Kevin Scharp’s influential work on the alethic paradoxes combines an extensively developed inconsistency theory with a substantial conceptual engineering project. I argue that Scharp’s inconsistency theory is in tension with his conceptual engineering project: the inconsistency theory includes an account of concepts that implies that the conceptual engineering project will fail. I recommend that Scharp revises his account of concepts, and show how doing so allows him to resolve the tension. The discussion is important for ongoing work on (...) conceptual engineering. Firstly, it is important to get clear on whether Scharp’s conceptual engineering project is—or could be—successful. Secondly, the issues discussed herein may generalise to other conceptual engineering projects, such as explication and ameliorative projects. In particular, the discussion has implications for how conceptual engineers can think about concepts and their relation to how we use words. (shrink)

Approaching Cassirer’s writings can be overwhelming. This is true not just because of the sheer volume of what he published, but even more so because of how varied it all is. For example, if you wa...

Sympathetic commentators on Kant’s account of physical knowledge agree that while philosophy of science has much to gain from Kant’s notion of constitutive a priori principles, Kant’s conceptual and methodological resources are inconsistent with the possibility of scientific change. In this article, I argue that this received view is lacking since Kant’s claim that a unique set of a priori principles structures our knowledge for all time is not central to his account of the constitutive a priori. Two underemphasized (...) points of Kant’s theory bear this out. First, Kant applies ‘a priori’ widely to include non-truth-evaluable elements of knowledge. As such, Kant primarily understands the necessity that attaches to these elements in light of the constitutive role they play in knowledge rather than in terms of truth for all time. Second, Kant uses two methods to establish the existence of constitutive a priori principles: the analytic and the synthetic. On my interpretation, while scientific change has discredited the analytic method, the synthetic method remains viable. In this way, I offer a new perspective on the ways in which Kant’s theory of the constitutive a priori can ground Neo-Kantian philosophies of science like those of Hans Reichenbach and Michael Friedman. (shrink)

The concept of measuring inconsistency in information was developed by John Grant in a 1978 paper in the context of first-order logic. For more than 20 years very little was done in this area until in the early 2000s a number of AI researchers started to formulate new inconsistency measures primarily in the context of propositional logic knowledge bases. The aim of this volume is to survey what has been done so far, to expand inconsistency measurement to other formalisms, to (...) connect it with related topics, and to provide ideas for further research in a topic that is particularly relevant now in view of the many inconsistencies in the massive amount of information available. The book contains 11 chapters. The first chapter, by John Grant, gives his original motivation for starting this field, explains why it was formulated in a highly mathematical manner, presents important material that was omitted from the original paper, and provides ideas about the use of dimensions in measuring inconsistency. The second chapter, by Matthias Thimm, is a survey that covers most of the research on inconsistency measures up to 2017. The other 9 chapters, all by experts either in inconsistency measures, or in the topic under consideration, or both, connect inconsistency measures with argumentation, disjunctive logic programming, fuzzy logic systems, modal logics, multiset representation, paraconsistent consequence, probabilistic logic, relational databases, and spatio-temporal databases."-- back cover. (shrink)

Most opposition to induced abortion turns on the belief that human fetuses are persons from conception. On this view, the moral status of the fetus alone requires those in a position to provide aid—gestational mothers—to make tremendous sacrifices to benefit the fetus. Recently, critics have argued that this pro-life position requires more than opposition to induced abortion. Pro-life theorists are relatively silent on the issues of spontaneous abortion, surplus in vitro fertilisation human embryos, and the suffering and death of born (...) persons due to lack of access to food, shelter and medical care. Colgrove et al call such arguments inconsistency arguments, arguing they ‘do not matter’ and mischaracterise them as ad hominem attacks. Here, I argue these are better understood as moral dilemmas. While some critics argue pro-life inaction is evidence that they do not really believe human fetuses are persons, I contend this inaction is likely the result of resolvable confusion rather than moral negligence. (shrink)

William Simkulet has recently criticised Colgrove et al’s defence against what they have called inconsistency arguments—arguments that claim opponents of abortion (OAs) act in ways inconsistent with their underlying beliefs about human fetuses (eg, that human fetuses are persons at conception). Colgrove et al presented three objections to inconsistency arguments, which Simkulet argues are unconvincing. Further, he maintains that OAs who hold that the fetus is a person at conception fail to act on important issues such as the plight (...) of frozen embryos, poverty and spontaneous abortion. Thus, they are morally negligent. In response, we argue that Simkulet has targeted a very narrow group of OAs, and so his criticisms are inapplicable to most OAs. We then explain why his responses to each of Colgrove et al’s objections do not succeed, even for this restricted group. Finally, we note that Simkulet fails to provide evidence for his claims regarding OAs’ supposed failures to act, and we show that OAs veritably do invest resources into these important issues. We conclude that Colgrove et al’s reasons for rejecting inconsistency arguments (en masse) remain intact. (shrink)

The article is an extended critical discussion of Kevin Scharp’s Replacing Truth. Scharp’s case for the claim that the concept of truth is inconsistent is criticized, and so is his case for the claim that the concept of truth must be replaced because of its inconsistency.

The badness of having conflicting emotions is a familiar theme in academic ethics, clinical psychology, and commercial self-help, where emotional harmony is often put forward as an ideal. Many philosophers give emotional harmony pride of place in their theories of practical reason.1 Here we offer a defense of a particular species of emotional conflict, namely, ambivalence. We articulate an conception of ambivalence, on which ambivalence is unresolved inconsistent desire (§1) and present a case of appropriate ambivalence (§2), before considering (...) two alternative defenses of emotional conflict (§3). We then argue that inconsistent desires can be fitting (§4) and that it can be reasonable not to resolve inconsistent desires (§5), before considering an objection (§6) and concluding the discussion (§7). (shrink)

Inconsistency and contradiction are important concepts. Unfortunately, they are easily confused. A proposition or belief which is inconsistent is one which is self- contradictory and vice-versa. Moreover two propositions or beliefs which are contradictories are inconsistent with each other. Nonetheless it is a mistake to suppose that inconsistency is the same as contradiction.

This dissertation has two main goals. The first is to provide a practice-based analysis of the field of inconsistent mathematics: what motivates it? what role does logic have in it? what distinguishes it from classical mathematics? is it alternative or revolutionary? The second goal is to introduce and defend a new conception of inconsistent mathematics - queer incomaths - as a particularly effective answer to feminist critiques of classical logic and mathematics. This sets the stage for a genuine (...) revolution in mathematics, insofar as it suggests the need for a shift in mainstream attitudes about the role of logic and ethics in the practice of mathematics. (shrink)

The first mention of the concept of an inconsistency measure for sets of formulas in first-order logic was given in 1978, but that paper presented only classifications for them. The first actual inconsistency measure with a numerical value was given in 2002 for sets of formulas in propositional logic. Since that time, researchers in logic and AI have developed a substantial theory of inconsistency measures. While this is an interesting topic from the point of view of logic, an important motivation (...) for this work is also that some intelligent systems may encounter inconsistencies in their operation. This research deals primarily with propositional knowledge bases, that is, finite sets of propositional logic formulas. The goal of this paper is to extend the concept of inconsistency measure in a formal way to sets of formulas with the modal operators “necessarily” and “possibly” applied to propositional logic formulas. We use frames for the semantics, but in a way that is different from the way that frames are commonly used in modal logics, in order to facilitate measuring inconsistency. As a set of formulas may have different inconsistency measures for different frames, we define the concept of a standard frame that can be used for all finite sets of formulas in the language. We do this for two languages. The first language, AMPL, contains formulas where a prefix of operators is applied to a propositional logic formula. The second language, CMPL, adds connectives that can be applied to AMPL formulas in a limited way. We show how to extend propositional logic inconsistency measures to such sets of formulas. Finally, we define a new concept, weak inconsistency measure, and show how to compute it. (shrink)

William Simkulet has recently criticised Colgrove et al ’s defence against what they have called inconsistency arguments—arguments that claim opponents of abortion act in ways inconsistent with their underlying beliefs about human fetuses. Colgrove et al presented three objections to inconsistency arguments, which Simkulet argues are unconvincing. Further, he maintains that OAs who hold that the fetus is a person at conception fail to act on important issues such as the plight of frozen embryos, poverty and spontaneous abortion. Thus, (...) they are morally negligent. In response, we argue that Simkulet has targeted a very narrow group of OAs, and so his criticisms are inapplicable to most OAs. We then explain why his responses to each of Colgrove et al’s objections do not succeed, even for this restricted group. Finally, we note that Simkulet fails to provide evidence for his claims regarding OAs’ supposed failures to act, and we show that OAs veritably do invest resources into these important issues. We conclude that Colgrove et al ’s reasons for rejecting inconsistency arguments remain intact. (shrink)

I argue that one need not be an inferentialist in order to model inconsistent concepts, contrary to what some have thought. Representationalists can do so by adopting a form of bilateralism about contents. It remains unclear, however, why conceptual inconsistency would constitute a defect to be eliminated, rather than a vindication of dialetheism to be embraced. I suggest some answers to explore that involve accepting a descriptive form of dialetheism but denying its normative forms.

This paper starts the systematic study of inconsistency measures for propositional logics enriched with operators involving time. We use Prior’s operators for tense logic: H, G, P, and F; however, we apply different semantics to them. We define two logics. The first one, ATPL, allows formulas with the application of any of the four operators any number of times to propositional logic formulas. The semantics is given in terms of TPL structures. We then show how to measure the inconsistency of (...) a set of ATPL formulas using appropriately modified versions of standard inconsistency measures for propositional logic. Additionally, these new measures are checked for the satisfaction of various properties. We also investigate a new concept of inconsistency that cannot be defined for propositional logic. Then, ATPL is extended to CTPL by applying the propositional connectives to ATPL formulas and measuring inconsistency is extended to sets of CTPL formulas. (shrink)

In this work, the first of a series, we study the nature of informal inconsistency in physics, focusing mainly on the foundations of quantum theory, and appealing to the concept of quasi-truth. We defend a pluralistic view of the philosophy of science, grounded on the existence of inconsistencies and on quasi-truth. Here, we treat only the ‘classical aspects’ of the subject, leaving for a forthcoming paper the ‘non-classical’ part.

Consistency is one of the key concepts of logic; logicians have put a great deal of effort into proving the consistency of many logics. Understanding what causes inconsistency is also important; some logicians have developed paraconsistent logics that, unlike classical logics, allow some contradictions without making all formulas provable. Another direction of research studies inconsistency by measuring the amount of inconsistency of sets of formulas. While the initial attempt in 1978 was too ambitious in trying to do this for (...) first-order logic, this research got a substantial boost when an inconsistency measure was proposed for propositional logic in 2002. Since then, researchers in logic and artificial intelligence have made many interesting proposals and found related issues. Almost all of this work has been done for propositional logic. The purpose of this paper is to extend inconsistency measures to logics that also contain operators, such as modal operators. We use the terminology “generalized propositional logic” for such logics. We show how to extend propositional inconsistency measures to sets of formulas in any such generalized propositional logic. Examples are used to illustrate how various modal operators, including spatial and tense operators, fit into this framework. We also show that the addition of operators leads to a weak type of inconsistency. In all cases, the calculations for several inconsistency measures are given. (shrink)

This is a discussion of different ways of working out the idea that the semantic paradoxes show that natural languages are somehow “inconsistent”. I take the workable form of the idea to be that there are expressions such that a necessary condition of understanding them is that one be inclined to accept inconsistent claims (an conception also suggested by Matti Eklund). I then distinguish “simple” from “complex” forms of such views. On a simple theory, such expressions are meaningless, (...) while on a complex theory they are not. I argue that complex theories are incompatible with truth conditional semantics and that simple theories are only coherent when the inconsistent claims are metalingusitic attributions of meaning. I close with a discussion of the version of the simple metalinguistic theory I have defended in “Understanding the Liar” and other papers. (shrink)

This paper discusses a conception of physics as a collection of theories that, from a logical point of view, is inconsistent. It is argued that this logical conception of the relations between physical theories is too crude. Mathematical subtleties allow for a much more nuanced and sophisticated understanding of the relations between different physical theories.

This is a discussion of different ways of working out the idea that the semantic paradoxes show that natural languages are somehow “inconsistent”. I take the workable form of the idea to be that there are expressions such that a necessary condition of understanding them is that one be inclined to accept inconsistent claims (an conception also suggested by Matti Eklund). I then distinguish “simple” from “complex” forms of such views. On a simple theory, such expressions are meaningless, (...) while on a complex theory they are not. I argue that complex theories are incompatible with truth conditional semantics and that simple theories are only coherent when the inconsistent claims are metalingusitic attributions of meaning. I close with a discussion of the version of the simple metalinguistic theory I have defended in “Understanding the Liar” and other papers. (shrink)

As consistency is such an important topic in logic, researchers have for a long time investigated how to attain and maintain it. But consistency can also be studied from the point of view of its opposite, inconsistency. The problem with inconsistency in classical logic is that by the principle of explosion a single inconsistency leads to triviality. Paraconsistent logics were introduced to get around this problem by defining logics in such a way that the explosion principle does not apply to (...) them. Another approach stays in the classical framework and evaluates the amount of inconsistency in a set of formulas. The great bulk of this work has been done for propositional logic and presents many interesting issues about inconsistency. A previous paper introduced the concept of generalized propositional logic (GPL) to provide a uniform method for measuring inconsistency in logics that allow the application of unary operator pairs, such as for modality, time, and space, to propositional logic formulas. The universality of GPL manifests itself in the fact that such an operator pair is evaluated in a uniform manner across all such logics. The difference lies solely in the choice of a frame for each logic. But some logics also contain nonunary operators. For example, temporal logics typically contain a binary Until operator. The purpose of this paper is to show how to extend generalized propositional logic to extended generalized propositional logic (EGPL) by adding nonunary operator pairs and measure inconsistency in such logics. The universality of EGPL manifests itself in the fact that once the evaluation of the nonunary operators is given, it carries over to all such logics. For example, the temporal Until operator becomes applicable to modal logic. Furthermore, while relative inconsistency measures were previously considered for GPL, they are now extended to EGPL and a new approach removes an undesirable feature from the previous version. Also, this paper provides results about various properties of the new inconsistency measures. Many examples and explanations are given to illustrate the issues involving this extension. (shrink)

A popular and enduring approach to the liar paradox takes the concept of truth to be inconsistent. Very roughly, truth is an inconsistent concept if the central principles of this concept (taken together) entail a contradiction, where one of these central principles is Tarski's T-schema for truth: a sentence S is true if and only if p, (where S says that p). This article targets a version of Inconsistentism which: retains classical logic and bivalence; takes the truth-predicate “is (...) true” to pick out a property (and determine a non-empty extension relative to a given world); and holds that liar sentences exhibit a certain kind of indeterminacy in truth-value. Call such a view Modest Inconsistentism since it is somewhat more conservative in its outlook than various other forms of Inconsistentism. Such a modest view has its attractions: we retain the thesis that the liar sentence is meaningful; we get to respect the claims that there are truths and that there is a property of truth; we get to keep classical logic and bivalence; and, prima facie, no strengthened liar paradox is in the offing. The main aim in this paper is to show that Modest Inconsistentism, despite its initial attractions, is in deep trouble—because it does, after all, give rise to a strengthened liar paradox. We shall also see that there are related kinds of theory which are also subject to the same worry. (shrink)

This article argues that the reduction of the morality of killing in war to the morality of killing in self-defense by ‘reductive-individualist’ revisionist just war theories is inconsistent, because when those theories apply the moral notion of self-defense to the morality of killing in war, they do not preserve the two conceptions of the “individual” inherent in this notion. The article demonstrates this inconsistency in two steps: First, it disentangles the two conceptions of the individual inherent to the notion (...) of self-defense, namely (1) that the individual is an “entity” potentially bearing a right to self-defense (unlike, e.g., groups) and (2) that the individual is a “particular,” where “particular” signifies that every human is different from every other human. The conception of the individual as a “particular” is tied to the idea that a justification grounded in a rule of self-defense is necessarily “concrete,” in the sense of referring to individually given and specific perceptions or cases, as opposed to “abstract,” in the sense of being detached from specific perceptions or cases. The article then demonstrates that reductive individualism reflects the first notion of the individual, but not the second. Due to the “loss” of the individual as a “particular”, the reductive-individualist reduction of the morality of killing in war to the morality of killing in self-defense is inconsistent, and hence its justification of killing in war grounded in self-defense is not concrete. Since such a justification must be concrete, reductive individualism cannot offer a justification for belligerent killing. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:36. A DISCUSSION ON PERSONAL IDENTITY Jane L. Mclntyre's original paper "Is Hume's Self Consistent?" was presented at the MoGiIl Hume Conference; it will be published in the forthcoming volume devoted to those preceedings. Tom Beauchamp" s paper is presented here as delivered. John Biro's paper has been revised since its original presentation. 37. SELF INCONSISTENCY OR MERE SELF PERPLEXITY? Professor Mclntyre's imaginative and constructive paper has three primary (...) parts (despite its division into six sections). First, she offers an interpretation of Hume's view of the self in Book I of the Treatise. Second, she explains why his own reservations in the Appendix create problems not only for this theory of self identity but for other parts of his philosophy as well. Finally, she tries to ease him out of these difficulties with her overlap interpretation of the bundle theory. My comments follow exactly this outline, though my conclusions, for the most part, do not coincide with hers. My reservations do not derive from her attempt to render Hume consistent. Rather, I question the foundations of the entire enterprise in which she, Robison, Nathanson, et. al. are engaged. That is, I remain unconvinced that the alleged problem, as presently framed, is more than a pseudo-problem. I. Hume's Theory in Book I In Book I Hume offers a variety of arguments about the nature of the self, most of which rely on other theories, such as those of causation, the association of ideas, and substance. Whatever the exact arguments and positions he may be advancing, at least the following six propositions are integral to his theory of personal identity: 1)The self is entirely reducible to a collection of perceptions. 2)The self is not characterized by strict identity. 3)There is nothing simple in which the collection of perceptions inheres. 4)Both identity and simplicity are attributed to the self because of relations between perceptions--the relations of causation and resemblance. 5)The relations of resemblance and causation unite these perceptions. 38. 6) There are no real (non-associational) connections or relations among these perceptions which unite them. Half of these six claims are critical denials of other philosophical claims; the other half are constructive philosophical theories. Hume's entire philosophical program in Book I is tied up with these claims. The criticisms are directed at numerous metaphysical theories of mind, substance and causation; and the constructive account of personai identity requires his theories of perception and association of ideas. I mention these obvious points only because it is so important to note that if_ the interpretation is correct which Professor Mclntyre and others give to (roughly) five sentences in the Appendix, where Hume mentions a possible inconsistency, then Hume is not only questioning his theory of personal identity in Book I, he is calling Book I itself into question. To be convinced that this strikingly implausible turnabout occurs in five sentences of the Appendix, we must be given a most compelling argument—one which I doubt is forthcoming. II. Hume's Alleged Inconsistency The alleged problem of inconsistency arises because Hume says in the Appendix that he does not know how to render his own former opinions consistent (T633, 636). However, when he comes to a formal statement of the inconsistency, as everyone is agreed, the propositions said to be inconsistent are not inconsistent. In the attempt to grasp Hume's meaning, a general consensus has emerged in recent Hume scholarship, including Professor Mclntyre in its company, that we ought both to move backward and forward a sentence or two in Hume's text. Hume says in those passages that his hopes for his theory are diminished because he is unable to explain the principles, that unite our successive perceptions in our thought or consciousness (T636) ; and he then indicates that i_f perceptions could be shown to inhere in something simple or to be really connected, these prob- 39. lems would vanish. It is this textual setting which Robison, Nathanson, and Professor Mclntyre turn into the claim that "the concept of a self which is affected by experience, and therefore must persist through experience— is precisely the concept of the self that... (shrink)

I propose a broad concept of happiness as an ultimate moral goal that is consistent with what reflective people desire and what people generally approve. Broad happiness includes many and various pleasures, a minimum of pain, a predominately active life and awareness of what can be attained. Besides these characteristics, which are found in Mill, I add that mental and physical faculties must be developed in accord with biological potential, people must be able to choose activities that exercise their developed (...) faculties and must be able to achieve many of the goals toward which their activities aim. This claim can be established by considering scientific data and analyzing what moralists usually approve. According to it, intellectual activities will be found to be the most important aspects of happiness.My concept will differ from Mill’s in that I reject the notion that happiness is synonymous with pleasure and the absence of pain, although both are part of happiness. Because Mill adopted this definition, his theory produced many anomalies. For example, in order to maintain that intellectual activities are morally superior, Mill was led to introduce qualities of pleasure. This maneuver is inconsistent with his empiricism. Moreover, the activities that are most approved from a moral point of view cannot be explained by the pleasure principle. The broad concept of happiness can account for the primacy of intellectual activities and those activities that are most often morally approved. (shrink)

I propose a broad concept of happiness as an ultimate moral goal that is consistent with what reflective people desire and what people generally approve. Broad happiness includes many and various pleasures, a minimum of pain, a predominately active life and awareness of what can be attained. Besides these characteristics, which are found in Mill, I add that mental and physical faculties must be developed in accord with biological potential, people must be able to choose activities that exercise their developed (...) faculties and must be able to achieve many of the goals toward which their activities aim. This claim can be established by considering scientific data and analyzing what moralists usually approve. According to it, intellectual activities will be found to be the most important aspects of happiness.My concept will differ from Mill’s in that I reject the notion that happiness is synonymous with pleasure and the absence of pain, although both are part of happiness. Because Mill adopted this definition, his theory produced many anomalies. For example, in order to maintain that intellectual activities are morally superior, Mill was led to introduce qualities of pleasure. This maneuver is inconsistent with his empiricism. Moreover, the activities that are most approved from a moral point of view cannot be explained by the pleasure principle. The broad concept of happiness can account for the primacy of intellectual activities and those activities that are most often morally approved. (shrink)

Theories are conceptualized as predictors of phenomena using computable functions acting on prior world information. Formally, the concept of bounded prior world recursive function is defined and used as a candidate for a potential theory. An artificial world of fact is then constructed for which there exist two inconsistent best theories, in that they cannot be improved upon, and these theories are maximally inconsistent in that every best theory is a compromise. It is argued that in such a (...) world the scientific objective would be to find these maximally inconsistent theories. The construction is motivated as an attempt to illustrate the status of theory in the social sciences and in economics, in particular. (shrink)

The well-known empiricist apories of the lawfulness of nature prevent an adequate philosophical interpretation of empirical science until this day. Clarification can only be expected through an immanent refutation of the empiricist point of view. My argument is that Hume’s claim, paradigmatic for modern empiricism, is not just inconsequent, but simply contradictory: Empiricism denies that a lawlike character of nature can be substantiated. But, as is shown, anyone who claimes experience to be the basis of knowledge (as the empiricist naturally (...) does), has, in fact, always already presupposed the lawfullness of nature, i.e. has assumed the ontology of a nature lawful in itself. If lawfulness is, more closely, understood as dependency on conditions, then the functional character of the laws of nature is involved with the consequence that verification is not to be taken as a mere repetition of measurements but as clarification of the conditional structure of the physical process. Furthermore the functionality of the laws of nature also includes a statement on their invariance (relative to certain transformations) and so their lawlikeness. This throws a new light on the problem of induction. Seen in this way it is hardly surprising that the notorious neglect of the functional aspect in empiricism has led to fundamental problems with the concept of the law of nature. (shrink)

According to standard accounts of mathematical representations of physical phenomena, positing structure-preserving mappings between a physical target system and the structure picked out by a mathematical theory is essential to such representations. In this paper, I argue that these accounts fail to give a satisfactory explanation of scientific representations that make use of inconsistent mathematical theories and present an alternative, robustly inferential account of mathematical representation that provides not just a better explanation of applications of inconsistent mathematics, but (...) also a compelling explanation of mathematical representations of physical phenomena in general. 1Inconsistent Mathematics and the Problem of Representation2The Early Calculus3Mapping Accounts and the Early Calculus3.1Partial structures3.2Inconsistent structures3.3Related total consistent structures4A Robustly Inferential Account of the Early Calculus in Applications 4.1The robustly inferential conception of mathematical representation4.2The robustly inferential conception and inconsistent mathematics4.3The robustly inferential conception and mapping accounts5Beyond Inconsistent Mathematics. (shrink)

Multidimensional concepts are everywhere, and they are important. Examples include moral value, welfare, scientific confirmation, democracy, and biodiversity. How, if at all, can we aggregate the underlying dimensions of a multidimensional concept F to yield verdicts about which things are Fer than which overall? Social choice theory can be used to model and investigate this aggregation problem. Here, we focus on a particularly thorny problem made salient by this social choice-theoretic framework: the underlying dimensions of a given concept might (...) be measurable on different types of scales—e.g., some ordinal and some cardinal. An underappreciated impossibility theorem due to Anna Khmelnitskaya shows that seemingly plausible constraints on aggregation across scale types are inconsistent. This impossibility threatens to render the notion of overall Fness incoherent. We attempt to defuse this threat, arguing that the impossibility depends on an overly restrictive conception of measurement and of how measurement constrains aggregation. Adopting a more flexible—and, we think, more perspicuous—conception of measurement opens an array of possibilities for aggregation across disparate scale types. (shrink)

In this paper I’ll explore the relation between ω-inconsistency and plain inconsistency, in the context of theories that intend to capture semantic concepts. In particular, I’ll focus on two very well known inconsistent but non-trivial theories of truth: LP and STTT. Both have the interesting feature of being able to handle semantic and arithmetic concepts, maintaining the standard model. However, it can be easily shown that both theories are ω- inconsistent. Although usually a theory of truth (...) is generally expected to be ω-consistent, all conceptual concerns don’t apply to inconsistent theories. Finally, I’ll explore if it’s possible to have an inconsistent, butω-consistent theory of truth, restricting my analysis to substructural theories. (shrink)

Ideally, pro-environmental consumer behavior leads to a lower impact on the environment. However, due to negative behavioral spillovers environmentally friendly behavior could lead to an overall higher environmental impact if subsequent environmentally unfriendly behavior occurs. In this exploratory interview study we focused on two pathways leading to negative spillover: a psychological path and an economic path. We wanted to gain insight into people’s motivations to behave environmentally unfriendly and to explore people’s level of awareness of both pathways. Our results indicate (...) that pro-environmental behaviors that are associated with higher effort are performed less frequently, and that when people do not perform these behaviors they associate them with higher effort levels. When people perceive behaviors as more effortful they increasingly seem to use arguments to motivate and rationalize why performing the behavior is difficult or impossible. Moreover, we found that although some people can imagine that moral licensing and rebound effects could occur and can provide examples from their own lives, most people assess these concepts as not rational. People seem unaware of the relation between a first pro-environmental behavior and a subsequent behavior, and therefore inconsistencies in behavior go unnoticed. As people are good at rationalizing why they do not perform specific PEBs, they in general feel satisfied with their own pro-environmental actions. In order to discourage negative spillovers, we describe a number of approaches and research ideas aimed at taking away the grounds for rationalization. (shrink)

The aim of this article is to generalize logics of formal inconsistency (LFIs) to systems dealing with the concept of incompatibility, expressed by means of a binary connective. The basic idea is that having two incompatible formulas to hold trivializes a deduction, and as a special case, a formula becomes consistent (in the sense of LFIs) when it is incompatible with its own negation. We show how this notion extends that of consistency in a non-trivial way, presenting conservative translations for (...) many simple LFIs into some of the most basic logics of incompatibility, thereby evidencing in a precise way how the notion of incompatibility generalizes that of consistency. We provide semantics for the new logics, as well as decision procedures, based on restricted non-deterministic matrices. The use of non-deterministic semantics with restrictions is justified by the fact that, as proved here, these systems are not algebraizable according to Blok-Pigozzi nor are they characterizable by finite Nmatrices. Finally, we briefly compare our logics to other systems focused on treating incompatibility, specially those pioneered by Brandom and further developed by Peregrin. (shrink)

The main object of this paper is to provide the logical machinery needed for a viable basis for talking of the ‘consequences’, the ‘content’, or of ‘equivalences’ between inconsistent sets of premisses.With reference to its maximal consistent subsets (m.c.s.), two kinds of ‘consequences’ of a propositional set S are defined. A proposition P is a weak consequence (W-consequence) of S if it is a logical consequence of at least one m.c.s. of S, and P is an inevitable consequence (I-consequence) (...) of S if it is a logical consequence of all the m.c.s. of S. The set of W-consequences of a set S it determines (up to logical equivalence) its m.c.s. (This enables us to define a normal form for every set such that any two sets having the same W-consequences have the same normal form.) The W-consequences and I-consequences will not do to define the ‘content’ of a set S. The first is too broad, may include propositions mutually inconsistent, the second is too narrow. A via media between these concepts is accordingly defined: P is a P-consequence of S, where P is some preference criterion yielding some of the m.c.s. of S as preferred to others, and P is a consequence of all of the P-preferred m.c.s. of S. The bulk of the paper is devoted to discussion of various preference criteria, and also surveys the application of this machinery in diverse contexts - for example, in connection with the processing of mutually inconsistent reports. (shrink)

I argue that Sui-Generis Views are preferrable to Non-Belief and Higher-Order Belief Views because of the three dominant contemporary conceptions of agnosticism, only Sui-Generis Views leave room for the possibility of agnosticism-involving doxastic inconsistency. In order to establish that this constitutes a point in favour of Sui-Generis Views, this paper offers a sustained argument in support of the thesis that doxastic inconsistency consistency involving (dis)believing P and agnosticism towards P is possible. The paper concludes by responding to Thomas Raleigh’s argument (...) against the possibility of agnosticism-involving doxastic inconsistency. (shrink)

Toward a theory of n-tuples of individuals and concepts as surrogates for Russellian singular propositions and singular concepts. Alonzo Church proposed a powerful and elegant theory of sequences of functions and their arguments as singular-concept surrogates. Church’s account accords with his Alternative (0), the strictest of his three competing criteria for strict synonymy. The currently popular objection to strict criteria like (0) on the basis of the Russell-Myhill paradox is here rebutted. Russell-Myhill is not a problem specifically for (...) Alternative (0). Rather it is a disproof of unrestricted concept comprehension. Unrestricted comprehension is also inconsistent with facts about sets of properties. It is demonstrated furthermore that the principal rival conception of propositions--propositions conceived as classes of possible worlds--is subject to a fatal philosophical collapse: It follows on that conception, given that each of us is fallible, that everyone believes everything. Although it is far superior to its principal rival conception, Church’s proposed theory is vulnerable under (0) to a version of Russell’s notorious Gray’s /Elegy/ objection. Some amendments to Church’s proposal are proffered that address Russell’s objection, including an amendment first proposed in the present author’s /Frege’s Puzzle/ (1986). Church’s response (personal correspondence) is considered. (shrink)

Whereas a number of recent articles have focussed upon whether the thesis of content externalism is compatible with a certain sort of knowledge that is gained via first-person authority,1 far less attention has been given to the relationship that this thesis bears to the possession of knowledge in general and, in particular, its relation to internalist and externalist epistemologies. Nevertheless, although very few actual arguments have been presented to this end, there does seem to be a shared suspicion that content (...) externalism must be incompatible with epistemic internalism. In a recent and influential paper, however, James Chase has challenged this conventional wisdom by offering a subtle defence of the view that content externalism and epistemic internalism are, in fact, compatible after all.2 Our aim here is twofold. First, to show that Chase is only able to achieve this result because he focuses upon the internalist conception of justification, rather than knowledge. Second, to formulate one prima facie argument which shows that an internalist conception of knowledge is incompatible with an externalist conception of content, an argument which, moreover, is not touched by Chase. (shrink)

This article provides a critical evaluation of the central components of Integrative Bioethics, a project aiming at a bioethical framework reconceptualization. Its proponents claim that this new system of thought has developed a better bioethical methodology than mainstream Western bioethics, a claim that we criticize here. We deal especially with the buzz words of Integrative Bioethics – pluriperspectivism, integrativity, orientational knowledge, as well as with its underlying theory of moral truth. The first part of the paper looks at what the (...) claims of a superior methodology consist in. The second reveals pluriperspectivism and integrativity to be underdeveloped, hazy terms, but which seem to be underpinned by two theses – the incommensurability and the inclusiveness theses. These theses we critically scrutinize. We then consider strategies the project's proponents might apply to curb these theses in order to acquire minimal consistency for their framework. This part of the article also deals with the conception of moral truth that drives the theory, a position equally burdened with inconsistencies. In the last part of the article, we observe the concept of orientational knowledge, and develop two interpretations of its possible meaning. We claim that, following the first interpretation, Integrative Bioethics is completely descriptive, in which case it is informative and important, but hardly bioethics; if it is normative, following the second interpretation, it is bioethics as we already know it, but merely clad in rhetorical embellishments. We conclude that there is nothing new about this project, and that its inconsistencies are reason enough for its abandonment. (shrink)

This article provides a critical evaluation of the central components of Integrative Bioethics, a project aiming at a bioethical framework reconceptualization. Its proponents claim that this new system of thought has developed a better bioethical methodology than mainstream Western bioethics, a claim that we criticize here. We deal especially with the buzz words of Integrative Bioethics – pluriperspectivism, integrativity, orientational knowledge, as well as with its underlying theory of moral truth. The first part of the paper looks at what the (...) claims of a superior methodology consist in. The second reveals pluriperspectivism and integrativity to be underdeveloped, hazy terms, but which seem to be underpinned by two theses – the incommensurability and the inclusiveness theses. These theses we critically scrutinize. We then consider strategies the project's proponents might apply to curb these theses in order to acquire minimal consistency for their framework. This part of the article also deals with the conception of moral truth that drives the theory, a position equally burdened with inconsistencies. In the last part of the article, we observe the concept of orientational knowledge, and develop two interpretations of its possible meaning. We claim that, following the first interpretation, Integrative Bioethics is completely descriptive, in which case it is informative and important, but hardly bioethics; if it is normative, following the second interpretation, it is bioethics as we already know it, but merely clad in rhetorical embellishments. We conclude that there is nothing new about this project, and that its inconsistencies are reason enough for its abandonment. (shrink)

Consciousness is arguably the most important area within contemporary philosophy of mind and perhaps the most puzzling aspect of the world. Despite an explosion of research from philosophers, psychologists, and scientists, attempts to explain consciousness in neurophysiological, or even cognitive, terms are often met with great resistance. In The Consciousness Paradox, Rocco Gennaro aims to solve an underlying paradox, namely, how it is possible to hold a number of seemingly inconsistent views, including higher-order thought (HOT) theory, conceptualism, infant and (...) animal consciousness, concept acquisition, and what he calls the HOT-brain thesis. He defends and further develops a metapsychological reductive representational theory of consciousness and applies it to several importantly related problems. Gennaro proposes a version of the HOT theory of consciousness that he calls the "wide intrinsicality view" and shows why it is superior to various alternatives, such as self-representationalism and first-order representationalism. HOT theory says that what makes a mental state conscious is that a suitable higher-order thought is directed at that mental state. -/- Thus Gennaro argues for an overall philosophical theory of consciousness while applying it to other significant issues not usually addressed in the philosophical literature on consciousness. Most cognitive science and empirical works on such topics as concepts and animal consciousness do not address central philosophical theories of consciousness. Gennaro’s integration of empirical and philosophical concerns will make his argument of interest to both philosophers and nonphilosophers. (shrink)

Alain Badiou’s reception in the English-speaking world has centred on his project of a “mathematical ontology” undertaken in Being and Event. Its reception has raised serious concerns about how mathematics could be relevant to concrete situations. Caution must be taken in applying mathematics to concrete situationsand, without making explicit the equivocal senses of “consistency” as it operates in Badiou’s thought, this caution cannot be precisely applied. By examining Being and Event as well as looking backwards at his first philosophical work, (...) The Concept of Model, some key distinctions on the meaning of “consistency” will be clarified. (shrink)

The debate over physicalism in philosophy of mind can be seen as concerning an inconsistent tetrad of theses: (1) if physicalism is true, a priori physicalism is true; (2) a priori physicalism is false; (3) if physicalism is false, epiphenomenalism is true; (4) epiphenomenalism is false. This paper argues that one may resolve the debate by distinguishing two conceptions of the physical: on the theory‐based conception, it is plausible that (2) is true and (3) is false; on the object‐based (...) conception, it is plausible that (3) is true and (2) is false. the paper also defends and explores the version of physicalism that results from this strategy. (shrink)

First published in 1912, this book by F. R. Tennant was intended to redress the vague and inconsistent conceptions of sin that were popularly held at the beginning of the twentieth century. Tennant maintained that for any ongoing debate to remain meaningful, it was imperative that definitions of key terms should keep pace with discussion. Therefore his study aimed at providing a clear, logical definition of what sin in Christian doctrine represented, whilst also bringing to bear the importance of (...) ethics and psychology to any modern understanding of the subject. (shrink)

An important strand in philosophy of science takes scientific explanation to consist in the conveyance of some kind of information. Here I argue that this idea is also implicit in some core arguments of mechanists, some of whom are proponents of an ontic conception of explanation that might be thought inconsistent with it. However, informational accounts seem to conflict with some lay and scientific commonsense judgments and a central goal of the theory of explanation, because information is relative to (...) the background knowledge of agents. Sometimes we make lay judgments about whether a model is an explanation simpliciter, not just an explanation relative to some particular agent. And as philosophers of explanation, we would like a philosophical account to tell us when a model is an explanation simpliciter, not just when a model is an explanation relative to some particular agent. Thus, even if one’s account of explanation is not concerned with explanation qua communicative or speech act, the account’s reliance on the concept of information generates a prima facie conflict between the claims that 1) explanation is the conveyance of information, 2) information is relative to the background knowledge of an agent, and 3) some models are explanations not relative to the background knowledge of any particular agent. I sketch a solution to this puzzle by distinguishing informationally what I call “explanation simpliciter” from what I call “explanation-to,” relativizing the latter to an individual’s background knowledge and the former to what I call “total scientific background knowledge”. (shrink)

In accordance with societal norms and values, consumers readily indicate their positive attitudes toward sustainability. However, they hardly take sustainability into account when engaging in exchange relationships with companies. To shed light on this paradox, this paper investigates whether defense mechanisms and the more specific concept of neutralization techniques can explain the discrepancy between societal norms and actual behavior. A multi-method qualitative research design provides rich insights into consumers’ underlying cognitive processes and how they make sense of their attitude–behavior divergences. (...) Drawing on the Ways Model of account-taking, which is advanced to a Cycle Model, the findings illustrate how neutralization strategies are used to legitimize inconsistencies between norm-conforming attitudes and actual behavior. Furthermore, the paper discusses how the repetitive reinforcement of neutralizing patterns and feedback loops between individuals and society are linked to the rise of anomic consumer behavior. (shrink)

In graph theory, the concept of domination is essential in a variety of domains. It has broad applications in diverse fields such as coding theory, computer net work models, and school bus routing and facility lo cation problems. If a fuzzy graph fails to obtain acceptable results, neutrosophic sets and neutrosophic graphs can be used to model uncertainty correlated with indeterminate and inconsistent information in arbitrary real-world scenario. In this study, we consider the concept of domination as it relates (...) to single-valued neutrosophic incidence graphs (SVNIGs). Given the importance of domination and its utilization in numerous fields, we propose the application of dominating sets in SVNIG with valid edges. We present some relevant definitions such as those of valid edges, cardinality, and isolated vertices in SVNIG along with some examples. Furthermore, we also show a few significant sets connected to the dominating set in an SVNIG such as independent and irredundant sets. We also investigate a relationship between the concepts of dominating sets and domination numbers as well as irredundant and independence sets in SVNIGs. Finally, a real-life deployment of domination in SVNIGsis investigated in relation to COVID-19 vaccination locations as a practical application. (shrink)

In this paper I want to consider whether the 'phenomenal concepts' posited by many recent philosophers of mind are consistent with Wittgenstein’s private language argument. The paper will have three sections. In the first I shall explain the rationale for positing phenomenal concepts. In the second I shall argue that phenomenal concepts are indeed inconsistent with the private language argument. In the last I shall ask whether this is bad for phenomenal concepts or bad for (...) Wittgenstein. (shrink)