This article explores the concept of ethical invention in both Jean-Paul Sartre’s and Michel Foucault’s later lectures and interviews, showing that a courageous disposition to invent or transform plays a key role in both thinkers’ visions of ethics. Three of Sartre’s post-Critique of Dialectical Reason lectures on ethics are examined: Morality and History, The Rome Lecture, and A Plea for Intellectuals. It is shown that ethical invention for Sartre requires the use of our freedom to transcend our current circumstances, a (...) willingness to break away from harmful ideologies, and directing our free praxis towards the goal of universal humanism. Examining several of Foucault’s interviews alongside his lecture series The Government of Self and Others and The Courage of Truth, it is shown that ethical invention for Foucault requires a rejection of necessities or inevitabilities in our current landscape, a willingness to reshape our current beliefs, and a philosophical way of life that results in an alteration of the relationship to self and others. For both thinkers, ethical invention should be preceded by a critical reflection on ourselves in our historical moment. Both argue that ethical invention requires a rejection of the inherent value of our world and realization that the conditions of possibility for being subjects are malleable. Last, it is shown that both philosophers specifically call philosophers or intellectuals to invent. (shrink)

: In a short and much-neglected passage in the second Critique, Kant discusses the threat posed to human freedom by theological determinism. In this paper we present an interpretation of Kant’s conception of and response to this threat. Regarding his conception, we argue that he addresses two versions of the threat: either God causes appearances directly or he does so indirectly by causing things in themselves which in turn cause appearances. Kant’s response to the first version is that God cannot (...) cause appearances directly because they depend essentially on the passive sensibility of finite beings. Kant’s response to the second version is that human beings are endowed with transcendental freedom, which blocks the causal transitivity that is presupposed by this version. We also contrast his position on this topic with Leibniz’s and Spinoza’s. (shrink)

Many of us think that we just aren't enough. Not good enough, not pretty enough, not rich enough, and not happy enough. But just because we think something doesn't mean it's true. You are more than you think you are teaches you how to revise your belief system, fulfill your deepest dreams and desires, and create an epic, successful, and inspiring life. Unlocking your True Self is the key to new levels of joy, beauty, and peace. But what is the (...) True Self, and how can you realize its infinite potential? In this easy-to-read book, Kimberly Snyder answers these questions and shows you how to tap into this unstoppable force to transform every aspect of your life for the better. Drawing inspiration from the teachings of the great guru Paramahansa Yogananda along with personal stories and the latest scientific research, Kimberly offers simple exercises, potent ancient practices, and in-depth meditations to help you overcome negative beliefs and see yourself as you truly are--a goddess, a warrior, a lover, and a creator of your extraordinary destiny" -- Back cover. (shrink)

This paper is an essay in counterfactual epistemology. What if experience have high-level contents, to the effect that something is a lemon or that someone is sad? I survey the consequences for epistemology of such a scenario, and conclude that many of the striking consequences could be reached even if our experiences don't have high-level contents.

This work "collects the author's work at the intersection between political philosophy and religion. Alongside his influential earlier essays, it includes nine new essays in which Wolterstorff develops original lines of argument and stakes out novel positions regarding the nature of liberal democracy, human rights, and political authority. Taken together, these positions are an attractive alternative to the so-called public reason liberalism defended by thinkers such as John Rawls"--jacket.

In recent years, scholars have come to understand emotions as dynamic and socially constructed—the product of interdependent cultural, relational, situational, and biological influences. While researchers have called for a multilevel theory of emotion construction, any progress toward such a theory must overcome the fragmentation of relevant research across various disciplines and theoretical frameworks. We present affect control theory as a launching point for cross-disciplinary collaboration because of its empirically grounded conceptualization of social mechanisms operating at the interaction, relationship, and cultural (...) levels, and its specification of processes linking social and individual aspects of emotion. After introducing the theory, we illustrate its correspondence with major theories of emotion construction framed at each of four analytical levels: cultural, interactional, individual, and neural. (shrink)

Modern science began as natural philosophy, an admixture of philosophy and science. It was then killed off by Newton, as a result of his claim to have derived his law of gravitation from the phenomena by induction. But this post-Newtonian conception of science, which holds that theories are accepted on the basis of evidence, is untenable, as the long-standing insolubility of the problem of induction indicates. Persistent acceptance of unified theories only in physics, when endless equally empirically successful disunified rivals (...) are available, means that physics makes a persistent, problematic metaphysical assumption about the universe: that all disunified theories are false. This assumption, precisely because it is problematic, needs to be explicitly articulated within physics, so that it can be critically assessed and, we may hope, improved. The outcome is a new conception of science—aim-oriented empiricism—that puts science and philosophy together again, and amounts to a modern version of natural philosophy. Furthermore, aim-oriented empiricism leads to the solution to the problem of induction. Natural philosophy pursued within the methodological framework of aim-oriented empiricism is shown to meet standards of intellectual rigour that science without metaphysics cannot meet. (shrink)

How is consciousness possible? What biological purpose does it serve? And why do we value it so highly? In Soul Dust, the psychologist Nicholas Humphrey, a leading figure in consciousness research, proposes a startling new theory. Consciousness, he argues, is nothing less than a magical-mystery show that we stage for ourselves inside our own heads. This self-made show lights up the world for us and makes us feel special and transcendent. Thus consciousness paves the way for spirituality, and allows (...) us, as human beings, to reap the rewards, and anxieties, of living in what Humphrey calls the "soul niche." Tightly argued, intellectually gripping, and a joy to read, Soul Dust provides answers to the deepest questions. It shows how the problem of consciousness merges with questions that obsess us all--how life should be lived and the fear of death. Resting firmly on neuroscience and evolutionary theory, and drawing a wealth of insights from philosophy and literature..."--Jacket. (shrink)

Governing Animals explores the role of the liberal state in protecting animal welfare. Examining liberal concepts such as the social contract, property rights, and representation, Kimberly K. Smith argues that liberalism properly understood can recognize the moral status and social meaning of animals and provides guidance in fashioning animal policy.

The U.S. Supreme Court declared procreation to be a fundamental right in the early twentieth century in a case involving Oklahoma's Habitual Criminal Sterilization Act, an act that permitted unconsented sterilization of individuals convicted of certain crimes. The right that the Court articulated in that case is a negative right: it requires that the government not place unjustified roadblocks in the way of people seeking to procreate, but it does not require the government to take positive steps to help people (...) procreate if they wish to. I argue that a positive legal right is morally necessary in the United States, given the profound significance of procreation, the current barriers to access to care, and the related issues of individual and societal justice. I assume at the outset that the right to procreate should be expansive enough to include a right to noncoital reproduction. The absence of a positive right to procreate reflects not just constitutional tradition but also a governmental and societal commitment to a longstanding set of reproductive hierarchies by which those who fall outside of the traditional framing of family too frequently find their procreative dreams hindered. Reconceiving procreative rights to include a positive right would create greater opportunities to argue and lobby for increased access to technologies that are out of reach for many. (shrink)

Although formal barriers to women’s social and political participation have crumbled, society remains, to a significant degree, gendered in the roles that women and men play. Women’s and men’s choices regarding work and family are largely responsible for maintaining and reinforcing the differences. While feminists recognize the need to criticize women’s choices, too often they focus on restrictive conditions rather than the choices themselves. Kimberly A. Yuracko argues instead that encouraging women to make choices in accordance with a grounded (...) and well-defined conception of perfectionism—a philosopy concerned with human flourishing—is the most effective way to redress persistent gender inequality. To this end, Yuracko seeks not only to expose the perfectionism underlying current choice critiques, but to articulate a concrete set of feminist perfectionist principles that would improve the quality of individual women’s lives and improve the social standing of women as a whole. (shrink)

There is an extensive literature on time travel in both philosophy and physics. Part of the great interest of the topic stems from the fact that reasons have been given both for thinking that time travel is physically possible—and for thinking that it is logically impossible! This entry deals primarily with philosophical issues; issues related to the physics of time travel are covered in the separate entries on time travel and modern physics and time machines. We begin with the definitional (...) question: what is time travel? We then turn to the major objection to the possibility of backwards time travel: the Grandfather paradox. Next, issues concerning causation are discussed—and then, issues in the metaphysics of time and change. We end with a discussion of the question why, if backwards time travel will ever occur, we have not been visited by time travellers from the future. (shrink)

Centring on human perception, attunement to others, and a transcendent conception of the good, Iris Murdoch's intervention in moral philosophy remains an insightful and evocative source for ethical theory. Discerning some pervasive dualisms that hamper its coherence and development, I suggest that her work finds a generative conversation partner in the contemporary metaphysician, William Desmond. Desmond's thought offers promising avenues to overcome these dualisms by repositioning the source and nature of value and by theorising an anti-reductive, relational ontology. Staging a (...) constructive encounter between these two thinkers that preserves Murdoch's distinct prioritisation of attention and individuality within a Desmond-inspired metaphysics, I present a synthetic ethical approach that promotes the ideal of attending to an other—in the givenness of its particularity, manifold surplus, and constitutive relationality—as good in itself. (shrink)

Here I show that the one-variable fragment of several first-order relevant logics corresponds to certain S5ish extensions of the underlying propositional relevant logic. In particular, given a fairly standard translation between modal and one-variable languages and a permuting propositional relevant logic L, a formula $$\mathcal {A}$$ A of the one-variable fragment is a theorem of LQ (QL) iff its translation is a theorem of L5 (L.5). The proof is model-theoretic. In one direction, semantics based on the Mares-Goldblatt [15] semantics for (...) quantified L are transformed into ternary (plus two binary) relational semantics for S5-like extensions of L (for a general presentation, see Seki [26, 27]). In the other direction, a valuation is given for the full first-order relevant logic based on L into a model for a suitable S5 extension of L. I also discuss this work’s relation to finding a complete axiomatization of the constant domain, non-general frame ternary relational semantics for which RQ is incomplete [11]. (shrink)

I propose a revision of Cantor’s account of set size that understands comparisons of set size fundamentally in terms of surjections rather than injections. This revised account is equivalent to Cantor's account if the Axiom of Choice is true, but its consequences differ from those of Cantor’s if the Axiom of Choice is false. I argue that the revised account is an intuitive generalization of Cantor’s account, blocks paradoxes—most notably, that a set can be partitioned into a set that is (...) bigger than it—that can arise from Cantor’s account if the Axiom of Choice is false, illuminates the debate over whether the Axiom of Choice is true, is a mathematically fruitful alternative to Cantor’s account, and sheds philosophical light on one of the oldest unsolved problems in set theory. (shrink)

A doctrine of intelligent design through evolution is not going to find many friends. It is destined to encounter opposition on all sides. Among scientists the backlog of evolution will have little patience for intelligent design. Among religiousists, many who form intelligent design have their doubts about evolution. In the general public s mind there is a diametrical opposition between evolution and intelligent design: one excludes the other. This book will argue that this view of the matter is not correct, (...) and that in actuality one can regard evolution itself as a pathway to intelligent design. We would do well to go beyond The Origin of Species and taking as our guide such works as W. Wentworth Thomson s On Growth and Form acknowledging that evolutionary adaptation can result in solutions of a sort that intelligence could readily ratify. Accordingly, what the present book seeks is a naturalization of Intelligent Design that sees such design as itself the result of natural and evolutionary processes.". (shrink)

Although it is not yet officially recognized as a clinical entity which is diagnosable, Internet Gaming Disorder (IGD) has been included in section III for further study in the DSM-5 by the American Psychiatric Association (APA, 2013). This is important because there is increasing evidence that people of all ages, in particular teens and young adults, are facing very real and sometimes very severe consequences in daily life resulting from an addictive use of online games. This article summarizes general aspects (...) of IGD including diagnostic criteria and arguments for the classification as an addictive disorder including evidence from neurobiological studies. Based on previous theoretical considerations and empirical findings, this paper examines the use of one recently proposed model, the Interaction of Person-Affect-Cognition-Execution (I-PACE) model, for inspiring future research and for developing new treatment protocols for IGD. The I-PACE model is a theoretical framework that explains symptoms of Internet addiction by looking at interactions between predisposing factors, moderators, and mediators in combination with reduced executive functioning and diminished decision making. Finally, the paper discusses how current treatment protocols focusing on Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy for Internet addiction (CBT-IA) fit with the processes hypothesized in the I-PACE model. (shrink)

Proposes a new model of contractualism based on an interpersonal, deliberative conception of practical reason which answers the twin demands of moral accuracy and explanatory adequacy.

Kant's theory of the intuitive intellect has a broad and substantial role in the development and exposition of his critical philosophy. An emphasis on this theory's reception and appropriation on the part of the German idealists has tended to divert attention from Kant's own treatment of the topic. In this essay, I seek an adequate overview of the theory Kant advances in support of his critical enterprise. I examine the nature of the intuitive intellect's object; its epistemic relation to its (...) object; its mode of comprehension; the relationship between these cognitive elements; and I ask which minds Kant regards as intuitive intellects. (shrink)

This chapter discusses ontological commitment to properties, understood as ontological correlates of predicates. We examine the issue in four metaontological settings, beginning with an influential Quinean paradigm on which ontology concerns what there is. We argue that this naturally but not inevitably avoids ontological commitment to properties. Our remaining three settings correspond to the most prominent departures from the Quinean paradigm. Firstly, we enrich the Quinean paradigm with a primitive, non-quantificational notion of existence. Ontology then concerns what exists. We argue (...) that this strengthens the Quinean case against ontological commitment to properties while also newly distinguishing between stronger and weaker forms of nominalism. Secondly, we enrich the Quinean paradigm with the ideology of fundamentality. Ontology then centrally concerns what’s fundamental. We argue that this leaves ontological commitment to properties wide open although Bradleyan regress threatens. Thirdly, we enrich the Quinean paradigm with primitive higher-order quantifiers. Ontology then expands to concern what there higher-order is and what there first-order is. We argue that this naturally but not inevitably incurs ontological commitment to properties. (shrink)

A philosophically and historically influential section of the Critique of Judgement presents an ‘intuitive intellect’ as a mind whose representation is limited to what actually exists, and does not extend to mere possibilities. Kant’s paradigmatic instance of such an intellect is however also the divine mind. This combination threatens to rule out the reality of the mere possibilities presupposed by Kant’s theory of human freedom. Through an analysis of the relevant issues in metaphysical cosmology, modal metaphysics and philosophical theology, I (...) show that Kant in fact possesses the resources to reconcile the philosophical claims of §76 of the Critique of Judgement with his keystone commitment to the reality of human freedom. (shrink)

In a crossed-out section in his Fisk University commencement address on Otto von Bismarck, W. E. B. Du Bois mentions that Hegel was one of the figures that influenced him early on in his intellectual development. I argue that although Du Bois uses Hegelian language and employs a Hegelian conception of history in his address “The Conservation of Races,” he abandons both in his essay “Sociology Hesitant.” He became critical of the teleological conception of history because it rests on determinism, (...) which in his view denies the possibility for social change. With what I call his “mystical holism,” Du Bois is at odds with Hegel’s methodological holism, a distinguishing characteristic of absolute idealism. Du Bois’s dynamic idealism, which grows out of opposition to Hegelian idealism, leaves us with hope for a world without racism or at the very least in a better position to develop idealism as an anti-racist system of philosophical thought. (shrink)

Du Bois regarded social reform as a legitimate object for the scientist. He gave a place to non-epistemic values in scientific reasoning and, to counter the effects of scientific racism, he constructed his approach around the belief that scientists must adopt an assumption or scientific hypothesis that African Americans are human. His engagement in scientific research was a way to reform the society in which he lived, which in turn, led him to defend the faithfulness to fact as his conception (...) of scientific objectivity. This essay examines his sophisticated theory of facts, account of the difference between the natural and human sciences, and unique pragmatist theory of truth. (shrink)

From trauma expert and somatic healer Kimberly Johnson comes a guide for tapping into the wisdom and resilience of the body to rewire the nervous system, heal from trauma, and live fully.

Commentators have shown a steady interest in the role of feeling in Kant’s moral and practical philosophy over the last few decades. Much attention has been given to the notion of ‘moral feeling’ in general, as well as to what Kant calls the ‘feeling of respect’ for the moral law. My focus in this essay is on the role of feeling in practical judgment. My claim in what follows is that the act of judging in the practical domain—i.e., determining what (...) one ought to do, or what action one ought to perform, in a specific case—crucially involves feeling. Put more simply: I argue that practical judgment has an essentially affective dimension. The upshot of the account I will give is that it provides us with a richer and more complex account of moral feeling than has previously been appreciated in the literature. While it is recognized that feeling plays a certain role in moral motivation, what I hope to demonstrate here is that feeling is involved much earlier in the exercise of moral agency. Far from entering only at the point at which we are trying to muster the strength of will to carry out what we know we ought to do, feeling is present the moment we begin to deliberate about what it is that we ought to do. (shrink)

We argue that, under certain plausible assumptions, de Sitter space settles into a quiescent vacuum in which there are no dynamical quantum fluctuations. Such fluctuations require either an evolving microstate, or time-dependent histories of out-of-equilibrium recording devices, which we argue are absent in stationary states. For a massive scalar field in a fixed de Sitter background, the cosmic no-hair theorem implies that the state of the patch approaches the vacuum, where there are no fluctuations. We argue that an analogous conclusion (...) holds whenever a patch of de Sitter is embedded in a larger theory with an infinite-dimensional Hilbert space, including semiclassical quantum gravity with false vacua or complementarity in theories with at least one Minkowski vacuum. This reasoning provides an escape from the Boltzmann brain problem in such theories. It also implies that vacuum states do not uptunnel to higher-energy vacua and that perturbations do not decohere while slow-roll inflation occurs, suggesting that eternal inflation is much less common than often supposed. On the other hand, if a de Sitter patch is a closed system with a finite-dimensional Hilbert space, there will be Poincaré recurrences and dynamical Boltzmann fluctuations into lower-entropy states. Our analysis does not alter the conventional understanding of the origin of density fluctuations from primordial inflation, since reheating naturally generates a high-entropy environment and leads to decoherence, nor does it affect the existence of non-dynamical vacuum fluctuations such as those that give rise to the Casimir effect. (shrink)

In this piece, I extend a transformative power account to the conservation of dark (and starry) night skies. More specifically, I argue that the transformative power that dark nights bear warrants their conservation and is best understood in terms of the important intellectual, cultural, aesthetic, and (psycho-physiologically) restorative effects that they afford. This gives us a pressing set of reasons to combat the growing, global phenomenon of light pollution. To do so, I argue, we ought to preserve the few remaining (...) dark refuges that we have left (what I term wildness regions) and synergistically re-wild (i.e. re-darken) urban and suburban environments. Synergistic re-darkening, I propose, can be achieved by (i) establishing interpretive (educational) ‘dark zones’, (ii) implementing bioluminescent lighting technologies, and (iii) strategically employing lighting design. Finally, and in order to enact a degree of epistemic justice, I argue that we ought to implement multi-cultural ‘co-learning’ initiatives, which promote education pertaining to both Western, scientific and indigenous, North American astronomies. (shrink)

The aim of the Schematism chapter of the Critique of Pure Reason is to solve the problem posed by the “inhomogeneity” of intuitions and categories: the sensible properties of objects represented in intuition are of a different kind than the properties represented by categories. Kant's solution is to introduce what he calls “transcendental schemata,” which mediate the subsumption of objects under categories. I reconstruct Kant's solution in terms of two substantive premises, which I call Subsumption Sufficiency (i.e., that subsuming an (...) object under a transcendental schema is sufficient to subsume it under the corresponding category) and Real Possibility (i.e., that it is really possible to subsume objects under each of the transcendental schemata). These two principles, together with a trivial modal one (the Subsumption-Possibility Link), entail that it is possible to subsume objects under categories; in other words, the argument of the Schematism is valid. The main work of the paper consists in reconstructing Kant's arguments for, and explanations of, these premises. I argue that they hinge on Kant's claim that transcendental schemata are “time-determinations,” which I interpret to mean: rules for reflexively representing the temporal relations among our own representational states. On the basis of this reading, I reconstruct Kant's argument for Subsumption Sufficiency, category by category. I also explain why Real Possibility follows almost immediately. Granting Kant the argument up to this point in the Critique, the argument of the Schematism is sound. (shrink)

The state is central to social scientific and historical inquiry today, reflecting its importance in domestic and international affairs. States kill, coerce, fight, torture, and incarcerate, yet they also nurture, protect, educate, redistribute, and invest. It is precisely because of the complexity and wide-ranging impacts of states that research on them has proliferated and diversified. Yet, too many scholars inhabit separate academic silos, and theorizing of states has become dispersed and disjointed. This book aims to bridge some of the many (...) gaps between scholarly endeavors, bringing together scholars from a diverse array of disciplines and perspectives who study states and empires. The book offers not only a sample of cutting-edge research that can serve as models and directions for future work, but an original conceptualization and theorization of states, their origins and evolution, and their effects. (shrink)

A collection of original comics engaging fundamental issues in medical ethics, including patient autonomy, informed consent, unconscious bias, mandated reporting of suspected abuse, confidentiality, medical mistakes, surrogate decision-making, and futility.