This essay analyzes the use of military robots in terms of the jus in bello concepts of discrimination and proportionality. It argues that while robots may make mistakes, they do not suffer from most of the impairments that interfere with human judgment on the battlefield. Although robots are imperfect weapons, they can exercise as much restraint as human soldiers, if not more. Robots can be used in a way that is consistent with just war theory when they are programmed to (...) avoid using force against all but the most clearly hostile targets. However, the essay also cautions against using robots for counterinsurgency because they may alienate people in the contested area and lead to an escalation of hostilities. (shrink)

During combat, soldiers make critical split-second choices about matters of life and death dozens of times a day. These individual decisions accumulate to determine the outcome of wars. In this book, Marcus Schulzke examines the theory and practice of how military ethics can guide conduct in counterinsurgency, which are particularly difficult operations because the opponent operates outside of the laws of war. Schulzke surveys the ethical traditions that militaries borrow from; compares ethics in practice in the US (...) Army, British Army and Royal Marines Commandos, and Israel Defense Forces; and draws conclusions that may help militaries refine their approaches in future conflicts. The work is based on interviews with American, British, and Israeli soldiers who were deployed between 2000 and 2012, review of training materials and other official publications, published accounts from combat veterans, and observation of US Army focus groups with active duty soldiers. Examining three distinct national militaries illuminates positives and negatives is different approaches to military ethics. Schulzke makes a convincing argument that while moral warfare is an illusive goal, it is possible to make incremental improvements that can reduce war's destructiveness while improving the success of counterinsurgency operations. (shrink)

The possibility that autonomous weapons will be deployed on the battlefields of the future raises the challenge of determining who can be held responsible for how these weapons act. Robert Sparrow has argued that it would be impossible to attribute responsibility for autonomous robots' actions to their creators, their commanders, or the robots themselves. This essay reaches a much different conclusion. It argues that the problem of determining responsibility for autonomous robots can be solved by addressing it within the context (...) of the military chain of command. The military hierarchy is a system of distributing responsibility between decision makers on different levels and constraining autonomy. If autonomous weapons are employed as agents operating within this system, then responsibility for their actions can be attributed to their creators and their civilian and military superiors. (shrink)

The effect of violent video games is among the most widely discussed topics in media studies, and for good reason. These games are immensely popular, but many seem morally objectionable. Critics attack them for a number of reasons ranging from their capacity to teach players weapons skills to their ability to directly cause violent actions. This essay shows that many of these criticisms are misguided. Theoretical and empirical arguments against violent video games often suffer from a number of significant shortcomings (...) that make them ineffective. This essay argues that video games are defensible from the perspective of Kantian, Aristotelian, and utilitarian moral theories. (shrink)

Although most styles of military ethics are hybrids that draw on multiple ethical theories, they are usually based primarily on the model of Aristotelian virtue ethics. Virtue ethics is well-suited for regulating the conduct of soldiers who have to make quick decisions on the battlefield, but its applicability to military personnel is threatened by the growing use of unmanned weapon systems. These weapons disrupt virtue ethics’ institutional and cultural basis by changing what it means to display virtue and transforming the (...) roles soldiers perform and the nature of the military profession itself. I argue that in light of these challenges to virtue ethics, at least as it is traditionally understood within the armed forces, soldiers operating unmanned weapons require a more heavily rule-based approach to military ethics. (shrink)

I argue that there are strong consequentialist grounds for thinking that hate speech should be legally protected. The protection of hate speech allows those who are hateful to make their beliefs public, thereby exposing prejudices that might otherwise be suppressed to evaluation by other members of society. This greater transparency about prejudices has two social benefits. First, it facilitates social trust by making it easier to discover who holds beliefs that should exclude them from positions of authority, responsibility, and influence. (...) Second, it facilitates efforts to combat hatred by revealing which prejudiced members of society must be persuaded or discredited by those seeking to promote tolerance. (shrink)

Soldiers encounter extremely difficult ethical dilemmas during wars, as they must make decisions about how to follow the laws of war and their rules of engagement while still protecting themselves and accomplishing their missions. Scholarship on just war theory and military ethics generally describe soldiers' dilemmas as being ethical challenges that soldiers can overcome by using the correct ethical reasoning process. However, this essay argues that some of the apparent ethical dilemmas that soldiers confront are actually ethically insoluble dilemmas that (...) cannot be solved using ethical reasoning processes. Dilemmas are ethically insoluble when soldiers do not have sufficient knowledge of a situation or control over it to apply an ethical decision procedure. In these situations soldiers must guess at the right course of action and leave the outcome to luck. (shrink)

There are strong moral and legal pressures against harming civilians in times of conflict, yet neither just war theory nor international law is clear about what responsibilities belligerents have to correct harm once it has been inflicted. In this book, Marcus Schulzke argues that military powers have a duty to provide assistance to the civilians they attack during wars, and that this duty is entailed by civilians' right to life. Schulzke develops new just war principles requiring belligerents (...) to provide medical treatment and financial compensation to civilian victims, and then shows how these principles can be implemented in governmental, military, and international practice. He calls for a more individual-focused conception of international law and post-war justice for victims - as opposed to current state- or group-based reconstruction and reparation programs - which will provide a framework for protecting civilian rights. (shrink)

This paper explores the relevance of Kant's categorical imperative to military ethics and the solution it suggests for improving the treatment of women in the military. The second formulation of the categorical imperative makes universal respect for humanity a moral requirement by asserting that one must always treat other people as means in themselves and never as merely means to an end. This principle is a promising guide for military ethics and can be reconciled with the acts of violence required (...) by war. This paper argues that it can also regulate soldiers? relations to each other and that it may contribute to reorienting military culture in a way that overcomes the biases against female military personnel. (shrink)

Two of the most serious obstacles that plans for global taxation must overcome are: that there is no existing cosmopolitan political community that can serve as the ethical basis for global distributive justice and that many states have no strong interest that would lead them to support the creation of global taxes. I argue that it is possible for a system of global taxation to overcome these problems if a tax could provide a clear benefit to existing political communities and (...) if it could offer some benefit to the states that would bear much of the tax burden. A tax discouraging the use of tax havens is the most promising ways of accomplishing this. This type of tax could be legitimized on the basis of existing national political identities, as it would strengthen these communities by discouraging the violation of national ethical obligations through tax avoidance. States would also have a strong incentive for imposing this type of tax, as limiting the use of tax havens would allow states to collect lost revenue. (shrink)

This essay defends judicial review on procedural grounds by showing that it is an integral part of American democracy. Critics who object to judicial review using counter-majoritarian and epistemic arguments raise important concerns that should shape our understanding of the Supreme Court. Nevertheless, critics often fail to account for the formal and informal mechanisms that overcome these difficulties. Critics also fail to show that other branches of government could use the power of Constitutional interpretation more responsibly. By defending judicial review (...) in the American context, this essay demonstrates that judicial review is not inherently undemocratic. (shrink)

Over the past decade, New Atheists have campaigned against the influence of religion in public life and favored a more enlightened understanding of the world ? one based on the methods and theories of the natural sciences. Although the leaders of this movement refuse to give religion, even moderate religion, any place in determining moral conduct, they offer few alternatives. Most define moral responsibility by referring to facts about human biology or natural moral intuitions, yet without adequately defending this or (...) exploring the possibilities of non-naturalistic secular moralities. This essay argues that New Atheists' moral theories tend to be weak because of their naturalist assumptions. Its leading proponents seem to be unwilling to acknowledge that moral philosophy can play a role in developing secular moral precepts because philosophy fails to meet their strong criteria of scientific validity. This position is misguided not only because it has led New Atheists to defend weak moral theories but also because the methods of inquiry used in moral philosophy make it distinct from faith for many of the same reasons that the New Atheists think that science is distinct from faith. (shrink)

This essay proposes an alternative way of studying video games: as thought experiments akin to the narrative thought experiments that are frequently used in philosophy. This perspective incorporates insights from the narratological and ludological perspectives in game studies and highlights the philosophical significance of games. Video game thought experiments are similar to narrative thought experiments in many respects and can perform the same functions. They also have distinctive advantages over narrative thought experiments, as they situate counterfactuals in more complex, developed (...) contexts and present them to players who are participants in game worlds, rather than simply observers. (shrink)

Consider the following three claims. (i) There are no truths of the form ‘p and ~p’. (ii) No one holds a belief of the form ‘p and ~p’. (iii) No one holds any pairs of beliefs of the form {p, ~p}. Irad Kimhi has recently argued, in effect, that each of these claims holds and holds with metaphysical necessity. Furthermore, he maintains that they are ultimately not distinct claims at all, but the same claim formulated in different ways. I find (...) his argument suggestive, if not entirely transparent. I do think there is at least an important kernel of truth even in (iii), and that (i) ultimately explains what’s right about the other two. Consciousness of an impossibility makes belief in the obtaining of the corresponding state of affairs an impossibility. Interestingly, an appreciation of this fact brings into view a novel conception of inference, according to which it consists in the consciousness of necessity. This essay outlines and defends this position. A central element of the defense is that it reveals how reasoners satisfy what Paul Boghossian calls the Taking Condition and do so without engendering regress. (shrink)

The dominant theory of the evolution of moral cognition across a variety of fields is that moral cognition is a biological adaptation to foster social cooperation. This chapter argues, to the contrary, that moral cognition is likely an evolutionary exaptation: a form of cognition where neurobiological capacities selected for in our evolutionary history for a variety of different reasons—many unrelated to social cooperation—were put to a new, prosocial use after the fact through individual rationality, learning, and the development and transmission (...) of social norms. This chapter begins with a brief overview of the emerging behavioral neuroscience of moral cognition. It then outlines a novel theory of moral cognition that I have previously argued explains these findings better than alternatives. Finally, it shows how the evidence for this theory of moral cognition and human evolutionary history together suggest that moral cognition is likely not a biological adaptation. Instead, like reading sheet music or riding a bicycle, moral cognition is something that individuals learn to do—in this case, in response to sociocultural norms created in our ancestral history and passed down through the ages to enable cooperative living. (shrink)

Kant’s revolutionary new approach to philosophy was accompanied by the introduction of a largely novel terminology. With the Kant-Lexikon, a lexical reference gives the modern reader access to his work on the basis of present-day editions and takes into account 20th century and contemporary research and advances in lexicology. The Kant-Lexikon includes 2395 entries authored by 221 scholars.

The foundation of historical materialism.--A study on authority.--Sartre's existentialism.--Karl Popper and the problem of historical laws.--Freedom and the historical imperative.

This classic collection, newly revised and with a foreword by classicist Spencer Klavan, includes the famed original introduction by Russell Kirk, the full text of the Meditations of Marcus Aurelius, the complete Enchiridion of Epictetus, and key selections from Seneca and Hierocles of Alexandria in one compact volume.

The paper offers an account of luck, fate, and fortune. It begins by showing that extant accounts of luck are deficient because they do not identify the genus of which luck is a species. That genus of properties, the tychic, alert an agent to occasions on which the external world cooperates with or frustrates their goal-achievement. An agent’s sphere of competence is the set of goals that it is possible for them to reliably achieve. Luck concerns occasions on which there (...) is a mismatch between attempt and result; in bad luck the external world thwarts goal-achievement within the agent’s sphere of competence, in good luck the external world assists goal-achievement beyond the agent’s sphere of competence. Fateful events are those where, more passively, the agent finds the external world achieving or frustrating their goals. Fortune concerns the contraction and expansion of the agent’s sphere of competence. Eight reasons are given for accepting the account; its theoretical virtues and various things it explains. Lastly, three objections are answered; that the tychic properties relate to well-being rather than agency, that there are alternative theories of fortune available in the contemporary literature, that the account draws arbitrary distinctions between synonyms. (shrink)

Meditations offers timeless guidance for troubled times. Renowned for his principled leadership, Aurelius kept private notes detailing his philosophy on life and leadership. Meditations is a collection of those private notes, filled with insights on responding well to hardship both in thought and in action. His writings are a cornerstone of the Stoic philosophy, embraced by leaders throughout history and across the world for its emphasis on collaboration, rationality, and striving for the good of all people. George Long's elegant 1862 (...) translation balances accessibility with preserving the classic tone of the text. With archival printing, this pocket-sized new hardcover edition is designed for both portability and longevity. "Motions and changes are continually renewing the world, just as the uninterrupted course of time is always renewing the infinite duration of ages." -Marcus Aurelius. (shrink)

Marcus Aurelius was Emperor of Rome from 121 to 180. Thoughts of Marcus Aurelius was written for school age children. The author believed that children should be given the wisdom of great leaders from all eras. Marcus Aurelius believed that human happiness arises in part from man's acceptance of his duties and responsibilities. He believed that one should accept calmly what cannot be avoided and perform one's duties as well as possible. "It was the doctrine of (...) class='Hi'>Marcus Aurelius that most of the ills of life come to us from our own imagination, that it was not in the power of others seriously to interfere with the calm, temperate life of an individual, and that when a fellow being did anything to us that seemed unjust he was acting in ignorance, and that instead of stirring up anger within us it should stir our pity for him. Oftentimes by careful self-examination we should find that the fault was more our own than that of our fellow, and our sufferings were rather from our own opinions than from anything real.". (shrink)

A deluxe special edition of the ancient classic written by the Roman Emperor known as “The Philosopher” Meditations is a series of personal journals written by Marcus Aurelius, Emperor of Rome from 169 to 180 AD. The last of the “Five Good Emperors,” he was the most powerful and influential man in the Western world at the time. Marcus was one of the leaders of Stoicism, a philosophy of personal ethics which sought resilience and virtue through personal action (...) and responsibility. Stoicism, viewed as a foundation of modern self-help, has inspired many personal development and psychotherapy approaches through to the present day. Meditations is perhaps the most important source of our modern understanding of Stoic philosophy. Its twelve books chronicle different stages of Marcus Aurelius’ life and ideas. Although he ruled during the Pax Romana, the age of relative peace and stability throughout the empire, his reign was marked by near-constant military conflict and a devastating plague which killed upwards of five million people. Aurelius’ writings give modern readers an unprecedented look into the “spiritual exercises” which helped him through his tumultuous life and strengthened his patience, empathy, generosity, self-knowledge and emotional health. The private reflections recorded in the Meditations were never meant to be published, rather they were a source for Marcus’ own guidance and self-improvement, and jotted down by campfires or in military tents on the Roman front. The lessons, insights and perspectives contained within this remarkable work are just as relevant today as they were two millennia ago. This volume: Presents the timeless wisdom of Emperor Marcus Aurelius and his Stoic philosophy, with new research on his life and times Contains valuable insights on topics such as resilience, moderation and emotional control Discusses how to live “in agreement with nature” and abide by strong ethical principles Part of the bestselling Capstone Classics Series edited by Tom Butler-Bowdon, this attractive, high-quality hardcover volume includes: An original Introduction by Marcus Aurelius authority and Stoicism expert Donald Robertson, author of How To Think Like A Roman Emperor. A modernised, up to date version of the classic George Long translation. Meditations: The Philosophy Classic is a volume which will occupy a prominent place in any library for years to come. (shrink)

-- Douglas Kellner, University of Texas, Austin.

We argue that many intuitions do not have conscious propositional contents. In particular, many of the intuitions had in response to philosophical thought experiments, like Gettier cases, do not have such contents. They are more like hunches, urgings, murky feelings, and twinges. Our view thus goes against the received view of intuitions in philosophy, which we call Mainstream Propositionalism. Our positive view is that many thought-experimental intuitions are conscious, spontaneous, non-theoretical, non-propositional psychological states that often motivate belief revision, but they (...) require interpretation, in light of background beliefs, before a subject can form a propositional judgment as a consequence of them. We call our view Interpretationalism. We argue (i) that Interpretationalism avoids the problems that beset Mainstream Propositionalism and (ii) that our view meshes well with empirical results in contemporary cognitive science. (shrink)

This new edition brings Farquharson's authoritative 1944 translation up to date and includes a helpful introduction and notes for the student and general reader. Rutherford includes a selection of letters from Marcus to his tutor Fronto--most of which date from his earlier years--that offer personal detail and help to fill out the somber portrait of the emperor that is found in the Meditations.

Discover the ancient wisdom of Roman Emperor Marcus Aurelius Antoninus, as collected and edited by Walter Lee Brown. These helpful thoughts and meditations offer timeless insight on how to live a virtuous and fulfilling life. This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important, and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work is in the "public domain in the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, (...) you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant. (shrink)

This work has been selected by scholars as being culturally important, and is part of the knowledge base of civilization as we know it. This work was reproduced from the original artifact, and remains as true to the original work as possible. Therefore, you will see the original copyright references, library stamps (as most of these works have been housed in our most important libraries around the world), and other notations in the work.This work is in the public domain in (...) the United States of America, and possibly other nations. Within the United States, you may freely copy and distribute this work, as no entity (individual or corporate) has a copyright on the body of the work.As a reproduction of a historical artifact, this work may contain missing or blurred pages, poor pictures, errant marks, etc. Scholars believe, and we concur, that this work is important enough to be preserved, reproduced, and made generally available to the public. We appreciate your support of the preservation process, and thank you for being an important part of keeping this knowledge alive and relevant. (shrink)

Existential-Ontologie und historischer Materialismus bei Herbert Marcuse, von A. Schmidt.--Das Ganze und das ganz Andere; zur Kritik der reinen revolutionären Transzendenz, von W.F. Haug.--Technik und Eindimensionalität; eine Version der Technokratiethese? Von C. Offe.--Technologische Rationalität und spätkapitalistische ökonomie, von J. Bergmann.--Die geschichtliche Dimension des Realitätsprinzips, von H. Berndt und R. Reiche.--Marcuse and the New Left in America, by P. Breines.--Ausgewählte Bibliographie der Schriften Herbert Marcuses (p. 155-[161]).

The nature of light is a focus of Thomas Hobbes’s natural philosophical project. Hobbes’s explanation of the light of lucid bodies differs across his works, from dilation and contraction in Elements of Law to simple circular motions in De corpore. However, Hobbes consistently explains perceived light by positing that bodily resistance generates the phantasm of light. In Letters I.XIX–XX of Philosophical Letters, fellow materialist Margaret Cavendish attacks the Hobbesian understanding of both lux and lumen by claiming that Hobbes has illicitly (...) made abstractions from matter. In this paper, I argue that Cavendish’s criticisms rely on an incorrect understanding of the nature of Hobbesian geometry and the role it plays in Hobbes’s natural philosophy. Rather than understanding geometry as wholly abstract, Hobbes attempts to ground geometry in different ways of considering bodies and their motions. Furthermore, Hobbes’s own criticisms of abstraction suggest that he would share many of the worries she raises but deny that he falls prey to them. (shrink)

This book is concerned with helping you improve your approach to decision-making. The author examines judgement in a selection of managerial contexts and provides important understanding that can help you make better leadership decisions. The book also pinpoints the in-house politics of organisational decision-making. Drawing on the very latest research, it introduces practical techniques that show you how to analyse and develop your own decision-making style. It will help you to deliver sharp and insightful analyses of your business and develop (...) effective solutions. In addition, it presents simple checklists that will give you vital insights throughout the decision-making process. Students and practitioners of leadership, management, and allied fields will find this book useful in order to understand and implement useful methods. (shrink)

Psychoanalysis and Wisdom applies psychoanalytic insights to one of the great examples of wisdom literature, the Ethics of the Fathers, an ethical tractate of the Talmud. Paul Marcus quotes key passages from the Ethics of the Fathers, providing a psychoanalytic commentary to enlarge and deepen our understanding of its contents and focusing primarily on what constitutes a flourishing life. Marcus then considers what psychoanalysis can provide in its engagement with this classic of the wisdom teachings, such as illuminating (...) aspects of the Ethics that are overlooked or underappreciated, and how "pearls of wisdom" from the Ethics can be incorporated into psychoanalytic theory and practice. The book contains clinical material as well as the insights of philosophers like Martin Buber, Gabriel Marcel, and Emmanuel Levinas. Psychoanalysis and Wisdom will appeal to readers interested in psychoanalysis and psychotherapy and to academics and students of psychoanalytic studies, religious studies, Judaic studies, and philosophy. (shrink)

Meditations, aphorisms, maxims, notes, and comments construct a philosophy of thought congruent with the inconsistency of our reality. Those who continue to think never return to their point of departure. —Inconsistencies These 130 short texts—aphoristic, interlacing, and sometimes perplexing—target a perennial philosophical problem: Our consciousness and our experience of reality are inconsistent, fragmentary, and unstable; God is dead, and our identity as subjects discordant. How can we establish a new mode of thought that does not cling to new gods or (...) the false security of rationality? Marcus Steinweg, as he did in his earlier book The Terror of Evidence, constructs a philosophical position from fragments, maxims, meditations, and notes, formulating a philosophy of thought that expresses and enacts the inconsistency of our reality. Steinweg considers, among other topics, life as a game (“To think is to play because no thought is firmly grounded”); sexuality (“wasteful, contradictory, and contingent”); desire (”Desire has a thousand names; It's earned none of them”); reality (“overdetermined and excessively complex”); and world (“a nonconcept”). He disposes of philosophy in one sentence (“Philosophy is a continual process of its own redefinition.”) but spends multiple pages on “A Tear in Immanence,” invoking Nietzsche, Heidegger, Sartre, and others. He describes “Wandering with Foucault” (“Thought entails wandering as well as straying into madness”) and brings together Derrida and Debord. He poses a question: “Why should a cat be more mysterious than a dog?” and later answers one: “Beauty is truth because truth is beauty.” By the end, we have accompanied Steinweg on converging trains of thought. “Thinking means continuing to think,” he writes, adding “But thinking can only pose questions by answering others.” The question of inconsistency? Asked and answered, and asked. (shrink)

Im Anschluss an die Edith Stein-Gesamtausgabe (ESGA) erschliesst das Edith Stein-Lexikon das denkerische Erbe, die philosophiegeschichtliche wie phanomenologische Bedeutung Edith Steins (1891-1942) weiter und macht es im problemgeschichtlichen und systematischen Sinn sichtbar. Die von uber 40 Stein-Forschern aus verschiedenen Landern und Generationen verfassten uber 250 Artikel informieren uber Bedeutung und Genese der fur Edith Stein zentralen Begriffe und Termini. Das Lexikon wendet sich an alle am Denken Edith Steins Interessierte, an Dozierende, Studierende und an alle neugierigen Leser, die ermutigt und (...) angeregt werden, sich den Originaltexten Edith Steins zum ersten Mal zuzuwenden. (shrink)

Quick, accessible, compact guide to understanding key political concepts. Contents include: Liberty, Justice, Equality, Human rights, Social contract, Democracy, Monarchy, Anarchism, Capitalism, Socialism, Nationalism and Globalisation.

In the following contribution I would like to present Edith Stein´s Philosophical Anthropology in somewhat more detail. I am going to pursue the issue of being human in Stein, to address fundamental issues and key concepts of her oeuvre, to refer to other approaches, to point out to Stein´s innovative contribution to Philosophical Anthropology under the horizon of phenomenology and classical metaphysics. As a preliminary remark, I would first like to outline a few lines of Stein’s biography. It is of (...) course also possible to skip the first chapter and go straight to the philosophical considerations. (shrink)