Luis de Molina was a leading figure in the remarkable sixteenth-century revival of Scholasticism on the Iberian peninsula. Molina is best known for his innovative theory of middle knowledge. Alfred J. Freddoso's extensive introductory essay clears up common misconceptions about Molina's theory, defends it against both philosophical and theological objections, and makes it accessible to contemporary readers.

The past decade has seen a flurry of social scientific research on the use of racial categories in human genetics research. This literature has critically analyzed how U.S. race relations are being shaped by and themselves shaping research on human biological difference and disease. Recent work, however, suggests that the particular configurations of science and ethnoracial politics in the US are not exportable. Instead, research on human biology in other contexts reveals the importance of not just racial categories, but national, (...) ethnic, regional and linguistic classifications of bodies and communities... (shrink)

In discussions of standards of proof, a familiar perspective often emerges. According to what we call specificationism, standards of proof are legal rules that specify the quantum of evidence required to determine that a litigant’s claim has been proven. In so doing, they allocate the risk of error among litigants (and potential litigants), minimizing the risk of certain types of error. Specificationism is meant as a description of the way the rules actually function. We argue, however, that its claims are (...) either mistaken or at a minimum deeply misleading, especially when it comes to standard of proof rules (SPRs) that contain indeterminate formulas, as is typical. As against specificationism, we argue that SPRs are best understood as rules that confer competence to decide whether a given standard has been met—according to whatever vague or inchoate interpretation (if any) of the rule in question triers of fact implicitly or explicitly employ. We call this the competence-norm approach. (shrink)

Eight focus groups were conducted in four public hospitals in Madrid to explore healthcare professionals’ perceptions of advance directives in order to improve the understanding of their lack of success among physicians and patients. A purposive sample of sixty healthcare professionals discussed ADs and reasons for their infrequent use. Three main themes were identified: perceptions about their meaning, appraisals of their use in clinical practice, and decision-making about them. Healthcare professionals perceived a lack of clarity about their definition and implementation. (...) There is insufficient awareness of their efficacy in improving the quality of clinical relationships and decision-making, and they are often perceived only as a bureaucratic procedure. Advance directives are not integrated in the clinical practice of Madrid’s healthcare specialist services because their application is exceedingly complex, because of insufficient education about them, and because of lack of procedural clarity. Consequently, healthcare professionals are not aware of how ADs could improve clinical decision-making, of when and for whom their use is appropriate, and of who has responsibility for providing ADs-related information to patients. These circumstances contribute to patients’ lack of interest in completing these documents and to physicians’ sceptical views about their usefulness. (shrink)

According to Joseph Raz, the fact of making a valid promise creates “promissory reasons”: it constitutes for the promisor a reason for performing her promise and a reason for not acting for at least some of the reasons that recommend something different than performing. In his latest work on promising, Raz provides a novel account of the grounds of promissory reasons—an account which is different in important respects to the one he defended decades ago. In this paper, I argue that, (...) as his previous one, his latest account of the grounds of promissory reasons faces significant difficulties. (shrink)

Theoretical and empirical research on stakeholder behavior tends to focus on specific actions or responses in the context of the organization–stakeholder relationship. Despite increased efforts to look beyond the dyadic organization–stakeholder relationship, research still favors the perspective of the focal organization. The taken-for-granted assumption of the organization–stakeholder relationship may limit our understanding of how organization–stakeholder linkages are formed and evolve over time. By adopting the perspective of the stakeholder, this article examines organization–stakeholder relationship formation and tracks changes in the salience (...) of stakeholder groups otherwise considered to be nonstakeholders. This research draws from a case study of small coffee producers in Southern Mexico who formed a cooperative and developed salience within their stakeholder network after a long history of diverse individual, organizational, and institutional arrangements. The findings suggest that the replacement of bureaucratic stakeholder relationships with relationships characterized by strong moral commitment to stakeholders’ claims enabled independent farmers to transform into an integrated, solid, and worldwide competitive group of coffee producers. (shrink)

Alireza Bagheri supports a policy on organ procurement where individuals could choose their own definition of death between two or more socially accepted alternatives. First, we claim that such a policy, without any criterion to distinguish accepted from acceptable definitions, easily leads to the slippery slope that Bagheri tries to avoid. Second, we suggest that a public discussion about the circumstances under which the dead donor rule could be violated is more productive of social trust than constantly moving the line (...) between life and death. (shrink)

Background: Treating medication-refractory freezing of gait in Parkinson’s disease remains challenging despite several trials reporting improvements in motor symptoms using subthalamic nucleus or globus pallidus internus deep brain stimulation. Pedunculopontine nucleus region DBS has been used for medication-refractory FoG, with mixed findings. FoG, as a paroxysmal phenomenon, provides an ideal framework for the possibility of closed-loop DBS.Methods: In this clinical trial, five subjects with medication-refractory FoG underwent bilateral GPi DBS implantation to address levodopa-responsive PD symptoms with open-loop stimulation. Additionally, PPN (...) DBS leads were implanted for CL-DBS to treat FoG. The primary outcome of the study was a 40% improvement in medication-refractory FoG in 60% of subjects at 6 months when “on” PPN CL-DBS. Secondary outcomes included device feasibility to gauge the recruitment potential of this four-lead DBS approach for a potentially larger clinical trial. Safety was judged based on adverse events and explantation rate.Findings: The feasibility of this approach was demonstrated as we recruited five subjects with both “on” and “off” medication freezing. The safety for this population of patients receiving four DBS leads was suboptimal and associated with a high explantation rate of 40%. The primary clinical outcome in three of the five subjects was achieved at 6 months. However, the group analysis of the primary clinical outcome did not reveal any benefit.Interpretation: This study of a human PPN CL-DBS trial in medication-refractory FoG showed feasibility in recruitment, suboptimal safety, and a heterogeneous clinical effect in FoG outcomes. (shrink)

Análisis historiográfico del relato de las vicisitudes del alfaquí Ṭālūt, elaborado por Ibn al-Qūṭiyya y reproducido por numerosas fuentes andalusíes y orientales. De dicho análisis se desprende que la supuesta versión amplia de la crónica de Ibn al-Qūṭiyya nunca existió y que la coincidencia entre varias obras en presentar una versión extensa del relato es debida a su común dependencia de un subarquetipo que amplificó retóricamente el texto original de Ibn al- Qūṭiyya.

Intelligent Transportation Systems are expected to automate how parking slots are booked by trucks. The intrinsic dynamic nature of this problem, the need of explanations and the inclusion of private data justify an agent-based solution. Agents solving this problem act with a Believe Desire Intentions reasoning, and are implemented with JASON. Privacy of trucks becomes protected sharing a list of parkings ordered by preference. Furthermore, the process of assigning parking slots takes into account legal requirements on breaks and driving time (...) limits. Finally, the agent simulations use the distances, the number of trucks and parkings corresponding to the proportions of the current European Union data. The performance of the proposed solution is tested in these simulations with three different distances against an alternative with complete knowledge. The difference in efficiency, the number of illegal breaks and the traveled distances are measured in them. Comparing the results, we can conclude that the nonprivate alternative is slightly better in performance while both alternatives do not produce illegal breaks. In this way the simulations show that the proposed privacy protection does not impose a relevant handicap in efficiency. (shrink)

The European project European and Latin American Systems of Ethics Regulation of Biomedical Research Project (EULABOR) has carried out the first comparative analysis of ethics regulation systems for biomedical research in seven countries in Europe and Latin America, evaluating their roles in the protection of human subjects. We developed a conceptual and methodological framework defining ‘ethics regulation system for biomedical research’ as a set of actors, institutions, codes and laws involved in overseeing the ethics of biomedical research on humans. This (...) framework allowed us to develop comprehensive national reports by conducting semi-structured interviews to key informants. These reports were summarised and analysed in a comparative analysis. The study showed that the regulatory framework for clinical research in these countries differ in scope. It showed that despite the different political contexts, actors involved and motivations for creating the regulation, in most of the studied countries it was the government who took the lead in setting up the system. The study also showed that Europe and Latin America are similar regarding national bodies and research ethics committees, but the Brazilian system has strong and noteworthy specificities. (shrink)

Resumen Nicolás Gómez Dávila caracteriza la Modernidad democrática como una época gnóstica. En este artículo pretendo reconstruir esta caracterización a partir de una lectura intertextual de Textos. Desde una filosofía de la historia y desde una antropología filosófica Gómez Dávila interpreta fenómenos históricos como la Modernidad y la democracia con una perspectiva que privilegia lo religioso. Su conclusión es que en la Modernidad democrática el ser humano se ha arrogado atributos divinos, es decir, se ha divinizando. Así, intentaré mostrar cómo (...) funciona la intertextualidad de Textos en la crítica a la Modernidad democrática y ofreceré además algunas consideraciones críticas.Nicolás Gómez Dávila characterizes democratic Modernity as a gnostic age. This article pretends to reconstruct his characterization by way of an intertextual reading of Textos. Gómez Dávila’s thesis is derived from a philosophy of history and a philosophical anthropology; both allow him to interpret Modernity from a religious perspective. His conclusion is that democratic Modernity bestows human beings unlimited sovereignty, which for him means gnostic divinization. Thus, I intend to explain how intertextuality works in the assessment of democratic Modernity and put forward a few critical considerations. (shrink)

It is unknown whether hospital-based medical professionals in Spain educate patients about advance directives. The objective of this research was to determine the frequency of hospital-based physicians’ and nurses’ engagement in AD discussions in the hospital and which patient populations merit such efforts. A short question-and-answer-based survey of physicians and nurses taking care of inpatients was conducted at a university hospital in Madrid, Spain. In total, 283 surveys were collected from medical professionals, of whom 71 per cent were female, with (...) an average age of thirty-four years. Eighty-four per cent had never educated patients about ADs because of lack of perceived responsibility, time, or general knowledge of ADs. Patient populations that warranted AD discussions included those with terminal illnesses, chronic diseases, and elderly patients. Regarding degree of AD understanding in medical professionals: 57 per cent of medical professionals claimed sufficient general knowledge of ADs, 19 per cent understood particulars regarding AD document creation, and 16 per cent were aware of AD regulatory policies. Engagement in AD discussions was considered important by 83 per cent of medical professionals, with 79 per cent interested in participating in such discussions themselves. The majority of hospital physicians and nurses do not educate their patients about ADs, despite acknowledging their importance. Patient populations of highest priority included those with terminal diseases or chronic illness or who are of advanced age. (shrink)

ABSTRACT:A wide range of research uses patterns of genetic variation to infer genetic similarity between individuals, typically referred to as genetic ancestry. This research includes inference of human demographic history, understanding the genetic architecture of traits, and predicting disease risk. Researchers are not just structuring an intellectual inquiry when using genetic ancestry, they are also creating analytical frameworks with broader societal ramifications. This essay presents an ethics framework in the spirit of virtue ethics for these researchers: rather than focus on (...) rule following, the framework is designed to build researchers’ capacities to react to the ethical dimensions of their work. The authors identify one overarching principle of intellectual freedom and responsibility, noting that freedom in all its guises comes with responsibility, and they identify and define four principles that collectively uphold researchers’ intellectual responsibility: truthfulness, justice and fairness, anti-racism, and public beneficence. Researchers should bring their practices into alignment with these principles, and to aid this, the authors name three common ways research practices infringe these principles, suggest a step-by-step process for aligning research choices with the principles, provide rules of thumb for achieving alignment, and give a worked case. The essay concludes by identifying support needed by researchers to act in accord with the proposed framework. (shrink)

In this article, I offer a theoretical account of a central yet surprisingly overlooked form of legal influence or control, one that I refer to as the law’s ‘exhortative’ influence. The law exercises an ‘imperative’ influence when it purports to control agents’ behavior by imposing on them legal duties to act or refrain from acting in the legally desired or repelled way. By contrast, it exercises what I call an exhortative form of influence when it aims at impacting agents’ reasons (...) for action whilst refraining from mandating or prohibiting the legally desired or repelled conduct. The law’s exhortative control or influence must be distinguished not only from its imperative influence, but also from what I call the law’s merely ‘instructive’ form of influence, such as the one provided by so-called power-conferring laws. Though I illustrate the functioning of this special form of legal control—the law’s exhortative influence—by using primarily the example of the law of contracts, the article offers novel insights about law in general as a mode of social ordering by developing a theory of the structure of ‘legal incentives’. Legal incentives, I contend, are the means through which the law exercises its exhortative influence. Clearly distinguishing different techniques of legal influence is not only of analytical interest, but should invite us to think of accounts of the justification of legal authority that consider the similarities but also the differences in the moral significance of these diverse techniques. (shrink)

Este trabajo presenta los resultados preliminares obtenidos en la conformación del Atlas Iberoamericano en Bioética que ha desarrollado el Centro Anáhuac de Desarrollo Estratégico en Bioética (CADEBI) respecto a la identificación y análisis de las instituciones de Bioética existentes en la Región. Se realizó una revisión documental a través de motores de búsqueda, bases de datos, redes sociales y otras fuentes. La información obtenida se agrupó en seis diferentes categorías de acuerdo con la estructura, objetivos y actividades que desarrollan. De (...) esta manera, se realizó un diagnóstico inicial con base en las fuentes documentales disponibles en la Web. Como parte de los resultados, se identificaron 157 instituciones en 25 países; así como la variación en la densidad institucional, concentrándose principalmente en España (29 instituciones), México (26 instituciones), Argentina (17 instituciones), Brasil (13 instituciones), Chile (11 instituciones) y Colombia (8 instituciones). Además, se resalta la importancia de las comisiones nacionales de bioética en el desarrollo institucional, señalando la relación entre el avance científico y tecnológico de los países y el desarrollo de la bioética. El texto concluye con la propuesta de crear un Observatorio de la Red Iberoamericana de Bioética para documentar y promover el intercambio institucional y científico en la Región, así como algunas recomendaciones derivadas del desarrollo de este trabajo. (shrink)

El presente escrito pretende ser un aporte a la comprensión del singular valor de la buena voluntad según lo descrito en la Fundamentación de la metafísica de las costumbres. Para ello, después de aclarar sucintamente ciertos extravíos conceptuales sobre esta noción, repasaremos dos de las más representativas aproximaciones contemporáneas a la axiología kantiana que, sin embargo, arrojan resultados insatisfactorios al momento de precisar el valor de la voluntad buena: los abordajes de Korsgaard y Sensen. Intentaremos develar dichos fallos y luego (...) replantearemos la distinción entre valor irrestricto e incondicionado para aliviarlos en el marco general de la propuesta de Sensen. (shrink)

Muchos de los comentaristas de Gómez Dávila han notado que el carácter de su obra es intertextual, es decir, que no es un sistema cerrado: siempre está conectado implíci-tamente con otros libros y pensadores. El mismo Gómez Dávila nos indica en sus Escolios que Montaigne y Burckhardt tienen un rol central en esta intertextualidad. De tal manera, el siguiente artículo se propone interpretar la conexión entre los dos pen-sadores anteriores y la obra del colombiano. En el caso de Burckhardt, se (...) mostrará có-mo su pesimismo antropológico basado en una idea del pecado original, su escepti-cismo sobre la posibilidad humana de construir utopías, su negación de la idea de progreso y su concepción del tamaño y el papel del Estado aparecen y se desarrollan en el pensamiento del colombiano. En el caso de Montaigne, se mostrará su cercanía con Gómez Dávila a partir de sus similitudes biográficas, su alejamiento del espíritu académico de sus propios tiempos, su concepción de la filosofía, su escepticismo como arma para defender la fe y su fuerte conservatismo. Finalmente, se concluirá que esta intertextualidad que el autor mismo señala en su confesión sobre Montaigne y Bur-ckhardt nos ayuda a darle orden y sentido a sus posiciones políticas en los Escolios. En efecto, se intentará mostrar que Gómez Dávila articula las influencias de sus maestros para concluir en una visión de mundo reaccionaria. (shrink)

Qu’est-ce qui fait qu’un discours atteint son effet? Comment évaluer celui-ci? Au premier siècle, Pseudo-Longin compose le traité Du Sublime et y étudie ce qui mène l’expression linguistique à son plus haut degré d’efficacité. Pour l’atteindre, un rôle fondamental est attribué à la phantasia, assimilée par la plupart des auteurs anciens à ce qui, dans le discours, produit des « images ». Le texte qui suit s’arrête à démontrer, d’une part, la place occupée par Pseudo-Longin dans le long débat philosophique (...) et rhétorique sur la phantasia et, d’autre part, sa contribution à la compréhension de celle-ci. Associée par métonymie à la vision, la phantasia s’adresse à l’ensemble des sensations et correspond à l’art de faire sentir le discours en chair propre. Réussie, elle permet la communication des sensations entre le discours, l’orateur et le public. (shrink)

Esports have transformed playing video games into a competitive activity that bears similarities to sports and the processes of sportization. Taking as a starting point the concept of sports as competitive games, the objective of this work is to analyse the sportization of esports, as well as the impact of esports on the concept of sports and their implications on sports in the immediate future. Sports and esports are two different realities that interact with each other. This is a conceptual (...) problem for sports, and it also defines a practical challenge in the immediate future of sports. The virtual environment offers new possibilities in sports, such as broadening the possibilities of confrontation and competition development, contributing to reducing the environmental impact of certain sports, improving safety and maintaining the physical integrity of athletes, and increasing social justice and equality of chances in sports competitions. The challenge, therefore, is to try to bring esports and sports closer together, even moving toward hybrid sports, as addressed throughout this article. (shrink)

We present a map of standard quantum mechanics onto a dual theory, that of the classical thermodynamics of irreversible processes. While no gravity is present in our construction, our map exhibits features that are reminiscent of the holographic principle of quantum gravity.

The complexity and emotional/psychological responses to the environmental challenges of the 21st century has led to the coining and development of new words and concepts that, for some people, better describe how they are personally grappling with anthropogenic ecosystem damage and climate breakdown. This paper identifies some of the more commonly used environmental neologisms within scholarly literature and evaluates their usefulness and contradictions for those influenced by the virtue ethics promoted by the ancient Stoics and the Catholic Church. We find (...) that environmental neologisms, when framed by these philosophical and/or theological ideas, offer an alternative and, ultimately, helpful means to contemplate the nature of what might be considered an environmental crisis and how best we might address, or at least, mitigate it, as conscientious spiritual human beings. (shrink)

Under a widespread understanding of the nature of moral obligation, one cannot be under an obligation to perform or omit an act and have a moral power to release oneself from one’s obligation. According to this view, being under an obligation necessarily entails relinquishing one’s sovereignty over the obligatory matter, that is, one’s capacity to control one’s own obligational world. This essay argues against such a view. I shall argue that by making what I will call a commitment, a person (...) assumes an obligation towards another on a given matter whilst preserving the power to release herself from her obligation. Commitments constitute morally obligatory acts over which’s obligatoriness those obliged always retain control. They constitute obligations over which obligors preserve moral sovereignty. I show that the notion of commitment sheds light on the structure of important moral phenomena such as some of our loyalty obligations, and, furthermore, that it reveals something central about the justification and scope of the law of contracts. (shrink)

In this article I study Kant's doctrine of the power of judgement. I focus on its main function of rendering possible the transition from the lawfulness of nature to the realization of practical ends. In order to do so, I analyze the concept of “spontaneity” and the principle of “purposiveness of nature”, understood as a “principle of contingency”, according to Kant's explanation in the Critique of the Power of Judgement.

Este artículo tiene como objetivo discutir la concepción pública de las razones para justificar la obligación moral propuesta por Christine Korsgaard en sus libros The Sources of Normativity (1996a) y Self-constitution (2009). Se enfatizará principalmente dos puntos conectados. Por un lado, la descripción de Korsgaard de la naturaleza pública de las razones, que afirma que su fuerza normativa es potencialmente compartida, es insuficiente para su propia concepción de las obligaciones morales universales, porque estas obligaciones se basan en la normatividad compartida (...) existente de las razones. Por otra parte, Korsgaard no considera su propia explicación de la normatividad de las razones para dar cuenta del paso de la fuerza normativa compartible de las razones a su normatividad compartida existente, y esto se debería a que ello traería consecuencias perjudiciales para apoyar el respeto incondicional a la humanidad. Además, revisaré formas alternativas de entender la publicidad de las razones y esbozaré un trilema para la justificación moral de Korsgaard. (shrink)

El presente trabajo replantea la clásica dicotomía de teoría y praxis situada en el centro de la disputa entre el movimiento estudiantil alemán de protesta y Theodor W. Adorno. En un primer momento, se presenta una reconstrucción histórica enfocada en algunos episodios que caracterizan el clima de finales de la década del sesenta alemana, resaltando la figura mediadora del cineasta y escritor alemán Alexander Kluge. A partir de allí, se iluminan los cruces y las asociaciones antes que las posiciones dicotómicas (...) frente al hacer/no hacer: teoría, política y arte se plantean como mediaciones diferentes e interrelacionadas de la noción de crítica de las tres las posiciones. (shrink)

Los Māsilik al-abṣār de Ibn Faḍl Allāh al-'Umarī incluyen un breve resumen de la Historia de los omeyas de al-Andalus. En este trabajo se analizan las relaciones textuales entre ese pasaje y el Muqtabis de Ibn Ḥayyān, crónica que resulta ser la fuente casi única utilizada por al-'Umarī para redactar ese capítulo.

Jeremy Fix, in ‘Two Sorts of Constitutivism’ (2021), makes a case for the possibility of contingent essential properties to account for the metaphysical status of constitutive standards of things. In this brief note, I will present an open problem affecting Fix's conception, namely, the explanation of the membership of particulars to a genus, which is necessary to identify particulars subject to standards.

This article addresses some critical aspects of the relationship between aesthetic medicine (AM) and ethics and proposes a possible deontological ethical line to pursue based on current practices. The role of AM has always been controversial and suffers from unclear practical and moral boundaries, even within academic settings, since it aims to improve the appearance of individuals, not to cure a disease. Today, it is essential and pertinent to discuss these issues, as AM specialists are dealing with a growing and (...) increasingly demanding patient population that has undergone profound evolution in recent years. Current challenges within the field of AM include a lack of global uniformity concerning the education of AM specialists, an increasing number of physicians practicing AM with diverse training backgrounds, the spread of AM being practiced outside of medical practice or hospital settings, and the influence of social media where the success is modelled and dictated by the identification of a youthful appearance). By the field of action enriched by technologies that aim not only at enhancement per se but also at the preservation and regeneration of tissues, it is necessary to establish an active multidisciplinary discussion on the definition of shared ethical limits. This discussion would allow AM to fully reclaim its identity as a specialty that aims to improve patient well-being whilst maintaining respect for patient aesthetic harmony, the expertise of specialists who practice AM, the essential role of safety, and awareness of the importance of a confidential doctor−patient relationship. (shrink)

Prepared with the cooperation and assistance of Sara Timby, Stanford University Libraries, this edition contains papers that were still on C. I. Lewis' desk at the time of his death. Especially noteworthy is the fragment entitled "On Probability" in which Lewis directs his attention to the subject of past experiences, which, although now beyond recall, are regarded as having played a role in the fomation of our beliefs. Also included are notes on thought regarded as action, on the Kantian postulate (...) of the existence of God, and Lewis' own notion of conscious life as "repository of value.". (shrink)

Análisis historiográfico de las diferentes versiones conservadas en las crónicas árabes de un relato sobre la conquista de al-Andalus. Del estudio se desprende que el texto procede de la obra, hoy perdida, del cronista cordobés del siglo X Ahmad al Rāzī, de quien la tomaron —en unos casos de forma directa, en otros, a través de fuentes intermedias— numerosos autores, entre ellos, el compilador de los Ajbār maŷmū‛a. Esto aporta una prueba más de que esta crónica anónima y de datación (...) incierta no es otra cosa que una recopilación elaborada a partir de textos históricos anteriores y no fuente redactada con materiales historiográficos de primera mano, como algunos sostienen. El relato aquí analizado fue empleado también por autores cristianos y se halla reproducido en obras como la Crónica de 1344 y el De Rebus Hispanie de Jiménez de Rada. (shrink)

Gaston Bouthol founded a particular sociology known as polemology. Skeptical about the pacifism and critic of the juridical illusion of the international regulation of the peace-phenomenon, he studied the war-phenomenon without moralising prejudices. Polemology, that involves a critic of culture, is focused on the social function of war, known as the most important institution of destruction. The study of major wars enabled him to raise an hypothesis that foresees the periodicity of wars.

Este texto é uma tradução a partir do original em latim, com uma introdução e comentários, da Dissertação sobre o estilo filosófico de Nizólio, obra escrita em 1669 pelo jovem Leibniz. Nessa obra Leibniz se ocupa com o estilo que deve ter a exposição filosófica. A introdução tem duas partes: na primeira parte se examina o contexto da aparição daquela obra de Leibniz em uma época em que não há uma distinção clara entre os limites entre a Lógica, a Retórica (...) e a Dialética. Na segunda parte é feita uma exposição do conteúdo do texto de Leibniz. (shrink)

This article argues that the notion of a promissory right captures a central feature of the morality of promising which cannot be explained by the notion of promissory obligation alone: the fact that the promisee acquires a full range of control over the promisor’s obligation. It defends two main claims. First, it argues that promissory rights are distinctively grounded in our interest in controlling others’ deontic world. Second, it proposes a version of the ‘Interest Theory’ of rights that incorporates our (...) interest in purely deontic forms of control into the various human interests that constitute the grounds of our rights. (shrink)