to Kahn's account and speculate that Anaximander was influenced by Greek legends about Phaethon and Deucalion. 5 None of these scholars consider alternative possible sources of Anaximander's meteorological ideas, so that support for mythology as the source derives largely from the lack of a rival. But there is an alternative, namely, folk meteorology.Folk meteorology may be described as the body of folk wisdom concerning the nature and prediction of weather patterns. It typically comes in the form of pithy statements or jingles such as "Red sky at night, shepherd's delight; red sky in morning, shepherd's warning." 6 Folk meteorology has been almost completely neglected even by folklore scholars, so it is not surprising that it has escaped the attention of philosophers and classical scholars as well. However, an examination of folk beliefs about meteorology reveals significant similarities with some of the philosophical beliefs attributed to Anaximander, most notably, and surprisingly, regarding the concept of justice (dikê) implicit in Anaximander's famous fragment.The purpose of this paper is to construct and defend a case for the influence of folk meteorology on Anaximander, particularly on the concept of justice in the Anaximander fragment. The case begins on familiar ground, with the fragment itself and arguments against attempts to trace influences on it to non-meteorological sources, and continues with some evidence of the universality of folk meteorology across cultures and the character of balance as a folk-meteorological concept, which is then applied to the Anaximander fragment as a means of explicating what Anaximander meant there by justice. The suitability of balance for this purpose is taken as evidence that Anaximander was influenced by folk meteorology. Thus, this inquiry identifies a plausible origin of one of Anaximander's central philosophical ideas, an origin which has so far remained completely unexplored by scholars of ancient Greek philosophy. The Fragment of Anaximander Anaximander is famous among Greek scholars for the central role he gave to the concept of justice (dikê) in his natural philosophy. The one fragment of his writings, quoted by Simplicius in his Commentary on Aristotle's Physics (24.18-21), records Anaximander's view on the effect of justice in the physical world: [End Page 2] The things that are perish into the things out of which they come to be, according to necessity, for they pay penalty and retribution... (shrink)

Wellman argues that legitimate states have a presumptive right to close their borders, excluding all prospective immigrants. He maintains that this right is not outweighed by egalitarian considerations because societies can fulfill their duties to outsiders by transferring aid instead of opening borders. I argue that societies cannot discharge their egalitarian duties by providing aid in at least two cases: when opening borders is the only way to fulfill these duties, and when transferring aid is inconsistent with egalitarian commitments. I (...) also consider additional, non-egalitarian moral considerations that may justify a duty to maintain open borders. I conclude that Wellman fails to prove that states have an actual, all things considered right to close their borders. (shrink)

This is the first of the four essays in Part II of the book on liberalism and traditionalist education; all four are by authors who would like to find ways for the liberal state to honour the self-definitions of traditional cultures and to find ways of avoiding a confrontation with differences. For example, Shelley Burtt argues that the liberal state has good reason to be far more accommodating of traditional groups than liberals commonly recognize. She contends that liberal autonomy, (...) properly understood, is not threatened in any special way by traditional religious or cultural groups, and that traditional cultures are as capable of fostering autonomy as their more cosmopolitan counterparts. Most strikingly, she maintains that it is a good thing, from the perspective of liberal autonomy, to be encumbered by unchosen attachments and loyalties such as those that we might expect to be most fully developed within religious communities. The essay is in two main parts: Part One takes up the challenge of the notion that liberal theorists have missed the chance to describe in detail the possibilities for autonomous thought from within a comprehensive education to a particular way of life or understanding of the good, offering several reasons why the central demand of autonomy – to think and know for oneself – is well within the reach of individuals who receive this sort of ‘grounded’ education; Part Two looks more closely at liberal theories of autonomy, particularly aspects of those accounts that encourage the idea that comprehensive educations are at odds with the development of autonomy, arguing that such characterizations overstate the difficulties that exist, and concluding by reaffirming the possibility of combining an education for autonomy with education toward a comprehensive vision of the good life. (shrink)

This article engages critically with issues surrounding the theorization of the self and body relation, where the body is interpreted as material increasingly open to human intervention and choice. It is argued that this theorization rests upon a mind/body split that limits an understanding of embodied identity. The significance for feminism of undermining representational practices that rely upon this dualism are outlined and criticized for reproducing the logic of representation they set out to destabilize. An alternative strategy is examined and (...) the argument is made that to understand embodied identity the question must not be what do bodies mean but what can they do. Here feminist approaches that rely upon a radically different ontological position in order to move beyond the mind/body split are utilized. These theoretical debates are made meaningful through the lens of self narratives produced by young women–a context which demands the development of strategies for theorizing lived bodies. (shrink)

Wellman argues that legitimate states have a presumptive right to close their borders, excluding all prospective immigrants. He maintains that this right is not outweighed by egalitarian considerations because societies can fulfill their duties to outsiders by transferring aid instead of opening borders. I argue that societies cannot discharge their egalitarian duties by providing aid in at least two cases: when opening borders is the only way to fulfill these duties, and when transferring aid is inconsistent with egalitarian commitments. I (...) also consider additional, non-egalitarian moral considerations that may justify a duty to maintain open borders. I conclude that Wellman fails to prove that states have an actual, all things considered right to close their borders. (shrink)

This article is a feminist intervention into the ways that disability is researched and represented in philosophy at present. Nevertheless, some of the claims that I make over the course of the article are also pertinent to the marginalization in philosophy of other areas of inquiry, including philosophy of race, feminist philosophy more broadly, indigenous philosophies, and LGBTQI philosophy. Although the discipline of philosophy largely continues to operate under the guise of neutrality, rationality, and objectivity, the institutionalized structure of the (...) discipline implicitly and explicitly promotes certain ontologies, epistemologies, and methodologies as bona fide philosophy, while casting the ontologies, epistemologies, and methodologies of marginalized philosophies as mere simulacra of allegedly fundamental ways of knowing and doing philosophy and thus rendering these marginalized philosophies more or less expendable. This article is designed to show that legitimized philosophical discourses are vital mechanisms in the problematization of disability. (shrink)

This paper raises two objections to the freedom of movement argument from the perspective of nonideal philosophy: the argument cannot provide a means for establishing admissions priorities when all prospective immigrants cannot be admitted and it ignores alternative grounds for moral claims to admission in the context of histories of injustice. I develop an alternative admissions-guiding principle that assigns strong moral claims to admission to certain prospective immigrants based on a global extension of the no-harm principle. It claims that a (...) society must admit prospective immigrants if admission is necessary either to prevent that society from harming those immigrants or to compensate immigrants whom it has already harmed. States must fulfill these duties before they may legitimately use immigrant admissions policy in service of other national goals, including the advancement of economic interests. (shrink)