Most epistemologists hold that knowledge entails belief. However, proponents of this claim rarely offer a positive argument in support of it. Rather, they tend to treat the view as obvious and assert that there are no convincing counterexamples. We find this strategy to be problematic. We do not find the standard view obvious, and moreover, we think there are cases in which it is intuitively plausible that a subject knows some proposition P without—or at least without determinately—believing that P. Accordingly, (...) we present five plausible examples of knowledge without (determinate) belief, and we present empirical evidence suggesting that our intuitions about these scenarios are not atypical. (shrink)

In describing and classifying things we often rely on their modal characteristics. We will in general not have a satisfactory account of the nature and character of an object, unless we specify at least partly how the thing might be or cannot be, and also how it might have been or could not have been. In his contribution to the Second Jerusalem Philosophical Encounter,1 Strawson addressed the issue of how to understand such ascriptions of modal characteristics. Although his paper is (...) terse and provocative, and develops an intriguing account of modal predications, it has never received much attention in the philosophical literature. Recently, the issues dealt with in Strawson’s paper have become the subject of a widespread debate. Hence, we think it worthwhile to put Strawson’s account under closer scrutiny. In what follows, we first discuss his account of present tense ‘might’-statements, then his account of past perfect ‘might’-statements, and finally some essentialist remarks that he makes in his paper. That the discussion will be rather critical for the most part (though not exclusively so) should not belie the originality and inherent value of his pioneering approach. (shrink)

The book series Linguistische Arbeiten (LA) publishes high-quality work in linguistics that addresses current issues in synchrony and diachrony, theoretically or empirically oriented.

Statements about the behavior of biochemical entities (e.g., about the interaction between two proteins) abound in the literature on molecular biology and are increasingly becoming the targets of information extraction and text mining techniques. We show that an accurate analysis of the semantics of such statements reveals a number of ambiguities that have to be taken into account in the practice of biomedical ontology engineering: Such statements can not only be understood as event reporting statements, but also as ascriptions of (...) dispositions or tendencies that may or may not refer to collectives of interacting molecules or even to collectives of interaction events. (shrink)

The essays in this volume commemorate the 70th anniversary of Jacques Maritain's Pour la Justice, in which the French Thomist and future drafter of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights grappled with the moral, political, and religious challenges facing Europe in the aftermath of World War II. During this time Maritain reflected on humanism, Christian philosophy, the relation between freedom, religion and politics, and increasingly, on education. Several scholars reflect on the historical impact of Maritain's own writings during World War (...) II, Vatican II, and the Spanish Civil war. In other sections, contemporary Thomists suggest ways a resurgent Thomism can engage with the pressing issues of our own day. Essays on Thomistic ethics address problems in bioethics, the philosophy of love, and the foundations of Natural Law, while others tackle perennial problems in metaphysics and epistemology, such as the problem of free will, subjectivity, and the role of creative intuition in aesthetics. Still other essays apply Maritain's work on education to current challenges facing religious universities today. The contributors to this volume include: Noel Adams, Florian Michel, Sr. Anne Frances Ai Le, Brian Kemple, Stephen Chamberlain, Walter Schulz, Francisco Eduardo Plaza, James Jacobs, John Dunaway, Greg Kerr, Megan Furman, Karen Chan, Justin Gable, Federico Tedesco, Michael Torre, Richard Schenk, OP, and Gregory Reichberg. (shrink)

Zeit und Zeitlichkeit erscheinen für die Natur und die Existenz des Menschen grundlegend und fordern zugleich sein Denken wesentlich heraus. Das gilt in besonderer Weise für die Epoche des Mittelalters, in der sich Philosophen und Theologen, sowohl in Christentum als auch Islam, intensiv mit dem Thema auseinandergesetzt haben. Das daraus hervorgegangene, vielfältige und interessante Material ist oft als Gefüge aus naturphilosophischen, ethischen und religiösen Komponenten zu charakterisieren und eröffnet überraschende Einblicke - gerade in vergleichender Perspektive. Zu diesem Zweck wurden in (...) der vorliegenden Studie die zwei Denker al-Gazali ( 1111 Tus) und Meister Eckhart ( 1328 Avignon?) ausgewählt und gegenübergestellt. Nach der historischen bzw. ideengeschichtlichen Kontextualisierung beider werden im Detailzugriff auf die Texte die wichtigsten Punkte zu den jeweiligen Zeit- und Ewigkeitsvorstellungen herausgearbeitet und die Kategorien zu ihrer Gruppierung gebildet. Schliesslich werden im Vergleich die Gemeinsamkeiten und Unterschiede benannt. Die zwei Hauptthesen, denen die Arbeit dabei folgt, sind erstens die relative Ähnlichkeit der Referenzautoren, deren Zeitvorstellungen und spiritueller Ausrichtung. Und zweitens daran anknüpfend die Annahme, dass bei intellektueller und lebenspraktischer Vertiefung der Religion kulturelle und religionsspezifische Unterschiede in den Hinter- und universale Motive in den Vordergrund rücken."-- Back cover. (shrink)

The pressures that led to the evolution of episodic memory have recently seen much discussion, but a fully satisfactory account of them is still lacking. We seek to make progress in this debate by taking a step backward, identifying four possible ways that episodic memory could evolve in relation to simulationist future planning—a similar and seemingly related ability. After distinguishing each of these possibilities, the paper critically discusses existing accounts of the evolution of episodic memory. It then presents a novel (...) argument in favor of the view that episodic memory is a by-product of the evolution of simulationist future planning. The paper ends by showing that this position allows for the maintenance of the traditional view that episodic memory operates on stored memory traces, as well as explaining a number of key features of episodic memory: its being subject to frequent and systematic errors, its neural co-location with the capacity for simulationist future planning, and the potential existence of non-human episodic memory. (shrink)

Two authors with decades of experience promoting human rights argue that, as the world changes around us, rights hardly imaginable today will come into being. A rights revolution is under way. Today the range of nonhuman entities thought to deserve rights is exploding-not just animals but ecosystems and even robots. Changes in norms and circumstances require the expansion of rights: What new rights, for example, are needed if we understand gender to be nonbinary? Does living in a corrupt state violate (...) our rights? And emerging technologies demand that we think about old rights in new ways: When biotechnology is used to change genetic code, whose rights might be violated? What rights, if any, protect our privacy from the intrusions of sophisticated surveillance techniques? Drawing on their vast experience as human rights advocates, William Schulz and Sushma Raman challenge us to think hard about how rights evolve with changing circumstances, and what rights will look like ten, twenty, or fifty years from now. Against those who hold that rights are static and immutable, Schulz and Raman argue that rights must adapt to new realities or risk being consigned to irrelevance. To preserve and promote the good society-one that protects its members' dignity and fosters an environment in which people will want to live-we must at times rethink the meanings of familiar rights and consider the introduction of entirely new rights. Now is one of those times. The Coming Good Society details the many frontiers of rights today and the debates surrounding them. Schulz and Raman equip us with the tools to engage the present and future of rights so that we understand their importance and know where we stand. (shrink)