Seeking to derive the manifestly qualitative world of objects and entities without recourse to fundamental categoricity or qualitativity, I offer an account of how higher-order categorical properties and objects may emerge from a pure-power base. I explore the possibility of ‘fields’ whose fluctuations are force-carrying entities, differentiated with respect to a micro-topology of curled-up spatial dimensions. Since the spacetime paths of gauge bosons have zero ‘spacetime interval’ and no time-like extension, I argue that according them the status of fundamental entities (...) would support a pure-power ontology. Such entities, circulating within self-sustaining micro-topological ‘networks’, feasibly maintain definite spatial configurations of conserved physical quantities, including energy-momentum. Perceived as time-like and massy, and representing fermionic entities, they give rise to the manifest world. (shrink)

This paper largely engages with Brian Ellis’s description of categorical dimensions as put forward in his paper in this volume. The New Essentialism advocated by Ellis posits the ontologically-robust existence of both dispositional and categorical properties. I have argued that the distinction that Ellis draws between the two is unpersuasive, and that the causal role of categorical dimensions—what they do—is inseparable from what they are. This observation is reinforced by the fact that absolute physical quantities permit re-interpretations of measurement that (...) remove a clear differentiation between categoricity and dispositionality. Distinguishing between ‘pure power’ and ‘dispositionality’, I further argue that: i) there are no ontologically-robust categorical properties, although their apparent existence is explicable as higher-order and supervenient; ii) that the fundamental ingredients of the world may be accounted for in terms of pure-power that is neither categorical nor dispositional; and iii) that the categorical-dispositional distinction arises only at the higher-order level of objects, and does not in any case constitute ontologically-robust partitioning of reality. -/- . (shrink)

In this paper I argue that the requirement for the qualitative is theory-dependent, determined by the fundamental assumptions built into the ontology. John Heil’s qualitative, in its role as individuator of objects and powers, is required only by a theory that posits a world of distinct objects or powers. Does Heil’s ‘deep’ view of the world, such that there is only one powerful object require the qualitative as individuator of objects and powers? The answer depends on whether it is possible (...) to account for the manifest objects and the ostensible spatial primacy of our perceived world without recourse to the qualitative. In this paper I outline just such an account with the intention of extending Heil’s efforts to incorporate fundamental power in the world while providing a coherent explanation for our strong intuition of spatial, as against relational, priority. (shrink)

In this paper, I argue that Mumford's Realist Lawlessness account of powers leads to ontological Holism. Consequently, this calls for a deflated conception of haecceity, intrinsicality and discreteness.

This Thesis engages with contemporary philosophical controversies about the nature of dispositional properties or powers and the relationship they have to their non-dispositional counterparts. The focus concerns fundamentality. In particular, I seek to answer the question, ‘What fundamental properties suffice to account for the manifest world?’ The answer I defend is that fundamental categorical properties need not be invoked in order to derive a viable explanation for the manifest world. My stance is a field-theoretic view which describes the world as (...) a single system comprised of pure power, and involves the further contention that ‘pure power’ should not be interpreted as ‘purely dispositional’, if dispositionality means potentiality, possibility or otherwise unmanifested power or ability bestowed upon some bearer. The theoretical positions examined include David Armstrong’s Categoricalism, Sydney Shoemaker’s Causal Theory of Properties, Brian Ellis’s New Essentialism, Ullin Place’s Conceptualism, Charles Martin’s and John Heil’s Identity Theory of Properties and Rom Harré’s Theory of Causal Powers. The central concern of this Thesis is to examine reasons for holding a pure-power theory, and to defend such a stance. This involves two tasks. The first requires explaining what plays the substance role in a pure-power world. This Thesis argues that fundamental power, although not categorical, can be considered ontologically-robust and thus able to fulfil the substance role. A second task—answering the challenge put forward by Richard Swinburne and thereafter replicated in various neo-Swinburne arguments—concerns how the manifestly qualitative world can be explained starting from a pure-power base. The Light-like Network Account is put forward in an attempt to show how the manifest world can be derived from fundamental pure power. (shrink)

Sydney Shoemaker’s causal theory of properties is an important starting place for some contemporary metaphysical perspectives concerning the nature of properties. In this paper, I discuss the causal and intrinsic criteria that Shoemaker stipulates for the identity of genuine properties and relations, and address George Molnar’s criticism that holding both criteria presents an unbridgeable hypothesis in the causal theory of properties. The causal criterion requires that properties and relations contribute to the causal powers of objects if they are to be (...) deemed genuine rather than ‘mere-Cambridge’. The intrinsic criterion requires that all genuine properties and relations be intrinsic. Molnar’s S-property argument says that these criteria conflict if one considers extrinsic spatiotemporal properties and relations to contribute causally. In this paper, I argue that a solution to the contradiction that Molnar identifies involves a denial of discreteness between objects, leading to a power holist perspective and a resulting deflationary account of intrinsicality. (shrink)

The purpose of this study was to evaluate, revise, and extend the Informed Consent Ontology (ICO) for expressing clinical permissions, including reuse of residual clinical biospecimens and health data. This study followed a formative evaluation design and used a bottom-up modeling approach. Data were collected from the literature on US federal regulations and a study of clinical consent forms. Eleven federal regulations and fifteen permission-sentences from clinical consent forms were iteratively modeled to identify entities and their relationships, followed by community (...) reflection and negotiation based on a series of predetermined evaluation questions. ICO included fifty-two classes and twelve object properties necessary when modeling, demonstrating appropriateness of extending ICO for the clinical domain. Twenty-six additional classes were imported into ICO from other ontologies, and twelve new classes were recommended for development. This work addresses a critical gap in formally representing permissions clinical permissions, including reuse of residual clinical biospecimens and health data. It makes missing content available to the OBO Foundry, enabling use alongside other widely-adopted biomedical ontologies. ICO serves as a machine-interpretable and interoperable tool for responsible reuse of residual clinical biospecimens and health data at scale. (shrink)

The case for an eco-emancipatory politics to release the Earth from human domination and free us all from lives that are both exploitative and exploited Human domination of nature shapes every aspect of our lives today, even as it remains virtually invisible to us. Because human beings are a part of nature, the human domination of nature circles back to confine and exploit people as well—and not only the poor and marginalized but also the privileged and affluent, even in the (...) world’s most prosperous societies. Although modern democracy establishes constraints intended to protect people from domination as the arbitrary exercise of power, it offers few such protections for nonhuman parts of nature. The result is that, wherever we fall in human hierarchies, we inevitably find ourselves both complicit in and entrapped by a system that makes sustainable living all but impossible. It confines and exploits not only nature but people too, albeit in different ways. In Eco-Emancipation, Sharon Krause argues that we can find our way to a better, freer life by constraining the use of human power in relation to nature and promoting nature’s well-being alongside our own, thereby releasing the Earth from human domination and freeing us from a way of life that is both exploitative and exploited, complicit and entrapped. Eco-emancipation calls for new, more-than-human political communities that incorporate nonhuman parts of nature through institutions of representation and regimes of rights, combining these new institutional arrangements with political activism, a public ethos of respect for nature, and a culture of eco-responsibility. (shrink)

In this book Sharon Krause argues that moral and political deliberation must incorporate passions, even as she insists on the value of impartiality.

This study focuses on multiple masculinities conceptualized in terms of sociality, a concept used to refer to nonsexual interpersonal attractions. Through male homosocial heterosexual interactions, hegemonic masculinity is maintained as the norm to which men are held accountable despite individual conceptualizations of masculinity that depart from that norm. When it is understood among heterosexual men in homosocial circles that masculinity means being emotionally detached and competitive and that masculinity involves viewing women as sexual objects, their daily interactions help perpetuate a (...) system that subordinates femininity and nonhegemonic masculinities. Nonhegemonic masculinities fail to influence structural gender arrangements significantly because their expression is either relegated to heterosocial settings or suppressed entirely. (shrink)

The concept of non-domination is an important contribution to the study of freedom but it does not comprehend the whole of freedom. Insofar as domination requires a conscious capacity for control on the part of the dominant party, it fails to capture important threats to individual freedom that permeate many contemporary liberal democracies today. Much of the racism, sexism and other cultural biases that currently constrain the life-chances of members of subordinate groups in the USA are largely unconscious and unintentional, (...) and they do not always involve control. Although they constitute real barriers to freedom, these forms of influence are not accurately characterized as domination, and they will require different mechanisms to overcome them. To achieve the more capacious freedoms that liberal democracy promises, we will need to go beyond non-domination and to come to terms with the non-sovereign, socially distributed character of human agency. (shrink)

In their vulnerability to arbitrary, exploitative uses of human power, many of Earth’s nonhuman parts are subject to environmental domination. People too are subject to environmental domination in ways that include but also extend beyond the special environmental burdens borne by those who are poor and marginalized. Despite the substantial inequalities that exist among us as human beings, we are all captured and exploited by the eco-damaging collective practices that constitute modern life for everyone today. Understanding the complex, interacting dynamics (...) of environmental domination can orient us to a more liberatory approach to our environmental problems and to one another, both human and nonhuman. To make good on this potential, however, we need to move beyond existing conceptions of domination. This essay reconstructs the concept of domination to illuminate the multiple ways that the human domination of nature interacts with the domination of people, and it identifies changes that could support more emancipatory forms of political order, a politics of non-domination for people and the Earth. (shrink)

A better appreciation of the material, distributed quality of human agency can illuminate subtle dynamics of domination and oppression and reveal resources for potentially liberatory political action. Materialist accounts of agency nevertheless pose challenges to the notion of personal responsibility that is so crucial to political obligation and democratic citizenship. To guard against this danger, we need to sustain the close connection between agency and a sense of selfhood that is individuated, reflexive, and responsive to norms. Yet we should acknowledge (...) that reflexive selfhood is not the whole of individual agency for the sources of agency extend beyond the individual herself. We also need to recognize the ways that both reflexivity and norm-responsiveness are themselves embodied capacities. When properly conceived, a materialist view of agency can increase awareness of our oftenunwitting contributions to systematic inequalities of power and extend our political responsibilities in emancipatory directions, thus holding great promise for democratic life. (shrink)

Background: There is little research into medical students’ or doctors’ attitudes to abortion, yet knowing this is important, as policy makers should be aware of the views held by professionals directly involved in abortion provision and changing views may have practical implications for the provision of abortion in the future. Methods: We surveyed 300 medical students about their views on abortion, their beliefs about the status of the fetus and the rights of the mother, their attitude towards UK law and (...) their willingness to be involved in abortion provision as qualified doctors. Results: 62% of medical students were pro-choice, 33% pro-life and 7% undecided. Students’ views correlated with gender, year of study and holding a religious belief. Their beliefs about abortion, the status of the fetus and the rights of women significantly correlated with their attitudes towards the UK law and their willingness to be involved in abortion provision. Students’ willingness to be involved in abortion provision was related to their views on abortion, the extent of participation required, the circumstances of the pregnancy and the stage of pregnancy. Conclusions: The percentage of pro-choice students was lower than that found in research on general practitioners’ attitudes to abortion. It is unclear whether this is because students become more pro-choice as they progress through their medical career or because there is genuinely a change in attitudes to abortion. (shrink)

The Companion to Montesquieu provides a first port-of-call for readers new to the study of Montesquieu, even as it makes major contributions to the specialist literature. The volume will attract scholars of multiple disciplines and readers interested in concepts like liberty, cosmopolitanism, sovereignty, and slavery treated in the thematic chapters.

The philosophical bases underlying methodological and decision-making processes for environmental issues are rarely questioned, and yet have important consequences. What commonly results is that first order solutions are technical ways of addressing problems which limit human relation to nature. Martin Heidegger’s phenomenology makes a distinction between “thatness” and “whatness.”“What a thing is” is depicted by modern science with “being as continual presence.” “That a thing is” refers to nature’s capacity for disclosure and withdrawal, that being is both “presence and absence.” (...) This essay evaluates thepragmatic prospects of heightening an approach on the “thatness” of nature. (shrink)

Political respect for nature is an important part of cultivating a more emancipatory and ecologically sustainable politics. As a political principle, it can supplement respect for persons with institutional mechanisms that formally constrain how human power may be exercised over non-human beings and things and that require us to use our power in ways that are attentive to nature’s well-being along with our own. Moreover, when internalized by citizens as part of their shared political ethos and public culture, respect for (...) nature has the potential to protect against the abuse of power in our interpersonal relations with Earth’s non-human parts. Political respect for nature means acknowledging that non-human beings and things count, that they deserve to be treated according to standards of right and that there are principled limits to how human power may be exercised over them. It means formalizing these constraints in the basic structure of society and fostering a public culture of self-restraint and responsiveness. (shrink)

Few empirical studies have explored how different types of knowledge are associated with diverse objectivities and moral economies. Here, we examine these associations through an empirical investigation of the public policy debate in Israel around medical cannabis, which may be termed a contested medicine because its therapeutic effects, while subjectively felt by users, are not generally recognized by the medical profession. Our findings indicate that beneath the MC debate lie deep-seated issues of epistemology, which are entwined with questions of ethics (...) and morality. Whereas some stakeholder groups viewed evidence-based medicine and mechanical objectivity as the only valid knowledge base, others called for recognition of a particular experience-based knowledge, championing regulatory, administrative, or strong objectivity. Stakeholders’ interpretations of what should be considered as ethical courses of action corresponded to their epistemological views, with most criticizing the regulators for relying on regulatory subjectivity instead of objectivity. Our in-depth mapping of this arena allowed us not only to shed light on the emergence of the new entity called “medical cannabis” but also to reexamine the link between epistemology, ethics, and action and to elucidate how heterogeneous groups view the validity and objectivity of knowledge and the interface between medicine, science, and policy. (shrink)

This article examines Montesquieu's concept of natural law and treatment of legal customs in conjunction with his theory of moral psychology. It explores his effort to entwine the rational procedural quality of laws with the substantive principles that sustain them. Montesquieu grounds natural law in the desires of the human being as ‘a feeling creature’, thus establishing the normative force of desire and making right action attractive by engaging the passions rather than subordinating them to reason. As a result, natural (...) law generates both political norms and the motivations that drive political actions. It provides a standard for assessing the ostensibly jumbled multiplicity of legal customs in human societies. And it reminds us that there is more to political theory than the rational justifi-cation of norms, that central to any account of liberal constitutionalism must be an effort to show the attractions – and not only the justice or the rationality – of right action. Key Words: law • Montesquieu • moral psychology • motivation • natural • law • norm justification • passions. (shrink)

The close connection between norms and motives that is characteristic of Hume's moral theory threatens to break down when it comes to the political matter of justice. Here a gap arises between the moral approval of justice, which is based on its utility, and the desires that motivate just action, which utility cannot fully explain. Therefore the obligation to justice may seem to be motivationally unsupported. This difficulty is compounded by the fact that, for Hume, no obligation can arise unless (...) a normally effective motivation exists for it. In addition to disabling just action, then, the motivational deficit threatens to undercut the normative status of justice as a virtue. A solution to this dilemma lies in what Hume calls the "immediately agreeable" condition of "integrity" or "character." The agreeableness of integrity indirectly confers upon justice a luster that makes it attractive and obligatory even when it does not actually serve the interests of individual or society, and when self-interest and sympathy fall short in sustaining compliance. (shrink)

The close connection between norms and motives that is characteristic of Hume’s moral theory threatens to break down when it comes to the political matter of justice. Here a gap arises between the moral approval of justice, which is based on its utility, and the desires that motivate just action, which utility cannot fully explain. Therefore the obligation to justice may seem to be motivationally unsupported. This difficulty is compounded by the fact that, for Hume, no obligation can arise unless (...) a normally effective motivation exists for it. In addition to disabling just action, then, the motivational deficit threatens to undercut the normative status of justice as a virtue. A solution to this dilemma lies in what Hume calls the “immediately agreeable” condition of “integrity” or “character.” The agreeableness of integrity indirectly confers upon justice a luster that makes it attractive and obligatory even when it does not actually serve the interests of individual or society, and when self-interest and sympathy fall short in sustaining compliance. (shrink)

I think that Alzheimer's disease and all neurological disabilities of this kind, degenerative conditions, are of the most intense intellectual interest and importance … because these people are taking us to places we would rather not think about and what these people have to say—to the degree that they can say anything at all—should teach us something about what a person is, what human identity is.What could it mean in general to say that possible ways to be a person can (...) from time to time come into being or disappear?What can we learn about the experience of dementia and about ways of being human when a poet describes her forgetting? My mother, the poet Shirley Kaufman, died in 2016 at the age of 93. She had... (shrink)

An explosion in the varieties of life-extending interventions for older persons is changing the face of many medical specialties in the United States, altering the nature of end-stage disease, and reshaping societal expectations about normal old age, longevity, and the time for death. There is no doubt that the rapid growth of the over-85 age group and better health in late life for many people in the United States are redefining “old.” Robert Butler, founding director of the National Institute on (...) Aging, has stated that “80 is the new 60,” adding to other popular remarks that signify a changed understanding of life course expectations, especially for those who can access all that medicine has to offer. Overall .. (shrink)

This paper highlights contributions of A Democratic Bearing, especially its conceptualization of domination and the demos, and argues that the liberal limitation of power is an important supplement to deliberative democracy in sustaining the ‘democratic bearing’ model of citizenship that the book calls for.