Here, we review genomic target site selection during retroviral integration as a multistep process in which specific biases are introduced at each level. The first asymmetries are introduced when the virus takes a specific route into the nucleus. Next, by co‐opting distinct host cofactors, the integration machinery is guided to particular chromatin contexts. As the viral integrase captures a local target nucleosome, specific contacts introduce fine‐grained biases in the integration site distribution. In vivo, the established population of proviruses is subject (...) to both positive and negative selection, thereby continuously reshaping the integration site distribution. By affecting stochastic proviral expression as well as the mutagenic potential of the virus, integration site choice may be an inherent part of the evolutionary strategies used by different retroviruses to maximise reproductive success. (shrink)

In this paper, I respond to Pierre Le Morvan’s critique of my thesis that ignorance is lack of true belief rather than absence of knowledge. I argue that the distinction between dispositional and non-dispositional accounts of belief, as I made it in a previous paper, is correct as it stands. Also, I criticize the viability and the importance of Le Morvan’s distinction between propositional and factive ignorance. Finally, I provide two arguments in favor of the thesis that ignorance is lack (...) of true belief rather than absence of knowledge. (shrink)

Can only science deliver genuine knowledge about the world and ourselves? Is science our only guide to what exists? Scientism answers both questions with yes. Scientism is increasingly influential in popular scientific literature and intellectual life in general, but philosophers have hitherto largely ignored it. This collection is one of the first to develop and assess scientism as a serious philosophical position. It features twelve new essays by both proponents and critics of scientism. Before scientism can be evaluated, it needs (...) to be clear what it is. Hence, the collection opens with essays that provide an overview of the many different versions of scientism and their mutual interrelations. Next, several card-carrying proponents of scientism make their case, either by developing and arguing directly for their preferred version of scientism or by responding to objections. Then, the floor is given to critics of scientism. It is examined whether scientism is epistemically vicious, whether scientism presents a plausible general epistemological outlook and whether science has limits. The final four essays zoom out and connect scientism to ongoing debates elsewhere in philosophy. What does scientism mean for religious epistemology? What can science tell us about morality and is a scientistic moral epistemology plausible? How is scientism related to physicalism? And is experimental philosophy really a form of scientism tailored to philosophy? (shrink)

Pleidooi voor een nieuwe culturele wereldorde die niet uitgaat van het westerse denken in tegenstellingen, maar verschillende denkwijzen en opvattingen erkent en niet uitsluit.

In this article I argue that there are two different types of understanding: the understanding we get from explanations, and the understanding we get from unification. This claim is defended by first showing that explanation and unification are not as closely related as has sometimes been thought. A critical appraisal of recent proposals for understanding without explanation leads us to discuss the example of a purely classificatory biology: it turns out that such a science can give us understanding of the (...) world through unification of the phenomena, even though it does not give us any explanations. The two types of understanding identified in this paper, while strictly separate, do have in common that both consist in seeing how the individual phenomena of the universe hang together. Explanations give us connections between the phenomena through the asymmetric, ‘vertical’ relation of determination; unifications give us connections through the symmetric, ‘horizontal’ relation of kinship. We then arrive at a general definition of understanding as knowledge of connections between the phenomena, and indicate that there might be more than two types of understanding. (shrink)

European states, including Belgium, have looked at the construction of Europe through an economie and a political prism. Both dimensions have evolved following parallel paths. In Belgium a large consensus has always existed concerning the economie dimension of the European construction. In this respect Belgiums post-1945 European policies area direct continuation of the interwar efforts to build a West-European economic area, based on a free trade philosophy and a rejection of economic nationalism which always handicapped small trading states such as (...) Belgium. Even before the second world war the Belgian elite thus accepted the principles of economic multilateralism.In the political dimension however a consensus on a federal Europe only emerged at the end of the seventies. Till then, important parts of the Belgian political elite remained sceptical and even hostile to the construction of a supranational Europe, based on a traditional view on political autonomy and independence. The reasons why Belgian views on the political dimension of Europe slowly shifted to a federal objective were partly domestic and partly the result of the growing awareness that a small countries' political interests in the world can be best pursued through supranationality. (shrink)

Is our experience of the world 'rich' or 'thin'? In other words, are we aware of unattended sensory stimuli, or are the contents of our consciousness constrained by what we attend to? A recent, ingenious, attempt to address this issue offers us a seemingly unavailable, 'moderate' option; our experience is somewhere between the two. But before we make our minds up about this conclusion, we should see that it resulted from conflating two ways of construing the relevant concepts. I claim (...) that, one way of reading 'rich' vs. 'thin', echoes the psychologists' distinction between 'early' vs. 'late' accounts of selective attention, and I argue that 'perceptual load theory', a recent response to this empirical issue, offers us a satisfying solution to our philosophical problem. Ultimately, we are only aware of what we attend to, so we can conclude that our experience of the world is philosophically 'thin'. Nonetheless, the second way of reading 'rich' vs. 'thin' relates to the range of sensory stimuli that we can be aware of. I claim that this range depends upon the attentional load that our sensory systems are placed under. The 'moderate' position, then, merely marks out one possible degree of sensory awareness on a continuum that runs from 'rich' to 'thin'. (shrink)

This paper explores the potential and relevance of an innovative sociological research method known as the Imitation Game for research in health care. Whilst this method and its potential have until recently only been explored within sociology, there are many interesting and promising facets that may render this approach fruitful within the health care field, most notably to questions about the experiential knowledge or ‘expertise’ of chronically ill patients. The Imitation Game can be especially useful because it provides a way (...) to map this experiential knowledge more systematically, without falling in the dual trap of either over-relying on in-depth, but highly specific phenomenological ‘insider’-approaches that are hard to generalize, or, alternatively, problematically reducing the rich life-worlds of patients to a set of indicators in a questionnaire. The main focus of this paper is theoretical and conceptual: explaining the Imitation Game method, discussing its usefulness in the health care domain, and exploring the ways in which the approach can be utilized for chronic illness care. The paper presents both a conceptual and empirical exploration of how the Imitation Game method and its underlying theoretical concepts of ‘contributory expertise’ and ‘interactional expertise’ can be transferred from the sociological realm to the field of health care, what kinds of insights can be gained from the method, which methodological issues it may raise, and what potentially fruitful research routes can be explored. I argue that the Imitation Game can be thought of as a ‘social learning experiment’ that simultaneously enables the participants to learn from each other’s perspectives, allows researchers to explore exciting new possibilities, and also offers the tools to intervene in the practice that is being studied. (shrink)

In this paper, I argue that unification is neither necessary nor sufficient for explanation. Focusing on the versions of the unificationist theory of explanation of Kitcher and of Schurz and Lambert, I establish three theses. First, Kitcher’s criterion of unification is vitiated by the fact that it entails that every proposition can be explained by itself, a flaw that it is unable to overcome. Second, because neither Kitcher’s theory nor that of Schurz and Lambert can solve the problems of asymmetry (...) and accidental generalizations, it follows that unification is not sufficient to ground explanation. Third, some good explanations are disunifying, which entails that unification is not necessary for explanation either. (shrink)

This book is a volume in the Penn Press Anniversary Collection. To mark its 125th anniversary in 2015, the University of Pennsylvania Press rereleased more than 1,100 titles from Penn Press's distinguished backlist from 1899-1999 that had fallen out of print. Spanning an entire century, the Anniversary Collection offers peer-reviewed scholarship in a wide range of subject areas.

Websites (e.g. intervention websites targeting health risk behaviors) can be effective in achieving their goals if they are used. The actual use, however, is often very low. This study aimed to assess the effect of visual complexity on intention to use websites, by using within-subjects manipulations of visual complexity and cognitive load (1097 trials, N = 93). The results indicate that high visual complexity has a negative effect on intention to use websites ( F (1, 1095) = 14.81, p < (...) .001), but this is fully mediated through attitude towards the website based on the first impression ( F (1, 1094) = 13.41, p < .001). This clearly demonstrates the powerfulness of a first impression before interacting with a website and stresses the need for evidence-based insight into how this first impression is constituted. Keywords: visual complexity; websites; intention to use. (shrink)

Websites can be effective in achieving their goals if they are used. The actual use, however, is often very low. This study aimed to assess the effect of visual complexity on intention to use websites, by using within-subjects manipulations of visual complexity and cognitive load. The results indicate that high visual complexity has a negative effect on intention to use websites = 14.81,p<.001), but this is fully mediated through attitude towards the website based on the first impression = 13.41,p<.001). This (...) clearly demonstrates the powerfulness of a first impression before interacting with a website and stresses the need for evidence-based insight into how this first impression is constituted. Keywords: visual complexity; websites; intention to use. (shrink)

Websites can be effective in achieving their goals if they are used. The actual use, however, is often very low. This study aimed to assess the effect of visual complexity on intention to use websites, by using within-subjects manipulations of visual complexity and cognitive load. The results indicate that high visual complexity has a negative effect on intention to use websites = 14.81, p <.001), but this is fully mediated through attitude towards the website based on the first impression = (...) 13.41, p <.001). This clearly demonstrates the powerfulness of a first impression before interacting with a website and stresses the need for evidence-based insight into how this first impression is constituted. Keywords: visual complexity; websites; intention to use. (shrink)

What does "nature" mean? This general question, central to the social construction of nature, is addressed here by examining one of nature's particulars, Pacific salmon, and by looking at how one group of people, salmon biologists, imbue the fish with meaning. Based upon historical, comparative, and qualitative data, it appears that nature is socially constructed through both cognitive and physical processes. "Salmon"- and indirectly nature - emerges not as a monolithic, timeless, certain entity, but rather as one that is manipulable, (...) fleeting, and the product of a variety of social relations. In particular, public policy and economics appear to have profoundly influenced salmon biologists' cognitive and physical constructions of salmon. (shrink)

Scriven’s paradox of predictability arises from the combination of two ideas: first, that everything in a deterministic universe is, in principle, predictable; second, that it is possible to create a system that falsifies any prediction that is made of it. Recently, the paradox has been used by Rummens and Cuypers to argue that there is a fundamental difference between embedded and external predictors; and by Ismael to argue against a governing conception of laws. The present paper defends a new diagnosis (...) of the roots of the paradox. First, it is argued that the unpredictability has to be understood in the light of Turing’s famous results about computability, in particular his proof that there is no solution to the ‘halting problem.’ This allows us to see that previous analyses of the paradox were either mistaken or not fully adequate. Second, the sense of paradox that nevertheless remains is traced to the idea that rational behaviour is not dependent on contingent environmental circumstances: that it is always up to us to engage in activities such as rational prediction or rational belief. The paradox of predictability teaches us that this idea, natural though it may be, is mistaken. (shrink)

This book develops and defends a theory of responsible belief. The author argues that we lack control over our beliefs, but that we can nonetheless influence them. It is because we have intellectual obligations to influence our beliefs that we are responsible for them.

Bioethics, Volume 36, Issue 2, Page 154-161, February 2022.

Two apparently mutually exclusive ideas about the relation between contrastive and non-contrastive explanations can be found in the literature. According to contrastivists, all explanation is contrastive explanation and the supposed existence of non-contrastive explanations can be revealed to be an illusion. According to non-contrastivists, on the other hand, contrastive explanation can be fully analysed in terms of non-contrastive explanation, and is thus not of fundamental importance. In the current article, I discuss the main arguments in favour of and against each (...) of the two positions. This discussion leads to the idea that contrastive explanations are to be understood as parts of a bigger, more complete non-contrastive explanation; but that all actual explanations explain only a limited set of contrasts. I conclude that, once the relation between contrastive and non-contrastive explanations is understood correctly, there remains no substantial issue to divide contrastivism and non-contrastivism. (shrink)

Philosophical accounts of visual perception have long had to contend with questions of perceptual relativity: visual phenomenology seems to be influenced by factors independent of the objective properties of the external objects we perceive. More recently, a host of such examples has emerged from psychological studies on visual attention. In two prominent accounts of the consequences of this research, Block argues that these effects occur without changes in the way one visually represents the world to be. If true, this would (...) undermine representationalist accounts of the phenomenology of perception, which share a commitment to the claim that phenomenal character supervenes on representational content. Block’s thesis is based on experiments involving non-selective attention, and he draws the metaphysical conclusion that the resources representationalists need to distinguish veridical from illusory perception are nonexistent. The empirical evidence he considers is highly compelling, as is the ‘landscape’ model of attention that appears to underwrite it. However, in discussing these issues, Block also considers a representative example of selective attention, wherein he concedes a point that provides grounds for a plausible representationalist response. I assemble and assess this response, revealing the contradiction at the heart of Block’s thesis, and conclude, that the representationalist should remain unmoved. (shrink)

Woodward’s interventionist theory of causation is beset by a problem of circularity: the analysis of causes is in terms of interventions, and the analysis of interventions is in terms of causes. This is not in itself an argument against the correctness of the analysis. But by requiring us to have causal knowledge prior to making any judgements about causation, Woodward’s theory does make it mysterious how we can ever start acquiring causal knowledge. We present a solution to this problem by (...) showing how the interventionist notion of causation can be rationally generated from a more primitive agency notion of causation. The agency notion is easily and non-circularly applicable, but fails when we attempt to capture causal relations between non-actions. We show that the interventionist notion of causation serves as an appropriate generalisation of the agency notion. Furthermore, the causal judgements based on the latter generally remain true when rephrased in terms of the former, which allows one to use the causal knowledge gained by applying the agency notion as a basis for applying Woodward’s interventionist theory. We then present an overview of relevant empirical evidence from developmental psychology which shows that our proposed rational reconstruction lines up neatly with the actual development of causal reasoning in children. This gives additional plausibility to our proposal. The article thus provides a solution to one of the main problems of interventionism while keeping Woodward’s analysis intact. (shrink)

Elizabeth Anscombe’s classic paper Causality and Determination claims that causation can be perceived. It also defends causal singularism, the idea that the causal relation is fundamentally between the particular cause and effect, and does not depend on regularities holding elsewhere in the universe. But does the former furnish an argument for the latter? The present paper analyses a special type of causal experience involving emotional reactions to present stimuli; for instance, being frightened by a spider. It argues that such experiences (...) are strongly local, in the sense that they justify belief in a local causal relation independently of our knowledge about events elsewhere in the universe. If this analysis is correct, Humean regularity theories of causation are false; and all other non-singularist theories of causation face a difficult explanatory challenge. This means that the case for causal singularism comes out considerably strengthened. (shrink)

Recent interest in the idea that there can be scientific understanding without explanation lends new relevance to Duhem's notion of natural classification. According to Duhem, a classification that is natural teaches us something about nature without being explanatory. However, Duhem's conception of naturalness leaves much to be desired. In this paper, I argue that we can measure the naturalness of classification by using an amended version of the notion of unification as defined by Schurz and Lambert. If this thesis is (...) correct, it both leads to a better conceptual understanding of scientific understanding, and also gives the nascent literature on this topic some much-needed precision. (shrink)

Coherence is a measure of how much our beliefs hang together. Understanding is achieved when we see that something is not just a brute, isolated fact. This suggests that it might be possible to use the extant probabilistic measures of coherence to formulate a measure of understanding. We attempt to do so, but it turns out that a coherence theory runs into trouble with the asymmetry of understanding. We identify four difficulties and show how they have been solved by a (...) unification approach to explanation. We also identify four advantages of the coherence approach, and assess the possibilities of reconciling the strengths of the two approaches.La coherencia es una medida sobre cuanta interdependencia hay entre nuestras creencias. La comprension se obtiene cuando vemos que algo no es un hecho bruto, aislado. Esto sugiere la posibilidad de usar las medidas probabilisticas de coherencia al uso para elaborar una medida de la comprension. Explorare esta posibilidad, a pesar de que una teoria de la coherencia tropieza con problemas aqui dado el caracter asimetrico de la comprension. Identifico cuatro dificultades al respecto y muestro como han sido resueltas mediante un enfoque de la explicacion basado en la nocion de unificacion. Tambien identifico cuatro ventajas en la aproximacion desde la coherencia y examino que perspectivas hay de reconciliar los puntos fuertes de ambos planteamientos. (shrink)

a brief history of the study of ignorance. There is a lack of serious investigation into ignorance: apart from the apophatic tradition in the ancient world and the Middle Ages and the more recent fields of agnotology, philosophy of race, and feminist philosophy, ignorance itself has received little philosophical attention. It is then laid out how the field that one would expect to have studied ignorance in detail, namely, epistemology, has failed to do so. The chapter also explores why this (...) could be the case. Subsequently, it is explained what is new about this book and how this fills the important gap in the study of ignorance: it develops and applies an epistemology of ignorance. Finally, it gives a brief overview of the chapters ahead. (shrink)

This research explores the role of emotions in goal-directed behaviour. A model is provided for an emotional goal system whereby appraisals of the consequences of achieving or not achieving a goal are hypothesised to elicit anticipatory emotions; the anticipatory emotions are expected, in turn, to contribute to volitions in the service of goal pursuit (namely, intentions, plans, and the decision to expend energy); goal-directed behaviours next arise in response to volitions and lead to goal attainment; and the latter then functions (...) as the basis for a new set of appraisals and accompanying goaloutcome emotions. The model was tested in a longitudinal study of the responses of 406 adults (243 women, 163 men) in The Netherlands. The context for the study was the regulation of one's bodyweight via exercising and dieting. (shrink)

Any plausible ethics of belief must respect that normal agents are doxastically blameworthy for their beliefs in a range of non-exotic cases. In this paper, we argue, first, that together with independently motivated principles this constraint leads us to reject occurrentism as a general theory of belief. Second, we must acknowledge not only dormant beliefs, but tacit beliefs as well. Third, a plausible ethics of belief leads us to acknowledge that a difference in propositional content cannot in all contexts count (...) as a criterion for belief individuation. In some contexts, we need to individuate beliefs in a different manner, namely in such a way that they have at least part of their causal history essentially. (shrink)

One of the Mozi research centers outside of China is at the K.U. Leuven in Belgium. The two papers translated and published in this issue were first presented at a workshop that was held there in June 2009: "The Many Faces of Mozi: A Synchronic and Diachronic Study of Mohist Thought.".

There are convincing counter-examples to the widely accepted thesis that we cannot believe at will. For it seems possible that the truth of a proposition depend on whether or not one believes it. I call such scenarios cases of Truth Depends on Belief and I argue that they meet the main criteria for believing at will that we find in the literature. I reply to five objections that one might level against the thesis that TDB cases show that believing at (...) will is possible, namely that mind-reading is impossible, in TDB cases, one's belief is caused by one's desire, in TDB scenarios, one chooses not a belief but something else, TDB cases are reducible to Feldman cases, and that if truth depends on belief, we are on the road to a regress. Of course, TDB scenarios hardly, if ever, occur in real life. For three reasons, they are nonetheless important. First, they show that the thesis that it is conceptually impossible to believe at will is simply false. Second, they provide us with an imp.. (shrink)

In my master's thesis for physics and philosophy, I take a long and hard look at the debates surrounding Maxwell's Demon and the status of the second law of thermodynamics. I try to clarify the use of Maxwell's thought experiment in understanding the second law; to prove that the second law is contingent, given only classical mechanics and time asymmetry; to argue that the law only holds because of facts about the kinds of particles that exist in our universe; to (...) show that and why the attempts to banish the demon using fluctuations, measurements or information or erasure have been unsuccessful; and I conclude that Maxwell's Demon is alive and kicking. (shrink)

This article offers an analysis of ignorance. After a couple of preliminary remarks, I endeavor to show that, contrary to what one might expect and to what nearly all philosophers assume, being ignorant is not equivalent to failing to know, at least not on one of the stronger senses of knowledge. Subsequently, I offer two definitions of ignorance and argue that one’s definition of ignorance crucially depends on one’s account of belief. Finally, I illustrate the relevance of my analysis by (...) paying attention to four philosophical problems in which ignorance plays a crucial role. (shrink)

William Alston has argued that the so-called deontological conception of epistemic justification, on which epistemic justification is to be spelled out in terms of blame, responsibility, and obligations, is untenable. The basic idea of the argument is that this conception is untenable because we lack voluntary control over our beliefs and, therefore, cannot have any obligations to hold certain beliefs. If this is convincing, however, the argument threatens the very idea of doxastic responsibility. For, how can we ever be responsible (...) for our beliefs if we lack control over them? Several philosophers have argued that the idea that we bear responsibility for our beliefs can be saved, because absence of voluntary control over our beliefs is perfectly compatible with having obligations to hold particular beliefs. With others, I call this view ‘doxastic compatibilism’. It comes in two varieties. On the first variety, doxastic obligations do not require any kind of doxastic control whatsoever. I argue that this variety of doxastic compatibilism fails because it confuses doxastic responsibility with other closely related phenomena. On the second variety, doxastic obligations do not require voluntary doxastic control, but only compatibilist doxastic control (roughly, reason-responsiveness) and we do in fact have such control. I grant that we have such control, but also argue that having such control is insufficient for bearing doxastic responsibility. The plausibility of the examples put forward by doxastic compatibilists in support of the claim that it is sufficient for doxastic responsibility derives from the fact that in these examples, the subjects have control over factors that influence what they believe rather than control over those beliefs themselves. (shrink)

This paper assesses five main empirical scientific arguments against the reliability of belief formation on the basis of introspecting phenomenal states. After defining ‘reliability’ and ‘introspection’, I discuss five arguments to the effect that phenomenal states are more elusive than we usually think: the argument on the basis of differences in introspective reports from differences in introspective measurements; the argument from differences in reports about whether or not dreams come in colours; the argument from the absence of a correlation between (...) visual imagery ability and the performance on certain cognitive tasks; the argument from our unawareness of our capacity of echolocation; the argument from inattentional blindness and change blindness. I argue that the experiments on which these arguments are based do not concern belief formation on the basis of introspection in the first place or fail to show that it is unreliable, even when limited to introspection of phenomenal states. (shrink)

In order to discuss the notion of presence, I explore Fascist Italy as an example of a presence-based culture. In the first part of this paper, I focus on the doctrines of "the philosopher of fascism," Giovanni Gentile , in order to show that his programme of cultural awakening revolves around the notion of the "presentification of the past." This notion formed the basis of Gentile's dialectic of the act of thought, which is the kernel of his actual idealism, or (...) actualism. I argue that actualism should primarily be interpreted as an ontology of a historical reality; it expresses the view that reality is history. In his 1914 inaugural "L'esperienza pura e la realtà storica" , Gentile drew this view to its ultimate consequence by developing a view of experience that has some striking parallels with the contemporary views of presence as expounded by Gumbrecht, Runia, and Ankermit. In the second part of my paper, I discuss how Gentile and his collaborators put presence into practice in school reforms, the Enciclopedia Italiana, and in hundreds of monuments, memorials, and exhibitions. Finally, I discuss the 1932 Mostra della rivoluzione fascista, which was not only the apex of Fascist culture politics, but also of the practice of presence. In this context, I argue that this practice should not be seen as a politics of historical interpretation, as Hayden White once held, but as a politics of sublime historical experience, or presence. The presence of presence in Fascist political culture raises some difficult questions for all who embrace the new paradigm, questions that can only be answered if the notion of presence is somehow balanced by the critical historical method, which is the basis for a true dialogue with the past. (shrink)

In recent years, the healthcare field welcomed an emerging field of practices captured under the umbrella term ‘Big Data’. This term is surrounded with positive rhetoric and promises about the ability to analyse real-world data quickly and comprehensively. Such rhetoric is highly consequential in shaping debates on Big Data. While the fields of Science and Technology Studies and Critical Data Studies have been instrumental in elaborating the neglected and problematic dimensions of Big Data, it remains an open question how and (...) to what extent such insights become embedded in other fields. In this paper, we analyse the epistemological claims that accompany Big Data in the healthcare domain. We systematically searched scientific literature and selected 206 editorials as these reflect on developments in the domain. Through an interpretive analysis, we construct five ideal-typical discourses that all frame Big Data in specific ways. Three of the discourses frame Big Data in positive terms and disseminate a compelling rhetoric. Metaphors of ‘capturing’, ‘illuminating’ and ‘harnessing’ data presume that Big Data are benign and leading to valid knowledge. The scientist and critical-interpretive discourses question the objectivity and effectivity claims of Big Data. Metaphors of ‘selecting’ and ‘constructing’ data illustrate another political message, framing Big Data as limited. We conclude that work in the critical-interpretive discourse has not broadly infiltrated the medical domain. Ways to better integrate aspects of the discourse in the healthcare domain are urgently needed. (shrink)

In this article I provide and defend a solution to the problem of moral luck. The problem of moral luck is that there is a set of three theses about luck and moral blameworthiness each of which is at least prima facie plausible, but that, it seems, cannot all be true. The theses are that (1) one cannot be blamed for what happens beyond one’s control, (2) that which is due to luck is beyond one’s control, and (3) we rightly (...) blame each other for events that are due to luck. I suggest that the response which distinguishes between degree and scope of blameworthiness is promising. The main objection that one might level against this approach is that it seems to lead to the absurd conclusion that we, in the actual world, are as blameworthy as the person we could have been and who performs all sorts of heinous acts in a far away possible world. For, we in the actual world and our counterpart in a far away possible world are both such that we would perform certain heinous acts in particular circumstances. I argue that this objection can be met, namely by paying attention to the nature of luck. By using the insights into the nature of luck that have been gained by epistemologists, we can solve the problem of luck as it has been formulated by ethicists. For, epistemologists have argued that some event is due to luck only if it fails to occur in a substantial number of nearby possible worlds. I defend this account of luck and argue that the problem of moral luck can be solved if we pay attention to the nature of luck. I, therefore, call my solution to the problem of moral luck a modal solution. (shrink)

The philosophical literature displays a lively debate on the conditions under which ignorance excuses. In this paper, I formulate and defend an answer to two questions that have not yet been discussed in the literature on exculpatory ignorance. First, which kinds of propositional attitudes that count as ignorance provide an excuse? I argue that we need to consider four options here: having a false belief, suspending judgement on a true proposition, being deeply ignorant of a truth, and having a true (...) belief that falls short of knowledge. Second, ignorance of which propositions counts as an excuse? I discuss four candidates: ignorance of one’s obligation, ignorance that one is able to meet that obligation, ignorance of how to meet that obligation, and lack of foresight regarding that obligation. I argue that we can give a satisfactory account of exculpatory ignorance only if we pay attention to these two neglected issues. (shrink)

Degree‐sentences, i.e. sentences that seem to refer to things that allow of degrees, are widely used both inside and outside of philosophy, even though the metaphysics of degrees is much of an untrodden field. This paper aims to fill this lacuna by addressing the following four questions: [A] Is there some one thing, such that it is degree sensitive? [B] Are there things x, y, and z that stand in a certain relation to each other, viz. the relation that x (...) has more y than z? [C] In those cases in which degree sentences do not refer to phenomena that are degree sensitive, what is responsible for their prima facie seeming to do so? [D] If there are degree sensitive things, to which ontological categories do they belong? We answer each of these questions by arguing that there are, metaphysically speaking, different phenomena that degree sentences refer to: some refer to determinates that emanate from a certain determinable, others to tokens that are instantiations of a certain type, and yet others to what we call ‘complex, resultant properties that are constituted by stereotypical properties’. Finally, we show the relevance of our answers by applying them to the notions of freedom and belief. (shrink)

Ignorance is a neglected issue in philosophy. This is surprising for, contrary to what one might expect, it is not clear what ignorance is. Some philosophers say or assume that it is a lack of knowledge, whereas others claim or presuppose that it is an absence of true belief. What is one ignorant of when one is ignorant? What kinds of ignorance are there? This neglect is also remarkable because ignorance plays a crucial role in all sorts of controversial societal (...) issues. Ignorance is often thought to be a moral and legal excuse; it is a core concept in medical ethics and debates about privacy, and it features in religious traditions and debates about belief in God. This book does not only study an epistemic phenomenon that is interesting in itself, but also provides important tools that can be fruitfully used in debates within and beyond philosophy. (shrink)

Gevaar – werkelijk gevaar, de dreiging van de dood – maken wij als burgers van een moderne samenleving gelukkig maar weinig mee. Mochten we er al eens mee te maken krijgen, dan is dat meestal in een vorm waarin we machteloos zijn er iets tegen te doen: wanneer ons vliegtuig naar beneden stort, is het de piloot die de stuurknuppel in handen heeft; en wanneer een gezwel in ons lichaam gevonden wordt, zullen we op de oncoloog moeten vertrouwen. Wij strijden (...) nooit zelf voor ons leven. Daarmee is voor ons een basiservaring, de ervaring van het overleven, verloren gegaan. (shrink)

Philosophical theories of causation are commonly judged by their ability to correctly determine whether there is a causal relation present in intuitively clear example scenarios. If the theories survive this test, they are then used to answer big philosophical questions about causation. This Method of Examples is attractive because it seems to allow us to determine the quality of a theory of causation independently of answering the big philosophical questions; which is good, since it means that we can then non-circularly (...) use the theories judged to be best to answer those questions. However, the current article argues that this virtue of the Method of Examples is an illusion. In particular, I argue that the necessary step of judging whether a proposed analysis of causation is reductive can only be taken after many of the most vexing philosophical questions about causation have already been answered. It is then shown that a rejection of the methodological supremacy of the Method of Examples leads to a more pluralistic method of judging theories of causation, a pluralism that benefits non-standard approaches like interventionism and agency theories. (shrink)

Coherence is a measure of how much our beliefs hang together. Understanding is achieved when we see that something is not just a brute, isolated fact. This suggests that it might be possible to develop a coherence theory of understanding, which is what we attempt to do in this article using several formal measures of coherence. However, it turns out that a coherence theory runs into trouble with the asymmetry of understanding. We identify four difficulties and give suggestions for how (...) they could be solved. These solutions all point away from coherence and towards a rather different notion, unification, which casts some doubt on the possibility of a coherence theory of understanding. (shrink)