This book discusses ethical behavior through the genocidal stages of the Holocaust. Paul E. Wilson first looks at the antisemitism in Germany and Europe beginning in the decades preceding the Nazis reign of terror, and goes on to discuss the ethical decisions made in the initial stages that moved society toward genocide. The author maintains that the stages of genocide represent subtle changes that can be happening within a society in response to the moral choices made by actors. (...) By giving attention to the stages of genocide in the Holocaust, this book contributes to the overall understanding of how the Holocaust was possible, and encourages the moral community to join the watch for the development of genocide in the modern world. (shrink)

Throughout his career David Hull has sought to bring the philosophy of science into closer contact with science and especially with biological science (Hull 1969, 1997b). This effort has taken many forms. Sometimes it has meant ‘either explaining basic biology to philosophers or explaining basic philosophy to biologists’ (Hull 1996, p. 77). The first of these tasks, simple as it sounds, has been responsible for revolutionary changes. It is well known that traditional philosophy of science, modeled as it was on (...) theoretical physics, proved inadequate when philosophers turned their attention to biological science. Biological examples have driven major revisions of accounts of reduction (Hull 1974; Schaffner 1993, Ch. 9), laws of nature (Beatty et al. 1997), theories (Lloyd 1988) and natural kinds (Wilson 1999, Part III). Nor is explaining basic philosophy to biologists a task to be looked down upon. It is useful, not because philosophy has all the answers, but because scientists must think about how to do science, that is doing philosophy of science and scientists frequently reinvent philosophical views with known flaws. Early in his career Hull found biological systematists in the grip of a crude operationalism about scientific concepts and said so in the pages of Systematic Zoology (Hull 1968). For the next thirty years, as biologists debated the nature of species and the correct principles of classification, Hull added a philosophical note at the same congresses and in the same journals (Hull 1970, 1976, 1980, 1997a, 1999). (shrink)

This article examined the effects of body–object interaction (BOI) on semantic processing. BOI measures perceptions of the ease with which a human body can physically interact with a word's referent. In Experiment 1, BOI effects were examined in 2 semantic categorization tasks (SCT) in which participants decided if words are easily imageable. Responses were faster and more accurate for high BOI words (e.g., mask) than for low BOI words (e.g., ship). In Experiment 2, BOI effects were examined in a semantic (...) lexical decision task (SLDT), which taps both semantic feedback and semantic processing. The BOI effect was larger in the SLDT than in the SCT, suggesting that BOI facilitates both semantic feedback and semantic processing. The findings are consistent with the embodied cognition perspective (e.g., Barsalou's, 1999, Perceptual Symbols Theory), which proposes that sensorimotor interactions with the environment are incorporated in semantic knowledge. (shrink)

Thomas Jefferson and Philosophy: Essays on the Philosophical Cast of Jefferson’s Writings is a collection of essays on topics that relate to philosophical aspects of Jefferson’s thinking over the years. Much historical insight is given to ground the various philosophical strands in Jefferson’s thought and writing on topics such as political philosophy, moral philosophy, slavery, republicanism, wall of separation, liberty, educational philosophy, and architecture.

Although various sections of this work have been published separately in various journals and volumes their separate publication is wholly attributable to the exigencies of life in academia: the work was devised as and is supposed to constitute something of an organic unity. Part II of 'The Cow with the Subtile Nose' was published under the title 'A Creative Use of Language' in New Literary History (Autumn, 1972), pp. 108-18. 'The Cow on the Roof' appeared in The Journal oj Philosophy (...) LXX, No. 19 (November 8, 1973), pp. 713-23. 'A Fine Forehand' appeared in the Journal oj the Philosophy oj Sport, Vol. 1 (September, 1974), pp. 92-109. 'Quote: Judgements from Our Brain' appeared in Perspectives on the Philosophy oj Wittgenstein, ed. by I. Block (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1981), pp. 201-211. 'Art and Sociobiology' appeared in Mind (1981), Vol. XC, pp. 505-520. 'Anything Viewed'appeared in Essays in Honour oj Jaakko Hintikka, ed. by Esa Saarinen, Risto Hilpinen, Illkka Niiniluoto and Merrill Provence Hintikka (Dordrecht, Holland and Boston, Massachusetts: D. Reidel Publishing Co., 1979), pp. 285-293. 'How I See Philosophy' appeared in The Owl oj Minerva, ed. by C. J. Bontempo and S. Jack Odell (New York: McGraw-Hill Book Co., 1975), pp. 223-5. All the remaining parts are also forthcoming in various journals and volumes. I am grateful to Bradley E. Wilson for the preparation of the index. (shrink)

Contrary to John Bramhall and critics like him, Thomas Hobbes takes the view that no account of liberty or freedom can serve as the relevant basis on which to distinguish moral from nonmoral agents or explains the basis on which an agent becomes subject to law and liable to punishment. The correct compatibilist strategy rests, on Hobbes’s account, with a proper appreciation and description of the contractualist features that shape and structure the moral community. From this perspective human agents may (...) indeed use their liberty to make themselves moral agents. In doing this, however, they are not employing a distinct kind of liberty but rather using a liberty that they share with animals and other nonmoral agents to perform a distinct kind of act (i.e., consent) whereby they become moral agents subject to law and any punishments that are required to enforce it. ____ -/- Originally published in the Oxford Handbook of Philosophy in Early Modern Europe - eds. D. Clarke & C. Wilson, OUP 2011 -/- Republished in Recasting Hume and Early Modern Philosophy: Selected Essays - OUP 2021: Paul Russell]. (shrink)

This book explores historical and current discussions of the relevance of evolutionary theory to ethics. The historical section conveys the intellectual struggle that took place within the framework of Darwinism from its inception up to the work of G. C. Williams, W. D. Hamilton, R. D. Alexander, A. L. Trivers, E. O. Wilson, R. Dawkins, and others. The contemporary section discusses ethics within the framework of evolutionary theory as enriched by the works of biologists such as those mentioned above. (...) The issue of whether ethical practice and ethical theory can be grounded in the theory of evolution has taken a new and significant direction within the context of sociobiology and is proving to be a challenge to previous thinking. This book conveys that challenge. (shrink)

The term ‘sociobiology’ was introduced in E. O. Wilson's Sociobiology: The New Synthesis (1975) as the application of evolutionary theory to social behavior. Sociobiologists claim that many social behaviors have been shaped by natural selection for reproductive success, and they attempt to reconstruct the evolutionary histories of particular behaviors or behavioral strategies.

The dual role of olfaction in both smelling and tasting, i.e. flavour perception, makes it an important test case for philosophical theories of sensory individuation. Indeed, the psychologist Paul Rozin claimed that olfaction is a “dual sense”, leading some scientists and philosophers to propose that we have not one, but two senses of smell: orthonasal and retronasal olfaction. In this paper I consider how best to understand Rozin’s claim, and upon what grounds one might judge there to be one (...) or two distinct olfactory modalities. I conclude that while Rozin may be right that humans have dual occurrences of an olfactory ‘sense’, the concept of a sense-modality, and hence the ‘sense’ of smell, is ambiguous between two different notions: a physiological sensory channel and an experiential modality, along the lines suggested by J. J. Gibson. Furthermore, recognising that these are complementary rather than competing conceptions of a sense-modality enables the formulation of a powerful ‘dual-concept’ framework for posing and addressing questions concerning the complex architecture of human multisensory experience. (shrink)

Clark, R. L. Facts, fact-correlates, and fact-surrogates.--Heintz, J. The real subject-predicate asymmetry.--Stenius, E. All men are mortal.--Wilson, N. L. Notes on the form of certain elementary facts.--Binkley, R. The ultimate justification of moral rules.--Castañeda, H. Goodness, intentions, and propositions.--Patterson, R. L. An analysis of faith.--Simpson, E. Discrimination as an example of moral irrationality.--Welsh, P. Osborne on the art of appreciation.--Lachs, J. The omnicolored sky: Baylis on perception.--Strawson, P. F. Causation in perception.--Reid, C. L. Charles A. Baylis: a bibliography.

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:IS THERE A PRUSSIAN HUME? or How Far Is It from Könisberg to Edinburgh! Lewis White Beck has recently argued that Hume, in spite of his empiricist commitment, implicitly recognized the limitations of that position when he incorporated in his thinking ideas that are essentially Kantian and incompatible with his official empiricism. Beck is not, of course, the first so to argue; Robert Paul Wolff made a 2 (...) similar claim some years ago in a well-known paper. Wolff's case has, however, been challenged, and it is the aim of the present paper to challenge Beck's somev.'hat different case. 4 Beck argues that Hume has two causal principles: (1)Every event has a cause (2)Same cause, same effect the second of which he claims Hume defends, and the first of which he claims Hume does not defend. He then turns to the case of perception, where we observe an object once intermittently and once continuously. The result is a gappy series of impressions in the first case, and a non-gappy one in the second. The existence of the gap falsifies principles (1) and (2). In order to save principle (2), Beck argues, Hume relies on principle (1). The latter enables Hume to "feign" unobserved events to fill the gap. But (1) is also falsified by the empirical data, that is, the existence of the gap. So this appeal to (1) is illegitimate. At least it is illegitimate if the only support we are permitted to use is observational data. And that is all that the official Hume, committed to empiricism, is permitted to use. However, Hume does use (1), contrary to what his official position allows. This suggests that he recognizes, what Kant explicitly argued, that there are non-empirical reasons justifying the acceptance of (1). And it is here that we see the Prussian aspects of the Scots sceptic. Beck's case depends upon three points: (a)He must separate principles (1) and (2). (b)He must argue that gappy series of impressions are filled by appealing to (1). (c)He must argue that gappy series of impressions falsify (1), rendering its use to fill those gaps illegitimately. In what follows it is argued that the distance from Königsberg to Edinburgh cannot thus be bridged. Specifically, it is argued, first, that (a) is false, or, more specifically that for Hume (2) entails (1) ; second, that, when (1) and (2) are so understood, then (b) is partially correct; and third, that, when (1) and (2) are taken as Hume takes them, then (c) is incorrect: the gaps do not falsify (1), its use remains legitimate. Let us begin with principle (2), the "same cause, same effect" principle. This principle is Rule 4 of Hume's rules by which to judge of causes and effects. He states it as The same cause always produces the same effect, and the same effect never arises hut from the same cause. (T173) Rules 1-3 give the analysis of the causal relation insofar as it is an ob8 jective relation among things. Rule 4 then makes a claim about events and causes. Rule 4 is followed by four rules which are the best statement of Mill's Methods of eliminative induction prior to Herschell's Preliminary Discourse. When one of these methods is used, the data eliminate all possible hypotheses but one, and the conclusion is that this uneliminated hypothesis must be true, correctly describing the relevant causal relation. Hume carefully points out that we draw this conclusion not from the data alone, but 3. also from the "same cause, same effect" principle. Thus, when Hume states Rule 5, the method of agreement, he writes There is another principle, which hangs upon this [i.e., upon Rule 4, "same cause, same effect"], viz. that where several different objects produce the same effect, it must be by means of some quality, which we discover to be common amongst them. For as_ like effects imply like causes, we must always ascribe the causation to the circumstance, wherein we discover the resemblance. (T174, italics added) We can bring out the logic of the situation if we translate this into the... (shrink)

Reviews evidence which suggests that there may be little or no direct introspective access to higher order cognitive processes. Ss are sometimes unaware of the existence of a stimulus that importantly influenced a response, unaware of the existence of the response, and unaware that the stimulus has affected the response. It is proposed that when people attempt to report on their cognitive processes, that is, on the processes mediating the effects of a stimulus on a response, they do not do (...) so on the basis of any true introspection. Instead, their reports are based on a priori, implicit causal theories, or judgments about the extent to which a particular stimulus is a plausible cause of a given response. This suggests that though people may not be able to observe directly their cognitive processes, they will sometimes be able to report accurately about them. Accurate reports will occur when influential stimuli are salient and are plausible causes of the responses they produce, and will not occur when stimuli are not salient or are not plausible causes. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:IS THERE A PRUSSIAN HUME? or How Far Is It from Könisberg to Edinburgh! Lewis White Beck has recently argued that Hume, in spite of his empiricist commitment, implicitly recognized the limitations of that position when he incorporated in his thinking ideas that are essentially Kantian and incompatible with his official empiricism. Beck is not, of course, the first so to argue; Robert Paul Wolff made a 2 (...) similar claim some years ago in a well-known paper. Wolff's case has, however, been challenged, and it is the aim of the present paper to challenge Beck's somev.'hat different case. 4 Beck argues that Hume has two causal principles: (1)Every event has a cause (2)Same cause, same effect the second of which he claims Hume defends, and the first of which he claims Hume does not defend. He then turns to the case of perception, where we observe an object once intermittently and once continuously. The result is a gappy series of impressions in the first case, and a non-gappy one in the second. The existence of the gap falsifies principles (1) and (2). In order to save principle (2), Beck argues, Hume relies on principle (1). The latter enables Hume to "feign" unobserved events to fill the gap. But (1) is also falsified by the empirical data, that is, the existence of the gap. So this appeal to (1) is illegitimate. At least it is illegitimate if the only support we are permitted to use is observational data. And that is all that the official Hume, committed to empiricism, is permitted to use. However, Hume does use (1), contrary to what his official position allows. This suggests that he recognizes, what Kant explicitly argued, that there are non-empirical reasons justifying the acceptance of (1). And it is here that we see the Prussian aspects of the Scots sceptic. Beck's case depends upon three points: (a)He must separate principles (1) and (2). (b)He must argue that gappy series of impressions are filled by appealing to (1). (c)He must argue that gappy series of impressions falsify (1), rendering its use to fill those gaps illegitimately. In what follows it is argued that the distance from Königsberg to Edinburgh cannot thus be bridged. Specifically, it is argued, first, that (a) is false, or, more specifically that for Hume (2) entails (1) ; second, that, when (1) and (2) are so understood, then (b) is partially correct; and third, that, when (1) and (2) are taken as Hume takes them, then (c) is incorrect: the gaps do not falsify (1), its use remains legitimate. Let us begin with principle (2), the "same cause, same effect" principle. This principle is Rule 4 of Hume's rules by which to judge of causes and effects. He states it as The same cause always produces the same effect, and the same effect never arises hut from the same cause. (T173) Rules 1-3 give the analysis of the causal relation insofar as it is an ob8 jective relation among things. Rule 4 then makes a claim about events and causes. Rule 4 is followed by four rules which are the best statement of Mill's Methods of eliminative induction prior to Herschell's Preliminary Discourse. When one of these methods is used, the data eliminate all possible hypotheses but one, and the conclusion is that this uneliminated hypothesis must be true, correctly describing the relevant causal relation. Hume carefully points out that we draw this conclusion not from the data alone, but 3. also from the "same cause, same effect" principle. Thus, when Hume states Rule 5, the method of agreement, he writes There is another principle, which hangs upon this [i.e., upon Rule 4, "same cause, same effect"], viz. that where several different objects produce the same effect, it must be by means of some quality, which we discover to be common amongst them. For as_ like effects imply like causes, we must always ascribe the causation to the circumstance, wherein we discover the resemblance. (T174, italics added) We can bring out the logic of the situation if we translate this into the... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:IS THERE A PRUSSIAN HUME? or How Far Is It from Könisberg to Edinburgh! Lewis White Beck has recently argued that Hume, in spite of his empiricist commitment, implicitly recognized the limitations of that position when he incorporated in his thinking ideas that are essentially Kantian and incompatible with his official empiricism. Beck is not, of course, the first so to argue; Robert Paul Wolff made a 2 (...) similar claim some years ago in a well-known paper. Wolff's case has, however, been challenged, and it is the aim of the present paper to challenge Beck's somev.'hat different case. 4 Beck argues that Hume has two causal principles: (1)Every event has a cause (2)Same cause, same effect the second of which he claims Hume defends, and the first of which he claims Hume does not defend. He then turns to the case of perception, where we observe an object once intermittently and once continuously. The result is a gappy series of impressions in the first case, and a non-gappy one in the second. The existence of the gap falsifies principles (1) and (2). In order to save principle (2), Beck argues, Hume relies on principle (1). The latter enables Hume to "feign" unobserved events to fill the gap. But (1) is also falsified by the empirical data, that is, the existence of the gap. So this appeal to (1) is illegitimate. At least it is illegitimate if the only support we are permitted to use is observational data. And that is all that the official Hume, committed to empiricism, is permitted to use. However, Hume does use (1), contrary to what his official position allows. This suggests that he recognizes, what Kant explicitly argued, that there are non-empirical reasons justifying the acceptance of (1). And it is here that we see the Prussian aspects of the Scots sceptic. Beck's case depends upon three points: (a)He must separate principles (1) and (2). (b)He must argue that gappy series of impressions are filled by appealing to (1). (c)He must argue that gappy series of impressions falsify (1), rendering its use to fill those gaps illegitimately. In what follows it is argued that the distance from Königsberg to Edinburgh cannot thus be bridged. Specifically, it is argued, first, that (a) is false, or, more specifically that for Hume (2) entails (1) ; second, that, when (1) and (2) are so understood, then (b) is partially correct; and third, that, when (1) and (2) are taken as Hume takes them, then (c) is incorrect: the gaps do not falsify (1), its use remains legitimate. Let us begin with principle (2), the "same cause, same effect" principle. This principle is Rule 4 of Hume's rules by which to judge of causes and effects. He states it as The same cause always produces the same effect, and the same effect never arises hut from the same cause. (T173) Rules 1-3 give the analysis of the causal relation insofar as it is an ob8 jective relation among things. Rule 4 then makes a claim about events and causes. Rule 4 is followed by four rules which are the best statement of Mill's Methods of eliminative induction prior to Herschell's Preliminary Discourse. When one of these methods is used, the data eliminate all possible hypotheses but one, and the conclusion is that this uneliminated hypothesis must be true, correctly describing the relevant causal relation. Hume carefully points out that we draw this conclusion not from the data alone, but 3. also from the "same cause, same effect" principle. Thus, when Hume states Rule 5, the method of agreement, he writes There is another principle, which hangs upon this [i.e., upon Rule 4, "same cause, same effect"], viz. that where several different objects produce the same effect, it must be by means of some quality, which we discover to be common amongst them. For as_ like effects imply like causes, we must always ascribe the causation to the circumstance, wherein we discover the resemblance. (T174, italics added) We can bring out the logic of the situation if we translate this into the... (shrink)

Paul E. Griffiths argues that most research on the emotions has been as misguided as Aristotelian efforts to study "superlunary objects" - objects...

In this chapter we argue that the four principles of medical ethics -- beneficence, non-maleficence, respect for autonomy and justice (Beauchamp & Childress, 2001; Gillon, 1985), a new Family Interest Principle (introduced below) and a consideration of ‘capacity’ provide a reasoned practice guide for work with mothers experiencing health problems, focussing here on mental health when a parent is a patient. Our concern is the relationship of the clinician with a parent and through the parent their child. Ethics of service (...) provision or services planning (e.g. Culyer, 2001; McLachlan, 2005; see also Newbigging and Paul, chapter xxx), or the provision of other services (e.g. education, child protection) although intensely relevant to this area are not addressed in this chapter nor will we deal with the complex aspects of medical ethics relating to the treatment of children (Baines, 2008). We use the term ‘parent’ to refer to any adult person who fulfils a substantive parental role with a child. Defining what counts as a family will in certain circumstances be contentious. There are diverse patterns of family arrangements that may be influenced by cultural, political economic and temporal factors. For the purposes of our discussion, we define a family in terms of its role in childrearing, as a group of at least one adult and at least one child, living together in long term relationships on an ongoing basis with vested interest in the well being of each of the family members. (shrink)

Almost all of the themes contained in E.O.Wilson's sociobiological writing on war and human aggression were prefigured in Anglo-American bio-social discourse, c. 1880–1919. Instinct theory – stemming from animal psychology and the genetics revolution – encouraged the belief that pugnacity had been programmed into the ancient part of the human brain as a result of evolutionary pressures dating from prehistory. War was seen to be instinct-driven, and genocidal fighting postulated as a eugenic force in early human evolution. War was (...) explained in distinctly modern sociobiological terms as adaptive behaviour springing from territorial urges, crowding, competition for resources and reproductive advantage, ethnocentrism and pseudo-speciation. (shrink)

_Why efforts to create a scientific basis of morality are doomed to fail_ In this illuminating book, James Davison Hunter and Paul Nedelisky recount the centuries-long, passionate quest to discover a scientific foundation for morality. The "new moral science" led by such figures as E.O. Wilson, Patricia Churchland and Joshua Greene is only the newest manifestation of an effort that has failed repeatedly. Though claims for its accomplishments are often wildly exaggerated, this new iteration has been no more (...) successful than its predecessors. Hunter and Nedelisky argue that in the end, science cannot tell us how we should live or why we should be good and not evil, and this is for both philosophical and scientific reasons. In the face of this failure, the new moral science has taken a surprising turn. Whereas earlier efforts sought to demonstrate what is right and wrong, the new moral scientists have concluded that right and wrong, because they are not amenable to scientific study, don’t actually exist. Their moral nihilism turns the science of morality into a social engineering project. If there is nothing moral for science to discover, the science of morality becomes, at best, a program to achieve arbitrary societal goals. Concise and rigorously argued, _Science and the Good _is a major critique of a would-be science that has gained too much influence in today’s public discourse, and an exposé of that project’s darker turn. (shrink)

ABSTRACT It is becoming increasingly common (at least in the United States) for doctors to appeal to futility judgments as the basis for certain types of clinical decisions, such as the decision to withhold CPR. The clinical use of futility judgments raises two basic questions regarding futility. First, how is the concept of futility to be understood? Secondly, once we have a clearer understanding of futility, what role should determinations of futility play in clinical decision‐making? Much of the discussion about (...) the concept of futility has centered on the value‐ladenness of futility judgments. I argue that futility determinations need to be distinguished from two other types of value‐based judgments, namely, identification of the goals of treatment and treatment decisions based on an assessment of the benefits and burdens of treatment. If this distinction is sound, it suggests a very limited role for futility determinations in clinical decisionmaking, a role which should serve to promote communication between doctor and patient. (shrink)

The relationship between individuals’ creativity and their ethical ideologies appears to be complex. Applying Forsyth’s (1980, 1992) personal moral philosophy model which consists of two independent ethical ideology dimensions, idealism and relativism, we hypothesized and found support for a positive relationship between creativity and relativism. It appears that creative people are less likely than non-creative people to follow universal rules in their moral decision making. However, contrary to our hypothesis and the general stereotype that creative people are less caring about (...) others, we found a positive relationship between creativity and idealism. These findings indicate that highly creative people are likely to be what Forsyth called “situationists,” individuals with both an ethic of caring and a pragmatic moral decision-making style. The finding that creative individuals tend to be situationists, and particularly that they tend to be high in idealism, appears to refute the line of reasoning that argues for a “creative personality” characterized in part by social insensitivity. Understanding the relationship between creativity and ethical ideologies has important implications for researchers, managers and teachers. (shrink)

Staged 2 different videotaped interviews with the same individual—a college instructor who spoke English with a European accent. In one of the interviews the instructor was warm and friendly, in the other, cold and distant. 118 undergraduates were asked to evaluate the instructor. Ss who saw the warm instructor rated his appearance, mannerisms, and accent as appealing, whereas those who saw the cold instructor rated these attributes as irritating. Results indicate that global evaluations of a person can induce altered evaluations (...) of the person's attributes, even when there is sufficient information to allow for independent assessments of them. Furthermore, Ss were unaware of this influence of global evaluations on ratings of attributes. In fact, Ss who saw the cold instructor actually believed that the direction of influence was opposite to the true direction. They reported that their dislike of the instructor had no effect on their rating of his attributes but that their dislike of his attributes had lowered their global evaluations of him. (shrink)

The etiological approach to ‘proper functions’ in biology can be strengthened by relating it to Robert Cummins' general treatment of function ascription. The proper functions of a biological trait are the functions it is assigned in a Cummins-style functional explanation of the fitness of ancestors. These functions figure in selective explanations of the trait. It is also argued that some recent etiological theories include inaccurate accounts of selective explanation in biology. Finally, a generalization of the notion of selective explanation allows (...) an analysis of the proper functions of human artifacts. (shrink)

Many of the most important properties of human groups – including properties that may give one group an evolutionary advantage over another – are properly defined only at the level of group organization. Yet at present, most work on the evolution of culture has focused solely on the transmission of individual-level traits. I propose a conceptual extension of the theory of cultural evolution, particularly related to the evolutionary competition between cultural groups. The key concept in this extension is the emergent (...) group-level trait. This type of trait is characterized by the structured organization of differentiated individuals and constitutes a unit of selection that is qualitatively different from selection on groups as defined by traditional multilevel selection theory. As a corollary, I argue that the traditional focus on cooperation as the defining feature of human societies has missed an essential feature of cooperative groups. Traditional models of cooperation assume that interacting with one cooperator is equivalent to interacting with any other. However, human groups involve differential roles, meaning that receiving aid from one individual is often preferred to receiving aid from another. In this target article, I discuss the emergence and evolution of group-level traits and the implications for the theory of cultural evolution, including ramifications for the evolution of human cooperation, technology, and cultural institutions, and for the equivalency of multilevel selection and inclusive fitness approaches. (shrink)

Some ‘naturalist’ accounts of disease employ a biostatistical account of dysfunction, whilst others use a ‘selected effect’ account. Several recent authors have argued that the biostatistical account offers the best hope for a naturalist account of disease. We show that the selected effect account survives the criticisms levelled by these authors relatively unscathed, and has significant advantages over the BST. Moreover, unlike the BST, it has a strong theoretical rationale and can provide substantive reasons to decide difficult cases. This is (...) illustrated by showing how life-history theory clarifies the status of so-called diseases of old age. The selected effect account of function deserves a more prominent place in the philosophy of medicine than it currently occupies. _1_ Introduction _2_ Biostatistical and Selected Effect Accounts of Function _3_ Objections to the Selected Effect Account _3.1_ Boorse _3.2_ Kingma _3.3_ Hausman _3.4_ Murphy and Woolfolk _4_ Problems for the Biostatistical Account _4.1_ Schwartz _5_ Analysis versus Explication _6_ Explicating Dysfunction: Life History Theory and Senescence _7_ Conclusion. (shrink)

In behavioral ecology some authors regard the innateness concept as irretrievably confused whilst others take it to refer to adaptations. In cognitive psychology, however, whether traits are 'innate' is regarded as a significant question and is often the subject of heated debate. Several philosophers have tried to define innateness with the intention of making sense of its use in cognitive psychology. In contrast, I argue that the concept is irretrievably confused. The vernacular innateness concept represents a key aspect of 'folkbiology', (...) namely, the explanatory strategy that psychologists and cognitive anthropologists have labeled 'folk essentialism'. Folk essentialism is inimical to Darwinism, and both Darwin and the founders of the modern synthesis struggled to overcome this way of thinking about living systems. Because the vernacular concept of innateness is part of folkbiology, attempts to define it more adequately are unlikely to succeed, making it preferable to introduce new, neutral terms for the various, related notions that are needed to understand cognitive development. (shrink)

Because physical theories typically predict numerical values, an improvement in experimental precision reduces the tolerance range and hence increases corroborability. In most psychological research, improved power of a statistical design leads to a prior probability approaching 1/2 of finding a significant difference in the theoretically predicted direction. Hence the corroboration yielded by "success" is very weak, and becomes weaker with increased precision. "Statistical significance" plays a logical role in psychology precisely the reverse of its role in physics. This problem is (...) worsened by certain unhealthy tendencies prevalent among psychologists, such as a premium placed on experimental "cuteness" and a free reliance upon ad hoc explanations to avoid refutation. (shrink)

Several authors have argued that causes differ in the degree to which they are ‘specific’ to their effects. Woodward has used this idea to enrich his influential interventionist theory of causal explanation. Here we propose a way to measure causal specificity using tools from information theory. We show that the specificity of a causal variable is not well-defined without a probability distribution over the states of that variable. We demonstrate the tractability and interest of our proposed measure by measuring the (...) specificity of coding DNA and other factors in a simple model of the production of mRNA. (shrink)

Human experts are the source of knowledge required to develop computer systems that perform at an expert level. Human beings are not, however, able to reliably express what they know. As a result, experts often develop non-authentic accounts of their own expertise. These accounts, here termed reconstructed methods of reasoning, lead to computer systems that perform at a high level of proficiency but have the disadvantage that they often do not reflect the heuristics and processing constraints of a system user. (...) Reconstructed methods of reasoning are compared with authentic methods derived from the study of expert human behavior. Tests are proposed to establish the authenticity of reasoning methods and examples from medical diagnosis are used to illustrate how authentic methods of reasoning can be incorporated into an expert computer system. CiteULike Connotea Del.icio.us What's this? (shrink)

Biodiversity studies comprise the systematic examination of the full array of different kinds of organisms together with the technology by which the diversity can be maintained and used for the benefit of humanity. Current basic research at the species level focuses on the process of species formation, the standing levels of species numbers in various higher taxonomic categories, and the phenomena of hyperdiversity and extinction proneness. The major practical concern is the massive extinction rate now caused by human activity, which (...) threatens losses in the esthetic quality of the world, in economic opportunity, and in vital ecosystem services. (shrink)

We outline three very different concepts of the gene—instrumental, nominal, and postgenomic. The instrumental gene has a critical role in the construction and interpretation of experiments in which the relationship between genotype and phenotype is explored via hybridization between organisms or directly between nucleic acid molecules. It also plays an important theoretical role in the foundations of disciplines such as quantitative genetics and population genetics. The nominal gene is a critical practical tool, allowing stable communication between bioscientists in a wide (...) range of fields grounded in well-defined sequences of nucleotides, but this concept does not embody major theoretical insights into genome structure or function. The post-genomic gene embodies the continuing project of understanding how genome structure supports genome function, but with a deflationary picture of the gene as a structural unit. This final concept of the gene poses a significant challenge to conventional assumptions about the relationship between genome structure and function, and between genotype and phenotype. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:The Tragic Vision of African American ReligionPaul E. CapetzThe Tragic Vision of African American Religion Matthew V. Johnson New York, N.Y.: Palgrave Macmillan, 2010. 189 pp. $75.00Matthew Johnson’s profound book The Tragic Vision of African American Religion sheds new light upon the distinctive nature of African American religion. Adequate interpretation of this topic requires understanding the traumas inflicted upon Africans sold into slavery, their existential predicaments before and (...) after emancipation, and the ongoing plight of their descendants whose psyches have been indelibly scarred by this traumatic history. Johnson avails himself of the resources of philosophical theology, psychoanalytic theory, and literary criticism to argue his thesis that African American religion expresses a tragic vision of reality. Besides providing an illuminating analysis of the traumatic experience underlying this religious vision, Johnson presents a compelling constructive proposal as to the broader implications of his thesis for Christian theology at large.As a student of David Tracy and Langdon Gilkey, Johnson sees the necessity for rigorous philosophical reflection in theology. Because the spirituality of the black church stands in some real tension with the traditional theological categories inherited from Europe, Johnson proceeds with “a phenomenological orientation grounded in a philosophical hermeneutical approach” that allows him to excavate the traumatic experiences informing this spirituality (4). He skillfully uses the concepts of mourning, loss, longing, and desire developed in psychoanalytical theory to probe the significance of trauma for grasping the dynamics of African American spirituality. He engages literary criticism and argues convincingly for a distinction between “tragedy” as a literary genre and the tragic vision it articulates. Indeed, the tragic vision is prior to tragedy. The tragic is not the encounter with meaninglessness per se but “the always already aesthetic representation of the encounter, which preserves its terrible truth in a transfigured vision of reality” (6). This vision affirms life while facilitating “the recognition and embrace of the darker, more fundamental truths of life” (7).Cognizant that other theologians have declared the incompatibility of Christian faith with a tragic vision of reality, Johnson believes otherwise. He insists that the tragic is fundamental to human experience as such, although it is frequently evaded by strategies of foreclosure—including those of Christian theology—that falsify the experience. Yet the distinctive thing about the black religious experience is the way African Americans made the Christian faith [End Page 215] their own by transforming it at a deep spiritual level through their tragic vision. Mildly critical of previous formulations of black theology, Johnson contends that this involved much more than the affirmation that God cares about the sociopolitical liberation of oppressed people. The Christian tragic vision of the black experience offers the possibility of a new basis for “theology in an African American key” (6). Since he understands himself primarily as a Christian theologian, however, Johnson addresses an audience consisting of more than fellow black theologians. He rightly highlights a profound truth that white theologians have largely failed to grasp: the contribution of the black church “transcends the confines of African American culture to speak meaningfully to a Christian faith struggling to remain viable in a meaningful way” (10).James Cone once issued this challenge: “Why don’t white theologians make racism their issue?” White theologians who ponder Johnson’s book will begin to understand the full import of this challenge: by opening ourselves unreservedly to the pain of our black sisters and brothers, we may discover anew the meaning of that genuine humanity to which the gospel summons all people. A theological reformulation of Christian faith as tragic in the light of the traumas of the black experience could occasion a much needed reformation of the white churches in America.Paul E. CapetzUnited Theological Seminary of the Twin CitiesCopyright © 2012 The Society of Christian Ethics... (shrink)