"L'oeuvre d'art est une tentative vers l'unique, elle s'affirme comme un tout, comme un absolu et, en même temps, elle appartient à un système de relations complexes [...]. Elle est matière et elle est esprit, elle est forme et elle est contenu [...]. Elle est créatrice de l'homme, créatrice du monde et elle installe dans l'histoire un ordre qui ne se réduit à rien d'autre." Un Eloge de la main complète ce texte. "La main arrache le toucher à sa passivité (...) réceptive, elle l'organise pour l'expérience et pour l'action [...]. Elle se mesure avec la matière qu'elle métamorphose, avec la forme qu'elle transfigure. Educatrice de l'homme, elle le multiplie dans l'espace et dans le temps." [Source : 4e de couv.]. (shrink)

Crutchfield (Crutchfield in Bioethics 33:112–121, [4]) has argued that if moral bioenhancement (MBE) ought to be compulsory, then it ought to be covert. More precisely, they argue that MBE is a public health intervention, and for this reason should be governed by public health ethics. Taking from various public health frameworks, Crutchfield provides an array of values to consider, such as: utility, liberty, equality, transparency, social trust, and autonomy. Subsequently, they argue that a covert MBE programme does better than an (...) overt one, in preserving or promoting said values, and hence, that a covert MBE is preferable. In this paper, I will provide novel reasons to doubt that the relevant values are in fact better promoted or preserved by a covert MBE programme. Additionally, I will provide a novel autonomy-based consideration which counts in favour of the MBE programme being overt, rather than covert. Given that as things currently stand it is unclear which kind of MBE programme is preferable, the upshot of my criticism of Crutchfield will be to provide some recommendations as to how we might proceed in establishing whether a covert or overt MBE programme fares better. (shrink)

Much of the literature on values in science is limited in its perspective because it focuses on the role of values in individual scientists’ decision making, thereby ignoring the context of scientific collaboration. I examine the epistemic structure of scientific collaboration and argue that it gives rise to two arguments showing that moral and social values can legitimately play a role in scientists’ decision to accept something as scientific knowledge. In the case of scientific collaboration some moral and social values (...) are properly understood to be extrinsic epistemic values, that is, values that promote the attainment of scientific knowledge. (shrink)

Sandra Harding's feminist standpoint epistemology makes two claims. The thesis of epistemic privilege claims that unprivileged social positions are likely to generate perspectives that are “less partial and less distorted” than perspectives generated by other social positions. The situated knowledge thesis claims that all scientific knowledge is socially situated. The bias paradox is the tension between these two claims. Whereas the thesis of epistemic privilege relies on the assumption that a standard of impartiality enables one to judge some perspectives as (...) better than others, the situated knowledge thesis seems to undermine this assumption by suggesting that all knowledge is partial. I argue that a contextualist theory of epistemic justification provides a solution to the bias paradox. Moreover, contextualism enables me to give empirical content to the thesis of epistemic privilege, thereby making it into a testable hypothesis. (shrink)

I examine ramifications of the widespread view that scientific objectivity gives us a permission to trust scientific knowledge claims. According to a widely accepted account of trust and trustworthiness, trust in scientific knowledge claims involves both reliance on the claims and trust in scientists who present the claims, and trustworthiness depends on expertise, honesty, and social responsibility. Given this account, scientific objectivity turns out to be a hybrid concept with both an epistemic and a moral-political dimension. The epistemic dimension tells (...) us when scientific knowledge claims are reliable, and the moral-political dimension tells us when we can trust scientists to be socially responsible. While the former dimension has received a fair amount of attention, the latter is in need of analysis. I examine what it means for scientists to be socially responsible, that is, to follow “sound” moral and social values in different stages of scientific inquiry. Social responsibility is especially important when scientists function as experts in society. Members of the public and policymakers do not want to rely on scientific research shaped by moral and social values they have good reasons to reject. Moreover, social responsibility is important in social research in which moral and social values can legitimately play many roles. I discuss the strengths and weaknesses of different answers to the question of how social scientists can identify appropriate moral and social values to inform their research. I argue that procedural accounts of social responsibility, such as well-ordered science and deliberative polling, have limitations. (shrink)

An analysis of group justification enables us to understand what it means to say that a research group is justified in making a claim on the basis of evidence. I defend Frederick Schmitt's (1994) joint account of group justification by arguing against a simple summative account of group justification. Also, I respond to two objections to the joint account, one claiming that social epistemologists should always prefer the epistemic value of making true judgments to the epistemic value of maintaining consistency, (...) and another one claiming that the notion of joint commitment implicit in the joint account is epistemically unacceptable. (shrink)

It is now recognized that relations of trust play an epistemic role in science. The contested issue is under what conditions trust in scientific testimony is warranted. I argue that John Hardwig's view of trustworthy scientific testimony is inadequate because it does not take into account the possibility that credibility does not reliably reflect trustworthiness, and because it does not appreciate the role communities have in guaranteeing the trustworthiness of scientific testimony.

: It is now recognized that relations of trust play an epistemic role in science. The contested issue is under what conditions trust in scientific testimony is warranted. I argue that John Hardwig's view of trustworthy scientific testimony is inadequate because it does not take into account the possibility that credibility does not reliably reflect trustworthiness, and because it does not appreciate the role communities have in guaranteeing the trustworthiness of scientific testimony.

Whereas much of the literature in the social epistemology of scientific knowledge has focused either on scientific communities or research groups, we examine the epistemic significance of scientific/intellectual movements (SIMs). We argue that certain types of SIMs can play an important epistemic role in science: they can remedy epistemic injus- tices in scientific practices. SIMs can counteract epistemic injustices effectively because many forms of epistemic injustice require structural and not merely individual remedies. To illustrate our argument, we discuss the case (...) of indigenous studies. (shrink)

I introduce a case study from organization studies to argue that social epistemologists’ recommendation to cultivate diversity and dissent in science is unlikely to be welcomed in the social sciences unless it is coupled with another epistemic ideal: the norm of epistemic responsibility. The norm of epistemic responsibility enables me to show that organization scholars’ concern with the fragmentation of their discipline is generated by false assumptions: the assumption that a diversity of theoretical approaches will lead to fragmentation and the (...) assumption that an imposed consensus on a theoretical approach is needed to maintain the unity of the discipline. (shrink)

I argue that in epistemically well-designed scientific communities, scientists are united by mutual epistemic responsibilities, and epistemic responsibilities are understood not merely as epistemic but also as moral duties. Epistemic responsibilities can be understood as moral duties because they contribute to the well-being of other human beings by showing respect for them, especially in their capacity as knowers. A moral account of epistemically responsible behaviour is needed to supplement accounts that appeal to scientists’ self-interests or personal epistemic goals. This is (...) because neither the self-interest nor the epistemic account can always explain why it is rational for an individual scientist to be epistemically responsible. (shrink)

This landmark book is now reissued in a new edition that has been vastly rewritten and updated to respond to recent Kantian literature.

In recent years, feminist philosophy of science has been subjected to criticism. The debate has focused on the implications of the underdetermination thesis for accounts of the role of social values in scientific reasoning. My aim here is to offer a different approach. I suggest that feminist philosophers of science contribute to our understanding of science by (1) producing gender‐sensitive analyses of the social dimensions of scientific inquiry and (2) examining the relevance of these analyses for normative issues in philosophy (...) of science. (shrink)

: As a response to the critics of feminist science studies I argue that it is possible to formulate empirical hypotheses about gender ideology in the practice of the physical sciences without (1) reinforcing stereotypes about women and mathematical sciences or (2) assuming at the outset that the area of physics under investigation is methodologically suspect. I will then critically evaluate two case studies of gender ideology in the practice of the physical sciences. The case studies fail to show that (...) gender ideologies have influenced the practice of the physical sciences in a profound way--not because it is impossible to conceive how gender ideologies could influence the practice of the physical sciences even in a profound way--but because they do not provide the right kind of evidence. This, however, leaves open the possibility that future studies might provide such evidence. (shrink)

In his new book the eminent Kant scholar Henry Allison provides an innovative and comprehensive interpretation of Kant's concept of freedom. The author analyzes the concept and discusses the role it plays in Kant's moral philosophy and psychology. He also considers in full detail the critical literature on the subject from Kant's own time to the present day. In the first part Professor Allison argues that at the centre of the Critique of Pure Reason there is the foundation for a (...) coherent general theory of rational agency. The second part employs this account of rational agency as a key to understanding Kant's concept of moral agency and associated moral psychology. The third part focuses on Kant's attempt to ground both moral law and freedom in the Groundwork and the Critique of Practical Reason. This is a major contribution to the interpretation of Kant which will be of special interest to scholars and graduate students of Kant's moral theory. (shrink)

Henri Bergson (1859-1941) is one of the truly great philosophers of the modernist period, and there is currently a major renaissance of interest in his unduly neglected texts and ideas amongst philosophers, literary theorists, and social theorists. Creative Evolution (1907) is the text that made Bergson world-famous in his own lifetime; in it Bergson responds to the challenge presented to our habits of thought by modern evolutionary theory, and attempts to show that the theory of knowledge must have its (...) basis in a theory of life. (shrink)

A monumental work by an important modern philosopher, Matter and Memory (1896) represents one of the great inquiries into perception and memory, movement and time, matter and mind. Nobel Prize-winner Henri Bergson surveys these independent but related spheres, exploring the connection of mind and body to individual freedom of choice. Bergson’s efforts to reconcile the facts of biology to a theory of consciousness offered a challenge to the mechanistic view of nature, and his original and innovative views exercised a (...) profound influence on other philosophers--including James, Whitehead, and Santayana--as well as novelists such as Dos Passos and Proust. Matter and Memory is essential to an understanding of Bergson’s philosophy and its legacy. (shrink)

Henri Bergson (1859-1941) is one of the truly great philosophers of the modernist period, and there is currently a major renaissance of interest in his unduly neglected texts and ideas amongst philosophers, literary theorists, and social theorists. Creative Evolution (1907) is the text that made Bergson world-famous in his own lifetime; in it Bergson responds to the challenge presented to our habits of thought by modern evolutionary theory, and attempts to show that the theory of knowledge must have its (...) basis in a theory of life. (shrink)

Epistemic trustworthiness depends not only on one’s epistemic but also on moral qualities. Such qualities need to be upheld by scientific communities and institutions as well as by individual scientific experts. While non-experts can often take scientific experts’ epistemic trustworthiness for granted, in some cases they cannot rationally treat it as the default, and they need to be convinced of the experts’ commitment to the well-being of others. This study contributes to philosophical discussions on public trust in science by introducing (...) an impact assessment model. The model helps philosophers understand how scientific experts can build and maintain epistemic trustworthiness in relation to those social groups who have reasons to distrust scientists. (shrink)

This book constitutes one of the most important contributions to recent Kant scholarship. In it, one of the pre-eminent interpreters of Kant, Henry Allison, offers a comprehensive, systematic, and philosophically astute account of all aspects of Kant's views on aesthetics. The first part of the book analyses Kant's conception of reflective judgment and its connections with both empirical knowledge and judgments of taste. The second and third parts treat two questions that Allison insists must be kept distinct: the normativity of (...) pure judgments of taste, and the moral and systematic significance of taste. The fourth part considers two important topics often neglected in the study of Kant's aesthetics: his conceptions of fine art, and the sublime. (shrink)

When future generations come to analyze and survey twentieth-century philosophy as a whole, Bertrand Russell’s logic and theory of knowledge is assured a place of prime importance. Yet until this book was first published in 1969 no comprehensive treatment of his epistemology had appeared. Commentators on twentieth-century philosophy at the time assumed that Russell’s important contributions to the theory of knowledge were made before 1921. This book challenges that assumption and draws attention to features of Russell’s later work which were (...) overlooked. The analysis starts with Russell’s earliest views and moves from book to book and article to article through his enormous span of writing on the problems and theory of knowledge. The changes in ideas as he developed the theory are traced, and the study culminates in a statement of his latest views. His work is seen in a continuity in which the changes were part of the development of his mature thought, and the total evaluation and interpretation clarify many of the common misunderstandings of his philosophy. This is naturally of interest to all philosophers, and for students this is the answer to inevitable questions on the nature of Russell’s ideas and their evolution. (shrink)