This article explains the problems with Alan Shewmon’s critique of brain death as a valid sign of human death, beginning with a critical examination of his analogy between brain death and severe spinal cord injury. The article then goes on to assess his broader argument against the necessity of the brain for adult human organismal integration, arguing that he fails to translate correctly from biological to metaphysical claims. Finally, on the basis of a deeper metaphysical analysis, I offer a revised (...) rationale for the validity of the neurological criterion of human death. (shrink)

In this paper, I argue that brain death is death because, despite the appearance of genuine integration, the brain-dead body does not in fact possess the unity that is proper to a human organism. A brain-dead body is not a single entity, but a multitude of organs and tissues functioning in a coordinated manner with the help of artificial life support. In order to support this claim, I first lay out Hoffmann and Rosenkrantz’s ontological account of the requirements for organismal (...) unity and summarize an earlier paper in which I apply this account to the brain death debate. I then further support this ontological argument by developing an analogy between the requirements for the unity of an organism and the requirements for the unity of an orchestra. To do so, I begin by examining the role that a conductor plays in unifying a traditional orchestra, and then go on to show that the human organism functions like a traditional orchestra that relies upon a conductor for its unity. Next, I consider the conditions required to achieve orchestral unity in conductorless orchestras and show that, in contrast to simpler organisms like plants, the postnatal human organism lacks those conditions. I argue, in other words, that although conductorless orchestras do exist, the human organism is not one of them. Like a traditional orchestra without a conductor, the brain-dead body is not a unified whole. (shrink)

In this essay, I outline fundamental anthropological and moral principles related to human sexuality and gender identity and then apply these principles to analyze and evaluate the views of several authors who attempt to carve out a “middle way” between liberal and traditionalist approaches to these issues. In doing so, I engage especially with the claim that gender dysphoria, rather than being a psychological issue, is a type of biological intersex condition in which one’s “brain sex” is out of line (...) with one’s genital and chromosomal sex. I argue that understanding the human person as a unity of body and soul and recognizing human sexuality as ordered toward the human good of marriage understood as inseparably unitive and procreative reveals the flaws in this position and helps to show why hormonal or surgical gender reassignment therapy is not a medically or ethically appropriate response to gender dysphoria. I also offer an alternative characterization of gender dysphoria and suggestions for responding with true compassion to those who suffer from it. (shrink)

In this article, I explore difficult and sensitive questions regarding the nature of transgender identity claims and the appropriate medical treatment for those suffering from gender dysphoria. I first analyze conceptions of transgender identity, highlighting the prominence of the wrong-body narrative and its dualist presuppositions. I then briefly argue that dualism is false because our bodily identity is essential and intrinsic to our overall personal identity and explain why a sound, nondualist anthropology implies that gender identity cannot be entirely divorced (...) from sexual identity. Finally, I make the case that arguments in favor of hormonal and surgical treatments for gender dysphoria rest on this mistaken dualist anthropology, and that these treatments therefore give false hope to those suffering from gender dysphoria, while causing irreversible bodily harm and diverting attention from underlying psychological problems that often need to be addressed. I also briefly discuss how these philosophical claims relate to empirical studies on the outcomes of hormonal and surgical treatments for gender dysphoria and to testimonies of transgender individuals who regret having undergone these treatments. (shrink)

As is clear in the 2008 report of the President's Council on Bioethics, the brain death debate is plagued by ambiguity in the use of such key terms as ‘integration’ and ‘wholeness’. Addressing this problem, I offer a plausible ontological account of organismal unity drawing on the work of Hoffman and Rosenkrantz, and then apply that account to the case of brain death, concluding that a brain dead body lacks the unity proper to a human organism, and has therefore undergone (...) a substantial change. I also show how my view can explain hard cases better than one in which biological integration is taken to imply ontological wholeness or unity. (shrink)

Michael Nair-Collins and Franklin Miller are right to emphasise that, in order to deliberate responsibly about ethical and legal questions related to brain death and organ donation, it is crucial to answer the question of whether or not ‘brain death’i does indeed mark the biological death of the organism. Nonetheless, I disagree with the authors’ conclusion that brain death does not indicate the death of the human organism. Death can never be defined in merely biological terms, because any biological conception (...) of death relies on metaphysical presuppositions regarding what it means to be an ‘organism as a whole’, rather than an aggregate of cells and tissues. Death is a change in substance —that is, a change from one type of entity to another — not the cessation of all biological life. Organismal death occurs well before all of the organism’s parts irreversibly cease vital activity and decompose into inorganic matter. Biological life in some form can and usually does continue after organismal death at least for a time, with recent evidence indicating that animal cell networks continue to perform complex functions like stress response, immune response and inflammation response up to several days postmortem.1 With external support, many cells and tissues can continue to perform their functions ex vivo for long periods of time or even indefinitely.2 Henrietta Lax died in 1951, but cells derived from her cancerous cervical cells …. (shrink)

The dominant philosophical view of gamete donation as morally permissible rests on two premises: parental obligations are triggered primarily by playing a causal role in procreation, not by genetic ties, and those obligations are transferable—that is, they are obligations to make adequate provision for the child’s needs, not necessarily to raise the child oneself. Thus while gamete donors are indeed agent causes of the children that their donation helps to bring into existence, most think that donors’ obligations are discharged insofar (...) as they know that competent others intend to care for those children. In this article, I call into question this dominant view by challenging both of its premises. Challenging the first premise, I argue that genetic parenthood is what primarily triggers parental obligations. Challenging the second premise, I claim that those obligations are non-transferable—i.e., that they are obligations not simply to ensure that someone will raise one’s genetic child, but to raise that child oneself . The implication of my argument is that gamete donation is inherently wrong insofar as it involves acquiring non-transferable obligations that one has no intention of fulfilling. (shrink)

This statement summarizes the conclusions of the Symposium on the Definition of Death, held at The Catholic University of America in June 2014. After providing the background and context for contemporary debates about brain death and describing the aims of the symposium, the statement notes points of unanimous and broad agreement among the participants, and highlights areas for further study.

In recent years, a number of authors – such as Kershnar and Kelly, Steinhoff, and Scanlon – have criticized the doctrine of double effect (DDE) as incoherent, lacking an underlying rationale, or leading to counterintuitive conclusions. These critiques, however, rest on a failure to understand the DDE’s broader theoretical context and presuppositions. This paper aims to clarify and advance the debate regarding the DDE by, first, outlining a contemporary version of the broader normative theory (i.e. the Aristotelian-Thomistic natural law tradition) (...) within which the DDE finds its proper context, and explaining the rationale for the DDE within this context; second, clarifying the DDE’s proportionality condition to avoid common misinterpretations; and, third, showing how the DDE, when properly formulated and understood within the appropriate theoretical context, can withstand the recent criticisms that have been raised against it. (shrink)

The major difference between “new” and “old” natural law approaches to sexual ethics is that for new natural law theorists the moral evaluation of sex acts is always determined with reference to that basic form of human flourishing which is called marriage; old natural law theorists determine the morality of sex acts also with reference to the natural purpose of the sexual faculties. Ultimately, the old approach relies implicitly on prior value judgments to distinguish biological facts that are axiologically or (...) morally relevant from those that are not. It also appeals to values to ground the wrongness of immoral sex acts. In its pure form, the old natural law approach to sexual ethics lends itself to a misunderstanding of the unitive aspect of marriage. More broadly, an accurate understanding of new natural law does not run afoul of the correct interpretation of “nature” in natural law. (shrink)

Does the ability of some brain dead bodies to maintain homeostasis with the help of artificial life support actually imply that those bodies are living human organisms? Or might it be possible that a brain dead body on life support is a mere collection of still-living cells, organs and tissues which can coordinate with one another, but which lack the genuine integration that is the hallmark of a unified human organism as a whole? To foster further study of these difficult (...) and timely questions, a Symposium on the Definition of Death was held at The Catholic University of America in June 2014. The Symposium brought together scholars from a variety of disciplines—law, medicine, biology, philosophy and theology—who all share a commitment to the dead donor rule and to a biological definition of death, but who have differing opinions regarding the validity of neurological criteria for human death. The papers found in this special issue are among the fruits of this Symposium. (shrink)

Irene Alexander’s article in last spring’s issue of this journal criticizes the new natural law account of sexual ethics, including Melissa Moschella’s defense of that view in a previous article also in this journal. Alexander claims that the NNL account adopts an empiricist view of nature and that NNL’s rejection of the perverted faculty argument is contrary to the Magisterium. Here Moschella responds to Alexander’s criticisms by clarifying NNL theorists’ understanding of the distinction between speculative and practical (...) reason through an explanation of Aquinas’s account of the four orders, correcting Alexander’s erroneous portrayal of NNL arguments against contraception, and arguing that the NNL account of sexual ethics is not only in line with magisterial teaching, but offers a better philosophical defense of that teaching than the view Alexander proposes. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Conceiving People: Genetic Knowledge and the Ethics of Sperm and Egg Donation by Daniel GrollMelissa MoschellaGROLL, Daniel. Conceiving People: Genetic Knowledge and the Ethics of Sperm and Egg Donation. New York: Oxford University Press, 2021. 256 pp. Cloth, $74.00In Conceiving People, Daniel Groll argues that, generally speaking, those intending to conceive with the help of donor gametes have a moral obligation to use an open donor rather than (...) an anonymous one. This obligation is grounded on the likelihood that their children will have a significant future interest in acquiring genetic knowledge, defined as "knowledge of who one's genetic progenitors are." Groll labels this view the significant interest view, which he argues for largely on empirical grounds.Before beginning his defense of the significant interest view, Groll dedicates chapter 2 to arguing that parents who conceive with the help of donor gametes should not keep this a secret from their children. His position on this point reflects the current consensus on the subject, but he offers a novel argument for it, based on the claim that keeping "the secret" in itself harms the parent–child relationship by inherently compromising the intimacy proper to that relationship.Chapter 3 presents the significant interest view in greater detail, distinguishing it from two other approaches: (1) the "Profound Prudential Good view," taken from the work of David Velleman, according to which "genetic knowledge is a profound prudential good and people who lack it will have tremendous trouble figuring out who they are," and (2) the view that "people have a right to genetic knowledge." Unlike these competing approaches, Groll's view "does not directly depend on claims about the value of genetic knowledge" but is based primarily on the fact that "many donor-conceived people are subjectively interested in having genetic knowledge," combined with the claim that parents have an obligation to promote their children's well-being by satisfying their worthwhile significant subjective interests. Because Groll's argument depends on the worth and significance of genetic knowledge, it is vulnerable to what he calls the "sideshow objection"—that is, that the significant interest view is just a sideshow, and the worth of genetic knowledge is what actually does the important normative work. At the same time, Groll's view that the interest in genetic knowledge is worthwhile and significant also leaves him open to the "bionormativity objection," according to which the interest in genetic knowledge "is morally problematic in virtue of evincing and entrenching a kind of bionormative prejudice" that sees the biological family as a normative ideal. [End Page 141]Responding to these two objections is the task of chapters 4 and 5. Chapter 4 argues that genetic knowledge is an objective but "prudentially optional good," meaning that "its value is not fungible, but a life that lacks it is not thereby impoverished." This distinguishes Groll's view from the profound prudential good view, which he characterizes as a form of "genetic chauvinism." Groll argues that genetic knowledge is valuable because it can provide insight into personal identity by answering questions about how I came to be and who I am like, but that the genetic knowledge is not the only or best way to answer these questions (thus explaining why it is optional, and why the significant interest view is not just a sideshow).Chapter 5 addresses the "bionormativity objection," which includes both "heteronormativity" (privileging families headed by a mother and father) and "biogenetic normativity" (privileging genetically related families). Groll ultimately responds to this objection by arguing that, even if (as Groll believes) our current society overemphasizes the importance of genetic relationships, "the interest in genetic knowledge is rationally intelligible quite apart from the bionormative social milieu that surrounds it."Chapters 6 through 8 present the implications of the preceding argument. Chapter 6 argues that the reasons to use an open donor are generally conclusive, because most reasons parents might have to use an anonymous donor do not outweigh the child's significant interest in obtaining genetic knowledge. Chapter 7 considers the responsibilities of gamete donors, arguing that gamete donation is not morally objectionable because it is permissible for donors to transfer prospective parenthood responsibilities... (shrink)

Using cell lines like HEK 293 or their products—like many of the COVID-19 vaccines—involves no cooperation with evil strictly speaking, but it does involve appropriation of the benefits of past evil. Applying M. Cathleen Kaveny’s framework for assessing the permissibility of appropriating the benefits of evil, the duty to avoid using cell lines like HEK 293 or their products is weak and defeasible. Proper interpretation of Dignitas personae requires recognizing the crucial moral differences between the use of these cell lines—which (...) does not perpetuate the injustice of abortion, imply approval of abortion, or involve significant risks of corrupting moral character or provoking scandal—and the direct use of fetal tissue or human embryos in research. (shrink)

This article defends the morality of heterologous embryo transfer (HET) against those who claim that HET is wrong because it makes a woman a mother through someone other than her spouse. I contrast genetic parenthood with gestation to show that gestation alone does not make someone a mother in the focal sense. Genetic parenthood gives rise to the full obligations of parenthood—i.e., makes someone a parent in the focal sense—because the child’s relationship to his genetic parents is (1) permanent, (2) (...) identity-defining, and (3) initially (at conception) the child’s closest human relationship. While the gestational relationship importantly influences the child’s identity, it lacks the unique closeness, permanence, and identity-defining nature that characterize the genetic parent-child relationship, and therefore gives rise only to temporary obligations akin to those of a foster parent. Recognizing these crucial differences between gestation and procreation helps to show that HET is not inherently immoral. (shrink)

This article defends the morality of heterologous embryo transfer against those who claim that HET is wrong because it makes a woman a mother through someone other than her spouse. I contrast genetic parenthood with gestation to show that gestation alone does not make someone a mother in the focal sense. Genetic parenthood gives rise to the full obligations of parenthood—i.e., makes someone a parent in the focal sense—because the child’s relationship to his genetic parents is permanent, identity-defining, and initially (...) the child’s closest human relationship. While the gestational relationship importantly influences the child’s identity, it lacks the unique closeness, permanence, and identity-defining nature that characterize the genetic parent-child relationship, and therefore gives rise only to temporary obligations akin to those of a foster parent. Recognizing these crucial differences between gestation and procreation helps to show that HET is not inherently immoral. (shrink)

In this paper I argue that liberal proponents of mandatory autonomy education tend to overlook or underestimate the potential threats that such an education poses to the overall well-being of children (including, ironically, threats to the development of genuine autonomy). They do so by paying insufficient attention to the importance of moral virtue as a constitutive element of and precondition for genuine autonomy, and by failing to recognize how the development and consolidation of moral virtue may be undermined by the (...) sort of autonomy education they recommend. I develop my argument through engagement with the work of Eamonn Callan and Ian MacMullen, drawing on Aristotelian ethics to highlight the shortcomings in their accounts. (shrink)

A crucial feature of Kant's critical-period writing on the sublime is its grounding in moral psychology. Whereas in the pre-critical writings, the sublime is viewed as an inherently exhausting state of mind, in the critical-period writings it is presented as one that gains strength the more it is sustained. I account for this in terms of Kantian moral psychology, and explain that, for Kant, sound moral disposition is conceived as a sublime state of mind.

Many extant theories of placebo focus on their causal structure wherein placebo effects are those which originate from select features of the therapy (e.g. client expectations or ‘incidental’ features like size, and shape). Although such accounts can distinguish placebos from standard medical treatments, they cannot distinguish placebos from everyday occurrences e.g. when positive feedback improves our performance on a task. Providing a social epistemological account of a treatment context can rule out such occurrences, and furthermore reveal a new way to (...) distinguish clinical placebos from standard medical treatments. (shrink)

It has been insufficiently remarked that Murdoch deems “Kant’s ethical theory” to be “one of the most beautiful and exciting things in the whole of philosophy” in her 1959 essay “The Sublime and the Good”. Murdoch specifically has in mind the connection between Kant’s ethics and his theory of the sublime, which runs via the moral feeling of respect (Achtung). The chapter examines Murdoch’s interest in Kant on this point as a way to tease out the range of issues that (...) complicate Kant’s significance for the development of Murdoch’s distinctive conception of ethics as it is articulated in _The Sovereignty of Good_ and earlier essays. It focuses on her particular concerns about the moral dangers of consolation, and why this led her to propose reworking the Kantian theory of the sublime as a theory of art, and specifically of tragedy. (shrink)

This Element considers Kant's account of the sublime in the context of his predecessors both in the Anglophone and German rationalist traditions. Since Kant says with evident endorsement that 'we call sublime that which is absolutely great' and nothing in nature can in fact be absolutely great, Kant concludes that strictly speaking what is sublime can only be the human calling to perfect our rational capacity according to the standard of virtue that is thought through the moral law. The Element (...) takes account of the difference between respect and admiration as the two main varieties of sublime feeling, and concludes by considering the role of Stoicism in Kant's account of the sublime, particularly through the channel of Seneca. (shrink)

On a version of consent theory that tempts many, predatory sexual relations involving significant power imbalances (e.g. between professors and students, adults and teenagers, or employers and employees) are wrong because they violate consent-centric norms. In particular, the wronged party is said to have been _incapable_ of consenting to the predation, and the sexual wrong is located in the encounter’s nonconsensuality. Although we agree that these are sexual wrongs, we resist the idea that they are always nonconsensual. We argue instead (...) that it is possible for students, teenagers, employees, etc. to fully consent to sexually predatory encounters; denying as much renders survivors of predation vulnerable to compounding harms. Survivors face a dilemma: give up either their understanding of their experience as wrong, or their self-conception as an agent capable of consenting. We call the latter phenomenon _agential demotion_. (shrink)

A new reading of Plato’s political thought Plato famously defends the rule of knowledge. Knowledge, for him, is of the good. But what is rule? In this study, Melissa Lane reveals how political office and rule were woven together in Greek vocabulary and practices that both connected and distinguished between rule in general and office as a constitutionally limited kind of rule in particular. In doing so, Lane shows Plato to have been deeply concerned with the roles and relationships (...) between rulers and ruled. Adopting a longstanding Greek expectation that a ruler should serve the good of the ruled, Plato’s major political dialogues—the Republic, the Statesman, and Laws—explore how different kinds of rule might best serve that good. With this book, Lane offers the first account of the clearly marked vocabulary of offices at the heart of all three of these dialogues, explaining how such offices fit within the broader organization and theorizing of rule. Lane argues that taking Plato’s interest in rule and office seriously reveals tyranny as ultimately a kind of anarchy, lacking the order as well as the purpose of rule. When we think of tyranny in this way, we see how Plato invokes rule and office as underpinning freedom and friendship as political values, and how Greek slavery shaped Plato’s account of freedom. Reading Plato both in the Greek context and in dialogue with contemporary thinkers, Lane argues that rule and office belong at the center of Platonic, Greek, and contemporary political thought. (shrink)

The paper argues that existing interpretations of Kant's Critique of Pure Reason as an "analysis of experience" (e.g., those of Kitcher and Strawson) fail because they do not properly appreciate the method of the work. The author argues that the Critique provides an analysis of the faculty of reason, and counts as an analysis of experience only in a derivative sense.

‘War is definitely hell on earth’. All too often, we hope the hell will be short-lived, over in a few days, and yet, as we know from experience, hell can go on and on and on. For healthcare workers who provide care to victims of conflict, the work raises many ethical dilemmas. The stories showcased in this edition of NIB share the experiences of a handful of brave individuals and how they navigated their professional ethical obligations as well as their (...) personal convictions during times of conflict. Adeptly portrayed are various approaches to ethical dilemmas, such as adhering to the ethical imperative of medical impartiality, the limits of professional and personal responsibility, coping with moral distress, and the power of humanity, evident through the collective efforts of strangers to help others. This commentary reflects on the ethical grey zones of being a healthcare provider in conflict, as there is no single right way of fulfilling professional obligations, each context being different. As several stories highlight, whilst stressful, the solidarity and comradery of working in a healthcare team can provide great support, purpose, and motivation. (shrink)

The application of artificial intelligence and machine learning technologies in healthcare have immense potential to improve the care of patients. While there are some emerging practices surro...

This book explores the role and implications of responsibility for anthropology, asking how responsibility is recognised and invoked in the world, what relations it draws upon, and how it comes to define notions of the person, institutional practices, ways of knowing and modes of evaluation. The category of responsibility has a long genealogy within the discipline of anthropology and it surfaces in contemporary debates as well as in anthropologists' collaboration with other disciplines, including when anthropology is applied in fields such (...) as development, medicine, and humanitarian response. As a category that unsettles, challenges and critically engages with political, ethical and epistemological questions, responsibility is central to anthropological theory, ethnographic practice, collaborative research, and applied engagement. With chapters focused on a variety of cultural contexts, this volume considers how anthropology can contribute to a better understanding of responsibility, including the 'responsibility of anthropology' and the responsibility of anthropologists to specific others. (shrink)

This revolutionary book empowers its readers intellectually by providing a snapshot of perennial and timely philosophical topics. Written by twenty expert women in philosophy and representing a diverse and pluralistic approach to philosophy as a discipline, this book appeals to a wide audience. Individual readers, especially girls and women ages 16-24, as well as university and high school educators and students who want a change from standard anthologies that include few or no women will find value in these pages. This (...) volume contains several notable features: the book is divided into four sections that correspond to major fields in Philosophy-metaphysics, epistemology, social and political philosophy, and ethics-but the chapters within those sections provide fresh ways of understanding those fields. " Every chapter begins with a lively anecdote about a girl or woman in literature, myth, history, science, or art to introduce the chapter's specific topic." Chapters are dominated by women's voices, with nearly all primary and secondary sources used coming from women in the history of philosophy and a diverse set of contemporary women philosophers. "All chapters offer the authors' distinct philosophical perspectives written in their own voices and styles, representing diverse training, backgrounds, and interests." The Introduction and Prologue explicitly invite the book's readers to engage in philosophical conversation and reflection, thus setting the stage for continued contemplation and dialogue beyond the book itself. The result is a rigorous yet accessible entry-point into serious philosophical contemplation designed to embolden and strengthen its readers' own senses of philosophical inquiry and competence. The book's readers will feel confident in knowing that expert women affirm an equitable and just intellectual landscape for all and thus have lovingly collaborated to write this book. (shrink)

Stalnaker’s ‘Assertion’ (1978 [1999]) offers a classic account of diagonalization as an approach to the meaning of a declarative sentence in context. Here I explore the relationship between diagonalization and some puzzles in Mahtani’s book The Objects of Credence. Diagonalization can influence how we think about both credence and desirability, so it influences both components of a standard expected utility equation. In that vein, I touch on two of Mahtani’s case-studies, chance and the finite version of the Two Envelope Paradox.

Maurice Merleau-Ponty did not author an ethic, and yet it is possible to extend his ontological descriptions to an ethic similar to that espoused by post modern thinkers. It is even possible to distill an environmental ethic, or at least, one of consideration of the more-than-human, from his work. This paper attempts to do some preliminary work in light of this, and lays some groundwork for the future direction of an environmental ethic inspired by a Merleau-Pontian ontology. At the same (...) time, it challenges the popularised view of Merleau-Ponty espoused by David Abram – viz., of Merleau-Ponty as an animist – and properly situates Merleau Ponty. (shrink)

Is the debate over the existence of numbers unsolvable? Mario Gómez-Torrente presents a novel proposal to unclog the old discussion between the realist and the anti-realist about numbers. In this paper, the strategy is outlined, highlighting its results and showing how they determine the desiderata for a satisfactory theory of the reference of Arabic numerals, which should lead to a satisfactory explanation about numbers. It is argued here that the theory almost achieves its goals, yet it does not capture the (...) relevant association between how a number can be split up and the morphological property of Arabic numerals to be positional. This property seems to play a substantial role in providing a complete theory of Arabic numerals and numbers. (shrink)

Programs, policies, and technologies — particularly those concerned with health equity — are often designed with justice envisioned as the end goal. These policies or interventions, however, frequently fail to recognize how the beneficiaries have historically embodied the cumulative effects of marginalization, which undermines the effectiveness of the intended justice. These well-meaning attempts at justice are bounded by greater socio-historical constraints. Bounded justice suggests that it is impossible to attend to fairness, entitlement, and equity when the basic social and physical (...) infrastructures underlying them have been eroded by racism and other historically entrenched isms. Using the case of Brazil’s National Health Policy for the Black Population, this paper proposes that bounded justice can contribute to justice discourses by serving as a concept, a proffering to a multi-disciplinary conceptual framework, and a potential analytic for those interested in the design of policy, technology, and programmatic interventions towards health equity. (shrink)

I propose a unified solution to two puzzles: Ross's puzzle and free choice permission. I begin with a pair of cases from the decision theory literature illustrating the phenomenon of act dependence, where what an agent ought to do depends on what she does. The notion of permissibility distilled from these cases forms the basis for my analysis of 'may' and 'ought'. This framework is then combined with a generalization of the classical semantics for disjunction — equivalent to Boolean disjunction (...) on the diagonal, but with a different two-dimensional character — that explains the puzzling facts in terms of semantic consequence. (shrink)

Journal of Philosophy of Education, EarlyView.

The relationship between truth and politics has rarely seemed more vexed. Worries about misinformation and disinformation abound, and the value of expertise for democratic decision-making dismissed. Whom can we trust to provide us with reliable testimony? In Truth and Evidence, the latest in the NOMOS series, Melissa Schwartzberg and Philip Kitcher present nine timely essays shedding light on practices of inquiry. These essays address urgent questions including what it means to #BelieveWomen; what factual knowledge we require to confront challenges (...) like COVID-19; and how white supremacy shapes the law of evidence. (shrink)