Direction of fit theories usually claim that beliefs are such that they “aim at truth” or “ought to fit” the world and desires are such that they “aim at realization” or the world “ought to fit” them. This essay argues that no theory of direction of fit is correct. The two directions of fit are supposed to be determinations of one and the same determinable two-place relation, differing only in the ordering of favored terms. But there is no such determinable (...) because of ineliminable asymmetries between the way that beliefs “aim at truth” and the way that desires “aim at realization.” This essay traces the ills of direction of fit theory to a misunderstanding of Anscombe and proposes a cure that distinguishes theoretical and practical thought by appeal to a distinction between thought in the form of a state and thought in the form of an event. (shrink)

Is Anscombean practical knowledge independent of what the agent actually does on an occasion? Failure to understand Anscombe’s answer to this question is a major obstacle to appreciating the subtlety and plausibility of her view. I argue that Anscombe’s answer is negative, and turns on the nature of mistakes in performance, and reveals a distinctive implicit metaphysics of mind and knowledge, structured by related capacities and exercises of capacities. If my interpretation is correct, then practical knowledge shares features with knowledge-how (...) and knowledge-that, but deserves its own epistemic category. (shrink)

Alvarez and Steward think the power of agency is a two-way power; Lowe thinks the will is. There is a problem for two-way powers. Either there is a unified description of the manifestation-type of the power, or not. If so, two-way powers are really one-way powers. If not, two-way powers are really combinations of one-way powers. Either way, two-way powers cannot help distinguish free agents from everything else. I argue the problem is best avoided by an Aristotelian view, which posits (...) a distinctive unity of explanation proper to two-way powers, grounded in a distinctive form of reasoning. (shrink)

Most contemporary theories of action maintain that there are basic actions. A basic action is something that one does intentionally without doing anything else intentionally as means to that end. Most contemporary theories of action also maintain that there are non-basic actions that are mistakes in performance, where a mistake in performance is a case of mucking up what one meant to do, without the failure being the result of prevention or abnormal interference. But most contemporary theories of action deny (...) that there are basic mistakes in performance: stretches of activity that would be basic actions were they to succeed, but are in fact mistakes in performance. I argue that we have reason to think that there are basic mistakes in performance, and if there are, then we must give up a key commitment common to much contemporary action theory. The commitment is that every particular imperfect expression of the will is grounded in some particular perfect expression of the will. Giving up this commitment has important metaphysical consequences for how we think of the will as a power of agency, and implies that causal deviance perhaps isn’t the main problem that causal theorists of action ought to worry about. (shrink)

Helen Steward argues that action is the exercise of a two-way power, and that if there are actions, then determinism is false. The concept of a two-way power has its roots in Aristotle, but Aristotle’s conception of a two-way power is compatible with determinism. I explain the differences between Steward and Aristotle’s conceptions of two-way powers and point out how a compatibilist opponent to Steward’s argument could exploit an Aristotelian conception of two-way powers. This leads to a dialectical stalemate between (...) the imagined Two-Way Compatibilist and the Agency Incompatibilist. In conclusion I sketch a neutral conception of action as the exercise of a two-way power that sidesteps the dialectical stalemate whilst retaining the best aspects of Steward’s account of animal agency. (shrink)

These comments, which take the form of criticism and response, were the basis of a zoom conversation at the Eastern APA, January 2021. Josh is putting them up on philpapers (with permission from all involved) in case they are helpful to people interested in the themes of this book.

In this innovative book, Gloria Frost reconstructs and analyses Aquinas's theories on efficient causation and causal powers, focusing specifically on natural causal powers and efficient causation in nature. Frost presents each element of Aquinas's theories one by one, comparing them with other theories, as well as examining the philosophical and interpretive ambiguities in Aquinas's thought and proposing fresh solutions to conceptual difficulties. Her discussion includes explanations of Aquinas's technical scholastic terminology in jargon-free prose, as well as background on (...) medieval scientific views - including ordinary language explanations of the medieval physical theories which Aquinas assumed in formulating his views on causation and causal powers. The resulting volume is a rich exploration of a central philosophical topic in medieval philosophy and beyond, and will be valuable especially for scholars and advanced students working on Aquinas and on medieval natural philosophy. (shrink)

This book, based on Jaegwon Kim's 1996 Townsend Lectures, presents the philosopher's current views on a variety of issues in the metaphysics of the mind...

This essay explores the development of Simone Weil's conception of obedience across religious, political, and ethical contexts. By bringing together these strands of Weil's thought, it aims to illuminate some important connections in her treatment of obedience throughout these diverse topics. The author argues that Weil's political treatment of obedience is deeply influenced by ideas in Christian thought, and that this account is situated within an understanding of obedience in the natural world which is itself ethically loaded. Hence it is (...) suggested that Weil's account of obedience has something to offer philosophy today: namely, a conception of obedience which recognises the practical and ethical need for obeying others, but which is distinct from the mere submission to power. (shrink)

Evidence-based medicine (EBM) calls for medical practitioners to “integrate” our best available evidence into clinical practice. A significant amount of the literature on EBM takes this integration to be unproblematic, focusing on questions like how to interpret evidence and engage with patient values, rather than critically looking at how these features of EBM can be implemented together. Other authors have also commented on this gap in the literature, for example, identifying the lack of clarity about how patient preferences and evidence (...) from trials is supposed to be integrated in practice. In this paper, I look at this issue from an epistemological perspective, (looking at how different types of knowledge in EBM can be used to make sounds judgements). In particular, I introduce an epistemological issue for this integration problem, which I call the epistemic integration problem. This is essentially the problem of how we can use information that is both general (eg, about a population sample) and descriptive (eg, about what expected outcomes are) to reach clinical judgements that are individualized (applying to a particular patient) and normative (about what is best for their health). (shrink)

In the ultimate meeting of the sublime with the ridiculous" (London Evening Standard) My Beautiful Despair blends the existential philosophy of Søren Kierkegaard with the superficial musings of Kim Kardashian West, based on the popular Twitter feed @KimKierkegaard. The love child of Søren Kierkegaard and Kim Kardashian, the @KimKierkegaard Twitter account has been admired, praised, and adored in The New Yorker, The Washington Post, The New York Times, Financial Times, The Economist, New York, Buzzfeed, and more, and has amassed nearly (...) a quarter of a million Twitter followers, including J.K. Rowling and Anna Kendrick. A mash-up of Kim's tweets and observations with Kierkegaard's philosophy, Kim Kierkegaardashian shares their musings on fashion, beauty, brunch, and the relentless waves of existential dread that wash over us day after day. Now in a humorous, illustrated gift book, perfectly suited for our existential times, Kierkegaardashian's philosophical insights are juxtaposed for the first time with Dash Shaw's brilliant black-and-white illustrations. A sample of the revelations included in My Beautiful Despair include: - I have majorly fallen off my workout-eating plan! AND it's summer. But to despair over sin is to sink deeper into it. - Obsessed with protecting your skin, lips, hair & face from the sun? Close the cover of the coffin tight, really tight, and be at peace. - I like my men like I like my coffee: a momentary comfort in the midst of all my suffering. - What is the operation by which a self relates itself to its own self, transparently? Selfie. - What if everything in life were a misunderstanding, what if laughter were really tears? Scared LOL!! - Glamour, menswear, top hat. (shrink)

New Materialisms brings into focus and explains the significance of the innovative materialist critiques that are emerging across the social sciences and humanities. By gathering essays that exemplify the new thinking about matter and processes of materialization, this important collection shows how scholars are reworking older materialist traditions, contemporary theoretical debates, and advances in scientific knowledge to address pressing ethical and political challenges. In the introduction, Diana Coole and Samantha Frost highlight common themes among the distinctive critical projects that (...) comprise the new materialisms. The continuities they discern include a posthumanist conception of matter as lively or exhibiting agency, and a reengagement with both the material realities of everyday life and broader geopolitical and socioeconomic structures. Coole and Frost argue that contemporary economic, environmental, geopolitical, and technological developments demand new accounts of nature, agency, and social and political relationships; modes of inquiry that privilege consciousness and subjectivity are not adequate to the task. New materialist philosophies are needed to do justice to the complexities of twenty-first-century biopolitics and political economy, because they raise fundamental questions about the place of embodied humans in a material world and the ways that we produce, reproduce, and consume our material environment. Contributors Sara Ahmed Jane Bennett Rosi Braidotti Pheng Cheah Rey Chow William E. Connolly Diana Coole Jason Edwards Samantha Frost Elizabeth Grosz Sonia Kruks Melissa A. Orlie. (shrink)

In this paper, I offer a novel account of entrapment. This account suggests that the wrongness of pursuing punishment in cases of entrapment consists of two distinct components, one concerning the culpability of the entrapped defendant and the other concerning the legitimacy of the entrapping state to prosecute crimes that it has effectively created. Distinguishing these two components of entrapment, I explain, helps to clarify the moral issues at stake and to resolve some confusions and debates in existing legal analyses (...) of entrapment. (shrink)

Iris Murdoch was a philosopher and novelist who wrote extensively on the themes of love, goodness, religion, and morality. In this article, we explore her notion of ‘moral vision’; the idea that morality is not just about how we act and make choices, but how we see the world in a much broader sense.

Cartesian scepticism poses the question of how we can justify our belief that other humans experience consciousness in the same way that we do. Wittgenstein’s response to this scepticism is one that does not seek to resolve the problem by providing a sound argument against the Cartesian sceptic. Rather, he provides a method of philosophical inquiry which enables us to move past this and continue our inquiry without the possibility of solipsism arising as a philosophical problem in the first place. (...) In this paper, I propose that Wittgenstein’s method of dismissing the Cartesian sceptic can also be applied to the problems posed by the ‘moral sceptic’, who denies the truth of all ethical or moral claims. I will argue that in the same way Wittgenstein’s focus on public language enables us to dismiss the traditional problem of other minds, a focus on public moral practices or language-games also enables us to dismiss the idea that moral claims are always ‘meaningless’, ‘false’ or ‘nonsensical’. On this account, the moral sceptic is misguided in much the same way as the solipsist who implicitly admits the existence of other minds in her practices. The moral sceptic who still engages in moral activities also implicitly admits the existence of meaningful moral positions. Wittgenstein’s dismissal of the Cartesian sceptic, as I understand it, can be broadly divided into two parts. The first part is an account of language acquisition. This part outlines how we might come to see other humans as conscious, thinking, feeling beings from a causal perspective. This suggests that we can arrive at an understanding of other minds as a primary perception itself - without needing to posit this perception as a kind of deductive or inductive hypothesis. Secondly, we can see how this relates to an epistemic model of language. This focuses on the role of language as something which consists of rule-governed activities, where the existence of other minds is embedded in our understanding of the world as a kind of grammatical rule, rather than an observational hypothesis. From both these arguments the Cartesian sceptic is,, irrelevant to some forms of philosophical inquiry. This is because the sceptic takes the existence of other minds to be a rational hypothesis/inference when it is not. I suggest that this approach can be applied to moral scepticism if we take certain normative claims as grammatical dispositions, rather than rational or metaphysical propositions. Hence, the moral sceptic who offers a rational or logical critique of these moral foundations is not necessarily saying anything relevant to our practices – the moral stances which they refute as rationally meaningless were never based on purely rational or logical hypotheses in the first place. (shrink)

La educación en línea forzada por la pandemia del 2020, puede ser un trampolín de oportunidades para la inclusión de personas con discapacidad visual gracias a las tecnologías de asistencia; o bien, las puede dejar fuera por el analfabetismo que existe en la sociedad con respecto a dónde encontrar y cómo usar dichas tecnologías de asistencia para favorecer la inclusión de este colectivo. Por ello, es de vital importancia implementar tecnologías de asistencia y metodologías didácticas innovadoras, que permitan aprendizajes significativos (...) y generen motivación en los estudiantes con discapacidad visual para participar de manera más proactiva. El juego y la formación aleatoria de equipos que permiten las plataformas potencializa la capacidad adaptativa de estos estudiantes en la comunidad educativa, al tiempo que se ejerce el derecho a la accesibilidad mediante la información en múltiples formatos de diseño universal para el aprendizaje. En este ensayo la autora, quien conduce una sala tiflotécnica en una universidad politécnica, discute el tipo de tecnologías digitales que coadyuvan a eliminar barreras al aprendizaje de personas con discapacidad visual, colectivo al que ella misma pertenece, con el propósito que se puedan generar el tipo de escenarios educativos que requieren. (shrink)

Although informed consent is important in clinical research, questions persist regarding when it is necessary, what it requires, and how it should be obtained. The standard view in research ethics is that the function of informed consent is to respect individual autonomy. However, consent processes are multidimensional and serve other ethical functions as well. These functions deserve particular attention when barriers to consent exist. We argue that consent serves seven ethically important and conceptually distinct functions. The first four functions pertain (...) principally to individual participants: (1) providing transparency; (2) allowing control and authorization; (3) promoting concordance with participants' values; and (4) protecting and promoting welfare interests. Three other functions are systemic or policy focused: (5) promoting trust; (6) satisfying regulatory requirements; and (7) promoting integrity in research. Reframing consent around these functions can guide approaches to consent that are context sensitive and that maximize achievable goals. (shrink)

Infallibilism leads to skepticism, and fallibilism is plagued by the threshold problem. Within this narrative, the pragmatic turn in epistemology has been marketed as a way for fallibilists to address the threshold problem. In contrast, pragmatic versions of infallibilism have been left unexplored. However, I propose that going pragmatic offers the infallibilist a way to address its main problem, the skeptical problem. Pragmatic infallibilism, however, is committed to a shifty view of epistemic certainty, where the strength of a subject’s epistemic (...) state can vary depending upon the practical context. Pragmatic views of epistemic strength are quite radical so the argumentative goal of my discussion is to argue for its plausibility, thereby arguing for the plausibility of pragmatic infallibilism. To do so, I discuss the role that the framing of decision problems and the construction of our deliberative attitudes have in our theories of rational choice. And I explore a way in which these necessary components of a normative theory of rationality can be used to motivate pragmatic views of evidential support. Finally, since the plausibility of our pragmatic account will depend upon the plausibility of a constructive account of rational choice, I conclude by comparing the adequacy of the constructive account with orthodox Bayesian and knowledge-based accounts. (shrink)

This chapter contains sections titled: Zack's Sensitivity Zack's Race Zack's Desire Zack's Violence Music Conclusion Notes.

Change is inevitable, and increasingly rapid and continuous in healthcare as organizations strive to adapt, improve and innovate. Organizational change challenges healthcare providers because it restructures how and when patient care delivery is provided, changing ways in which nurses must carry out their work. The aim of this doctoral study was to explore frontline nurses’ experiences of living with rapid and continuous organizational change. A critical hermeneutic approach was utilized. Participants described feeling voiceless, powerless and apolitical amidst rapid and continuous (...) organizational changes which fuelled apathy, cynicism and disengagement from the organization. However, critical analysis of the data showed that nurses actively engaged with power, voice and politics through resistant and transgressive behaviours in micro‐ethical moments of practice. There is a need to reconceptualize the concepts of voice, power and politics in nursing as there is dissonance between nurses’ beliefs about these concepts and what they are enacting in practice. Recognizing their enactment of power, voice and political agency at the micro‐level may empower nurses. Empowerment would mitigate the high levels of reports of powerlessness experienced in practice during organizational changes. (shrink)

Philip Kitcher’s The Ethical Project trios to vindicates ethics through an analysis of its evolutionary and cultural history, a history which in turn, he thinks, supports a particular conception of the role of moral thinking and normative practices in human social life. As Kitcher sees it, that role could hardly be more central: most of what makes human life human, and preferable to the fraught and impoverished societies of the great apes, depends on moral cognition. Prom this view of the (...) role of the ethical project as a social technology, Kitcher derives an account of moral progress and even moral truth: a normative analogue of the idea that truth is the convergence of rational enquiry. To Kitcher’s history, I present an anti-history. Most of what is good about human social life depends on the expansion of our social emotions, not on our capacities to articulate and internalise explicit norms. Indeed, since the Holocene and the origins of complex society, normative thought and normative institutions have been more prominent as tools of exploitation and oppression than as mechanisms of a social peace that balances individual desire with collective co-operation. I argue that the vindication project fails in its own terms: even given Kitcher’s distinctive pragmatic concept of vindication, history debunks rather than vindicates moral cognition. (shrink)

필자는 본 논문에서 귀납의 문제와 관련하여 흄이 『인성론』 1권에서 이성을 통하여서는 이를 정당화 할 수 없다고 주장한 것으로 해석하는 기존의 회의주의적 해석을 비판적으로 검토한다. 필자의 견해에 따르면, 흄이 『인성론』 1권에서 비판의 대상으로 삼고 있는 것은 인과 추론의 정당성 문제 그 자체가 아니라, 무비판적으로 받아들여져 온 무오류적 이성 개념이다. 흄은 이 무오류적 이성 개념을 부정하고, 이성을 넓은 의미에서의 상상력 아래로 포섭 시킨 후, 그 안에서 무작위로 작동하는 좁은 의미에서의 상상력과 개연성의 논리에 따라 작동하는 이성을 구분함으로써, 인과 추론을 정당화하는 새로운 길을 열고 (...) 있다. 따라서, 흄은 『인성론』 1권에서 인과 추론의 정당성을 부정하고 더 나아가 총체적 회의주의로 빠져드는 것이 아니라, 이성 개념을 새롭게 정립함으로써 오히려 총체적 회의 주의로 빠지지 않고 새로운 방식으로 인과 추론의 정당성을 확보하는 시도를 하고 있는 것이다. 이와 같은 필자의 해석은 『인성론』 1권과 『인성론』 2권, 3권을 단절적으로 해석하지 않고, 오히려 『인성론』 1권에서의 논의가 『인성론』 2권과 3권의 초석이 되어줌을 잘 드러내 보여준다. 다시 말해, 흄이 『인성론』 1권에서 주장하는 바, “우리의 감각들을 넘어서서 추적될 수 있고, 우리가 볼 수 없고 느낄 수 없는 존재들과 대상들을 우리들에게 알려주는 유일한 것은 인과이다”라고 하는 흄의 언명이 『인성론』 2권과 3권에서의 대상 세계에 대한 논의의 출발점이 되어주는 것이다. -/- This paper argues against the common interpretation that, in Book I of the Treatise, Hume attempts to show that inductive arguments concerning matters of fact cannot be justified by reason. It is true that he argues that inductive arguments cannot be justified by the traditional concept of infallible reason. However, it is important to note that contra to the traditional understanding of reason as infallible, he takes it to be open to errors by classifying it under the category of imagination in a broad sense. He then makes a distinction between reason as “the general and more establish’d properties of the imagination” and imagination as a narrow sense. From this, the paper concludes he attempts to justify inductive arguments concerning matters of fact by redefining reason as open to errors. That is, although inductive arguments cannot be justified by probable reasoning in terms of the traditional concept of infallible reason, the former can be justified by the logic of probability, which he calls “general rules” in terms of Hume’s concept of error-prone reason. (shrink)

1. 하나가 여럿에게 가는 길 - 2008년 11월 동아시아 경제공동체포럼 기조강연, 인천 드림시티에서 2. 물 - 마음과 돈과 물의 시대에 부쳐 3. 님 - 획기적 재분배의 이원집정제에 관하여 4. 도깨비 - ‘신의 우물’ 근처에서 춤추는 가난한 도깨비 이야기 5. 혁신 - 중국의 혁신은 ‘법혜월’과 같은 화엄개벽의 여성!

Che 1-p'yŏn. Ch'ŏndo wa inbŏp (inbŏpch'ŏn) -- 1. Kodae Chungguk ŭi inbŏpch'ŏn ch'ŏrhak sasang -- 2. Sŏnjin sidae ch'ŏnmyŏnggwan ŭi chŏn'gae -- 3. Sŏnjin sidae chŏnt'ong chaeigwan -- 4. Kunju wa minbon : Sŏnjin sidae kunju, minbollon kwa chŏhang, hyŏngmyŏng sasang -- 5. Ch'ŏndo ŭi naeyong kwa inbŏp ŭi panyŏng - Che 2-p'yŏn. Hangsang kwa pyŏnhwa -- 1. To ŭi hangsangsŏng kwa pyŏnhwasŏng -- 2. Pŏp ŭi hangsangsŏng kwa pyŏnhwasŏng -- 3. Pŏpchesasang hangsang kwa pyŏnhwa -- 4. Ch'im Ka-bon kwa (...) Yang Kye-ch'o ŭi pyŏnbŏmnon pigyo -- Che 3-p'yŏn. P'yŏnghwa ŭi pŏp kwa yebang pŏphak : punjaeng ŭi p'yŏnghwa haegyŏl kwa yebang. (shrink)

The question of justice -- Foundational matters -- Plato: a moral universe -- Aristotle: the virtuous life -- The inquiry into justice -- The moral inquiry -- Values -- The nature of the polity -- Debates of justice -- The nature of justice -- Individual rights and responsibilities -- International relations -- Future lives.