It has been argued that the primary acquisition of genericity in early child speech poses a problem for standard quantificational approaches to generics and instead motivates the claim that generics give voice to an innate, default mode of generalising. This article argues that analogous puzzles involving the acquisition of A‐quantifiers undermine the empirical support for a purely cognition‐based approach to generics. Instead, these acquisition puzzles should be solved by generalising the core insight of the cognitive defaults theory to these expressions, (...) reconciling formal semantic approaches with the role that cognitive development plays on lexical competence. (shrink)

This paper reevaluates Kaplan’s (Themes from Kaplan, Oxford University Press, Oxford, pp 481–563, 1989b) infamous ‘compulsive talker’ objection to Reichenbach’s (Elements of symbolic logic, AQ1 Macmillan, New York, 1947 ) token-reflexive theory of indexicals. It argues that Kaplan’s objection depends on the modal status of Reichenbachian tokens. On one interpretation, Kaplan’s objection stands. But on another, equally plausible interpretation, the following points hold: (i) Reichenbach’s theory effectively preempts contemporary discussion of rigid definite descriptions, (ii) Kaplan’s own analysis of indexicals in (...) terms of _dthat_-terms comes extremely close to Reichenbach’s own analysis, and (iii) Kaplan’s ‘compulsive talker’ objection should be rejected. (shrink)

Generic sentences involving phrasal conjunctions present a prima facie problem for the standard theory of generics according to which they express quasi-universal generalisations about what is characteristic for members of a particular kind. For example, the sentence ‘Elephants live in Africa and Asia’ is true, even though it is uncharacteristic for an elephant to live in both Africa and Asia. In response to this problem, theorists have recently proposed radical departures from the standard view. This paper argues that such departures (...) are unwarranted: not only do they fail to fully accommodate the data involving generic conjunctions, their scope is overly narrow, since the phenomena in question also arise in non-generic contexts. I propose a new theory of generics that aims to account for generic conjunctions in a principled manner and which sheds new light on the mereological commitments of natural language. (shrink)

There is a standard quantificational view of generic sentences according to which they have a tripartite logical form involving a phonologically null generic operator called 'Gen'. Recently, a number of theorists have questioned the standard view and revived a competing proposal according to which generics involve the predication of properties to kinds. This paper offers a novel argument against the kind-predication approach on the basis of the invalidity of Generic Excluded Middle, a principle according to which any sentence of the (...) form ⌜Either Fs are G or Fs are not G⌝ is true. I argue that the kind-predication approach erroneously predicts that GEM is valid, and that it can only avoid this conclusion by either collapsing into a form of the quantificational analysis or otherwise garnering unpalatable metaphysical commitments. I also show that, while the quantificational approach does not validate GEM as a matter of logical form, the principle may be validated on certain semantic analyses of the generic operator, and so, such theories should be rejected. (shrink)

It is a familiar point that we can use generic sentences to express generalisations that are tolerant to exceptions and then go on to state those exceptions explicitly. It is a less familiar point that switching the order of the generics has deleterious effects on their felicity. For example, the sequences ‘Ravens are black, but albino ravens aren’t’ is perfectly felicitous and judged to be true, whereas its reverse ‘Albino ravens aren’t black, but ravens are’ is infelicitous and contradictory-sounding. This (...) paper argues that such sequences pose a problem for extant theories of generics: while they have no trouble predicting the felicity of the first sequence of generics, they are unable to explain why reversing the order results in infelicity. I propose to account for these observations by adopting a dynamic semantic theory of generic sentences. (shrink)

Philosophical Perspectives, Volume 35, Issue 1, Page 320-339, December 2021.

Kevin Dorst has recently pointed out an apparently puzzling consequence of denying epistemic luminosity: given some natural-sounding bridging principles between knowledge, credence, and indicative conditionals, the denial of epistemic luminosity licenses the knowledge and assertability of abominable-sounding conditionals of the form ⌜If I don’t know that ϕ, then ϕ⌝. We provide a general and systematic examination of this datum by testing Dorst’s claim against various semantics for the indicative conditional in the setting of epistemic logic. Our conclusion is that, regardless (...) of whether knowledge is luminous, the knowability of these conditionals is highly sensitive to the correct semantic analysis of the indicative conditional. Moreover, standard pragmatic resources can explain away the infelicity of such assertions. As it stands, the datum does not tell against epistemic non-luminosity. (shrink)

John Broome argues that fairness requires that claims are satisfied in proportion to their strength. Broome holds that, when distributing indivisible goods, fairness requires the use of weighted lotteries as a surrogate to satisfy proportionally each candidate's claims. In this article, we present two arguments against Broome's account of fairness. First, we argue that it is almost impossible to calculate the weights of the lotteries in accordance with the requirements of fairness. Second, we argue that Broome rules out those methods (...) whose use might provide some resolution to this problem. From these arguments, we conclude that, contra Broome, fairness does not require the proportional satisfaction of claims. (shrink)

It is said there are only two things in life that are certain: death and taxes … maybe only taxes.

Heart disease is the leading cause of death amongst adult Americans and has recently become a top killer worldwide. The direct costs of cardiovascular disease are projected to triple in the next 20 years, from $272.5 billion to $818.1 billion (Heidenreich et al. 2011). Although there has been a decreased incidence and prevalence of ischemic heart disease over the past several decades in the United States, heart failure remains a major cause of morbidity and mortality. In the United States, approximately (...) 500,000 to 700,000 new cases are identified each year (Lloyd-Jones et al. 2009). Heart failure is now the number one diagnosis leading to hospitalization. As such, it is an increasingly heavy economic burden on .. (shrink)

The purpose of this article is to investigate how cultural meanings associated with the left ventricular assist device inform acceptance and experience of this innovative technology when it is used as a destination therapy. We conducted open-ended, semistructured interviews with family caregivers and patients who had undergone LVAD-DT procedures at six U.S. hospitals. A grounded theory approach was used for the analysis. Thirty-nine patients and 42 caregivers participated. Participants described a sense of obligation to undergo the procedure because of its (...) promise for salvation. However, once the device was implanted, patients described being placed into a liminal state of being neither sick nor healthy, with no culturally scripted role. Consideration of end-of-life decisions was complicated by the uncertainties about how patients with LVADs die. Pre-implantation communications among patient, family, and clinicians should take into account the impact of the technology on meaning, identity, and patient experience. (shrink)

Donation after circulatory determination of death (DCDD) is an accepted practice in the United States, but heart procurement under these circumstances has been debated. Although the practice is experiencing a resurgence due to the recently completed trials using ex vivo perfusion systems, interest in thoracoabdominal normothermic regional perfusion (TA-NRP), wherein the organs are reanimated in situ prior to procurement, has raised many ethical questions. We outline practical, ethical, and equity considerations to ensure transplant programs make well-informed decisions about TA-NRP. We (...) present a multidisciplinary analysis of the relevant ethical issues arising from DCDD-NRP heart procurement, including application of the Dead Donor Rule and the Uniform Definition of Death Act, and provide recommendations to facilitate ethical analysis and input from all interested parties. We also recommend informed consent, as distinct from typical “authorization,” for cadaveric organ donation using TA-NRP. (shrink)

Though many argue over root causes, few dispute the existence of gender disparities across our societal landscape. Patriarchal norms consistently obstruct the flourishing of those who identify themselves as women, those who are identified by others as women, and generally those who gender-identify in ways that challenge the norms of heterosexual cis-gender male privilege. Acknowledging the limits of our analysis, here we focus on some of the disparities faced by women in particular.1 From the persistent wage gap despite women's steadily (...) increasing participation in the workforce, to the perplexing paucity of women occupying C-suite positions in business or tenured professorships in academia despite efforts to... (shrink)

The ethical obligation to provide a reasonably safe discharge option from the inpatient setting is often confounded by the context of homelessness. Living without the security of stable housing is a known determinant of poor health, often complicating the safety of discharge and causing unnecessary readmission. But clinicians do not have significant control over unjust distributions of resources or inadequate societal investment in social services. While physicians may stretch inpatient stays beyond acute care need in the interest of their patients (...) who are experiencing homelessness, they must also consider the implications of using an inpatient hospital bed for someone without the attendant level of medical need. Caring for patients in an inpatient setting when they no longer require acute care means fewer beds for acute care patients. And when a patient who is experiencing homelessness declines a medically safer option such as a skilled nursing facility, then clinicians may be faced with the sole option of discharge to the street, which raises troubling questions of nonmaleficence and social justice. Here we investigate the different forms of injustice that play out when patients are discharged to the street, and offer a map of the interwoven ethical responsibilities of clinicians, hospitals, and skilled nursing facilities. (shrink)

During the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID‐19) pandemic, bioethical analyses often emphasized population health and societal benefit. Hospital policies frequently focused on reducing risk of transmitting SARS‐CoV‐2 by restricting visitors; requiring protective equipment; and screening staff, patients and visitors. While restrictions can be burdensome, they are often justified as essential measures to protect the whole population against a virus with high rates of transmission, morbidity and mortality. Yet communities are not monolithic, and the impacts of these restrictions affect different groups differently. (...) An ophthalmological unit outreach program in Ethiopia serves to illustrate. Pre‐operative screening policies were designed to protect as many patients as possible but had adverse impacts on underserved communities. As this case study demonstrates, creating hospital policies that truly serve the good of the society may require a more holistic review of impacts on inequitably positioned communities. (shrink)

Amy Sonnie and James Tracy’sHillbilly Nationalists, Urban Race Rebels, and Black Power, Dan Berger’s anthologyThe Hidden 1970sand Jefferson Cowie’sStayin’ Alive, in different ways, articulate an understanding of the political ferment that gripped the United States in the late 1960s and 1970s and its complex legacy for those struggling to change the world today. While Cowie provides a broad-brush if ultimately flawed overview of labour’s declining influence during the 1970s, Sonnie and Tracy focus their attention on five radical organisations that (...) challenged deep divisions of race to condemn inequality and oppression, and Berger similarly encompasses contributions evaluating the impact of a variety of left organisations including the Puerto Rican nationalist movement, indigenous and Black nationalist quests to establish self-determination, and the extraordinary Sojourner Truth Organization. This review critically evaluates the strengths and weaknesses of the arguments made by Sonnie and Tracy, Berger and Cowie and suggests how they may be helpful for future struggle. (shrink)

Jean-Paul Sartre was one of the twentieth century's most prominent atheists. But his philosophy was informed by theological writers and themes in ways that have not previously been acknowledged. In Sartre and Theology, Kirkpatrick examines Sartre's philosophical formation and rarely discussed early work, demonstrating how, and which, theology shaped Sartre's thinking. She also shows that Sartre's philosophy - especially Being and Nothingness and Existentialism is A Humanism - contributed to several prominent twentieth-century theologies, examining Catholic, Protestant, Orthodox, and Liberation (...) theologians rebuttals and appropriations of Sartre. -/- For philosophers, this work opens up an unmined vein of influence on Sartre's work which illuminates his conceptual divergences from the German phenomenological tradition. And for theologians, it offers insights into a theologically informed atheism which provoked responses from some of the twentieth-century's greatest theologians - an atheism from which we can still learn much today. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:372 BOOK REVIEWS This understanding, moreover, gives ontological validity to the communication of idioms, which Morris surprisingly sees as accomplishing nothing but" muddying the water" (p. 49). As God, the Son is omniscient, immutable, all-powerful, etc., but in his new mode of existence as man, he is truly ignorant, passible, and limited. Existing as man, the Son experiences all that pertains to historioolly conditioned humanity. In the Incarnation the (...) "·who", the person, remains the same, but the manner of the experience of the " Who " is distinctly different-divine and human-without confusion, change, division, or separation. The mystery obviously remains, but it is meaningful and coherent. (For a more complete presentation of these arguments see the author's : Does God Change? : The Word's Becoming in the Incarnation, Still River: St. Bede's, 1985). As stated at the outset, Morris presents a thorough and provocative study which should be read and studied by scholars. While he aptly critiques his opponents, he fails to challenge their understanding of the incarnational notion of "become" and the ensuing union. Rather, he himself presupposes that the Incarnation implies a compositional union of natures which in turn leads to an unresolvable incompatibility between the divine and human attributes in Christ. Morris may have been aided had he been more acquainted with the early Christological controversies and councils. Nevertheless, Morris has clearly raised many important contemporary Christological issues and has admirably attempted to provide answers which are faithful both to the Christian tradition and to human i~ea..'\On and logic. Mother of God Community, Washington, D.O. THOMAS WEINaNDY O.F.M., Cap. Community: A Trinity of Models. By FRANK G. KmKPATRICK. Washington, D.C.: Georgetown University Press, 1986. Pp. 248. Cloth $17.95; paper $10.95. In recent years the pathology of atomistic individualism has been variously described by the Council Fathers of Vahlcan II, liberationist and feminist theologians, Stanley Hauer.was, and countless other theological and secular critics. According to Frank Kirkpatrick, therapeutic intervention will not be effective in the long run unless it is based upon an alternative conceptual "model" of human oommunity. Of course, Kirkpa.tric.k has something specific in mind. Not just any alternative will do. Marxian models of human association, for example, are prone to BOOK REVIEWS 373 totalitarianism and the denial of proper individuality. Thus, he offers what he calls "the mutual/personal model of community" as "a substantial grounding for a Christian vision of community congruent with liberationist and feminist concerns " (vii). Western culture has generated a welter of perspectives on the nature and ground of human association. Within this motley, Kirkpatrick discerns three models of oommunity which have shaped Western social philosophy and religious thought. The book de~crihes these traditional models by identifying their controlling metaphors, accounts of human nature and its fulfillment, and the social, economic, and political practices and institutions they undergird. The author appraises the strengths and weaknesses of the models and attempts to reconcile their positive features within the Christian vision of Koinonia. The first model is "the atomistic/contractarian" wherein persons are regarded as "independent atoms rationally contracting with each other for the terms of their enforced relationship" (2). Kirkpatrick locates its sources in the thought of Hobbes, Locke, Bentham, James Mill, Adam Smith, and Rousseau. Observing that the individualism of this tradition has always flourished in America, Kirkpatrick surveys some of its c001temporary expressions in the work of George Gilder, F. A. Hayek, Michael N·ovak, Robert Nozick, and John Rawls. The fruits of the atomistic/ contracta.rian model are, to Kirkpatrick's taste, mostly bad-isolation, alienation, oppression, injustice-and are ineongruent with Christian Koinonia. His second model, " the organic/functional," views persons as "organs, interdependent and functionally related to each other within a larger organism" (2). Conceived by Edmund Burke, this model became fully formed and viable in the thought of Hegel and Marx, and was instrumental in the analyses of sociologists such as Ferdinand Tonnies and Charles H. Cooley. Kirkpatrick is troubled by this model's tendency to view human relationships exhaustively in terms of co-operativ.e function. He worries that there is an insufficient" sense of individual difference and self-identity to... (shrink)

Tom Dougherty (2013) argues that the following moral principles are inconsistent: (α) it is impermissible to benefit many people slightly rather than save someone’s life, and (β) it is permissible to risk someone’s life slightly to benefit them slightly. This inconsistency has highly counterintuitive consequences for non-consequentialist moral theories. However, Dougherty’s argument, the “Repetition Argument,” relies on a premise that ignores a morally important distinction between acting with statistical knowledge and acting with individualized knowledge. According to this premise, if it (...) is permissible to make it near certain that a distribution obtains, then it is permissible to bring about that distribution. I will argue that this premise proves too much for the Repetition Argument, and so we should reject it. Finally, to further motivate my own objection, I show that a recent objection to the Repetition Argument by James R. Kirkpatrick (2018) does not resolve the inconsistency. (shrink)

John Broome has proposed a theory of fairness according to which fairness requires that agents’ claims to goods be satisfied in proportion to the relative strength of those claims. In the case of competing claims for a single indivisible good, Broome argues that what fairness requires is the use of a weighted lottery as a surrogate to satisfying the competing claims: the relative chance of each claimant's winning the lottery should be set to the relative strength of each claimant's claim. (...) In this journal, James Kirkpatrick and Nick Eastwood have objected that the use of weighted lotteries in the case of indivisible goods is unacceptable. In this article, I explain why Kirkpatrick and Eastwood's objection misses its mark. (shrink)

In his magnum opus, Theorie des kommunikativen Handelns, the distinguished philosopher Jurgen Habermas presented his ideas as a whole, providing the first major defense of his philosophy. David Ingram here summarizes the themes of Habermas's masterwork, placing them in the context of the philosopher's other work, relating them to poststructuralism, hermeneutics, and Neo-Aristotelianism, and surveying what other critics have said about Habermas. "Ingram's exposition of Habermas is impressive for its erudition and its faithful adherence to the major contours of Habermas's (...) work."—James Farganis, _Contemporary Sociology_ "A valuable contribution to the understanding of an important, but difficult, thinker."—_Ethics_ "The book is indispensable to an understanding of both Habermas and the contemporary human condition."—Scott Warren, _Social Science Quarterly _ "Ingram has done sociologists, philosophers, and political scientists a great service by demystifying Habermas's more recent theory of communicative action."—R. George Kirkpatrick, _American Journal of Sociology_ "Likely to be and to remain the leading study on Habermas's Theory of Communicative Action. What McCarthy did for Habermas's earlier writings, Ingram accomplishes for his more recent work."—Fred R. Dallmayr, University of Notre Dame. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:January 25, 2012 (9:31 am) E:\CPBR\RUSSJOUR\TYPE3102\russell 31,2 064 red.wpd 1 See Russell’s exposure of this derogatory contraction of “Viet Nam Cong San” (“Vietnamese Communists”) in his War Crimes in Vietnam (London: Allen and Unwin, 1967), p. 45n. On the importance of language, cf. the legendary remark of Russell’s correspondent, Mohammad Ali: “I ain’t got no quarrel with them Viet Cong.… No Viet Cong ever called me nigger.” Russell attempted (...) to enlist Ali on behalf of the iwct (see the ra for their letters of 8 April, 18, 31 May, 11 Sept., 17 Oct., 15 Nov. and 16 Dec. 1967). russell: the Journal of Bertrand Russell Studies n.s. 31 (winter 2011–12): 167–87 The Bertrand Russell Research Centre, McMaster U. issn 0036-01631; online 1913-8032 ibliographies, rchival nventories, ndexes A SECONDARY BIBLIOGRAPHY OF THE INTERNATIONAL WAR CRIMES TRIBUNAL: LONDON, STOCKHOLM AND ROSKILDE Stefan Andersson [email protected] i.wintroduction T he International War Crimes Tribunal (iwct) on the United States’ warfare in Vietnam was founded in 1966 through the moral outrage of the British philosopher and political activist Bertrand Russell, his private secretary Ralph Schoenman, Ken Coates, Chris Farley and other people connected to the Bertrand Russell Peace Foundation and the Vietnam Solidarity Campaign. They wanted to inform the world about the us government’s attempts to convince the Vietnamese population (who were mainly peasants) that capitalism is a better political-economical system than communism, by killing as many “Vietcong”1 and unarmed seniors, women and children as possible with regular carpet bombing, cluster and phosphorus bombs, napalm, Agent Orange and other illegal weaponry, and oTering the survivors pleasant lodgingsinwired-inhamlets far away from their homes and the graves of their ancestors. This charm oTensive went on for more than ten years, and although three times as many bombs fell on Vietnam, Laos and Cambodia as were dropped during the whole Second World War, surprisingly enough the Vietnamese were not to be converted. In the 1960s this macabre spectacle could be watched on television all over the world, but very few protested against it. Until 1968 the majority of American January 25, 2012 (9:31 am) E:\CPBR\RUSSJOUR\TYPE3102\russell 31,2 064 red.wpd 168 stefan andersson 2 See Norman Mailer’s Armies of the Night: History as a Novel, the Novel as History (New York, New American Library, 1968). He met up with Noam Chomsky, “a slim sharp-featured man with an ascetic expression, and an air of gentle but absolute moral integrity” (p. 180). Both were arrested and spent a night in prison together. 3 See Kirkpatrick Sale, SDS (New York: Random House, 1973), p. 348. See also Natalie Atkin, “From Margin to Mainstream: American Peace Movements, 1950s– 1970s”, in issue “Peace Movements in Western Europe, Japan and the usa since 1945”, Mitteilungsblatt des Instituts für soziale Bewegungen, no. 32 (2004): 175–92. 4 See May 1970: Birth of the Antiwar University (New York: PathWnder P., 1971). 5 The so-called “Chicago conspiracy trials” or “Chicago 7 trials” that followed, when sevendefendants—AbbieHoTman,JerryRubin,DavidDellinger,TomHayden,Rennie Davis, John Froines and Lee Weiner—were charged with conspiracy and inciting to riot, showed that the us government was not going to tolerate such “unpatriotic” and “criminal ” behaviour. See James Tracy, Direct Action: Radical PaciWsm from the Union Eight to the Chicago Seven (Chicago: U. of Chicago P., 1996), pp. 145–51. 6 See Mark Kurlansky, 1968: the Year That Rocked the World (New York: Ballantine Books, 2004), and David Caute, 1968: the Year of the Barricades (London: Hamish Hamilton, 1988), pp. 3, 7–8, 12z–13. 7 Fredrik Logevall, “De Gaulle, Neutralization, and American Involvement in Vietnam, 1963–1964”, PaciWc Historical Review 61 (1992): 69–102. citizens were for the war, although some earlier, well-attended rallies against it, like the 1967 march on the Pentagon in late October,2 might have made some think diTerently. sds (Students for a Democratic Society)3 and other antiwar organizations never became the united force that could challenge the government ’s reliance on what Nixon called the “silent majority”. It was not until the us attacked Cambodia... (shrink)

We make some remarks on the mathematics and metaphysics of the hole argument, in response to a recent article in this journal by Weatherall ([2018]). Broadly speaking, we defend the mainstream philosophical literature from the claim that correct usage of the mathematics of general relativity `blocks' the argument.

Author Marc James Léger responds to Elias Khoury’s review of his book _Bernie Bros Gone Woke: Class, Identity, Neoliberalism_, which was published in volume 17 of the _International Journal of __Žižek Studies_. While Léger accepts the one mistake in the book that Khoury correctly identifies, he takes issue with nearly everything else in Khoury’s review, which involves fallacies, misquotations, reductive arguments, misdirection and failure to mention anything that would contradict Khoury’s generally false claims. Léger describes the possibility of academic (...) foul play in the context of a public secret directed against him and that he has been struggling against since the late 1990s. (shrink)

In their upcoming article, Henk Jasper van Gils-Schmidt and Sabine Salloch highlight the supposed responsibilities of healthcare professionals in addressing the global health challenges posed by climate change. They argue that healthcare professionals’ duties to future generations and their ‘climate-related obligations’ have been neglected, primarily due to potential conflicts with other responsibilities, such as providing optimal care to current patients and maintaining patient trust. The authors suggest that these competing obligations should be viewed as part of the multifaceted identities individuals (...) hold, encompassing roles as both physicians and environmentalists, each with normative and competing commitments. They propose that a transformative shift in physicians’ professional ethos, expanding from the predominant focus on individual patients to include obligations towards climate protection, could pave the way for identifying effective mechanisms to address these challenges. While acknowledging the authors’ emphasis on sustainable healthcare practices, we argue that a duty to climate protection as part of healthcare professionals’ identity lacks ethical support. We identify serious concerns that stem from the transformative shift in physicians’ professional ethos, particularly in the authors’ presentation of reasons for action. First, envisaging a stable disposition that compels healthcare professionals to ensure optimal care conditions for both immediate and potential future encounters is unrealistic. Such a scenario would necessitate a nuanced and multifaceted evaluation, weighing …. (shrink)

Deep brain stimulation is an experimental procedure for treatment-resistant depression. Some results show promise, but blinded trials had limited success. Ethical questions center on vulnerability: especially on whether depressed patients can weigh the risks and benefits effectively, whether depression causes “desperation,” and whether media portrayals create unrealistic hopes. We interviewed 24 psychiatric inpatients with treatment-resistant depression, qualitatively analyzing their comments. Most had minimal interest in deep brain stimulators. Some might consider them if their depression worsened, if alternatives were exhausted, or (...) if the evidence were stronger. Fears focused on the surgery, adverse effects, and the novelty of the device. Patients felt the depression interfered with their ability to weigh the risks and benefits. Patients seemed highly attuned to the risks, and were skeptical that the treatment would be effective. We conclude that ethical concerns about vulnerability remain, yet patients with treatment-resistant depression were thoughtful and cautious about trying a novel therapy. (shrink)

This book considers who should undertake humanitarian intervention in response to an ongoing or impending humanitarian crisis. It develops a normative account of legitimacy to assess not only current interveners, but also the desirability of potential reforms to the mechanisms and agents of humanitarian intervention.

It is becoming increasingly common for authoritarian regimes to leverage digital technologies to surveil, repress and manipulate their citizens. Experts typically refer to this practice as digital authoritarianism (DA). Existing definitions of DA consistently presuppose a politically repressive agent intentionally exploiting digital technologies to pursue authoritarian ends. I refer to this as the intention-based definition. This paper argues that this definition is untenable as a general description of DA. I begin by illustrating the current predominance of the intention-based definition (Section (...) 2). Section 3 then presents four counterexamples to this definition: benign surveillance; digital sovereignty; attention-harvesting algorithms; and tech-induced loneliness. In each case, we witness authoritarianism being promoted by digital technologies without any evidence of this being intentionally caused by politically repressive agents. Based on these observations, I contend that the intention-based definition is underinclusive and is therefore unsustainable. Section 4 outlines an improved definition of DA – what I call the promotion-based definition. Since this more expansive definition does not posit intentional, politically repressive agency as a precondition of DA, it can accommodate the counterexamples discussed in Section 3. Moreover, it enables us to catch a broader spectrum of cases of DA, such as tech-induced loneliness, which those adhering to the intention-based definition are prone to overlook. After outlining further practical benefits of the promotion-based definition, I argue that we still need to distinguish between intentional and unintentional forms of DA since they call for distinct types of remedial action. -/- . (shrink)

Limited Aggregation is the view that when there are competing moral claims that demand our attention, we should sometimes satisfy the largest aggregate of claims, depending on the strength of the claims in question. In recent years, philosophers such as Patrick Tomlin and Alastair Norcross have argued that Limited Aggregation violates a number of rational choice principles such as Transitivity, Separability, and Contraction Consistency. Current versions of Limited Aggregation are what may be called Comparative Approaches because they involve assessing the (...) relative strengths of various claims. In this paper, we offer a non-comparative version of Limited Aggregation, what we call the Threshold Approach. It states that there is a non-relative threshold that separates various claims. We demonstrate that the Threshold Approach does not violate rational choice principles such as Transitivity, Separability, and Contraction Consistency, and we show that potential concerns regarding such a view are surmountable. (shrink)

Do Quine and Carnap distort the social nature of inquiry by privileging individual epistemic subjects? This objection is at the heart of Donald Davidson’s claim that Quine fails to grasp the significance of the concept of truth. In Carnap’s case, the objection may be detected in Charles Morris’s call to ground scientific philosophy in semiotics, the science of signs, rather than syntax, the formal investigation of languages. Drawing out the challenge from Morris’s proposal requires examining a neglected influence on this (...) neglected philosopher: his advisor George Herbert Mead’s social theory of mind. I argue that Morris and Davidson can both be understood as demanding that scientific philosophers socialize their conception of objectivity. (shrink)

In 1933 the philosopher Martin Heidegger declared his allegiance to Hitler. Ever since, scholars have asked to what extent his work is implicated in Nazism. To address this question properly involves neither conflating Nazism and the continuing philosophical project that is Heidegger's legacy, nor absolving Heidegger and, in the process, turning a deaf ear to what he himself called the philosophical motivations for his political engagement. It is important to establish the terms on which Heidegger aligned himself with National Socialism. (...) On the basis of an untimely but by no means unprecedented understanding of the mission of the German people, the philosopher first joined but then also criticized the movement. An exposition of Heidegger's conception of Volk hence can and must treat its merits and deficiencies as a response to the enduring impasse in contemporary political philosophy of the dilemma between liberalism and authoritarianism. (shrink)

Reviewing works by James Alison, Alistair McFadyen, Andrew Sung Park, Ted Peters, and Solomon Schimmel, the author suggests that the status and function of the discourse/doctrine of sin highlight tensions between theology and ethics in ways that suggest the character, limits, and promise of religious ethics. This literature commends attention to sin-talk because it helps religious ethicists to render more adequately the dynamics of human agency, sociality, and culture and because it raises questions about the nature and task of (...) theology, faith, and morality. Yet these volumes also indicate that religious ethics should pay more attention to particular sins. (shrink)

The overall purpose of this paper is to clarify the physical meaning and epistemological status of the term 'measurement' as used in quantum theory. After a review of the essential logical structure of quantum physics, Part I presents interpretive discussions contrasting the quantal concepts observable and ensemble with their classical ancestors along the lines of Margenau's latency theory. Against this background various popular ideas concerning the nature of quantum measurement are critically surveyed. The analysis reveals that, in addition to internal (...) mathematical difficulties, all the so-called quantum theories of measurement are grounded in unjustifiable, classical presuppositions. (shrink)

A. W. Carus champions Rudolf Carnap’s ideal of explication as a model for liberal political deliberation. Constructing a linguistic framework for discussing social problems, he argues, promotes the resolution of our disputes. To flesh out and assess this proposal, I examine debate about the social institutions of marriage and adoption. Against Carus, I argue that not all citizens would accept the pragmatic principles underlying Carnap’s ideal. Nevertheless, explication may facilitate inquiry in the social sciences and be used to create models (...) that help us to understand past disputes. This latter application reveals explication’s potential for refining the social histories that inform contemporary political discourse. (shrink)

In this contribution, I defend the standard list of jus ad bellum principles. In The Ethics of War and the Force of Law: A Modern Just War Theory, Uwe Steinhoff endorses only three principles of jus ad bellum (right intention, just cause, and proportionality) and claims that the others are redundant. I argue that, although fundamentally all jus ad bellum principles can be reduced to proportionality, in practice it is vital to retain the main jus ad bellum criteria as separate (...) principles. (shrink)

Volume 20, Issue 7, July 2020, Page 82-84.

Physical and biological measurements might display range values extending towards infinite. The occurrence of infinity in equations, such as the black hole singularities, is a troublesome issue that causes many theories to break down when assessing extreme events. Different methods, such as re-normalization, have been proposed to avoid detrimental infinity. Here a novel technique is proposed, based on geometrical considerations and the Alexander Horned sphere, that permits to undermine infinity in physical and biophysical equations. In this unconventional approach, a continuous (...) monodimensional line becomes an assembly of countless bidimensional lines that superimpose in quantifiable knots and bifurcations. In other words, we may state that Achilles leaves the straight line and overtakes the turtle. (shrink)

Biodiversity is a valuable resource that supports sustainability within agricultural systems, yet in contradiction to this agriculture is recognised as a contributor to biodiversity loss. Agricultural advisory services are institutions that support sustainable agricultural development, employing a variety of approaches including farmer discussion groups in doing so. This study evaluates the impact of a farmland biodiversity management (FBM) communication strategy piloted within Irish farmer discussion groups. A sensemaking lens was applied in this objective to gain an understanding of how this (...) strategy could create an actionable space for FBM promotion amongst farmers. The strategy was piloted with six Irish dairy farmer discussion groups, after which focus groups were conducted with members of these groups. Additionally, baseline and endline surveys were completed by the members to determine their knowledge, attitude and on-farm practices relating to FBM. Analysis of the focus group data identified that the communication strategy supported the affordance of sensemaking with respect to FBM. Analysis of the data from the baseline and endline surveys relating to knowledge, attitudes and practices found that engaging with the communication strategy promoted farmers to improve their attitude in relation to FBM. Results from this study provide important lessons for agricultural advisory services to support farmers in incorporating FBM into the overall management of their farms and, in turn, to promote the improvement of farmland biodiversity and contribute to a sustainable future. (shrink)

Philosophical enquiry stands to benefit from the inclusion of methods from the digital humanities to study language use. Empirical studies using the methods of the digital humanities have the potential to contribute to both conceptual analysis and intuition-based enquiry, two important approaches in contemporary philosophy. Empirical studies using the methods of the digital humanities can also provide valuable metaphilosophical insights into the nature of philosophical methods themselves. The use of methods from the digital humanities in philosophy should be expected to (...) follow a similar trajectory to another attempt to introduce empirical methods in philosophy. Experimental philosophers use empirical methods from the cognitive sciences to bear on philosophical questions. At first, we should expect the main contribution of methods from the digital humanities in philosophy to be at the metaphilosophical level. Then, given the right impetus and support, we are optimistic that methods from the digital humanities can make important and sustained contributions to first-order philosophical enquiry. This chapter gives two case studies of recent studies in which methods from the digital humanities are used to address metaphilosophical questions about the use of the word ‘intuition’ and the methods of philosophy and physics. It gives three examples of contemporary first-order philosophical debates to which methods fromthe digital humanities could make an important contribution in epistemology, metaphysics and philosophy of language. The chapter discusses some methodological challenges and limitations which are of particular importance when considering the application of methods from the digital humanities in philosophy, including concerns about the demographic representativeness of widely available corpora. (shrink)