This 1994 book examines the development of the ideas of the new Austrian school from its beginnings in Vienna in the 1870s to the present. It focuses primarily in showing how the coherent theme that emerges from the thought of Carl Menger, Ludwig von Mises, Friedrich Hayek, Ludwig Lachman, Israel Kirzner and a variety of new younger Austrians is an examination of the implications of time and ignorance for economic theory.

In the 1930s, socialist economists used the assumptions of equilibrium theory to argue that a central planner could coordinate supply and demand from above. This argument led Hayek, over the years, to try to explain the limitations of equilibrium theory and, conversely, to explain how capitalism functioned without the assumptions of equilibrium being met. In a changing world of agents who are ignorant of the future, how is a functioning market “order” possible? One answer can be found in Hayek's argument (...) that evolved rules make people's future behavior more predictable and, more to the point, that they contain previously accumulated knowledge that provides the building blocks for future economic growth. Hayek's evolutionary theory was flawed, however, in failing to explain how people can know which rules are responsible for their success or failure so that they persist in using those rules and pass them forward in time. However, markets provide immediate feedback about success and failure through profits and losses. An evolutionary explanation of the economy would have permitted Hayek to dispense with the metaphor of general equilibrium, which was increasingly irrelevant to his understanding of economic order. (shrink)

This paper argues that there are areas of political behavior for which the usual assumption of wealth maximizing homo economicus is to narrow to generate convincing explanation of behavior. In particular, it is argued that for many political decisions, people choose according to some set of moral preconceptions while for others, people have insufficient information to make economic choices even if they were inclined to do so. This implies that normative public choice can only be part of a political decision (...) process in which non-pecuniary concerns influence choices. Finally, constitutional economics insofar as it is conceptually conceived, must presume some set of moral and informational properties of the parties to the social contract. (shrink)

Learn to think critically with the leading introduction to reasoning and argumentation. Highlights In clear, reader-friendly language, The Power of Critical Thinking provides an engaging introduction to argumentation, deductive and inductive reasoning, inferencing, and evaluating scientific theories New Critical Thinking and the Media boxes in each chapter apply the principles of critical thinking to the realms of media, advertising, and news New content on "fake news," the COVID-19 pandemic, and other important contemporary topics reflects the changing world in which today's (...) students must apply their critical thinking abilities New and updated exercises offer extensive opportunities for students to practise the skills through which they will become active, engaged critical thinkers Additional online resources-including a study guide and practice quizzes for students as well as an instructor's manual, a test bank, and PowerPoint slides for instructors-offer stimulating materials to enhance the learning and teaching experiences. About the Authors Chris MacDonald is an associate professor and chair of the Law and Business Department at the Ted Rogers School of Management, Toronto Metropolitan University. Lewis Vaughn is an independent scholar and author of several textbooks on philosophy, ethics, and critical thinking. (shrink)

Proponents of the public goods argument ('PGA') seek to ground the authority of the state on its putative indispensability as a means of providing public goods. But many of the things we take to be public goods – including many of the goods commonly invoked in support of the PGA – are actually what we might term publicized goods. A publicized good is any whose ‘public’ character results only from a policy decision to make some good freely and universally available. (...) This fact poses complications for the PGA, insofar as the set of possible publicized goods is quite extensive indeed. (shrink)

The dispute between Kantians and Humeans over whether practical reason can justify moral reasons for all agents is often characterized as a debate over whether reasons are hypothetical or categorical. Instead, this debate must be understood in terms of the distinction between agent-neutral and agent-relative reasons. This paper considers Alan Gewirth’s Reason and Morality as a case study of a Kantian justification of morality focused on deriving categorical reasons from hypothetical reasons. The case study demonstrates first, the possibility of categorical (...) agent-relative reasons, and second, that inattention to this possibility has caused considerable confusion in the debate between Kantians and Humeans. (shrink)

Gene discovery reveals new biology, expands the utility of marker‐assisted selection, and enables targeted mutagenesis. Still, such discoveries can take over a decade. We present a general strategy, “Agile Genetics,” that uses nested, structured populations to overcome common limits on gene resolution. Extensive simulation work on realistic genetic architectures shows that, at population sizes of >5000 samples, single gene‐resolution can be achieved using bulk segregant pools. At this scale, read depth and technical replication become major drivers of resolution. Emerging enrichment (...) methods to address coverage are on the horizon; we describe one possibility – iterative depth sequencing (ID‐seq). In addition, graph‐based pangenomics in experimental populations will continue to maximize accuracy and improve interpretation. Based on this merger of agronomic scale with molecular and bioinformatic innovation, we predict a new age of rapid gene discovery. (shrink)

Though sometimes maligned, “trolleyology” offers an effective means of opening and framing, not only classes in ethics, but indeed any introductory philosophy course taking a broadly “puzzle-based” approach. When properly sequenced, a subset of the thought experiments that are trolleyology’s stock-in-trade can generate a series of puzzles illustrating the shortcomings of our untutored moral intuitions, and which thus motivate the very enterprise of moral theorizing. Students can be engaged in the attempt to resolve said puzzles, inasmuch as they’re accessible and (...) compelling, and their resolutions generally easy to achieve. Once thus engaged, students can be directed to the fact that they had already rolled up their sleeves and begun “doing philosophy.” In this way, engagement with trolleyological puzzles can serve as a “microcosm” for philosophy more broadly, illustrating the processes of critical thinking that are likewise the stock-in-trade of philosophers across many different domains of inquiry. (shrink)

These essays critically reassess the widely accepted view that statistical methods of analysis can, and do, yield causal understanding of social phenomena. They emphasize the historical, philosophical and conceptual perspectives that underlie and inform current methodological controversies.

Procedural theories of practical reasoning provide rules according to which agents' reasons for action are constructed. Those procedures operate on some given input (an agent's desires, other mental states, and circumstances) to the reasoning process in a way that determines the output of an agent's reasons for action. I argue that a procedural theory of practical reasoning must include a previously unrecognized normative restriction on what counts as acceptable input, roughly, that agents should take features of their own, but not (...) others', selves as input. Using Korsgaard's The Sources of Normativity as a case study, I show that common features of procedural theories result in a threat to each person's view of themselves as practically distinct from others. I then show that psychological claims are insufficient to defeat this threat, and that maintaining a practical distinction between ourselves and others requires a normative restriction on the input to practical reflection. (shrink)

Typical justifications of prudence are based on the fact that we are temporally extended agents who remain numerically identical over time. After showing that prudential considerations should instead be based on our identity at a particular time, I outline a normative context for prudential reasons, based on a present commitment to temporal neutrality. I then consider how contingency in the content of a present commitment to temporal neutrality provides a flexible context that can help to resolve current debates about whether (...) agents are required to maximize value, maximin value, minimax loss or are required to conform to any of a host of other options on how to adjudicate various types of conflict between present and future values. (shrink)

I argue that much current thinking on externalities—at least among “lay political economists” (but even, on occasion, among professional economists)—is saddled with two analytical errors. The first is what I call coextensivism: the conflation of public goods and externalities. The second error is what I call externality profligacy: the conflation of economic and “social” externalities. The principal dangers presented by these two “dogmas on externalities” are that, while in their grips, we are under-disposed to seek negotiated, market-based solutions (of a (...) broadly Coasean nature) to challenges posed by economic externalities, and over-disposed to seek coercive, state-based solutions (of a broadly Pigouvian nature) to challenges posed by social externalities. (shrink)

A theoretical physicist and feminist theorist, Karen Barad elaborates her theory of agential realism, a schema that is at once a new epistemology, ontology, and ethics.

We frequently speak of certain things or phenomena being built out of or based in others. Making Things Up concerns these relations, which connect more fundamental things to less fundamental things: Karen Bennett calls these 'building relations'. She aims to illuminate what it means to say that one thing is more fundamental than another.

We hypothesised that belief in conspiracy theories would be predicted by the general tendency to attribute agency and intentionality where it is unlikely to exist. We further hypothesised that this tendency would explain the relationship between education level and belief in conspiracy theories, where lower levels of education have been found to be associated with higher conspiracy belief. In Study 1 participants were more likely to agree with a range of conspiracy theories if they also tended to attribute intentionality and (...) agency to inanimate objects. As predicted, this relationship accounted for the link between education level and belief in conspiracy theories. We replicated this finding in Study 2, whilst taking into account beliefs in paranormal phenomena. These results suggest that education may undermine the reasoning processes and assumptions that are reflected in conspiracy belief. (shrink)

The Progressive favors extending the legal institution of marriage so as to include same-sex unions along with heterosexual ones. The Traditionalist opposes such an extension, preferring to retain the legal institution of marriage in its present form. I argue that the Progressive ought to broaden her position, endorsing instead the Liberal case for extending the current institution so as to include polygamous unions as well—for any consideration favoring Progressivism over Traditionalism likewise favors Liberalism over Progressivism. Progressives inclined to resist Liberalism (...) are invited to consider an alternative position: the Libertarian stance that favors instead the ‘disestablishment’ of marriage. (shrink)

Ecological feminism is the position that there are important connections-historical, symbolic, theoretical-between the domination of women and the domination of nonhuman nature. I argue that because the conceptual connections between the dual dominations of women and nature are located in an oppressive patriarchal conceptual framework characterized by a logic of domination, (1) the logic of traditional feminism requires the expansion of feminism to include ecological feminism and (2) ecological feminism provides a framework for developing a distinctively feminist environmental ethic. I (...) conclude that any feminist theory and any environmental ethic which fails to take seriously the interconnected dominations of women and nature is simply inadequate. (shrink)

Ecological feminism is the position that there are important connections-historical, symbolic, theoretical-between the domination of women and the domination of nonhuman nature. I argue that because the conceptual connections between the dual dominations of women and nature are located in an oppressive patriarchal conceptual framework characterized by a logic of domination, (1) the logic of traditional feminism requires the expansion of feminism to include ecological feminism and (2) ecological feminism provides a framework for developing a distinctively feminist environmental ethic. I (...) conclude that any feminist theory and any environmental ethic which fails to take seriously the interconnected dominations of women and nature is simply inadequate. (shrink)

Recently much has been made of the grounding relation, and of the idea that it is intimately tied to fundamentality. If A grounds B, then A is more fundamental than B (though not vice versa ), and A is ungrounded if and only if it is fundamental full stop—absolutely fundamental. But here is a puzzle: is grounding itself absolutely fundamental?

A philosophical exploration of the nature, scope, and significance of ecofeminist theory and practice. This book presents the key issues, concepts, and arguments which motivate and sustain ecofeminism from a western philosophical perspective.

Recent defenses of shaming as an effective tool for identifying bad practice and provoking social change appear compatible with feminism. I complicate this picture by examining two instances of online feminist shaming that resulted in shame backlashes. Shaming requires the assertion of social and epistemic authority on behalf of a larger community, and is dependent upon an audience that will be receptive to the shaming testimony. In cases where marginally situated knowers attempt to “shame up,” it presents challenges for feminist (...) uses. (shrink)

Recent debate regarding transgender persons’ bathroom-utilization prerogatives raises broader issues concerning current practices of sex segregation more generally. I argue that the only consistently Progressive position on bathroom access is an outright opposition to any form of bathroom segregation. This opposition, in turn, entails a thorough-going rejection of all types of sex- and gender-segregation. I then suggest that Progressives uncomfortable with such wide-ranging implications may wish to consider the merits of a certain Traditionalist position on such matters—one that counsels caution (...) and legislative forbearance when it comes to overturning long-standing customs (such as those embodied in current practices of sex-segregation). (shrink)

We all have different “tastes” for different tastes: some of us have a sweet tooth, while others prefer more subtle flavors; some crave spicy foods, while others cannot stand them. As Bourdieu and others have pointed out, these varying judgments seem to be more than mere preferences; often they reflect (and partially constitute) differences of class and culture. But I want to suggest that we’ve possibly overlooked another important source of these divergent gastronomic evaluations, other than hierarchy and caste: mere (...) interpersonal variability with respect to brute gustatory sensations. After all, we all know about “supertasters and cilantro-haters”; how likely is it, though, that the interpersonal heterogeneity of gustatory sensation is limited to this one dimension? In this paper, I make the case that we should take this possibility more seriously, and offer some thoughts on how we might start getting a better handle on the nature and scope of interpersonal gustatory variability—including by suggesting some diagnostics that can help us get at (what I call) some of the “non-flavor dimensions” of our gustatory experience. I conclude by developing some implications for the prospects of an “alimentary aesthetics”: namely, that—should our gustatory experiences turn out to be quite heterogeneous—then they do not seem well-suited to serve as the basic ingredients of bona fide aesthetic judgment about food and drink. (shrink)

The central claim of the volume in which this chapter appears (*Fermented Landscapes*, ed. Colleen C. Myles, Univ. of Nebraska Press 2020) is that the chemical process of fermentation supplies an apt metaphor for understanding certain kinds of landscape change. The kinds of landscape change in question are, fortuitously, those often occasioned by commercial processes centered around fermentation itself: the commercial production of beer, wine, spirits, cider, cheese, and related fermented products. But what makes this metaphor apt? Which kinds of (...) landscape change are most fruitfully conceptualized as exhibiting “fermentation,” and how do they differ from other sorts of landscape change? What is it about fermentation-centered industries that effects fermentation-modeled landscape change, and when (if ever) do these industries contribute to other, different forms of landscape change? Is there any essential reason why fermentation-centered industries should create in their environs processes of transformation usefully characterized in terms of ferment? Or is this little more than a happy linguistic coincidence? In short: how much mileage do we get from this metaphor? This chapter offers a number of considerations germane to an evaluation of the “fermented landscapes” research paradigm—considerations to which readers may wish to remain alert as they study the contributions in this volume. (shrink)

A variety of relations widely invoked by philosophers—composition, constitution, realization, micro-basing, emergence, and many others—are species of what I call ‘building relations’. I argue that they are conceptually intertwined, articulate what it takes for a relation to count as a building relation, and argue that—contra appearances—it is an open possibility that these relations are all determinates of a common determinable, or even that there is really only one building relation.

Many theorists have recently observed that the response to the same-sex marriage controversy most congruent with basic liberal principles is neither the retention of the institution of marriage in its present form, nor its extension so as to include same-sex unions along with heterosexual ones, but rather the ‘dis-establishment’ of marriage. Less commonly observed, however, is the fact that there are two competing models for how the state might effect a regime of disestablished marriage. On the one hand, there is (...) a ‘deflationary’ approach, on which the state ceases to confer marital status, but does remain in the status-conferring business. On this approach, the state would still bestow a certain ‘thinner’, more ‘neutral’ legal status – as it does when it creates civil unions, for instance. Call this the ‘Status Model’ of disestablished marriage. On the other hand, there is an ‘eliminativist’ approach, on which the state ceases to confer any sort of status at all – not even the thin or neutral status of ‘civilly-unioned’. There simply are no registered domestic partnerships. What there is, is contract law, and individuals entering into contracts for life-partnership – contractual arrangements which might assume any of a wide variety of forms. Call this the ‘Contract Model’ of disestablished marriage. In this paper, I explore the merits of these competing models. After briefly discussing what it means to speak of ‘disestablishing marriage’, and examining the case for disestablishment, I proceed to consider the advantages and disadvantages of each model. My tentative conclusion is that the Contract Model is the one that best instantiates cardinal liberal virtues. (shrink)

That each of these questions has provided occasion for disagreement among able scholars can be readily confirmed by anyone willing to sample even a few items of the now voluminous contemporary literature dealing with this chapter. Indeed, anyone who has puzzled over Aristotle's text and tried to make sense of the relevant secondary literature will be able to sympathize with D. C. Williams' opinion that "tracing coherent philosophical arguments in De Interpretatione is rather like finding shapes in a cloud." Still, (...) I remain convinced that it should be possible to achieve a measure of agreement about the meaning and significance of Aristotle's text beyond any which has yet been attained. Toward this end I shall propose and defend in this paper a set of answers to the disputed questions - which seem to me to do justice both to the text and to the fact that scholarly opinion on these matters has diverged so sharply. (shrink)

Ecological feminism is the position that there are important connections-historical, symbolic, theoretical-between the domination of women and the domination of nonhuman nature. I argue that because the conceptual connections between the dual dominations of women and nature are located in an oppressive patriarchal conceptual framework characterized by a logic of domination, (1) the logic of traditional feminism requires the expansion of feminism to include ecological feminism and (2) ecological feminism provides a framework for developing a distinctively feminist environmental ethic. I (...) conclude that any feminist theory and any environmental ethic which fails to take seriously the interconnected dominations of women and nature is simply inadequate. (shrink)

The pluralist liberal defends a conception of liberal politics grounded in the thesis of value pluralism. Since he argues from a particular metaphysical thesis – value pluralism – to a particular understanding of politics – liberalism – his account will feature two separable, but interrelated, components: a distinctive justification of liberalism, and a conception of politics with distinctive content. The particular flavor of liberalism to which the pluralist is led is a species of what I term “accommodationism” – an understanding (...) that sees as a polity’s central task the accommodation of many divergent conceptions of the good life. I argue that the pluralist liberal’s case is hampered by four difficulties. Two of these difficulties challenge the justification of liberalism in terms of value pluralism, and two of them plague the particular accommodationist understanding of liberalism to which the pluralist is led. I conclude by arguing that classical liberalism is a view that is immune to these latter two criticisms. In fact, I suggest a more general claim: that classical liberalism provides the most promising resources for the articulation and defense of a conception of politics dedicated to accommodating the diverse and heterogeneous versions of human flourishing countenanced by value pluralism. (shrink)

Our topic is food that is "local, ethical, and sustainable." We defend a surprising claim about such a conception (at least, on certain ways of specifying its three central components): namely, that it may lend support to some varieties of “conscientious carnivorism.” We focus on an especially illustrative instance of (potentially) moral meat-eating: the case of Cinta Senese, a once-endangered pig that holds a special place in the cultural and environmental landscape in Tuscany, Italy. In Tuscany, Cinta Senese constitute a (...) robustly local food product (in the genealogical sense of "local"), where plausibly they lead quite worthwhile lives (in a welfarist sense of "worthwhile"). Further, the recent revival of their dwindling populations seemingly represents a “sustainability success” (in a conservationist sense). Thus, we argue that locavores with welfarist and conservationist proclivities may actually find that they have considerable reason to support, rather than to oppose, this form of animal agriculture – as well as others relevantly like it. (shrink)

The paper is an extended discussion of what I call the ‘dismissive attitude’ towards metaphysical questions. It has three parts. In the first part, I distinguish three quite different versions of dismissivism. I also argue that there is little reason to think that any of these positions is correct about the discipline of metaphysics as a whole; it is entirely possible that some metaphysical disputes should be dismissed and others should not be. Doing metametaphysics properly requires doing metaphysics first. I (...) then put two particular disputes on the table to be examined in the rest of the paper: the dispute over whether composite objects exist, and the dispute about whether distinct objects can be colocated. In the second part of the paper, I argue against the claim that these disputes are purely verbal disputes. In the third part of the paper, I present a new version of dismissivism, and argue that it is probably the correct view about the two disputes in question. They are not verbal disputes, and the discussion about them to date has not remotely been a waste of time. At this stage, however, our evidence has run out. I argue that neither side of either dispute is simpler than the other, and that the same objections in fact arise against both sides. (For example, the compositional nihilist does not in fact escape the problem of the many, and the one-thinger does not in fact escape the grounding problem.). (shrink)