Some skeptical theists use Wykstra’s CORNEA constraint to undercut Rowe-style inductive arguments from evil. Many critics of skeptical theism accept CORNEA, but argue that Rowe-style arguments meet its constraint. But Justin McBrayer argues that CORNEA is itself mistaken. It is, he claims, akin to “sensitivity” or “truth-tracking” constraints like those of Robert Nozick; but counterexamples show that inductive evidence is often insensitive. We here defend CORNEA against McBrayer’s chief counterexample. We first clarify CORNEA, distinguishing it from a deeper underlying (...) principle that we dub “CORE.” We then give both principles a probabilistic construal, and show how, on this construal, the counterexample fails. (shrink)

Graham and Maitzen think my CORNEA principle is in trouble because it entails “intolerable violations of closure under known entailment.” I argue that the trouble arises from current befuddlement about closure itself, and that a distinction drawn by Rudolph Carnap, suitably extended, shows how closure, when properly understood, works in tandem with CORNEA. CORNEA does not obey Closure because it shouldn’t: it applies to “dynamic” epistemic operators, whereas closure principles hold only for “static” ones. What the authors see as an (...) intolerable vice of CORNEA is actually a virtue, helping us see what closure principles should—and shouldn’t—themselves be about. (shrink)

Schellenberg’s Wisdom to Doubt uses a “meta-evidential condition constraining assent” that I dub MECCA. On MECCA, my total current evidence E may be good evidence for H, yet not justify my believing H, due to meta-evidential considerations giving me reason to doubt whether E is “representative” of the total evidence E* that exists. I argue that considerations of representativeness are implicit in judging that E is good evidence, rendering this description incoherent, and that Schellenberg’s specific meta-evidence has less trumping power (...) than he thinks. (shrink)

Using Currie's critique as a foil, this paper reconstructs Lakatos's thesis that historiography of science is laden with normative assumptions about scientific rationality. It is argued that this thesis comprises both a heuristic claim and a constitutive claim. The Received Critique of Lakatos fails to see that "internal history" and "rational reconstruction" receive a special meaning (by which they designate "rational preconstructions") when used in the context of the heuristic claim. Currie avoids this mistake, but attributes to Lakatos an "investigation-surrogate (...) claim" which misrepresents the heuristic claim, oversimplifying the relation Lakatos envisions between hard cores and the solutions they generate. (shrink)

How can the philosopher use history of science to assess normative methodologies? This paper distinguishes the "intuitionist" meta-methodologies from the "rationability" meta-methodology. The rationability approach is defended by showing that it does not lead to anarchistic conclusions drawn by Feyerabend, Lakatos, and Kuhn; rather, these conclusions are the result of auxiliary assumptions about the nature of rational norms. By freeing the rationability meta-method from these assumptions, the specter of anarchism can be exorcised from it.

What we call “the evidential argument from evil” is not one argument but a family of them, originating (perhaps) in the 1979 formulation of William Rowe. Wykstra’s early versions of skeptical theism emerged in response to Rowe’s evidential arguments. But what sufficed as a response to Rowe may not suffice against later more sophisticated versions of the problem of evil—in particular, those along the lines pioneered by Paul Draper. Our chief aim here is to make an earlier version of (...) skeptical theism more responsive to the type abductive atheology pioneered by Draper. In particular, we suggest a moderate form of skeptical theism may be able to resist Draper’s abductive atheology. (shrink)

Foucault, Power, and Education invites internationally renowned scholar Stephen J. Ball to reflect on the importance and influence of Foucault on his work in educational policy.

Drawing on a host of philosophers such as Arthur Schopenhauer, Gabriel Marcel, Josef Pieper, Paul Ricoeur, Viktor Frankl, Eric Voegelin, Bernard Lonergan, Roger Scruton, John Caputo, and Ludwig Wittgenstein, as well as theologians like Hans Urs von Balthasar, Karl Rahner, Hans KÃ1/4ng, Pope Benedict XVI and Pope Francis, this book argues passionately for the place of hope as the â ~beyondâ (TM) of both a will-oâ (TM)-the-wisp, facile optimism, on the one hand, and a world-weary, fatuous pessimism, on the other. (...) Drawing on the philosophy of Advaita Vedanta in the concluding chapter, it suggests that only by living from the Self as distinct from the ego can we know ultimate peace and experience the bliss of being that is beyond both hope and happiness. These philosophical reflections are both timely, as the publication appears amid the Coronavirus crisis, and wise. It is warmly recommended for its breadth and depth of knowledge. This book will appeal to students of both Eastern and Western philosophy, as well as spiritual seekers. (shrink)

Provides guiding principles and values for practising responsible global media ethics.

This is a unique book, drawing together the profound insights of Eastern philosophy (Advaita Vedanta), Western depth-psychology (Jungian), and spirituality (Ignatian) as applied to decision-making. Mention is made of Plato, C. G. Jung, Ira Progoff, Viktor Frankl, and Bernard Lonergan, amongst others. Powerful and practical tools and techniques for making wise decisions are offered. There are sections on Descartes's famous square, the ego and the Self, the I Ching and synchronicity, archetypes, neuroscience and the triune brain, biases and blind spots (...) which can derail decision-making, together with chapters on creativity, the "aha" experience, and the Enneagram with its nine decision-making styles. Dr. Costello is at pains to point out that heart (emotions), head (reason), and hands (action/doing) must be integrated before effective decision-making can take place and bear fruition. (shrink)

Transnational corporations have become actors with significant political power and authority which should entail responsibility and liability, specifically direct liability for complicity in human rights violations. Holding TNCs liable for human rights violations is complicated by the discontinuity between the fragmented legal/political structure of the TNC and its integrated strategic reality and the international state system which privileges sovereignty and non-intervention over the protection of individual rights. However, the post-Westphalian transition—the emergence of multiple authorities, increasing ambiguity of borders and jurisdiction (...) and blurring of the line between the public and private spheres—should facilitate imposing direct responsibility on transnational firms. Mechanisms for imposing direct responsibility on TNCs are considered including voluntary agreements and international law. However, I conclude that a hybrid public-private regime which relies onnon-hierarchical compliance mechanisms is likely to be both more effective and consistent with the structure of the emerging transnational order. (shrink)

1 Introducing Monsieur Foucault Stephen J. Ball Michel Foucault is an enigma, a massively influential intellectual who steadfastly refused to align himself ...

The experience of having to suffer debilitating pain is far too common in the United States, and many patients continue to be inadequately treated by their doctors. Although many physicians freely admit that their pain management practices may have been somewhat lacking, many more express concern that the prescribing of heightened levels of opioid analgesics may result in closer regulatory scrutiny, criminal investigation, or even criminal prosecution.Although several researchers have examined the regulatory environment and the threat of sanction or harm (...) it poses to physicians and patients, few have examined the likelihood of investigation or prosecution stemming from the aggressive use of opioids in physician-directed pain management. Accordingly, in an effort to assess whether the fear of prosecution is realistic and, if so, what factors contribute to its likelihood, we surveyed chief prosecutors in four states about their knowledge, opinions, and attitudes concerning opioids and the prosecution of physicians stemming from the treatment of patients who were either terminally ill or suffering from chronic noncancer pain. (shrink)

The experience of having to suffer debilitating pain is far too common in the United States, and many patients continue to be inadequately treated by their doctors. Although many physicians freely admit that their pain management practices may have been somewhat lacking, many more express concern that the prescribing of heightened levels of opioid analgesics may result in closer regulatory scrutiny, criminal investigation, or even criminal prosecution.Although several researchers have examined the regulatory environment and the threat of sanction or harm (...) it poses to physicians and patients, few have examined the likelihood of investigation or prosecution stemming from the aggressive use of opioids in physician-directed pain management. Accordingly, in an effort to assess whether the fear of prosecution is realistic and, if so, what factors contribute to its likelihood, we surveyed chief prosecutors in four states about their knowledge, opinions, and attitudes concerning opioids and the prosecution of physicians stemming from the treatment of patients who were either terminally ill or suffering from chronic noncancer pain. (shrink)

In 1937, just as Dobzhansky published the book that later generations would laud as the foundation of the modern synthesis, the American Naturnlist published a symposium on "supraspecific variation in nature and in classification." Alfred C. Kinsey, who later became one of America's most controversial intellectuals for his study of basic behaviors in another sort of WASP,1 led off the symposium with a summary of his extensive work on a family of gall wasps, the Cynipidae. In his article, Kinsey strongly (...) advocated the central theme of the developing synthesis: Evolution at all scales, particularly macroevolution, could be explained by the genetic mechanisms observed in laboratories and local populations. He first complained that some geneticists and naturalists were still impeding a synthesis with their insistence upon causal separation of levels: "Just as some of the geneticists have insisted that the laboratory genetics may explain the nature and origin of Mendelian races, but not of natural species, so others indicate that the qualities of higher categories must be explained on bases other than those involved in species" (1937, p. 208). He then defended the central postulate. (shrink)

War metaphors are ubiquitous in discussions of everything from political campaigns to battles with cancer to wars against crime, drugs, poverty, and even salad. Why are warfare metaphors so common, and what are the potential benefits and costs to using them to frame important social and political issues? We address these questions in a detailed case study by reviewing the empirical literature on the subject and by advancing our own theoretical account of the structure and function of war metaphors in (...) public discourse. We argue that war metaphors are omnipresent because they draw on basic and widely shared schematic knowledge that efficiently structures our ability to reason and communicate about many different types of situations, and they reliably express an urgent, negatively valenced emotional tone that captures attention and motivates action. Nevertheless, we find that the meaning of war metaphors is intimately tied to the context in which they are used, which may result in either positive or negative outcomes, depending on the situation. Thus, blanket statements about whether or not a war frame is useful are misguided or overly constraining. Here we situate our case study results in relation to popular theories of metaphoric representation and processing and offer some guidelines for using a war framing effectively. This work helps illuminate the complex, dynamic, and nuanced functions of metaphor in cognition in general, and in public discourse in particular. (shrink)

Death, like many social problems, has become medicalized. In response to this medicalization, physician-assisted suicide has emerged as one alternative among many at the end of life. And although the practice is currently legal in the states of Oregon and Washington, opponents still argue that PAS is unethical, is inconsistent with a physician's role, and cannot be effectively regulated. In comparison, Switzerland, like Oregon, permits PAS, but unlike Oregon, non-physicians and private organizations play a significant role in assisted death. Could (...) the Swiss model be the answer? The following essay explores the Swiss model of assisted suicide for its potential to enhance the regulation of PAS, reduce physician involvement, and perhaps demedicalize the way we die. (shrink)

This essay responds to Hirstein, Sifferd and Fagan’s book, Responsible Brains, which claims that executive function is the guiding mechanism that supports both responsible agency and the necessity for some excuses. In contrast, I suggest that executive function is not the universal acid and the neuroscience at present contributes almost nothing to the necessary psychological level of explanation and analysis. To the extent neuroscience can be useful, it is virtually entirely dependent on well-validated psychology to correlate with the neuroscientific variables (...) under investigation. The essay considers what executive function is and what the neuroscience adds to our understanding of it. Then it addresses moral and legal responsibility generally, and specific doctrines. Executive function is seldom found to be the most perspicuous approach to any of the general or specific moral and legal questions. (shrink)

This book develops an alternative approach to sentence- and word-meaning, which I dub the speech-act theoretic approach, or STA. Instead of employing the syntactic and semantic forms of modern logic–principally, quantification theory–to construct semantic theories, STA employs speech-act structures. The structures it employs are those postulated by a novel theory of speech-acts. STA develops a compositional semantics in which surface grammar is integrated with semantic interpretation in a way not allowed by standard quantification-based theories. It provides a pragmatic theory of (...) truth, a treatment of logically complex discourse as expressive cognitive states, and a background metaphysics in which the world is a totality of logically simple states of affairs. The book also puts forward an account of how intentional states provide the simple, representational foundation for a superstructure of speech-act structures–a system of thoughts–that far outruns the expressive power of the intentional foundation. In short, it provides an account of cognitive foundations of a language and a naturalistic reduction of semantics through an expressive theory of semantic norms. (shrink)

Medicalized Death and the Right to Die Movement Prior to the 20th Century, most Americans died at home, surrounded by family, friends, and neighbors. Religion, not medicine, governed the death bed for there was little physicians could do for the dying. Eventually, however, advances in medicine and technology would lead to dramatic changes in the timing and location of death: patients not only began living longer, they were also dying longer, and unlike their predecessors, were more likely to die alone, (...) in institutions, and among strangers. Modern medicine, in its zeal to conquer death, had become obsessed with its curative function and ability to extend the lives of the dying. To many in the medical community, death represented failure and was something to be avoided at all costs, and like many other social problems in the United States, had become medicalized. (shrink)

Stephen Ward argues that present media practices are narrowly based within the borders of single country and thus unable to successfully inform the public about a globalized world. Presenting an ethical framework for work in multimedia, the author extends John Rawl’s theories of justice and the human good to redefine the aims for which journalism should strive and then applies this new foundation to issues such as the roles of patriotism and objectivity in journalism. An innovative argument that presents (...) a necessary corrective to contemporary media practices, Global Journalism Ethics is a theoretically rich study for journalists on the air, in print, and on the internet. (shrink)

Few areas of scientific investigation have spawned more alternative approaches than animal behavior: comparative psychology, ethology, behavioral ecology, sociobiology, behavioral endocrinology, behavioral neuroscience, neuroethology, behavioral genetics, cognitive ethology, developmental psychobiology---the list goes on. Add in the behavioral sciences focused on the human animal, and you can continue the list with ethnography, biological anthropology, political science, sociology, psychology (cognitive, social, developmental, evolutionary, etc.), and even that dismal science, economics. Clearly, no reasonable-length chapter can do justice to such a varied collection. We (...) have opted therefore to focus on three of these subdisciplines and to provide a somewhat historical tour of them, mentioning along the way the philosophical points that are of particular interest to us, but allowing the development of these points to be limited only by the imaginations of our readers. For readers seeking a more-traditional historical survey, see Dewsbury (1984a, b) and Burghardt (1985a). Our chosen brief is to write about comparative psychology, ethology, and cognitive ethology, although other approaches, especially neuroscience, will be mentioned where appropriate. These sciences are philosophically significant because they are enmeshed in ancient philosophical questions about the nature of mind and purposeful action and about the differences between humans and other animals. These sciences are also clustered because of their attention to mechanistic explanations of individual animal behavior as opposed to attempting to capture regularities at a population level, such as the game-theoretic strategic models popular among behavioral ecologists. (shrink)

Most studies into the performance of socially responsible investment vehicles have focused on the performance of sustainable or socially responsible mutual funds. This research has been complemented recently by a number of studies that have examined the performance of sustainable investment indices. In both cases, the majority of studies have concluded that the returns of socially responsible investment vehicles have either underperformed, or failed to outperform, comparable market indices. Although the impact of sustainable indices to date has been limited, the (...) recent launch of sustainable indices by Dow Jones and FTSE suggests that more attention is being paid to the subject by financial markets, investors, and companies. This development raises a number of important issues which are reviewed in this article: (a) the performance of indices compared with their benchmark indices; (b) the methodologies employed in compiling the indices; and (c) the impact of the indices on companies and the investment community. The article concludes with a number of suggestions for areas that merit future research. (shrink)

This book is a comprehensive introduction to media ethics and an exploration of how it must change to adapt to today's media revolution. Using an ethical framework for the new 'mixed media' ethics – taking in the global, interactive media produced by both citizens and professionals – Stephen J. A. Ward discusses the ethical issues which occur in both mainstream and non-mainstream media, from newspapers and broadcast to social media users and bloggers. He re-defines traditional conceptions of journalistic truth-seeking, (...) objectivity and minimizing harm, and examines the responsible use of images in an image-saturated public sphere. He also draws the contours of a future media ethics for the 'new mainstream media' and puts forward cosmopolitan principles for a global media ethics. His book will be invaluable for all students of media and for others who are interested in media ethics. (shrink)

This article considers whether psychopaths should be held criminally responsible. After describing the positive law of criminal responsibility in general and as it applies to psychopaths, it suggests that psychopaths lack moral rationality and that severe psychopaths should be excused from crimes that violate the moral rights of others. Alternative forms of social control for dangerous psychopaths, such as involuntary civil commitment, are considered, and the potential legal implications of future scientific understanding of psychopathy are addressed.

This book reports recent landmark developments and the state of the art in NDS science in psychological theory and research.

This article proposes 3 principles and 3 imperatives as the philosophical foundations of a global journalism ethics. The central claim is that the globalization of news media requires a radical rethinking of the principles and standards of journalism ethics, through the adoption of a cosmopolitan attitude. The article explains how and why ethicists should construct a global journalism ethics, using a contractualist approach. It then formulates 3 "claims" or principles: the claims of credibility, justifiable consequence, and humanity. The claim of (...) humanity is developed further by the formulation of 3 imperatives: to act as a global agent, to serve world citizens, and to enhance nonparochial understandings. The article concludes by considering some implications of a cosmopolitan attitude for the practice of journalism. (shrink)

It is usually maintained by biologists and philosophers alike that essentialism is incompatible with evolutionary biology, and that abandoning essentialism was a precondition of progress being made in the biological sciences. These claims pose a problem for anyone familiar with both evolutionary biology and current metaphysics. Very few current scientific theories enjoy the prestige of evolutionary biology. But essentialism – long in the bad books amongst both biologists and philosophers – has been enjoying a strong resurgence of late amongst analytical (...) philosophers with a taste for metaphysics. Indeed, to impartial observers it is likely to appear that both evolutionary biology and essentialism are as well supported in their respective domains as could reasonably be expected. There is thus at least a prima facie tension here between evolutionary biology, metaphysics and, as we shall see, pre-theoretical common sense. (shrink)

Many people today believe that scientific and religious approaches to morality are mutually incompatible. Militant secularists claim scientific backing for their claim that the evolution of morality discredits religious conceptions of ethics. Some of their opponents respond with unhelpful apologetics based on fundamentalist views of revelation. This article attempts to provide an alternative option. It argues that public discussion has been excessively influenced by polemics generated by the new atheists. Religious writers have too often resorted to overly simplistic arguments rooted (...) in literalist approaches to the Bible and the religious traditions. More historically conscious methods can avoid implausible claims about both religion and science. (shrink)

The legalization of physician-assisted suicide remains a hotly debated issue throughout the United States, and continues to capture the attention of government officials at both the state and federal levels. While the practice is currently legal in Oregon, some federal lawmakers and officials from the U.S. Department of Justice have attempted to outlaw that state's practice through legislation, or through a strained interpretation of the federal Controlled Substances Act. And while several citizen groups throughout the United States have attempted but (...) failed to legalize PAS through popular initiative, several state lawmakers have succeeded in specifically outlawing the practice. Yet even though physician-assisted suicide remains unlawful in every state except Oregon, there is ample evidence that American physicians throughout the United States have participated in PAS by providing their terminally ill patients with lethal prescriptions. (shrink)

The legalization of physician-assisted suicide remains a hotly debated issue throughout the United States, and continues to capture the attention of government officials at both the state and federal levels. While the practice is currently legal in Oregon, some federal lawmakers and officials from the U.S. Department of Justice have attempted to outlaw that state's practice through legislation, or through a strained interpretation of the federal Controlled Substances Act. And while several citizen groups throughout the United States have attempted but (...) failed to legalize PAS through popular initiative, several state lawmakers have succeeded in specifically outlawing the practice. Yet even though physician-assisted suicide remains unlawful in every state except Oregon, there is ample evidence that American physicians throughout the United States have participated in PAS by providing their terminally ill patients with lethal prescriptions. (shrink)

Frege’s distinction between force and sense is a central pillar of modern thinking about meaning. This is the idea that a self-standing utterance of a sentence S can be divided into two components. One is the proposition P that S’s linguistic meaning and context associates with it. The other is S’s illocutionary force. The force/sense distinction is associated with another thesis, the embedding principle, that implies that the only content that embeds in compound sentences is propositional content. We argue that (...) both the Force/Sense distinction and the principle of embedding are seriously challenged by figurative language, and irony in particular. We conclude that theorists need to go back to the drawing board about the nature of illocutionary acts. (shrink)