Reissued here in its corrected second edition of 1864, this essay by John Stuart Mill argues for a utilitarian theory of morality. Originally printed as a series of three articles in Fraser's Magazine in 1861, the work sought to refine the 'greatest happiness' principle that had been championed by Jeremy Bentham, defending it from common criticisms, and offering a justification of its validity. Following Bentham, Mill holds that actions can be judged as right or wrong depending on whether they promote (...) happiness or 'the reverse of happiness'. Although attracted by Bentham's consequentialist framework based on empirical evidence rather than intuition, Mill separates happiness into 'higher' and 'lower' pleasures, arguing for a weighted system of measurement when making and judging decisions. Dissected and debated since its first appearance, the essay is Mill's key discussion on the topic and remains a fundamental text in the study of ethics. (shrink)

With this volume, Werner Pluhar completes his work on Kant's three Critiques, an accomplishment unique among English language translators of Kant. At once accurate, fluent, and accessible, Pluhar's rendition of the Critique of Practical Reason meets the standards set in his widely respected translations of the Critique of Judgement (1987) and the Critique of Pure Reason (1996).

This Is A New Release Of The Original 1898 Edition.

What is the Darwinian revolution and why is it important for philosophers? These are the questions tackled in this Element. In four sections, the topics covered are the story of the revolution, the question of whether it really was a revolution, the nature of the revolution, and the implications for philosophy, both epistemology and ethics.

There are several interpretations of the argument structure of Darwin's Origin of Species, representing Covering-Law, Inference-to-the-Best-Explanation, and (more recently) Semantic models. I argue that while all three types of interpretation enjoy some textual support, none succeeds in capturing the overall strategy of the Origin, consistent with Darwin's claim that it is 'one long argument'. I provide detailed criticisms of all three current models, and then offer an alternative interpretation based on the view that there are three main argument strategies in (...) the Origin, all supporting the 'causal efficacy' of Darwin's theory. This interpretation provides both a more unified treatment of the text, and some important implications concerning the relation between general philosophical models of scientific theory support and specific historical cases. (shrink)

Based on a series of lectures delivered at the University of Virginia in October 1981. Includes bibliographical references and index.

The concept of "fitness" is a notion of central importance to evolutionary theory. Yet the interpretation of this concept and its role in explanations of evolutionary phenomena have remained obscure. We provide a propensity interpretation of fitness, which we argue captures the intended reference of this term as it is used by evolutionary theorists. Using the propensity interpretation of fitness, we provide a Hempelian reconstruction of explanations of evolutionary phenomena, and we show why charges of circularity which have been levelled (...) against explanations in evolutionary theory are mistaken. Finally, we provide a definition of natural selection which follows from the propensity interpretation of fitness, and which handles all the types of selection discussed by biologists, thus improving on extant definitions. (shrink)

. Moral systems are described as systems of indirect reciprocity, existing because of histories of conflicts of interest and arising as outcomes of the complexity of social interactions in groups of long‐lived individuals with varying conflicts and confluences of interest and indefinitely iterated social interactions. Although morality is commonly defined as involving justice for all people, or consistency in the social treatment of all humans, it may have arisen for immoral reasons, as a force leading to cohesiveness within human groups (...) but specifically excluding and directed against other human groups with different interests. (shrink)

Introduction to one of the most important, controversial, and suggestive works of moral philosophy ever written.

This dissertation proposes a new sort of explication of the relation between a hypothesis and the data which test it. Instead of deductive, explanatory, or Bayesian probability relations, qualitative confirmation is explicated in terms of causal relations--E is evidence of H if and only if E is a causal consequence of H. Evidential inferences, according to this confirmation theory, are to be restricted to those licensed by underlying ontic relations. I show how the inferential properties of the causal relation match (...) intuitions about evidential relevance and thereby avoid the paradoxes of confirmation, including the Grue and Raven Paradoxes. This approach meshes with Salmon's ontic theory of scientific explanation, thus providing a unified integration of confirmation and explanation, and revealing the source of the warrant for the "inference to the best explanation" while additionally showing how that theory is incomplete. I also criticize Bayesianism and the hypothetico-deductive method, showing how the causal view's explication of evidential relevance is superior. Applications of this "Hypothetico-CausoInferential Method" are given using several historical scientific examples, including Oldham's discovery of the internal structure of the earth, Darwin's theory of evolution, Einstein's light-quanta hypothesis, and current debate on what killed the dinosaurs. The theory is compared and contrasted with similar views found in Aristotle, Descartes and Miller. It is judged against criteria of adequacy suggested by Hempel and Glymour, and I argue that it provides the best explanation of why controlled experimentation is taken as the hallmark of the scientific method. Finally, a strong version of the theory is considered which holds that in ideal circumstances a particular hypothesis may be confirmed with practical certainty by a single experiment, as Hume suggested. This possible notion of "inductive validity" is based upon a productive necessity-and-sufficiency analysis of causation, which I defend in detail against various objections using a proposed three-place model of the causal relation. (shrink)