The terms "extended cognition" and the "extended mind" identify two strands of philosophical argument that are commonly subsumed under the general heading of active externalism. The present paper describes an integrated approach to understanding extended cognition and the extended mind—one that papers over the differences between these two, ostensibly distinct, forms of cognitive extension. As an added bonus, the paper describes how active externalism might be applied to the realm of non-cognitive phenomena, thereby yielding an expansion in the theoretical and (...) empirical scope of the active externalist enterprise. Both these points of progress stem from what is called the dispositional hypothesis. According to the dispositional hypothesis, extended cognition occurs when the mechanisms responsible for the manifestation of dispositional properties include components that lie beyond the borders of the thing to which the dispositional properties are ascribed. (shrink)

The emergence of large-scale social media systems, such as Wikipedia, Facebook, and Twitter, has given rise to a new multi-disciplinary effort based around the concept of social machines. For the most part, this research effort has limited its attention to the study of Web-based systems. It has also, perhaps unsurprisingly, tended to highlight the social scientific relevance of such systems. The present paper seeks to expand the scope of the social machine research effort to encompass the Internet of Things. One (...) advantage of this expansion is that it helps to reveal some of the links between the science of social machines and the sciences of the mind. A second advantage is that it furthers our conceptual understanding of social machines and supports the quest to derive a philosophically-robust definition of the term “social machine.” The results of the present analysis suggest that social machines are best conceived as systems in which a combination of social and technological elements play a role in the mechanistic realization of system-level phenomena. The analysis also highlights the relevance of cognitive science and the philosophy of mind to our general understanding of systems that transcend the cyber, physical, and social domains. (shrink)

The scope of noninvasive prenatal testing (NIPT) could expand in the future to include detailed analysis of the fetal genome. This will allow for the testing for virtually any trait with a genetic contribution, including “non-medical” traits. Here we discuss the potential use of NIPT for these traits. We outline a scenario which highlights possible inconsistencies with ethical decision-making. We then discuss the case against permitting these uses. The objections include practical problems; increasing inequities; increasing the burden of choice; negative (...) impacts on the child, family, and society; and issues with implementation. We then outline the case for permitting the use of NIPT for these traits. These include arguments for reproductive liberty and autonomy; questioning the labeling of traits as “non-medical”; and the principle of procreative beneficence. This summary of the case for and against can serve as a basis for the development of a consistent and coherent ethical framework. (shrink)

The scope of noninvasive prenatal testing (NIPT) could expand in the future to include detailed analysis of the fetal genome. This will allow for the testing for virtually any trait with a genetic contribution, including “non-medical” traits. Here we discuss the potential use of NIPT for these traits. We outline a scenario which highlights possible inconsistencies with ethical decision-making. We then discuss the case against permitting these uses. The objections include practical problems; increasing inequities; increasing the burden of choice; negative (...) impacts on the child, family, and society; and issues with implementation. We then outline the case for permitting the use of NIPT for these traits. These include arguments for reproductive liberty and autonomy; questioning the labeling of traits as “non-medical”; and the principle of procreative beneficence. This summary of the case for and against can serve as a basis for the development of a consistent and coherent ethical framework. (shrink)

Two essays on utilitarianism, written from opposite points of view, by J. J. C. Smart and Bernard Williams. In the first part of the book Professor Smart advocates a modern and sophisticated version of classical utilitarianism; he tries to formulate a consistent and persuasive elaboration of the doctrine that the rightness and wrongness of actions is determined solely by their consequences, and in particular their consequences for the sum total of human happiness. In Part II Bernard Williams offers (...) a sustained and vigorous critique of utilitarian assumptions, arguments and ideals. He finds inadequate the theory of action implied by utilitarianism, and he argues that utilitarianism fails to engage at a serious level with the real problems of moral and political philosophy, and fails to make sense of notions such as integrity, or even human happiness itself. This book should be of interest to welfare economists, political scientists and decision-theorists. (shrink)

Non-invasive prenatal testing is at the forefront of prenatal screening. Current uses for NIPT include fetal sex determination and screening for chromosomal disorders such as trisomy 21. However, NIPT may be expanded to many different future applications. There are a potential host of ethical concerns around the expanding use of NIPT, as examined by the recent Nuffield Council report on the topic. It is important to examine what NIPT might be used for before these possibilities become consumer reality. There is (...) limited research exploring views of women on possible future uses of NIPT, particularly those of women who have undergone NIPT. In this study, we examined the views of women who undertook NIPT previously on the acceptability of and interest levels in using NIPT for a number of current and possible future applications. These included several medical conditions encompassing psychiatric, neurodevelopmental and adult-onset conditions as well as non-medical traits such as intelligence. One thousand women were invited to participate and 235 eligible surveys were received. Women generally reported an interest in using NIPT for medical conditions that severely impacted quality of life and with an onset earlier in life and stressed the importance of the accuracy of the test. Concerns were raised about the use of NIPT for non-medical traits. Respondents indicated that termination of pregnancy was not their only reason for testing, particularly in the case of sex. These results can further inform the ethical debate around the increasing integration of NIPT into healthcare systems. (shrink)

A theory of punishment should give some account of mercy and yet it is true to say that very little has been said about it at all. It is commonly regarded as a praiseworthy element in moral behaviour—something to be practised occasionally both for the good of the one who punishes and the one who is punished. The suffering that punishment involves is unpleasant for all concerned, and if it is possible to avoid it or lessen it without moral injustice, (...) then it is desirable to do so. We condemn as hard and unbending the judge who never shows mercy and the suggestion is that the poor unfortunates whose lot it is to be judged by him are poor unfortunates indeed. This is reflected in the fact that the opposite of merciful—merciless—means cruel. Presumably there are occasions when it is appropriate to show mercy to an offender, and other occasions when it is not. What are the conditions for the appropriate exercising of mercy, how do we decide how much mercy is appropriate, and when is a judge morally obliged to be merciful, if ever? (shrink)

Background Non-invasive prenatal testing (NIPT), which can screen for aneuploidies such as trisomy 21, is being implemented in several public healthcare systems across Europe. Comprehensive communication and information have been highlighted in the literature as important elements in supporting women’s reproductive decision-making and addressing relevant ethical concerns such as routinisation. Countries such as England and France are adopting broadly similar implementation models, offering NIPT for pregnancies with high aneuploidy probability. However, we do not have a deeper understanding of how professionals’ (...) counselling values and practices may differ between these contexts. Methods In this paper, we explore how professionals in England and France support patient decision-making in the provision of NIPT and critically compare professional practices and values. We draw on data from semi-structured interviews with healthcare professionals. Results Both English and French professionals emphasised values relating to patient choice and consent. However, understandings and application of these values into the practice of NIPT provision differed. English interviewees placed a stronger emphasis on interpreting and describing the process of counselling patients and clinical care through a “principle” lens. Their focus was on non-directiveness, standardisation, and the healthcare professional as “decision-facilitator” for patients. French interviewees described their approach through a “procedural” lens. Their focus was on formal consent, information, and the healthcare professional as “information-giver”. Both English and French professionals indicated that insufficient resources were a key barrier in effectively translating their values into practice. Conclusion Our findings illustrate that supporting patient choice in the provision of NIPT may be held as an important value in common on a surface level, but can be understood and translated into practice in different ways. Our findings can guide further research and beneficially inform practice and policy around NIPT provision. (shrink)

In this chapter, we analyze the relationships between the Internet and its users in terms of situated cognition theory. We first argue that the Internet is a new kind of cognitive ecology, providing almost constant access to a vast amount of digital information that is increasingly more integrated into our cognitive routines. We then briefly introduce situated cognition theory and its species of embedded, embodied, extended, distributed and collective cognition. Having thus set the stage, we begin by taking an embedded (...) cognition view and analyze how the Internet aids certain cognitive tasks. After that, we conceptualize how the Internet enables new kinds of embodied interaction, extends certain aspects of our embodiment, and examine how wearable technologies that monitor physiological, behavioral and contextual states transform the embodied self. On the basis of the degree of cognitive integration between a user and Internet resource, we then look at how and when the Internet extends our cognitive processes. We end this chapter with a discussion of distributed and collective cognition as facilitated by the Internet. (shrink)

In this article I try to refute the so-called "libertarian" theory of free will, and to examine how our conclusion ought to modify our common attitudes of praise and blame. In attacking the libertarian view, I shall try to show that it cannot be consistently stated. That is, my dscussion will be an "analytic-philosophic" one. I shall neglect what I think is in practice an equally powerful method of attack on the libertarian: a challenge to state his theory in such (...) a way that it will fit in the modern biology and psychology, which are becoming increasingly physicalistic. (shrink)

Motivational enhancement in sport – a form of ‘neuro-doping’ – can help athletes attain greater achievements in sport. A key question is whether or not that athlete deserves that achievement. We distinguish three concepts – praiseworthiness, prizeworthiness, and admiration – which are closely related. However, in sport, they can come apart. The most praiseworthy athlete may not be the most prizeworthy, and so on. Using a model of praiseworthiness as costly commitment to a valuable end, and situating prizeworthiness within the (...) boundaries of the sport, we argue that motivational enhancement in some cases can be compatible with desert. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Journal of the History of Philosophy 39.3 (2001) 458 [Access article in PDF] Philip Barker. Michel Foucault: An Introduction. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1998. Pp. xiii + 160. Paper, $19.00. The significance and value of an analyst's contribution to intellectual life and understanding is to be found in the influence his or her ideas exert on forms of thought and analysis. In the case of Michel Foucault the impact (...) of his work is felt in a wide range of disciplinary fields, including philosophy and history, disciplines to which he explicitly directed his attention, as well as other areas of intellectual endeavor, notably, sociology, criminology, political science, cultural studies, feminism, architecture, and literary analysis. Indeed, there are now few disciplinary fields that have not experienced the Foucault effect.Writing an introduction to Foucault's work is not an easy task. There are so many interpretations and issues to address, and there are already a large number of texts published on his work. Undaunted by the magnitude of the task, Philip Barker has produced a fine text, one that simultaneously manages to offer a clear introduction to the key elements of Foucault's work as well as provide food for thought for those already relatively familiar with the Foucaultian legacy. In an impressively wide-ranging text, Barker opens his discussion with a consideration of the question of how we are to read Foucault. Reflecting on Foucault's discussion of the author function, discourse, the circulation and meaning of texts, as well as the difficulties of commentary, Barker introduces the reader to the features of a "Foucauldian style of textual criticism." From here the text proceeds to cover such key substantive concerns in Foucault's work as the articulation of power, truth and strategy (Chapter 2) and discipline, subjectivities and selves (Chapters 3 and 4), before turning to a discussion of Foucault's "archaeological strategy," conception of historical analysis, and critical interrogation of the sovereign subject (Chapter 5). In the two final chapters of the book Barker seeks to encourage the reader to be more than a passive consumer of Foucault and to develop a "critical interaction" with Foucault's work. Through a series of brief reflections on philosophy, the politics of theory, and the notion of "thinking against," Barker, drawing on a text by Longinus, attempts, with a good deal of success, to put into practice Foucault's idea of "thinking differently" (Chapter 6). The book ends on a more personal and somewhat self-indulgent note, but one hopefully that will still encourage introductory readers to get to grips with Foucault's work for themselves.Barker has succeeded in producing a concise and generally stimulating introduction to Foucault's work, and it should encourage readers to try to make sense of Foucault's work for themselves. An introduction can do nothing more than open up some of the possible themes and issues to be found in the work of a thinker, and there is no substitute for engaging directly with the rich range of possibilities present in Foucault's several texts. Barry Smart University of Portsmouth... (shrink)

World Athletics have introduced regulations preventing female athletes with certain differences in sex development from competing in the female category. We argue these regulations are not justified and should be removed. Firstly, we examine the reasoning and evidence underlying the position that these athletes have a substantial mean difference in performance from other female athletes such that it constitutes an advantage, and argue it is not sufficient. Secondly, if an advantage does exist, it needs to be demonstrated it is unfair. (...) We argue the advantage would not be unfair because to say otherwise relies on a presupposition about whether these athletes are female, which involves contradictory and inconsistent definitions of sex. Thirdly, we contend that even if it is established that there is an advantage and it is unfair, the response of requiring athletes to take testosterone-suppressing medication is not appropriate and is unfair. (shrink)

Pharmacogenetics is an emerging biotechnology concerned with understanding the genetic basis of drug response, and promises to transform the development, marketing and prescription of medicines. This paper is concerned with analysing the move towards segmented drug markets, which is implicit in the commercial development of pharmacogenetics. It is claimed that in future who gets a particular drug will be determined by their genetic make up. Drawing on ideas from the sociology of expectations we examine how pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies are (...) constructing, responding to and realising particular ‘visions’ or expectations of pharmacogenetics and market stratification. We argue that the process of market segmentation remains uncertain, but that the outcome will be fashioned according to the convergence and divergence of the interests of key commercial actors. Qualitative data based both on interviews with industry executives and company documentation will be used to explore how different groups of companies are developing pharmacogenetics in distinct ways, and what consequences these different pathways might have for both clinical practice and health policy. In particular, the analysis will show a convergence of interests between biotechnology and pharmaceutical companies for creating segmented markets for new drugs, but a divergence of interest in segmenting established markets. Whilst biotechnology firms have a strong incentive to innovate, the pharmaceutical industry has no commercial interest in segmenting markets for existing products. This has important implications, as many of the claimed public health benefits of pharmacogenetics will derive from changing the prescribing of existing medicines. One significant implication of this is that biotechnology companies who wish to apply pharmacogenetics to existing medicines will have to explore an alternative convergence of interests with healthcare payers and providers . Healthcare providers may have a strong incentive to use pharmacogenetics to make the prescribing of existing medicine more cost-effective. However, we conclude by suggesting that a question mark hangs over their ability to provide the necessary economic and structural resources to bring such a vision to fruition. (shrink)

Alongside existing research into the social, political and economic impacts of the Web, there is a need to study the Web from a cognitive and epistemic perspective. This is particularly so as new and emerging technologies alter the nature of our interactive engagements with the Web, transforming the extent to which our thoughts and actions are shaped by the online environment. Situated and ecological approaches to cognition are relevant to understanding the cognitive significance of the Web because of the emphasis (...) they place on forces and factors that reside at the level of agent–world interactions. In particular, by adopting a situated or ecological approach to cognition, we are able to assess the significance of the Web from the perspective of research into embodied, extended, embedded, social and collective cognition. The results of this analysis help to reshape the interdisciplinary configuration of Web Science, expanding its theoretical and empirical remit to include the disciplines of both cognitive science and the philosophy of mind. (shrink)

Proponents of the extended mind have suggested that phenomenal transparency may be important to the way we evaluate putative cases of cognitive extension. In particular, it has been suggested that in order for a bio-external resource to count as part of the machinery of the mind, it must qualify as a form of transparent equipment or transparent technology. The present paper challenges this claim. It also challenges the idea that phenomenological properties can be used to settle disputes regarding the constitutional (...) status of bio-external resources in episodes of extended cognizing. Rather than regard phenomenal transparency as a criterion for cognitive extension, we suggest that transparency is a feature of situations that support the ascription of certain cognitive/mental dispositional properties to both ourselves and others. By directing attention to the forces and factors that motivate disposition ascriptions, we arrive at a clearer picture of the role of transparency in arguments for extended cognition and the extended mind. As it turns out, transparency is neither necessary nor sufficient for cognitive extension, but this does not mean that it is entirely irrelevant to our understanding of the circumstances in which episodes of extended cognizing are apt to arise. (shrink)

The chief point in Professor Flew's reply is this. God could have made men perfectly good, not by altering their inclinations, as I suggested in my main Utopia, but by boosting the forces which resist temptations. All men would need is more strength of character and more sense of duty. Perhaps I was psychically blind not to go into this. Let us do so now. Flew seems to have a monolithic idea of the concepts sense of duty and strength of (...) character , as though these have nothing to do with particular dispositions like courage. (shrink)

Examples of extended cognition typically involve the use of technologically low-grade bio-external resources (e.g., the use of pen and paper to solve long multiplication problems). The present paper describes a putative case of extended cognizing based around a technologically advanced mixed reality device, namely, the Microsoft HoloLens. The case is evaluated from the standpoint of a mechanistic perspective. In particular, it is suggested that a combination of organismic (e.g., the human individual) and extra-organismic (e.g., the HoloLens) resources form part of (...) a common mechanism that realizes a bona fide cognitive routine. In addition to demonstrating how the theoretical resources of neo-mechanical philosophy might be used to evaluate extended cognitive systems, the present paper illustrates one of the ways in which mixed reality devices, virtual objects (i.e., holograms), and online (Internet-accessible) computational routines might be incorporated into human cognitive processes. This, it is suggested, speaks to the recent interest in mixed/virtual reality technologies across a number of disciplines. It also introduces us to issues that cross-cut disparate fields of philosophical research, such as the philosophy of science and the philosophy of technology. (shrink)

The identity theory of mind holds that states and processes of the mind are identical to states and processes of the brain. Strictly speaking, it need not hold that the mind is identical to the brain. Idiomatically we do use ‘She has a good mind’ and ‘She has a good brain’ interchangeably but we would hardly say ‘Her mind weighs fifty ounces’. Here I take identifying mind and brain as being a matter of identifying processes and perhaps states of the (...) mind and brain. Consider an experience of pain, or of seeing something, or of having a mental image. The identity theory of mind is to the effect that these experiences just are brain processes, not merely correlated with brain processes. (shrink)

In his discussion note ‘J. J. C. Smart, Materialism and Occam's Razor’ Peter Glassen argues that it was inconsistent of me both to assert that realism is true and that Occam's razor is a reason for the materialist thesis. Glassen says that Occam's razor ‘ is not a physical thing, state or process at all ’. A little further down on the same page he uses the phrase ‘material or physical thing, state, or process’. It is possible, therefore, that (...) Glassen regards the distinction between ‘material’ and ‘physical’ as unimportant in the present context. I think however that one way of replying to Glassen turns on this distinction. (shrink)

Without doubt Michel Foucault was one of the 20th century's towering intellectuals. His work on organization of knowledge, sexuality, power, discipline, medicine, madness, identity, and politics has left an idelible mark on contemporary thinking in these fields. Edited by one of the world's most distinguished Foucault scholars, Barry Smart, this collection sets Foucault's work in the the appropriate historical and intellectual context by orgaizing the material thematically with introductions that quide the reader through the complexities of the essays. These (...) volumes will be essential reading wherever the work of Foucault is debated and applied. (shrink)

While epistemologists routinely employ disbelief talk, it is not clear that they really mean it, given that they often equate disbelieving p with believing ¬p. I argue that this is a mistake—disbelief is a doxastic attitude of rejection and is distinct from belief. I first clarify this claim and its opposition, then show that we must distinguish disbelieving p from believing ¬p in order to account for the fact that we continue to hold doxastic attitudes toward propositions that we reject. (...) After defending this argument against some possible objections, I examine several cases that reveal disbelieving p to be not only non-identical to believing ¬p, but independent of that attitude as well. Finally, I sketch some immediate and potential consequences of recognizing disbelief as a distinct doxastic attitude, particularly for work on epistemic rationality. (shrink)