The moral justification of intellectual property is often called into question when placed in the context of pharmaceutical patents and global health concerns. The theoretical accounts of both John Rawls and Robert Nozick provide an excellent ethical framework from which such questions can be clarified. While Nozick upholds an individuals right to intellectual property, based upon its conformation with Lockean notions of property and Nozicks ideas of just acquisition and transfer, Rawls emphasizes the importance of basic liberties, such as an (...) individuals right to health, superceding such secondary rights as intellectual property rights. From a policy perspective, patent protection for pharmaceutical products necessarily entails the balancing of corporate intellectual property interests and public interests in healthcare. The moral dilemma that occurs when these two interests clash is not easily resolved. Aside from corporate and public interests, the state maintains an interest in creating and preserving policies that regulate the moral dilemma itself. This paper analyzes the economic and ethical factors surrounding the production and distribution of the anti-HIV medication, AZT. Potential policy implications and recommendations are also discussed. (shrink)

The intellectual history of the last quarter of this century has been marked by the growing influence of Africana thought--an area of philosophy that focuses on issues raised by the struggle over ideas in African cultures and their hybrid forms in Europe, the Americas, and the Caribbean. Existentia Africana is an engaging and highly readable introduction to the field of Africana philosophy and will help to define this rapidly growing field. Lewis R. Gordon clearly explains Africana existential thought to (...) a general audience, covering a wide range of both classic and contemporary thinkers--from Douglass and DuBois to Fanon, Davis and Zack. (shrink)

The author argues for a theory of responsibility for outcomes of imposed risk, based on whether it was permissible to impose the risk. When one tries to apply this persuasive model of responsibility for outcomes of risk imposition to procreation, which is a risk imposing act, one finds that it doesn’t match one’s intuitions about responsibility for outcomes of procreative risk. This mismatch exposes a justificatory gap for procreativity, namely, that procreation cannot avail itself of the shared vulnerability to risks (...) and their constraints—to the balance one is forced to strike between one’s interest in being free to impose risks on others and one’s interest in being safe from harm resulting from the risk imposed by others—which serves to justify risk imposition, generally. Whereas most risk impositions involve trade-offs of liberty and security among people who share the vulnerabilities associated with the taking, imposing, or being constrained from imposing risks, procreation involves the introduction of people into that position of vulnerability in the first place. Thus, when one procreates, one imposes risks in the absence of the shared vulnerability that usually serves as a justification for risk imposition. Procreative risks may not be wrongfully imposed, but they aren’t permissibly imposed in a manner fully comparable to other permissibly imposed risks. This makes procreation a unique form of risk imposition, with unique implications for its justification and for one’s responsibility for its outcomes. This insight can help explain several puzzling procreative asymmetries. (shrink)

The ArgumentThe remarkable progress in modern genetic technology enables the identification of genes causing devastating diseases and thereby the development of tools for prenatal diagnosis and carrier detection. To implement the results of genetic research in traditional societies, where genetic diseases are more prevalent due to inbreeding, necessitates a culturally appropriate approach that also promotes traditional and societal values important to the relevant community. This paper presents our experience with implementing the results of modern genetic research among the traditional community (...) of the Negev Bedouin of Israel. Although the benefit of using those results for the prevention of genetic diseases seems obvious, successful implementation relies on a carefully designed educational program aimed at changing culturally related attitudes and perceptions. Such a program should attend to the needs of the community and be sensitive to its traditional values. (shrink)

This paper investigates connections between procreative ethics and the ethics of suicide and euthanasia. While there are good reasons for distinguishing between lives worth starting and lives worth continuing, I argue that those reasons provide no reason for denying that there is a relationship between procreative and end of life ethics. Regarding euthanasia/assisted suicide, we might think it too demanding to ask parents to help euthanize their terminally ill, suffering child, but had the parents not procreated, thereby exposing their child (...) to life's risks, their child wouldn't need euthanizing. If you need help killing yourself, shouldn't your parents, who got you into life in the first place – without your consent – help you out of it? Yet knowing that your parents would help you kill yourself may increase your desire to die. A conundrum. Regarding suicide, the fact that we are forced into life should bolster the right to suicide, even for reasons that others might find wanting. The ways in which we are brought into life have moral implications for the ways in which we are entitled to get out of it. (shrink)

Underpinning all the other branches of science, physics affects the way we live our lives, and ultimately how life itself functions. Recent scientific advances have led to dramatic reassessment of our understanding of the world around us, and made a significant impact on our lifestyle. In this book, leading international experts, including Nobel prize winners, explore the frontiers of modern physics, from the particles inside an atom to the stars that make up a galaxy, from nano-engineering and brain research to (...) high-speed data networks. Revealing how physics plays a vital role in what we see around us, this book will fascinate scientists of all disciplines, and anyone wanting to know more about the world of physics today. (shrink)

BackgroundVaccination against human papillomavirus (HPV) is a pivotal tool for preventing a significant cause of cervical cancer. One particular culturally recognized context associated with negative attitudes toward the HPV vaccine is the religiousness of parents. However, relatively speaking, there remains a scarcity of studies that have focused specifically on religious groups, especially non-Christian groups. PurposeTo better understand the basis for members of an ultra-Orthodox Jewish community to object to the HPV vaccine and how such objections can and cannot be reduced, (...) thereby improving cultural competence—namely, the cultural understanding and ethical addressing of HPV vaccination refusal. MethodsThis qualitative study conducted semi-structured interviews with ten Israeli ultra-Orthodox mothers who are opposed to administering the HPV vaccine to their daughters. The content analysis addressed these results and extracted the major issues arising from these particular interviews. ResultsFour main novel insights were found pertaining to the negative stance toward HPV vaccination among mothers in an ultra-Orthodox Jewish community: (a) lack of knowledge about the HPV vaccine is not part of the reasoning against it; (b) rabbinical authority might have a lesser influence than expected for the moderation of HPV vaccine refusal; (c) complicated viewpoints regarding childhood vaccination may be the larger non-moderating context for HPV vaccination refusal; and (d) cultural competence is important for the ability to change the negative attitudes toward HPV vaccination. ConclusionsThe study may improve cultural competence regarding HPV vaccination and contribute to decreasing objections to the HPV vaccine in ultra-Orthodox communities. (shrink)

Genocide in Rwanda, multiple murder at Denver or Dunblane, the gruesome activities of serial killers - what makes these great evils, and why do they occur? In addressing such questions this book, unusually, interconnects contemporary moral philosophy with recent work in New Testament scholarship. The conclusions to emerge are surprising. Gordon Graham argues that the inability of modernist thought to account satisfactorily for evil and its occurrence should not lead us to embrace an eclectic postmodernism, but to take seriously (...) some unfashionable pre-modern conceptions - Satan, demonic possession, spiritual powers, cosmic battles. Precisely because it strives to observe the high standards of clarity and rigour that are the hallmarks of philosophy in the analytical tradition, the book makes a powerful case for the rejection of humanism and naturalism, and for explaining the moral obligation to struggle against evil by reference to the New Testament's cosmic narrative. (shrink)

One of the most basic questions an ontology can address is: How many things, or substances, are there? A monist will say, ‘just one’. But there are different stripes of monism, and where the borders between these different views lie rests on the question, ‘To what does this “oneness” apply?’ Some monists apply ‘oneness’ to existence. Others apply ‘oneness’ to types. Determining whether a philosopher is a monist and deciphering what this is supposed to mean is no easy task, especially (...) when it comes to those writing in the early modern period because many philosophers of the sixteenth, seventeenth, and eighteenth centuries include God in their ontologies. InThe Principles,Anne Finch Conway offers an ontology that is often described as being both ‘vitalist’ and ‘monist’. I take this to mean that, for Conway, all that exists is in some way alive and that if asked ‘How many things, or substances, are there?’ Conway would say, ‘Just one’. But to what does this ‘oneness’ apply? And where does the point of disagreement between Conway and her interlocutors, Hobbes, Spinoza, More, and Descartes lie? In this paper, I argue that determining the answer to this first question turns out to be quite difficult. Nevertheless, we can still make sense of the second. (shrink)

Having children is probably as old as the first successful organism. It is often done thoughtlessly. This book is an argument for giving procreating some serious thought, and a theory of how, when, and why procreation may be permissible.Rivka Weinberg begins with an analysis of the kind of act procreativity is and why we might be justifiably motivated to engage in it. She then proceeds to argue that, by virtue of our ownership and control of the hazardous material that (...) is our gametes, we are parentally responsible for the risks we take with our gametes and for the persons that develop when we engage in activity that allows our gametes to unite with others and develop into persons. Further argument establishes that when done respectfully, and in cases where the child's chances of leading a life of human flourishing are high, procreation may be permissible. Along the way, Weinberg argues that the non-identity problem is a curiously common mistake. Arguments intending to show that procreation is impermissible because life is bad for people and imposed on them without their consent are shown to have serious flaws. Yet because they leave us with lingering concerns, Weinberg argues that although procreation is permissible under certain conditions, it is not only a welfare risk but also a moral risk. Still, it is a risk that is often permissible for us to take and impose, given our high level of legitimate interest in procreativity. In order to ascertain when the procreative risk is permissible to impose, contractualist principles are proposed to fairly attend to the interests prospective parents have in procreating and the interests future people have in a life of human flourishing. The principles are assessed on their own merits and in comparison with rival principles. They are then applied to a wide variety of procreative cases. (shrink)

In order to make sense of Scotus’s claim that rationality is perfected only by the will, a Scotistic doctrine of truth is developed in a speculative way. It is claimed that synthetic a priori truths are truths of the will, which are existential truths. This insight holds profound theological implications and is used on the one hand to criticize Kant's conception of existence, and on the other hand, to offer another explanation of the sense according to which the existence of (...) things is grasped. (shrink)

Teleological theories of reason and value, upon which all reasons are fundamentally reasons to realize states of affairs that are in some respect best, cannot account for the intuition that victims in non-identity cases have been wronged. Many philosophers, however, reject such theories in favor of alternatives that recognize fundamentally non-teleological reasons, second-personal reasons that reflect a moral significance each person has that is not grounded in the teleologist’s appeal to outcomes. Such deontological accounts appear to be better positioned to (...) identify the wrong committed against non-identity victims because a person wrongs another on such accounts if she violates his second-personal claims -- overall benefit to victims presents no obstacle to the identification of second-personal wrongdoing. Derek Parfit argues that non-identity is a problem for these deontological theories as well because the alleged victims are properly understood as consenting to the action in question, thereby waiving any such second-personal claim. But his arguments misrepresent the role of consent on such theories by articulating it through appeal to the very teleological theory of reasons that their advocates dismiss as inadequate. Properly understood, Parfit’s appeal to consent understood as retroactive endorsement only provides the answer on such deontological accounts to the question of whether, given that the non-identity victim is second-personally wronged, he is nonetheless better off existing. Indeed, it becomes clear that it is teleological theories for which non-identity poses a particular problem: they cannot -- while their deontological counterparts can – account for the intuition that non-identity victims have been wronged. (shrink)

In this paper we show how a realistic normative democratic theory can work within the constraints set by the most pessimistic empirical results about voting behaviour and elite capture of the policy process. After setting out the empirical evidence and discussing some extant responses by political theorists, we argue that the evidence produces a two-pronged challenge for democracy: an epistemic challenge concerning the quality and focus of decision-making and an oligarchic challenge concerning power concentration. To address the challenges we then (...) put forward three main normative claims, each of which is compatible with the evidence. We start with a critique of the epistocratic position commonly thought to be supported by the evidence. We then introduce a qualified critique of referenda and other forms of plebiscite, and an outline of a tribune-based system of popular control over oligarchic influence on the policy process. Our discussion points towards a renewal of democracy in a plebeian but not plebiscitarian direction: Attention to the relative power of social classes matters more than formal dispersal of power through voting. We close with some methodological reflections about the compatibility between our normative claims and the realist program in political philosophy. (shrink)

Sperm donation is a widely accepted and increasingly common practice. In the standard case, a sperm donor sells sperm to an agency, waives his parental rights, and is absolved of parental responsibility. We tend to assume that this involves no problematic abandonment of parental responsibility. If we regard the donor as having parental responsibilities at all, we may think that his parental responsibilities are transferred to the sperm recipients. But, if a man creates a child accidentally, via contraception failure, we (...) tend to assume that the man does indeed have parental responsibilities. Assessing these contrasting conclusions requires a theory of parental responsibility. I analyze prevalent theories of what makes someone parentally responsible and show that none of these theories can withstand scrutiny. I propose a new theory of parental responsibility, which, I argue, is more plausible than the alternatives. My theory of parental responsibility is based on our ownership and control over hazardous materials, namely, our gametes. I show that neither my theory, nor the theories I reject, can support our contrasting intuitions. I conclude that sperm donors are fathers, with parental responsibility. I argue that the alternative conclusion, that neither sperm donors nor accidental fathers are parentally responsible for their resulting offspring, is less plausible. I then consider whether parental responsibility can be transferred and argue that it is far from clear that it can. Finally, I address objections and consider some practical implications of these views. (shrink)

Philosophers concerned with procreative ethics have long been puzzled by Parfit’s Non-Identity Problem (NIP). Various solutions have been proposed, but I argue that we have not solved the problem on its own narrow person-affecting terms, i.e., in terms of the identified individuals affected by procreative decisions and acts, especially future children. Thus, the core problem remains unsolved. This is a nagging concern for all who hold the common intuition that actions that harm no one are permissible. I argue against Harmon’s (...) and Woodward’s direct, narrow person-affecting solutions, and in favor of a new solution to the NIP. My solution, or, rather, dissolution, is based on the argument that merely possible people, i.e., hypothetical people who could possibly, but will not actually, exist, are morally irrelevant. I show that the NIP only arises when we concern ourselves with merely possible people. Once we are careful to restrict our concerns to only those that do or will exist, the NIP is dissolved. (shrink)

Kant's Religion within the Boundaries of Mere Reason was written late in his career. It presents a theory of 'radical evil' in human nature, touches on the issue of divine grace, develops a Christology, and takes a seemingly strong interest in the issue of scriptural interpretation. The essays in this Critical Guide explore the reasons why this is so, and offer careful and illuminating interpretations of the themes of the work. The relationship of Kant's Religion to his other writings is (...) discussed in ways that underscore the importance of this work for the entire critical philosophy, and provide a broad perspective on his moral thought; connections are also drawn between religion, history, and politics in Kant's later thinking. Together the essays offer a rich exploration of the work which will be of great interest to those involved in Kant studies and the philosophy of religion. (shrink)

ABSTRACT This essay is a critical study of Jason Brennan's Against Democracy. We make three main points. First, we argue that Brennan's proposal of a right to competent government only works if one considers the absence of government a viable proposition, something most of his opponents are not prepared to do. Second, we suggest that Brennan's account of competent decision-making is blind to forms of oligarchic power that work against the very ideals of justice and epistemic virtue that competence is (...) meant to safeguard. Third, we muster empirical evidence to argue that, in the real world, democracy is not just about making decisions and selecting policies, in which case Brennan's argument misses its mark. (shrink)

Four years after the Panama Papers scandal, tax avoidance remains an urgent moral-political problem. Moving beyond both the academic and policy mainstream, I advocate the “democratization of tax enforcement,” by which I mean systematic efforts to make tax avoiders accountable to the judgment of ordinary citizens. Both individual oligarchs and multinational corporations have access to sophisticated tax avoidance strategies that impose significant fiscal costs on democracies and exacerbate preexisting distributive and political inequalities. Yet much contemporary tax sheltering occurs within the (...) letter of the law, rendering criminal sanctions ineffective. In response, I argue for the creation of Citizen Tax Juries, deliberative minipublics empowered to scrutinize tax avoiders, demand accountability, and facilitate concrete reforms. This proposal thus responds to the wider aspiration, within contemporary democratic theory, to secure more popular control over essential economic processes. (shrink)

v. 1, pt. 1. The essays -- v. 1, pt. 2. Exigesis, 1-184.

Life is pointless. That’s not okay. I show that. I argue that a point is a valued end and that, as agents, it makes sense for us to want our efforts and enterprises to have a point. Valued ends provide justifying reasons for our acts, efforts, and projects. I further argue that ends lie separate from the acts and enterprises for which they provide a point. Since there can be no end external to one’s entire life since one’s life includes (...) all of one’s ends, leading and living one’s life as a whole cannot have a point. Finally, I argue that since we live our lives and structure our living­a­human­life efforts both in parts and as a whole, it is fitting to be sad to recognize that leading and living a life is pointless. My discussion helps make sense of the literature that frequently talks around this topic but often does so vaguely and indirectly. (shrink)

Was Descartes a Cartesian Dualist? In this controversial study, Gordon Baker and Katherine J. Morris argue that, despite the general consensus within philosophy, Descartes was neither a proponent of dualism nor guilty of the many crimes of which he has been accused by twentieth century philosophers. In lively and engaging prose, Baker and Morris present a radical revision of the ways in which Descartes' work has been interpreted. Descartes emerges with both his historical importance assured and his philosophical importance (...) redeemed. (shrink)

This essay identifies ‘oligarchic harm’ as a dire threat confronting contemporary democracies. I provide a formal standard for classifying oligarchs: those who use personal access to concentrated wealth to pursue harmful forms of discretionary influence. I then use Aristotle to think through both the moral and the epistemic dilemmas of oligarchic harm, highlighting Aristotle’s concerns about the difficulties of using wealth as a ‘proxy’ for virtue. While Aristotle’s thought provides great resources for diagnosing oligarchic threats, it proves less useful as (...) a guide to democratic institutional design. Aristotle raises a deep-seated objection to democratic forms of ‘rule by the poor.’ A successful response to oligarchy must move beyond Aristotle’s objection and affirm the demos’ tripartite status as many, free, and poor. I briefly outline the terms of this ‘new’ mixed regime: one that seeks to tame oligarchy through a mixture of aggregative, deliberative, and plebeian institutions. (shrink)

Gordon Belot investigates the distinctive notion of geometric possibility that relationalists rely upon. He examines the prospects for adapting to the geometric case the standard philosophical accounts of the related notion of physical possibility, with particular emphasis on Humean, primitivist, and necessitarian accounts of physical and geometric possibility. This contribution to the debate concerning the nature of space will be of interest not only to philosophers and metaphysicians concerned with space and time, but also to those interested in laws (...) of nature, modal notions, or more general issues in ontology. (shrink)

Understanding in Epistemology Epistemology is often defined as the theory of knowledge, and talk of propositional knowledge has dominated the bulk of modern literature in epistemology. However, epistemologists have recently started to turn more attention to the epistemic state or states of understanding, asking questions about its nature, relationship … Continue reading Understanding in Epistemology →.

Life stinks. Mel Brooks knew it, David Benatar knows it,1 and so do I. Even when life does not stink so badly, there’s always the chance that it will begin to do so. Nonexistence, on the other hand, is odor free. Whereas being brought into existence can be harmful, or at least bad, nonexistence cannot be harmful or bad. Even if life is not clearly bad, it is at the very least extremely risky. David Benatar argues, somewhat notoriously, that since (...) it is better never to exist, one is harmed by being brought into existence and, therefore, procreation is likely always wrong and certainly always morally problematic. (shrink)

One might think that parental obligation to children ends with the end of childhood. I argue that if we consider why parents are obligated to their children, we will see that this view is false. Creating children exposes them to life’s risks. When we expose others to risks, we are often obligated to minimize damages and compensate for harms. Life’s risks last a lifetime, therefore parental obligation to one’s children does too. Grown children’s autonomy, and grown children’s independent responsibility for (...) some of their own problems, can sometimes limit what parental responsibility demands of parents but it doesn’t do away with the responsibility. I argue that my conclusions are not as counterintuitive as they might initially seem. I also consider the implications that parental obligation to grown children might have on the oft assumed obligation that grown children have to care for their parents. (shrink)

This article tackles the issue of offshore tax sheltering from the perspective of normative political realism. Tax sheltering is a pressing contemporary policy challenge, with hundreds of billions in private assets protected in offshore trusts and shell companies. Indeed, tax sheltering produces a variety of empirical dilemmas that render it a distinctive challenge for global governance. Therefore, it is crucial for normative political theorists to confront this problem. A realist approach offers three distinct advantages, elaborated in the three subsequent sections (...) of the article. First, it relaxes the theoretical burden by starting from the real practice of tax evasion rather than from an abstract theory of equality or justice. Second, this approach recognizes that sheltering is a political harm: a threat to the very maintenance of order, not just a problem of inequality or injustice. If politicians fail at such polity maintenance, realism's ethic of responsibility provides clear political reasons why they should be held accountable. Third, realism's focus on power and its acceptance of coercion open up new strategies for addressing the problem that would not be allowed by theories with a stronger emphasis on consensus. (shrink)

Under so-called primitive ontology approaches, in fully describing the history of a quantum system, one thereby attributes interesting properties to regions of spacetime. Primitive ontology approaches, which include some varieties of Bohmian mechanics and spontaneous collapse theories, are interesting in part because they hold out the hope that it should not be too difficult to make a connection between models of quantum mechanics and descriptions of histories of ordinary macroscopic bodies. But such approaches are dualistic, positing a quantum state as (...) well as ordinary material degrees of freedom. This paper lays out and compares some options that primitive ontologists have for making sense of the quantum state. (shrink)

The ArgumentIn this paper, I argue that the most significant contribution of the Jesuits to early modern science consists in the introduction of a new “image of knowledge.”In contradistinction to traditional Scholasticism, this image of knowledge allows for the possibility of a science of hypothetical entities.This problem became crucial in two specific areas. In astronomy, knowledge of mathematical entities of unclear ontological status was nevertheless proclaimed certain. In theology, God's knowledge of the future acts of man, logically considered as future (...) contingents, was also proclaimed certain. In both cases the concept of certain knowledge of hypothetical entities was problematic and challenged a central premise of the accepted canons of logic, i.e., that the objects of true knowledge must be real objects.The main argument of this paper is that the practical orientation of the Jesuit cultural milieu enabled Jesuit scientists and theologians to ignore accepted logical considerations and to modify traditional Thomist images of knowledge. Nevertheless, this modification was not so radical as to change the contemporary organization of knowledge. This was due to the peculiar status of the Jesuits within the church establishment, which exposed them to harsh criticism and created a deep need for legitimation. Thus, the limitations of Jesuit scientific culture are accounted for in institutional, rather than in logical terms. (shrink)