Within the Computer Science community, many ethical issues have emerged as significant and critical concerns. Computer ethics is an academic field in its own right and there are unique ethical issues associated with information technology. It encompasses a range of issues and concerns including privacy and agency around personal information, Artificial Intelligence and pervasive technology, the Internet of Things and surveillance applications. As computing technology impacts society at an ever growing pace, there are growing calls for more computer ethics content (...) to be included in Computer Science curricula. In this paper we present the results of a survey that polled faculty from Computer Science and related disciplines about teaching practices for computer ethics at their institutions. The survey was completed by respondents from 61 universities across 23 European countries. Participants were surveyed on whether or not computer ethics is taught to Computer Science students at each institution, the reasons why computer ethics is or is not taught, how computer ethics is taught, the background of staff who teach computer ethics and the scope of computer ethics curricula. This paper presents and discusses the results of the survey. (shrink)

Purpose Computing ethics represents a long established, yet rapidly evolving, discipline that grows in complexity and scope on a near-daily basis. Therefore, to help understand some of that scope it is essential to incorporate a range of perspectives, from a range of stakeholders, on current and emerging ethical challenges associated with computer technology. This study aims to achieve this by using, a three-pronged, stakeholder analysis of Computer Science academics, ICT industry professionals, and citizen groups was undertaken to explore what they (...) consider to be crucial computing ethics concerns. The overlap between these stakeholder groups are explored, as well as whether their concerns are reflected in the existing literature. Design/methodology/approach Data collection was performed using focus groups, and the data was analysed using a thematic analysis. The data was also analysed to determine if there were overlaps between the literature and the stakeholders’ concerns and attitudes towards computing ethics. Findings The results of the focus group analysis show a mixture of overlapping concerns between the different groups, as well as some concerns that are unique to each of the specific groups. All groups stressed the importance of data as a key topic in computing ethics. This includes concerns around the accuracy, completeness and representativeness of data sets used to develop computing applications. Academics were concerned with the best ways to teach computing ethics to university students. Industry professionals believed that a lack of diversity in software teams resulted in important questions not being asked during design and development. Citizens discussed at length the negative and unexpected impacts of social media applications. These are all topics that have gained broad coverage in the literature. Social implications In recent years, the impact of ICT on society and the environment at large has grown tremendously. From this fast-paced growth, a myriad of ethical concerns have arisen. The analysis aims to shed light on what a diverse group of stakeholders consider the most important social impacts of technology and whether these concerns are reflected in the literature on computing ethics. The outcomes of this analysis will form the basis for new teaching content that will be developed in future to help illuminate and address these concerns. Originality/value The multi-stakeholder analysis provides individual and differing perspectives on the issues related to the rapidly evolving discipline of computing ethics. (shrink)

Throughout his career, Wittgenstein was preoccupied with issues in the philosophy of perception. Despite this, little attention has been paid to this aspect of Wittgenstein's work. This volume redresses this lack, by bringing together an international group of leading philosophers to focus on the impact of Wittgenstein's work on the philosophy of perception. The ten specially commissioned chapters draw on the complete range of Wittgenstein's writings, from his earliest to latest extant works, and combine both exegetical approaches with engagements with (...) contemporary philosophy of mind. Topics covered include: perception and judgement in the _Tractatus _ aspect-perception the putative intentionality of perception representationalism. The book also includes an overview which summarises the evolution of Wittgenstein's views on perception throughout his life. With an outstanding array of contributors, _Wittgenstein and Perception_ is essential reading for students and scholars of Wittgenstein’s work, as well as those working in philosophy of mind and philosophy of perception. Contributors: Yasuhiro Arahata, Michael Campbell, William Child, Daniel Hutto, Michael O’Sullivan, Marie McGinn, Michel terHark, Charles Travis, and José Zalabardo. (shrink)

The nature and worth of Michael Oakeshott’s contribution as a political thinker have long been the subject of deep disagreement within the community of Anglophone political theory. This is partly the product of a partial familiarity with Oakeshott’s corpus. During his lifetime, his body of published work had a rather slender appearance, comprising two major monographs, separated by some forty years, and two rather more accessible collections of essays on politics and history. Following his death in 1990, however, a (...) much larger body of writings has become available. In particular, with the publication of his Notebooks, we are afforded the chance to form a nuanced and informed understanding of how the thinking in his texts interconnected, and to appreciate the range of intellectual influences and political preoccupations that characterised his work. (shrink)

It is widely thought that functionalism and the qualia theory are better positioned to accommodate the ‘affective’ aspect of pain phenomenology than representationalism. In this paper, we attempt to overturn this opinion by raising problems for both functionalism and the qualia theory on this score. With regard to functionalism, we argue that it gets the order of explanation wrong: pain experience gives rise to the effects it does because it hurts, and not the other way around. With regard to the (...) qualia theory, we argue that it fails to capture the sense in which pain 's affective phenomenology rationalises various bodily-directed beliefs, desires, and behaviours. Representationalism, in contrast, escapes both of these problems: it gets the order of explanation right and it explains how pain 's affective phenomenology can rationalise bodily-directed beliefs, desires, and behaviours. For this reason, we argue that representationalism has a significant advantage in the debates about pain 's affective phenomenology. We end the paper by examining objections, including the question of what representationalists should say about so-called ‘disassociation cases’, such as pain asymbolia. (shrink)

Qualia have proved difficult to integrate into a broadly physicalistic worldview. In this paper, I argue that despite popular wisdom in the philosophy of mind, qualia’s intrinsicality is not sufficient for their non-reducibility. Second, I diagnose why philosophers mistakenly focused on intrinsicality. I then proceed to argue that qualia are categorical and end with some reflections on how the conceptual territory looks when we keep our focus on categoricity.

A sizable literature exists concerning the structure of Socrates' argument at Euthyphro 9d–11b. Although there is some dispute, a substitutional reading has emerged as a leading interpretation. However, some rear‐guard maneuvers are in order to defend this reading against its competitors. In this paper, I articulate a substitutional reading and argue that it is invalid on two counts: one, Socrates oversteps the logic of his reductio ad absurdum, and two, he illicitly substitutes coreferring expressions in explanatory contexts. Next, I defend (...) the substitutional reading by (1) rebutting its leading contender, Sharvy's formal causation interpretation, and (2) showing how a similar substitutional argument is made in the Protagoras. (shrink)

A sizable literature exists concerning the structure of Socrates' argument at Euthyphro 9d–11b. Although there is some dispute, a substitutional reading has emerged as a leading interpretation. However, some rear‐guard maneuvers are in order to defend this reading against its competitors. In this paper, I articulate a substitutional reading and argue that it is invalid on two counts: one, Socrates oversteps the logic of his reductio ad absurdum, and two, he illicitly substitutes coreferring expressions in explanatory contexts. Next, I defend (...) the substitutional reading by (1) rebutting its leading contender, Sharvy's formal causation interpretation, and (2) showing how a similar substitutional argument is made in the Protagoras. (shrink)

In this article we aim to see how far one can get in defending the identity thesis without challenging the inference from conceivability to possibility. Our defence consists of a dilemma for the modal argument. Either “pain” is rigid or it is not. If it is not rigid, then a key premise of the modal argument can be rejected. If it is rigid, the most plausible semantic account treats “pain” as a natural-kind term that refers to its causal or historical (...) origin, namely, C-fibre stimulation. It follows that any phenomenon that is not C-fibre stimulation is not pain, even if it is qualitatively similar to pain. This means there could be phenomena that feel like pain but are not pain since they are not C-fibre stimulation. These possible phenomena can be used to explain away the apparent conceivability of pain without C-fibre stimulation. On either horn of the dilemma, the identity theorist has ample resources to respond to Kripke's argument, even without wandering into the contentious territory of conceivability and possibility. (shrink)

This syllabus was submitted to the Rhodes College Office of Academic Affairs by the course instructor.

This syllabus was submitted to the Rhodes College Office of Academic Affairs by the course instructor.

This syllabus was submitted to the Rhodes College Office of Academic Affairs by the course instructor.

This syllabus was submitted to the Rhodes College Office of Academic Affairs by the course instructor.

This syllabus was submitted to the Rhodes College Office of Academic Affairs by the course instructor.

This syllabus was submitted to the Rhodes College Office of Academic Affairs by the course instructor.

This syllabus was submitted to the Rhodes College Office of Academic Affairs by the course instructor.

I argue that an identity theorist can successfully resist a Kripkean modal argument by employing what I call a metaconceptual move. Furthermore, by showing how this move fails to apply straightforwardly to Chalmers' argument, I clarify the nature of the threat presented by Chalmers and how it differs from a Kripkean modal argument.

In Max Black’s Objection to Mind–Body Identity, Ned Block seeks to offer a definitive treatment of property dualism arguments that exploit modes of presentation. I will argue that Block’s central response to property dualism is confused. The property dualist can happily grant that mental modes of presentation have a hidden physical nature. What matters for the property dualist is not the hidden physical side of the property, but the apparent mental side. Once that ‘thin’ side is granted, the property dualist (...) has won. I conclude that although Block is wrong to think that the property dualist must argue for so-called thin mental properties, Block, and the physicalist, are able to resist property dualism. But any attempt to bolster this resistance and do more than dogmatically assert the crucial identity runs a serious risk of undermining the physicalism it is meant to save. (shrink)

Bertrand Russell developed a conception of the nature of the visual field, and of other sensory fields, as part of his project of explaining the construction of the external world. Wittgenstein's remarks on the visual field in the Tractatus are in part a response to Russell. Wittgenstein, against Russell, analyses the visual field in terms of facts rather than objects. Further, his conception of the field is, in a distinctive sense, depsychologised.

It has been claimed that empirical work in psychology requires the attribution of representational content to perceptual states: that is, the attribution of veridicality conditions to those states. This is a claim that can only be evaluated by the examination of actual empirical research. In this paper I argue that talk of ‘representation’ in at least one area of research in the psychology of perception can be reinterpreted so as to avoid the attribution of veridicality conditions. This area is the (...) study of human capacities to perceive the relative numerosities of collections of objects. (shrink)

Academic barbarism : practice and transmission -- Academic barbarism, universities and inequality -- Academic barbarism and the literature of concealment : Roberto Bolaño and W.G. Sebald -- Aaron Swartz, new technologies and the myth of open access -- Academic barbarism and the Asian university : the case of Hong Kong.

Holiness in the Christian tradition has often been understood in a way that devalues embodiment and practical engagement with the world of one's time. The latter understanding, for example, led to Marx's critique and repudiation of Christianity. Both interpretations of holiness can be understood as mistaken efforts to express the dynamism for authenticity in contextualised human subjectivity. Vatican 2 opposed both views by addressing itself to all people of good will, declaring that everyone was called to holiness, and that authentic (...) Christian identity involved solidarity with the world of one's time, especially those who are poor. Vatican 2, therefore, provided an authoritative faith foundation for holiness expressed through social commitment and for viewing social commitment on the part of people of good will in whatever state of life as a form of holiness. This vision was also the conviction of leading spirituality writers of the period, like Thomas Merton, and inspired liberation theologians and the Latin American Catholic bishops at their conference in Medellín a few years after the Council. The argument of this article is that the emergence and development of a non-dualist Christian spirituality is grounded methodologically in the correct appropriation of the common innate dynamism for authenticity in concrete human persons and lived spiritual experiences consistent with and capable of enhancing this dynamism. (shrink)

There is an apparent tension in William Blake’s attitude toward the visual. Blake denies the value of sense perception, and of perceptible natural objects, as sources of genuine insight. And he is dismissive of “natural religion” on the grounds that natural objects as present to the senses are insufficient to ground religious experience.Blake’s own spiritual experiences are, however, typically described in intensely visual terms. As a child of eight, he saw “a tree filled with angels” on the common at Peckham (...) Rye in south London, and throughout his life reported “visions” as a source of insight. The narrative of “The Marriage of Heaven and Hell” is largely composed of.. (shrink)

How do we become aware of the properties or states that are expressed by gestures, utterances, and facial expressions? This paper argues that expression raises peculiar problems, distinct from those of property perception in general. It argues against some current accounts of awareness of expressed states, before proposing an account which appeals to the notion of empathy. Finally, it situates the proposed account within current discussions of expression in the philosophy of music.

Male violence against women is at shocking levels in South Africa. According to Faul, ‘A woman is killed by an intimate partner every eight hours, a probable underestimate because no perpetrator is identified in 20 percent of killings’, whilst ‘More than 30 percent of girls have been raped by the time they are 18’. Reeva Steenkamp’s killing by her partner, Oscar Pistorius, came ‘the day before she planned to wear black in a “Black Friday” protest against the country’s excruciatingly high (...) number of rapes’. The purpose of this article is to reread a key biblical text regarding male violence against women in order to highlight how Jesus would want us to respond to such violence. The text is John 7:53–8:11. The NRSV: Catholic Edition entitles the story ‘The woman caught in adultery’. However, this title is problematic as it can lead to misleading readings of the text, as I will show, and so I have given it a different title, namely ‘The woman threatened with stoning’. (shrink)

Contemporary philosophers of perception, even those with otherwise widely differing beliefs, often hold that universals enter into the content of perceptual experience. This doctrine can even be seen as a trivial inference from the observation that we observe properties – ways that things are – as well as things. I argue that the inference is not trivial but can and should be resisted. Ordinary property perception does not involve awareness of universals. But there are visual experiences which do involve determinate (...) universals: following Wittgenstein, I call these ‘aspect experiences’. The common view of perceptual content effectively conflates aspect experiences with mere property perceptions. Wittgenstein’s later writings on the philosophy of psychology provide an alternative way to think about both aspects and properties. It also forms a contrast with Wittgenstein’s own early treatment of perception in the Tractatus, the doctrine of which is much closer to the contemporary norm among philosophers of perception. In seeing how Wittgenstein moved away from his early view, we can see how we might move away from that norm. (shrink)

This article examines Michael Oakeshott's views on European political history, based on the essays, reviews, lectures and unpublished works which he produced throughout his intellectual career. These pieces are less familiar than his writings on political philosophy, but deal with the same themes, notably the relationships between individuals, groups and the state. The conclusion is that Oakeshott was telling a new version of an old tale, the history of the development of a fundamental division in European political thought and (...) practice between two contrasting forms of human association, one communal and consensual, the other individualistic and contractarian. (shrink)

From the 1920s to the 1980s Oakeshott filled dozens of notebooks with his private reflections, both personal and intellectual. Their contents range from aphorisms to miniature essays, forming a unique record of his intellectual trajectory over his entire career. This volume makes them accessible in print for the first time, drawing together a host of his previously inaccessible observations on politics, philosophy, art, education, and much else besides. Religion in particular emerges as an ongoing concern for him in a way (...) that is not visible from his published works. The notebooks also provide a unique source of insight into Oakeshott's musings on life, thanks to the hitherto unsuspected existence of the series of 'Belle Dame’ notebooks that were written in the late 1920s and early 1930s but which only came to light two decades after his death. At the same period in which he was developing the concepts that would form Experience and its Modes, Oakeshott’s personal life lead him to reflect extensively on love and death, themes that highlight his enduring romantic affinities. Accompanied by an original editorial introduction, the volume allows readers to see for themselves exactly which works Oakeshott used in compiling each of his notebooks, providing a much clearer record of his intellectual influences than has previously been available. It will be an essential addition to the library of his works for all those interested in his ideas. (shrink)

Leon Goldstein’s critical philosophy of history has suffered a relative lack of attention, but it is the outcome of an unusual story. He reached conclusions about the autonomy of the discipline of history similar to those of R. G. Collingwood and Michael Oakeshott, but he did so from within the Anglo-American analytic style of philosophy that had little tradition of discussing such matters. Initially, Goldstein attempted to apply a positivistic epistemology derived from Hempel’s philosophy of natural science to historical (...) knowledge, but gradually formulated an anti-realistic epistemology that firmly distinguished historical knowledge of the past not only from the scientific perspective but also from fictional and common-sense attitudes to the past. Among his achievements were theories of the distinctive nature of historical evidence and historical propositions, of the constructed character of historical events, and of the relationship between historical research and contemporary culture. Taken together, his ideas merit inclusion among the most important twentieth-century contributions to the problem of historical knowledge. (shrink)

ABSTRACTLeon Goldstein's critical philosophy of history has suffered a relative lack of attention, but it is the outcome of an unusual story. He reached conclusions about the autonomy of the discipline of history similar to those of R. G. Collingwood and Michael Oakeshott, but he did so from within the Anglo‐American analytic style of philosophy that had little tradition of discussing such matters. Initially, Goldstein attempted to apply a positivistic epistemology derived from Hempel's philosophy of natural science to historical (...) knowledge, but gradually formulated an anti‐realistic epistemology that firmly distinguished historical knowledge of the past not only from the scientific perspective but also from fictional and common‐sense attitudes to the past. Among his achievements were theories of the distinctive nature of historical evidence and historical propositions, of the constructed character of historical events, and of the relationship between historical research and contemporary culture. Taken together, his ideas merit inclusion among the most important twentieth‐century contributions to the problem of historical knowledge. (shrink)

This book challenges the common view that Michael Oakeshott was mainly important as a political philosopher by offering the first comprehensive study of his ideas on history. It argues that Oakeshott's writings on the philosophy of history mark him out as the most successful of the philosophers who attempted to establish historical study as an autonomous form of thought during the twentieth century. It also contends that his work on the history of political thought is best seen in the (...) context of debates over the origins of the liberal state. For the first time, extensive use has been made of unpublished material in the collection of Oakeshott's papers at the LSE, resulting in an intellectual biography that should be of interest both to first-time students and those already familiar with his published works. (shrink)

The Vocabulary of a Modern European State is the companion volume to The Concept of a Philosophical Jurisprudence and completes the enterprise of gathering together Oakeshott’s previously scattered essays and reviews. As with all the other volumes in the series it contains an entirely new editorial introduction explaining how the writings it contains find their place in his work as a whole. It covers the years 1952 to 1988, the period during which Oakeshott wrote his definitive work, On Human Conduct. (...) The essay from which the volume takes its title was intended as a companion piece to the third part of the latter work, and is just one of over sixty pieces that it includes. The volume draws together critical responses to works by major philosophers, historians, and political theorists of his own generation such as Bertrand de Jouvenel, Herbert Marcuse, and Michael Polanyi as well as to some major figures of current scholarship such as Quentin Skinner and Roger Scruton. (shrink)

This highly readable new collection of thirty pieces by Michael Oakeshott, almost all of which are previously unpublished, covers every decade of his intellectual career, and adds significantly to his contributions to the philosophy of historical understanding and political philosophy, as well as to the philosophy of education and aesthetics. The essays were intended mostly for lectures or seminars, and are consequently in an informal style that will be accessible to new readers as well as to those already well (...) acquainted with Oakeshott’s works.Early pieces include a long essay ‘On the Relations of Philosophy, Poetry, and Reality’, and Oakeshott’s comments on ‘The Cambridge School of Political Science’ through which he himself had passed as an undergraduate. The collection also reproduces a substantial wartime essay ‘On Peace with Germany’. There are two new essays on the philosophy of education, and the essay which gives the work its title, ‘What is History?’, is just one of over half a dozen discussions of the nature of historical knowledge. Oakeshott’s later sceptical, ‘hermeneutic’, thought is also well represented by pieces such as ‘What is Political Theory?’ and ‘The Emergence of the History of Thought.’ Reviews of books by English and European contemporaries such as Butterfield, Hayek, Voegelin, and Arendt also help to place him in context more clearly than before.The book will be indispensable for all Oakeshott’s readers, no matter which area of his thought concerns them most. (shrink)

Michael Oakeshott made his reputation as a political philosopher, but for a long time it seemed as if he had little interest in politics before 1945. His major pre-war work, Experience and its Modes was an examination of the nature of philosophy and its relation to other forms of thought that made almost no mention of politics. However, it has become increasingly clear that this initial judgment was misleading. A posthumous collection of early essays, Religion, Politics, and the Moral (...) Life, proved that political philosophy was a lifelong concern. Nevertheless, the belief that Oakeshott was relatively uninterested in politics, at least in the 1920s, has persisted. This volume dispels that notion for good. It contains two previously unpublished works, a manuscript entitled 'A Discussion of some Matters preliminary to the Study of Political Philosophy', and the first version of a course of lectures on 'The Philosophical Approach to Politics' that Oakeshott gave between 1928 and 1930. These works establish that politics was a central concern in the first decade of his intellectual career, and show beyond any doubt that the ideas of Experience and its Modes actually grew out of Oakeshott's prior philosophical interest in politics. (shrink)

Many scholars and activists seek to eliminate “race”—the word and the concept—from our vocabulary. Their claim is clear: because science has shown that racial essentialism is false and because the idea of race has proved virulent, we should do away with the concept entirely. Michael O. Hardimon criticizes this line of thinking, arguing that we must recognize the real ways in which race exists in order to revise our understanding of its significance. Rethinking Race provides a novel answer to (...) the question “What is race?” Pernicious, traditional racialism maintains that people can be judged and ranked according to innate racial features. Hardimon points out that those who would eliminate race make the mistake of associating the word only with this view. He agrees that this concept should be jettisoned, but draws a distinction with three alternative ideas: first, a stripped-down version of the ordinary concept of race that recognizes minimal physical differences between races but does not consider them significant; second, a scientific understanding of populations with shared lines of descent; and third, an acknowledgment of “socialrace” as a separate construction. Hardimon provides a language for understanding the ways in which races do and do not exist. His account is realistic in recognizing the physical features of races, as well as the existence of races in our social world. But it is deflationary in rejecting the concept of hierarchical or defining racial characteristics. Ultimately, Rethinking Race offers a philosophical basis for repudiating racism without blinding ourselves to reality. (shrink)