While denying that God has moral obligations, William Alston defends divine moral goodness based on God’s performance of supererogatory acts. The present article argues that an agent without obligations cannot perform supererogatory acts. Hence, divine moral goodness cannot be established on that basis. Defenses of divine moral obligation by Eleonore Stump and Nicholas Wolterstorff are also questioned. Against Stump, it is argued (among other things) that the temptations of Jesus do not establish the existence of a tendency to sin in (...) a divine being. Hence, Stump’s Christological objection to Alston’s denial of divine moral obligation fails. Some counterexamples to that denial offered by Wolterstorff also fail. It is concluded that claims of divine moral goodness remain problematic. (shrink)

Alvin Plantinga’s solution to J. L. Mackie’s logical problem of evil invokes possible-worlds metaphysics. There are reasons for thinking that the solution is, at least, problematic. Difficulties emerge in the attempts to answer four related questions. Can God’s necessary existence, understood in terms of possible-world metaphysics, make God’s actual existence impossible to explain? Can an omniscient being with knowledge of the contents of every possible world prove ignorant of the consequences of his creative acts? Can an immoral action performed by (...) an agent suffering from “transworld depravity” also be free in the libertarian sense? Does the possible-worlds interpretation of libertarian freedom generate a vicious infinite regress? Special focus is on the possibility, advanced by Plantinga, that there are possible worlds that even an omnipotent being cannot create. Plantinga’s views are contrasted with those of Thomas Aquinas. (shrink)

While denying that God has moral obligations, William Alston defends divine moral goodness based on God’s performance of supererogatory acts. The present article argues that an agent without obligations cannot perform supererogatory acts. Hence, divine moral goodness cannot be established on that basis. Defenses of divine moral obligation by Eleonore Stump and Nicholas Wolterstorff are also questioned. Against Stump, it is argued (among other things) that the temptations of Jesus do not establish the existence of a tendency to sin in (...) a divine being. Hence, Stump’s Christological objection to Alston’s denial of divine moral obligation fails. Some counterexamples to that denial offered by Wolterstorff also fail. It is concluded that claims of divine moral goodness remain problematic. (shrink)

Pursuing a suggestion made by Christopher Stead in his book Divine Substance and employing distinctions made by Gottlob Frege in his article “Concept and Object,” it becomes possible to answer a common charge against Trinitarian Theism: its alleged inconsistency in claiming that, while there is only one God, there are also three “persons,” each rightly named “God.” The argument advanced, while supporting the logical coherence of traditional Trinitarian Theism, also defends the orthodoxy of the controversial “Social Trinitarianism” associated with Richard (...) of Saint Victor. (shrink)

Alvin Plantinga’s solution to J. L. Mackie’s logical problem of evil invokes possible-worlds metaphysics. There are reasons for thinking that the solution is, at least, problematic. Difficulties emerge in the attempts to answer four related questions. (1) Can God’s necessary existence, understood in terms of possible-world metaphysics, make God’s actual existence impossible to explain? (2) Can an omniscient being with knowledge of the contents of every possible world (a being endowed with “middle knowledge”) prove ignorant of the consequences of his (...) creative acts? (3) Can an immoral action performed by an agent suffering from “transworld depravity” also be free in the libertarian sense? (4) Does the possible-worlds interpretation of libertarian freedom generate a vicious infinite regress? Special focus is on the possibility, advanced by Plantinga, that there are possible worlds that even an omnipotent being cannot create. Plantinga’s views are contrasted with those of Thomas Aquinas. (shrink)

In a magisterial book-length study, Professor E. Christian Brugger concludes that the canons of the Council of Trent, given the beliefs and intentions of its participants, provide “a dogmatic definition of the absolute indissolubility of marriage as a truth of divine revelation” (original italics). The present concern is whether Brugger’s arguments support this conclusion. Also subject to scrutiny are the relevance, plausibility, and consistency of the conciliar thinking on which his arguments are premised. It will be argued that Brugger’s conclusion (...) is unwarranted, leaving the question of divorce and remarriage an open one. (shrink)

Defenders of theistic morality sometimes insist that God's will can impose moral obligation only if God has a right to command. The right is compared to that which parents have over their children and which is thought to derive from a filial debt of gratitude. This essay examines arguments for divine authority based on gratitude which employ the parental analogy. It is argued that neither parental nor divine authority is based on gratitude. An alternative derivation of parental authority is suggested (...) but shown to be unavailable to those who would compare divine to parental rights. (shrink)

A number of years ago, James Rachels presented an argument for the necessary non–existence of God. It was based upon a supposed inconsistency between worship and what might be called ‘autonomous moral agency’. In Rachels' view, one person's being the worshipper of another is partially determined by the way in which it is appropriate for the first to respond to the commands of the second. In brief, a worshipper's obedience to commands should be ‘ unqualified ’. Rachels thought that there (...) was some kind of incoherence in the requirement that an autonomous moral agent respond to commands in this way. He concluded that there could be no being who, like God, was alleged necessarily to be a fitting object of worship. (shrink)

Analyzes Schelling's arguments for his idealism and pieces together a description of his theory of nature from among the large number of his writings in this area. It also traces the influence of Naturphilosophie on 19th-century science and connects it with recent System Theory.

To attribute confusion to someone is to take up a paternalistic stance in evaluating his reasoning.

Everyone has mistaken one thing for another, such as a stranger for an acquaintance. A person who has mistaken two things, Joseph Camp argues, even on a massive scale, is still capable of logical thought. In order to make that idea precise, one needs a logic of confused thought that is blind to the distinction between the objects that have been confused. Confused thought and language cannot be characterized as true or false even though reasoning conducted in such language (...) can be classified as valid or invalid. To the extent that philosophers have addressed this issue at all, they take it for granted that confusion is a kind of ambiguity. Camp rejects this notion; his fundamental claim is that confusion is not a mental state. To attribute confusion to someone is to take up a paternalistic stance in evaluating his reasoning. Camp proposes a novel characterization of confusion, and then demonstrates its fruitfulness with several applications in the history of philosophy and the history of science. (shrink)

The tendency to test outcomes that are predicted by our current theory (the confirmation bias) is one of the best-known biases of human decision making. We prove that the confirmation bias is an optimal strategy for testing hypotheses when those hypotheses are deterministic, each making a single prediction about the next event in a sequence. Our proof applies for two normative standards commonly used for evaluating hypothesis testing: maximizing expected information gain and maximizing the probability of falsifying the current hypothesis. (...) This analysis rests on two assumptions: (a) that people predict the next event in a sequence in a way that is consistent with Bayesian inference; and (b) when testing hypotheses, people test the hypothesis to which they assign highest posterior probability. We present four behavioral experiments that support these assumptions, showing that a simple Bayesian model can capture people's predictions about numerical sequences (Experiments 1 and 2), and that we can alter the hypotheses that people choose to test by manipulating the prior probability of those hypotheses (Experiments 3 and 4). (shrink)

In 1968, the Harvard criteria equated irreversible coma and apnea with human death and later, the Uniform Determination of Death Act was enacted permitting organ procurement from heart-beating donors. Since then, clinical studies have defined a spectrum of states of impaired consciousness in human beings: coma, akinetic mutism, minimally conscious state, vegetative state and brain death. In this article, we argue against the validity of the Harvard criteria for equating brain death with human death. Brain death does not disrupt somatic (...) integrative unity and coordinated biological functioning of a living organism. Neurological criteria of human death fail to determine the precise moment of an organism’s death when death is established by circulatory criterion in other states of impaired consciousness for organ procurement with non-heart-beating donation protocols. The criterion of circulatory arrest 75 s to 5 min is too short for irreversible cessation of whole brain functions and respiration controlled by the brain stem. Brain -based criteria for determining death with a beating heart exclude relevant anthropologic, psychosocial, cultural, and religious aspects of death and dying in society. Clinical guidelines for determining brain death are not consistently validated by the presence of irreversible brain stem ischemic injury or necrosis on autopsy; therefore, they do not completely exclude reversible loss of integrated neurological functions in donors. The questionable reliability and varying compliance with these guidelines among institutions amplify the risk of determining reversible states of impaired consciousness as irreversible brain death. The scientific uncertainty of defining and determining states of impaired consciousness including brain death have been neither disclosed to the general public nor broadly debated by the medical community or by legal and religious scholars. Heart-beating or non-heart-beating organ procurement from patients with impaired consciousness is de facto a concealed practice of physician-assisted death, and therefore, violates both criminal law and the central tenet of medicine not to do harm to patients. Society must decide if physician-assisted death is permissible and desirable to resolve the conflict about procuring organs from patients with impaired consciousness within the context of the perceived need to enhance the supply of transplantable organs. (shrink)

Generalization is a fundamental problem solved by every cognitive system in essentially every domain. Although it is known that how people generalize varies in complex ways depending on the context or domain, it is an open question how people learn the appropriate way to generalize for a new context. To understand this capability, we cast the problem of learning how to generalize as a problem of learning the appropriate hypothesis space for generalization. We propose a normative mathematical framework for learning (...) how to generalize by learning inductive biases for which properties are relevant for generalization in a domain from the statistical structure of features and concepts observed in that domain. More formally, the framework predicts that an ideal learner should learn to generalize by either taking the weighted average of the results of generalizing according to each hypothesis space, with weights given by how well each hypothesis space fits the previously observed concepts, or by using the most likely hypothesis space. We compare the predictions of this framework to human generalization behavior with three experiments in one perceptual (rectangles) and two conceptual (animals and numbers) domains. Across all three studies we find support for the framework's predictions, including individual‐level support for averaging in the third study. (shrink)

In challenging Marxist theorists to confront the radical rebirth at the core of the fascist revolution, Roger Griffin has carried fascist studies to a new and valuable plateau. Likewise, David D. Roberts’s elaboration of Griffin’s model offers a provocative and fruitful avenue to rethink fascist political culture. This article seeks to advance the dialogue to the next level by considering what an international approach can add to these primarily nationalist interpretations of generic fascism. Drawing on examples from the history of (...) the United States, I argue that fascism is a fundamentally cosmopolitan process and that it needs to be placed on a broader continuum with the histories of slavery, racism and nationalism. (shrink)

In early 2017, Nevada amended its Uniform Determination of Death Act, in order to clarify the neurologic criteria for the determination of death. The amendments stipulate that a determination of death is a clinical decision that does not require familial consent and that the appropriate standard for determining neurologic death is the American Academy of Neurology’s guidelines. Once a physician makes such a determination of death, the Nevada amendments require the withdrawal of life-sustaining treatment within twenty-four hours with limited exceptions. (...) Neurologists have generally supported Nevada’s amendments for clarifying the diagnostic standard and limiting the ability of family members to challenge it. However, it is more appropriate to view the Nevada amendments with concern. Even though the primary purpose of the UDDA is to ensure that all functions of a person’s entire brain have ceased, the AAN guidelines do not accurately assess this. In addition, by characterizing the determination of death as solely a clinical decision, the Nevada legislature has improperly ignored the doctrine of informed consent, as well as the beliefs of particular faiths and cultures that reject brain death. Rather than resolving controversies regarding brain death determinations, the Nevada amendments may instead instigate numerous constitutional challenges. (shrink)

The American Journal of Bioethics, Volume 11, Issue 8, Page 52-54, August 2011.

Organ donation after cardiac or circulatory death (DCD) has been introduced to increase the supply of transplantable organs. In this paper, we argue that the recovery of viable organs useful for transplantation in DCD is not compatible with the dead donor rule and we explain the consequential ethical and legal ramifications. We also outline serious deficiencies in the current consent process for DCD with respect to disclosure of necessary elements for voluntary informed decision making and respect for the donor's autonomy. (...) We compare two alternative proposals for increasing organ donation consent in society: presumed consent and mandated choice. We conclude that proceeding with the recovery of transplantable organs from decedents requires a paradigm change in the ethics of organ donation. The paradigm change to ensure the legitimacy of DCD practice must include: (1) societal agreement on abandonment of the dead donor rule, (2) legislative revisions reflecting abandonment of the dead donor rule, and (3) requirement of mandated choice to facilitate individual participation in organ donation and to ensure that decisions to participate are made in compliance with the societal values of respect for autonomy and self-determination. (shrink)

Since the introduction of the concept of brain death by the Ad Hoc Committee of the Harvard Medical School to Examine the Definition of Brain Death in 1968, the validity of this concept has been challenged by medical scientists, as well as by legal, philosophical, and religious scholars. In light of increased criticism of the concept of brain death, Stephen Napier, a staff ethicist at the National Catholic Bioethics Center, set out to prove that the whole-brain death criterion serves as (...) good evidence for death in the Catholic bioethical framework, on the grounds that when whole-brain death has occurred the soul has already departed from the body. Opponents have argued that (1) brain death does not disrupt the somatic integrative unity and coordinated biological functioning of a living organism and (2) clinical tests outlined in the practice guidelines for determining brain death lack sufficient power to exclude persisting function and fail to detect elements of the brain that, although currently functionless, may retain potential for recovery under conditions of optimal medical care. It is therefore possible that heart-beating organ procurement from patients with impaired consciousness is de facto a concealed practice of active euthanasia and physician-assisted death, both of which, either concealed or overt, the Catholic Church opposes. (shrink)

The impact of _Harukanaru Sanga ni_ upon its publication in 1947 was immediate and dramatic- -the impetus, many have argued, for a post-war peace movement in Japan that has lasted over half a century. Now the text is available for the first time in English as _In the Far Away Mountains and Rivers_, a heart-wrenching and thought-provoking collection of letters, journal entries, and essays written by University of Tokyo students as they were drafted to fight in World War II. Many (...) of these students faced certain death as pilots in the kamikaze squads. Many of them deplored the war, and many were simply motivated by a sense of duty to their families and their country. They turned to poetry, philosophy, and religion—all in an attempt to make sense of the universal tragedy of war. (shrink)

Advance health care directives and informed consent remain the cornerstones of patients' right to self-determination regarding medical care and preferences at the end-of-life. However, the effectiveness and clinical applicability of advance health care directives to decision-making on the use of life support systems at the end-of-life is questionable. The Uniform Anatomical Gift Act (UAGA) has been revised in 2006 to permit the use of life support systems at or near death for the purpose of maximizing procurement opportunities of organs medically (...) suitable for transplantation. Some states have enacted the Revised UAGA (2006) and a few of those have included amendments while attempting to preserve the uniformity of the revised Act. Other states have introduced the Revised UAGA (2006) for legislation and remaining states are likely to follow soon. (shrink)

SummaryPhilosophically speaking, invention is the mother of necessity. This means that Hume's analysis of the idea of necessity utilizing the notion of power, when properly qualified, is essentially sound and not at all a discouraging prospect. The task of the paper, then, is to specify in what respect it is possible to claim, for the various important senses of ‘necessary’, that such a notion is applicable whenever successful control has been exercised.RésuméDu point de vue philosophique, I'invention est la mère de (...) la nécessité. En effet, l'analyse qu'a faite Hume de l'idée de nécessité en recourant à la notion de pouvoir est, lorsqu'elle est con‐venablement nuancée, essentiellement correcte et ne constitue pas du tout une perspective décourageante. Le but de cet article est done de montrer que la notion de »ntcessaire«, prise dans les divers sens importants du mot, est applicable partout ou un contrôle efficace a été obtenu.ZusammenfassungPhilosophisch betrachtet ist die Erfindung der Ursprung der Notwendigkeit. Das bedeutet, dass Humes Analyse der Vorstellung der Notwendigkeit auf Grund des Begriffes der Kraft im Wesentlichen richtig und vielversprechend ist, sofern sie korrekt formuliert wird. In der vorliegenden Arbeit wird gezeigt, in welcher Beziehung es für die verschiedenen wichtigen Bedeutungen von »notwendig« möglich ist, die Anwendung eines derartigen Begriffes tiberall dort zu garantieren, wo eine erfolgreiche Kontrolle durchgeführt worden ist. (shrink)