In «Naturalized Epistemology and the Law of Evidence Revisited», the original target article for the various refutations that I comment on here, I revisited through a slightly different lens the subject of the article that I coauthored with Brian Leiter close to twenty years ago. That article has prompted four responses from Professors Pardo, Spellman, Muffato, and Enoch. Professors Pardo and Spellman basically accept the implications of the original article and offer useful but friendly amendments. Prof. Muffato apparently does not (...) want to dispute over my ground and so changes the subject, and in doing so offers a number of interesting points. Only the fourth, Prof. Enoch, has the same doubts about the utility of my original article as I do of the genre that gave rise to it. I can thus be quite brief in discussing professors Pardo, Spellman, and Muffato, but it will take bit more effort to lay out the limits of Prof. Enoch’s analysis. (shrink)

Politics in America are polarized and trivialized, perhaps as never before. In Congress, the media, and academic debate, opponents from right and left, the Red and the Blue, struggle against one another as if politics were contact sports played to the shouts of cheerleaders. The result, Ronald Dworkin writes, is a deeply depressing political culture, as ill equipped for the perennial challenge of achieving social justice as for the emerging threats of terrorism. Can the hope for change be realized? (...) Dworkin, one the world's leading legal and political philosophers, identifies and defends core principles of personal and political morality that all citizens can share. He shows that recognizing such shared principles can make substantial political argument possible and help replace contempt with mutual respect. Only then can the full promise of democracy be realized in America and elsewhere. Dworkin lays out two core principles that citizens should share: first, that each human life is intrinsically and equally valuable and, second, that each person has an inalienable personal responsibility for identifying and realizing value in his or her own life. He then shows what fidelity to these principles would mean for human rights, the place of religion in public life, economic justice, and the character and value of democracy. Dworkin argues that liberal conclusions flow most naturally from these principles. Properly understood, they collide with the ambitions of religious conservatives, contemporary American tax and social policy, and much of the War on Terror. But his more basic aim is to convince Americans of all political stripes--as well as citizens of other nations with similar cultures--that they can and must defend their own convictions through their own interpretations of these shared values. (shrink)

We revisit Naturalized Epistemology and the Law of Evidence, published twenty years ago. The evolution of the relative plausibility theory of juridical proof is offered as evidence of the advantage of a naturalized approach to the study of the field and law evidence. Various alternative explanations of aspects of juridical proof from other disciplines are examined and their shortcomings described. These competing explanations are similar in their reductive, a priori approaches that are at odds with an empirically oriented naturalized approach. (...) The shortcomings of the various a priori approaches are driven by their common methodological commitments to employing weird hypotheticals to engage in intuition mining about the American legal systems that in turn ignore important aspects of the actual legal systems and consistently make impossible epistemological demands. As a result, both their descriptions of and prescriptions for American legal systems are implausible, unlike the relative plausibility theory. (shrink)

The underlying thesis of the research in ethical autonomy for lethal autonomous unmanned systems is that they will potentially be capable of performing more ethically on the battlefield than are human soldiers. In this article this hypothesis is supported by ongoing and foreseen technological advances and perhaps equally important by an assessment of the fundamental ability of human warfighters in today's battlespace. If this goal of better-than-human performance is achieved, even if still imperfect, it can result in a reduction in (...) noncombatant casualties and property damage consistent with adherence to the Laws of War as prescribed in international treaties and conventions, and is thus worth pursuing vigorously. (shrink)

Diane Vaughan’s analysis of the causes of the Challenger accident suggests ways to apply science and technology studies to the teaching of engineering ethics. By sensitizing future engineers to the ongoing construction of risk during mundane engineering practice, we can better prepare them to address issues of public health, safety, and welfare before they require heroic intervention. Understanding the importance of precedents, incremental change, and fallible engineering judgment in engineering design may help them anticipate potential threats to public safety arising (...) from routine aspects of workplace culture. We suggest modifications of both detailed case studies on engineering disasters and hypothetical, ethical dilemmas employed in engineering ethics classes. Investigating the sociotechnical aspects of engineering practice can improve the initial recognition of ethical problems in real-world settings and provide an understanding of the role of workplace organization and culture in facilitating or impeding remedial action. (shrink)

Machine generated contents note: Preface; 1. Introduction; 2. The value of species; 3. The conservation biology dilemma; 4. Assisted colonization; 5. Shifting goals and changing strategies; 6. The (in)significance of species boundaries; 7. Homo sapiens in particular; 8. Artifactual species; 9. Conclusion.

Religious atheism? -- The universe -- Religious freedom -- Death and immortality.

Over the centuries, magicians have developed extensive knowledge about the manipulation of the human mind—knowledge that has been largely ignored by psychology. It has recently been argued that this knowledge could help improve our understanding of human cognition and consciousness. But how might this be done? And how much could it ultimately contribute to the exploration of the human mind? We propose here a framework outlining how knowledge about magic can be used to help us understand the human mind. Various (...) approaches—both old and new—are surveyed, in terms of four different levels. The first focuses on the methods in magic, using these to suggest new approaches to existing issues in psychology. The second focuses on the effects that magic can produce, such as the sense of wonder induced by seeing an apparently impossible event. Third is the consideration of magic tricks—methods and effects together—as phenomena of scientific interest in their own right. Finally, there is the organization of knowledge about magic into an informative whole, including the possibility of a science centered around the experience of wonder. (shrink)

We show that early vision can use monocular cues to rapidly complete partially-occluded objects. Visual search for easily detected fragments becomes difficult when the completed shape is similar to others in the display; conversely, search for fragments that are difficult to detect becomes easy when the completed shape is distinctive. Results indicate that completion occurs via the occlusion-triggered removal of occlusion edges and linking of associated regions. We fail to find evidence for a visible filling-in of contours or surfaces, but (...) do find evidence for a "functional" filling-in that prevents the constituent fragments from being rapidly accessed. As such, it is only the completed structures—and not the fragments themselves—that serve as the basis for rapid recognition. (shrink)

It is suggested that the relationship between visual attention and conscious visual experience can be simplified by distinguishing different aspects of both visual attention and visual experience. A set of principles is first proposed for any possible taxonomy of the processes involved in visual attention. A particular taxonomy is then put forward that describes five such processes, each with a distinct function and characteristic mode of operation. Based on these, three separate kinds—or possibly grades—of conscious visual experience can be distinguished, (...) each associated with a particular combination of attentional processes. (shrink)

Our visual experience of the world is one of diverse objects and events, each with particular colors, shapes, and motions. This experience is so coherent, so immediate, and so effortless that it seems to result from a single system that lets us experience everything in our field of view. But however appealing, this belief is mistaken: there are severe limits on what can be visually experienced. -/- For example, in a display for air-traffic control it is important to track all (...) moving items. For a single item, this can be done without problem. Three or four can also be tracked, although some degree of effort may be needed. As the number is increased further, accurate tracking becomes more and more difficult—and eventually, impossible. Performance is evidently affected by a factor within the observer which enables certain kinds of perception to occur, but is limited in some way. This factor is generally referred to as attention. -/- At various times, attention has been associated with clarity of perception, intensity of perception, consciousness, selection, or the allocation of a limited “resource” enabling various operations (see Hatfield, 1998). During the past several decades, considerable progress has been achieved by focusing on the idea of selection (Broadbent, 1982). In particular, attention can be productively viewed as contingently selective processing. This can be embodied in various ways by various processes—there need not be a single quantity identified with all forms of attention, or a single site where it operates (Allport, 1993; Tsotsos, 2011). Although “paying attention” is often considered to be a unitary operation, it may simply refer to the control of one or more selective processes, ideally in a co-ordinated way. While this view has some cost in terms of conceptual simplicity, it can help make sense of a large set of phenomena. -/- This article surveys several of the major issues in our understanding of attention and how it relates to perception. It focuses on vision, since many—if not all—considerations are similar for all sensory modalities, and the level of understanding achieved in this domain is currently the most advanced. (shrink)

Secularization has accelerated. From 1981 to 2007, most countries became more religious, but from 2007 to 2020, the overwhelming majority became less religious. For centuries, all major religions encouraged norms that limit women to producing as many children as possible and discourage any sexual behavior not linked with reproduction. These norms were needed when facing high infant mortality and low life expectancy but require suppressing strong drives, and are rapidly eroding. These norms are so strongly linked with religion that abandoning (...) them undermines religiosity. Religion became pervasive because it was conducive to survival, encouraged sharing when there was no social security system, and it is conducive to mental health and coping with insecure conditions. People need coherent belief systems, but religion is declining. What comes next? The Nordic countries have consistently been at the cutting edge of cultural change. Protestantism left an enduring imprint, but the 20th Century welfare added universal health coverage, high levels of state support for education, welfare spending, child care, pensions and an ethos of social solidarity. These countries are also characterized by rapidly declining religiosity. Does this portend corruption and nihilism? Apparently not. These countries lead the world on numerous indicators of a well-functioning society, including economic equality, gender equality, low homicide rates, subjective well-being, environmental protection and democracy. They have become less religious, but their people have high levels of interpersonal trust, tolerance, honesty, social solidarity and commitment to democratic norms. The decline of religiosity has far-reaching implications. This book explores what comes next. (shrink)

Disturbed by these acrimonious arguments, the authors - former colleagues and university-press board members - embarked on an ambitious project to reexamine a number of major literary and philosophical works dealing with the liberal arts and education. With their discussions ranging from Plato to Rousseau, from Cicero to Vico, from Erasmus to Matthew Arnold, Sousa and Weinsheimer offer not a history of education philosophy but an examination of the present.

The field of neuroaesthetics attempts to identify the brain processes underlying aesthetic experience, including but not limited to beauty. Previous neuroaesthetic studies have focussed largely on paintings and music, while performing arts such as dance have been less studied. Nevertheless, increasing knowledge of the neural mechanisms that represent the bodies and actions of others, and which contribute to empathy, make a neuroaesthetics of dance timely. Here, we present the first neuroscientific study of aesthetic perception in the context of the performing (...) arts. We investigated brain areas whose activity during passive viewing of dance stimuli was related to later, independent aesthetic evaluation of the same stimuli. Brain activity of six naïve male subjects was measured using fMRI, while they watched 24 dance movements, and performed an irrelevant task. In a later session, participants rated each movement along a set of established aesthetic dimensions. The ratings were used to identify brain regions that were more active when viewing moves that received high average ratings than moves that received low average ratings. This contrast revealed bilateral activity in the occipital cortices and in right premotor cortex. Our results suggest a possible role of visual and sensorimotor brain areas in an automatic aesthetic response to dance. This sensorimotor response may explain why dance is widely appreciated in so many human cultures. (shrink)

This article discusses relations among the multiple levels of analysis present in macro-sociological explanation—i.e., relations of individual, structural, and institutional processes. It also criticizes the doctrinal insistence upon single-level individualistic explanation found in some prominent contemporary sociological theory. For illustrative material the article returns to intellectual uses of Weber's "Protestant Ethic thesis," showing how an artificial version has been employed as a kind of proof text for the alleged scientific necessity of individualist explanation. Our alternative exposition renders the discussion of (...) Protestantism and capitalism in an explicitly multilevel way, distinguishing possible individual-level, social-organizational, and institutional linkages. The causal processes involved are distinct ones, with the more structural and institutional forms neither captured nor attainable by individual-level thinking. We argue more generally that "methodological individualisms" confuse issues of explanation with issues about microfoundations. This persistent intellectual conflation may be rooted in the broader folk models of liberal individualism. (shrink)

Despite both positive and negative perceptions of the current state of higher education, the contemporary debate over what it is to be a university is limited. Most of all, it is limited imaginatively. The range of imagined options is narrow. The imagination has not been given anything even approaching a wide scope. As a result, our sense as to what a university could be and could become in the modern age is itself impoverished. If we are seriously to develop a (...) wide range of ideas of the university that is adequate to the challenges of the modern world, the imagination itself needs to be freed. Imagining the University seeks to address each of these sets of issues and will do so by first, identifying a very wide range of ideas of the university as it is now unfolding and could become; secondly, by evaluating those conceptions of the university with a classification of ideas of the university; and thirdly, by reflecting on the imagination itself, its current impoverishment and its possibilities. Whether studying, researching or deciding policy, this book is vital reading to all those involved in the planning and delivery of higher education. (shrink)

Environmental ethics is the study of the ethical relationships between human beings and the natural environment, including the nonhuman individuals that populate and constitute it. It involves developing a proper understanding of the human–nature relationship, identifying the goods and values that are part of or emerge from that relationship, determining the norms that those goods and values justify, and applying those norms to generate guidance on environmental issues and interactions. Environmental virtue ethics is that part of environmental ethics that concerns (...) character. The core questions of environmental virtue ethics are these:. (shrink)

In this paper I explore the extent to which a perspectival understanding of scientific knowledge supports forms of “scientific pluralism.” I will not initially attempt to formulate a general characterization of either perspectivism or scientific pluralism. I assume only that both are opposed to two extreme views. The one extreme is a (monistic) metaphysical realism according to which there is in principle one true and complete theory of everything. The other extreme is a constructivist relativism according to which scientific claims (...) about any reality beyond that of ordinary experience are merely social conventions. (shrink)

Traditionally, vision science and information/data visualization have interacted by using knowledge of human vision to help design effective displays. It is argued here, however, that this interaction can also go in the opposite direction: the investigation of successful visualizations can lead to the discovery of interesting new issues and phenomena in visual perception. Various studies are reviewed showing how this has been done for two areas of visualization, namely, graphical representations and interaction, which lend themselves to work on visual processing (...) and the control of visual operations, respectively. The results of these studies have provided new insights into aspects of vision such as grouping, attentional selection and the sequencing of visual operations. More generally yet, such results support the view that the perception of visualizations can be a useful domain for exploring the nature of visual cognition, inspiring new kinds of questions as well as casting new light on the limits to which information can be conveyed visually. (shrink)

In this essay I argue that T. S. Kuhn, at least in his later works, can be regarded as a perspectival realist. This is a retrospective interpretation based mainly on the essays published posthumously under the title The Road Since Structure (Kuhn 2000). Among the strongest grounds for this interpretation is that Kuhn explicitly states that one must have a “lexicon” in place before raising questions about the truth or falsity of claims made using elements of the lexicon. This, in (...) a linguistic framework, can be understood as an affirmation of perspectival realism. The essay concludes with an examination of Donald Davidson’s famous paper, “On The Very Idea of a Conceptual Scheme,” arguing, along lines Kuhn himself suggested, that Davidson’s presentation is no threat to his notion of a conceptual scheme, or, I would add, a theoretical perspective. (shrink)

The past three decades have witnessed a sharp reduction in the rate of growth of public research funding, and sometimes an actual decline in its level. In many countries, this decline has been accompanied by substantial changes in the ways that such funding has been allocated and monitored. In addition, the institutions governing how research is directed and conducted underwent significant reforms. In this paper we examine how these changes have affected scientists’ research goals and practices by comparing the development (...) of three scientific innovations in four European countries, namely Germany, the Netherlands, Switzerland, and Sweden. We find that the increased number of actors exercising authority over research goals does not necessarily lead to a greater diversity of interests funding research. A narrowing of goals and frameworks is especially probable when the increasing importance of external project funding is combined with reductions in state financing of universities and public research institutes. Finally, the growing standardisation of project cycle times and resource packages across funding agencies and scientific communities make it more difficult for researchers to pursue projects that deviate from these norms, especially, if they challenge mainstream beliefs and assessment criteria. (shrink)

Synthetic biology makes use of genetic and other materials derived from modern biological life forms to design and construct novel synthetic organisms. Artificial organisms are not constructed from parts of existing biological organisms, but from non-biological materials. Artificial and synthetic organisms are artefactual organisms. Here we are concerned with the non-instrumental value of such organisms. More specifically, we are concerned with the extent to which artefactual organisms have natural value, inherent worth and intrinsic value. Our conclusions are largely supportive of (...) the value of artefactual organisms. However, they do not constitute a comprehensive ethical evaluation of them. (shrink)

All these specialist aspects of one life are different facets of the intellectual diamond which scintillates in the huge quarry of The Bertrand Russell Archives at McMaster University, Hamilton, Ontario. This is the quintessential man, the bundle of contradictions passionately dedicated to intellect, at times carrying the rational argument to irrational extremes; the natural-born emotional adventurer forever hampered by orphaned youth and too-early marriage. This Russell in the round is greater than the sum of his constituent parts, a man of (...) epic proportions, struggling through a lifetime beset with frustration and near-disaster; in youth the constitutional sceptic, in old age the sometimes splendid figure with "courage never to submit or yield.". (shrink)

This paper is a contribution to that part of science studies known as 'the cognitive study of science'. The general goal of such studies is to understand cogni-.

Adopting the stage metaphor suggested in Brown’s review, and treating Scientific perspectivism as a play in five acts, I respond to his review as a playwright might respond to a generally favorable review. Taking the reader behind the stage door, I discuss the playwright’s intentions for each act, paying special attention to the expected audience for the play as a whole. The result, therefore, supplements the review from the standpoint of the playwright. It also provides answers to some of the (...) reviewer’s questions.Keywords: Matthew Brown; Scientific perspectivism. (shrink)

We describe some of the ways that the field of content analysis is being transformed in an Era of Big Data. We argue that content analysis, from its beginning, has been concerned with extracting the main meanings of a text and mapping those meanings onto the space of a textual corpus. In contrast, we suggest that the emergence of new styles of text mining tools is creating an opportunity to develop a different kind of content analysis that we describe as (...) a computational hermeneutics. Here the goal is to go beyond a mapping of the main meaning of a text to mimic the kinds of questions and concerns that have traditionally been the focus of a hermeneutically grounded close reading, a reading that focuses on what Kenneth Burke described as the poetic meanings of a text. We illustrate this approach by referring to our own work concerning the rhetorical character of US National Security Strategy documents. (shrink)

Many scholars believe “On a New List of Categories” is a metaphysical or transcendental deduction. The present essay will argue that Peirce derives the categories by induction and validates their order by prescision. Then the article shall solicit aid from Peirce’s early and later writings to explain how the new way to list the categories can serve as a genealogy of signification: how the different types of term, proposition, and argument emerge in the process of reasoning as the different types (...) of signs. Thus, the genealogy of signification would then qualify as a phenomenology of logic as a science of semiotics. Such a science of semiotics will have three types of comparison corresponding to the sign-relation in illation: namely, uniparance, diaparance, and comparance. Then the three types of comparison will occasion three types of relative in different types of propositions: namely, concurrents, disquiparants, and equiparants. Finally, the three types of relative will occasion the different types of sign corresponding to the different types of term: namely, icons, indices, and symbols. With this classification, there is then an explanation of how the process of reasoning is a semiotic process with three forms of valid argument: namely, hypothesis, induction, and deduction. (shrink)

The part that the university plays is increasingly of external and economic value, ignoring the importance of the value of knowledge in itself. By analyzing the university's current relationship with knowledge, this book tackles the problem head-on. It considers how the concept of knowledge can be reclaimed in an era of post truth and alternative fact, provides conceptual tools for people to think and debate about knowledge and education in new ways and offers a clear focus for the future development (...) of academia. This fascinating book is recommended reading to anyone engaged with the idea of rethinking universities in the 21st century. (shrink)

Somatic cell gene therapy has yielded promising results. If germ cell gene therapy can be developed, the promise is even greater: hundreds of genetic diseases might be virtually eliminated. But some claim the procedure is morally unacceptable. We thoroughly and sympathetically examine several possible reasons for this claim but find them inadequate. There is no moral reason, then, not to develop and employ germ-line gene therapy. Taking the offensive, we argue next that medicine has a prima facie moral obligation to (...) do so. (shrink)

The process of obtaining informed consent continues to be a contentious issue in clinical and public health research carried out in resource-limited settings. We sought to evaluate this process among human research participants in randomly selected active research studies approved by the School of Medicine Research and Ethics Committee at the College of Health Sciences, Makerere University.

Understanding the University constitutes the final volume in a trilogy - the first two books having been Being a University (2010) and Imagining the University (2012) - and represents the trilogy's ultimate aims and endeavours. The three volumes together offer a unique attempt at a fairly systematic and exhaustive level to map out just what it might be seriously to understand the extraordinarily complex entity that is known across the world as 'the university'. Through examination of the conditions and possibilities (...) underlying and affecting universities, this work offers an understanding of specific ideas of the university which can inform policies, strategies and practices in relation to the university. This book is a must read for leaders and senior managers in universities, as well as those undertaking postgraduate studies in the policy and practice of higher education. (shrink)

For scatterplots with gaussian distributions of dots, the perception of Pearson correlation r can be described by two simple laws: a linear one for discrimination, and a logarithmic one for perceived magnitude (Rensink & Baldridge, 2010). The underlying perceptual mechanisms, however, remain poorly understood. To cast light on these, four different distributions of datapoints were examined. The first had 100 points with equal variance in both dimensions. Consistent with earlier results, just noticeable difference (JND) was a linear function of the (...) distance away from r = 1, and the magnitude of perceived correlation a logarithmic function of this quantity. In addition, these laws were linked, with the intercept of the JND line being the inverse of the bias in perceived magnitude. Three other conditions were also examined: a dot cloud with 25 points, a horizontal compression of the cloud, and a cloud with a uniform distribution of dots. Performance was found to be similar in all conditions. The generality and form of these laws suggest that what underlies correlation perception is not a geometric structure such as the shape of the dot cloud, but the shape of the probability distribution of the dots, likely inferred via a form of ensemble coding. It is suggested that this reflects the ability of observers to perceive the information entropy in an image, with this quantity used as a proxy for Pearson correlation. (shrink)

Scientific realism is a doctrine that was both in and out of fashion several times during the twentieth century. I begin by noting three presuppositions of a succinct characterization of scientific realism offered initially by the foremost critic in the latter part of the century, Bas van Fraassen. The first presupposition is that there is a fundamental distinction to be made between what is “empirical” and what is “theoretical”. The second presupposition is that a genuine scientific realism is committed to (...) their being “a literally true story of what the world is like”. The third presupposition is that there are methods for justifying a belief in the empirical adequacy of a theory which do not also suffice to justify beliefs in its literal truth. Each of these presuppositions raises a number of problems, some of which are quite old and others rather newer. In each case, I briefly review some of the old problems and then elaborate the newer problems. (shrink)

My concern is with the possible implications of research in developmental psychology for understanding the workings of modern science. I agree both with Gopnik's general naturalistic orientation and with her more specific claims about scientists as cognitive agents. Neither the formal structure of propositions nor the social structure of scientific communities provides sufficient resources for the understanding we seek. So I agree that the empirical study of human cognition is not only relevant, but necessary, for understanding how science works.