Online research in philosophy

Journalism educators who appear as expert witnesses and consultants in media law cases such as libel and invasion of privacy are often unfamiliar with the practical aspects of serving as an eflective, efficient, and ethical expert. These practical dimensions include federal and state rules of evidence and civil procedure, the process of deciding whether or not to accept a case, negotiations over fees and employment conditions, ethical conflicts associated with representation, the litigation process, and post-trial issues. It is unusual, especially (...) in media law cases, for an expert's testimony to make or break a case, but a client has a right to expect aggressive and rigorous representation and ready accessibilityfrom the expert. The challenge facing the journalism educator who serves as an expert witness is balancing those demands with the responsibilities of being a professor while avoiding conflicts of interest. (shrink)

The Philosophy of Economics is the first work to seriously and successfully bridge twentieth-century economics and twentieth-century philosophy. Subroto Roy draws these two disciplines together and examines the basic intellectual roots of economics. This is also the first work by an economist to employ the writings of Wittgenstein and to tackle seriously the import of modern philosophy for economic thought. Unlike others in the field, Roy discusses not only the contributions of Popper, Kuhn, and Lakatos but also those of Frege, (...) Moore, and Wittgenstein, as well as Plato and Aristotle. (shrink)

Margaret Moore | : Les questions de justice soulevées par la possession du territoire sont nombreuses. Qui a droit à quoi ? La distribution est-elle équitable ? Quels sont les droits censés découler d’un droit au territoire ? Et il y en a bien d’autres. Le présent article met en évidence que ces questions de justice sont abordées sous une perspective plutôt différente selon la conception que l’on se fait du territoire. Il existe à ce dernier égard deux courants (...) dominants : le premier, souvent identifié à Locke, voit le territoire sous l’angle de la propriété ; le second, que l’on rattache à Kant, est considéré comme le domaine géographique du pouvoir juridictionnel. | : There are many justice issues raised by the possession of territory ; questions of who is entitled to what ; the fairness of the distribution ; and the entitlements that are thought to follow from having a right to territory, to name a few. This paper then goes on to show that these justice issues are framed somewhat differently depending on one’s conception of territory. There are two dominant conceptions of territory : territory as property ; and territory as the geographical domain of jurisdictional authority. The former is often identified with Locke, and the latter with Kant. (shrink)

Diversity in society can be viewed from two perspectives, normative and descriptive, both of which define how we think, discuss, and live. Normatively we are called to be responsible. This notion ideally depicts the vision of people of various backgrounds and beliefs living with an attitude of tolerance, respect, and the desire for justice. Descriptively, it is to recognize that people of diverse ethnic, social, economic, and philosophical backgrounds come together to live in various geographic locations, often resulting in heated (...) tension and turmoil. Cultural backgrounds are a primary source of identity for many and serve as a foundation for a great deal of self-definition, expression, and sense of individual identity and group belonging. (shrink)

We argue that the self-experimentation espoused by Roberts as a means of generating new ideas, particularly in the area of mood, may be confounded by the experimental procedure eliciting those affective changes. We further suggest that ideas might be better generated through contact with a broad range of people, rather than in isolation.

arbitrary flowchart programs by introducing a new recursive function for each tag point. In the above example, one obtains: int(x) = int1(x,0), p(n,¤| ,... .ur. ¢(¤.vH(¤.¤,.~¤,) ..... 1 h(n.c¤| ..... ¤r)), w(n.y2l(n.¤l ,.... ul,) ...., y2r(n,a|,_,,¤l_))_..

By focusing primarily on communication between adult and child and on adult-set criteria for appropriate action, Carpendale & Lewis's (C&L's) account of the development of social understanding in the epistemic triangle tends toward an enculturation view, while diminishing the role of individuals. What their proposed mechanism fails to acknowledge is that the two agents in the epistemic triangle necessarily have independent perspectives of the object and of each other.

Introduction: What is the critical spirit?--Utopianism, ancient and modern, by M.I. Finley.--Primitive society in its many dimensions, by S. Diamond.--Manicheanism in the Enlightenment, by R.H. Popkin.--Schopenhauer today, by M. Horkheimer.--Beginning in Hegel and today, by K.H. Wolff.--The social history of ideas: Ernst Cassirer and after, by P. Gay.--Policies of violence, from Montesquieu to the Terrorist, by E.V. Walter.--Thirty-nine articles: toward a theory of social theory, by J.R. Seeley.--History as private enterprise, by H. Zinn.--From Socrates to Plato, by H. Meyerhoff.--Rational society (...) and irrational art, by H. Read.--The quest for the Grail; Wagner and Morris, by C.E. Schorske.--Valéry; Monsieur Teste, by L. Goldmann.--History and existentialism in Sartre, by L. Krieger.--German popular biographies; culture's bargain counter, by L. Lowenthal.--The Rechtsstaat as magic wall, by O. Kirchheimer. (shrink)

Nel febbraio 1912 Wittgenstein venne ammesso al Trinity College con Russell come supervisor, e iniziò a seguire le lezioni di Moore. E’ probabile che leggesse il libretto di Moore, Ethics, pubblicato al suo arrivo a Cambridge, o che ritrovasse nelle lezioni di Moore alcune delle suggestioni presenti nel libro. Ma dopo il Tractatus Wittgenstein dedicò poco spazio alle riflessioni sull’etica e quel poco in un periodo ristretto di tempo, agli inizi degli anni ‘30, dalla Conferenza sull’etica2 alle (...) lezioni del ’32-33. Alle lezioni del 32-33 assistettero sia Alice Ambrose che George E. Moore, che ci lascianpo diversi tipi di appunti:3 Ambrose riporta frasi di Wittgenstein, Moore presenta e rielabora le sue idee. Una lettura comparata di questi appunti dà un’idea abbastanza chiara di quanto Wittgenstein in quegli anni riuscisse a fondere le sue idee sui giudizi morali con le sue idee sulla grammatica filosofica che veniva elaborando nel Big Typescript. (shrink)

G.H. von Wright, G.E. Moore's and Wittgenstein's successor, and John Wisdom's predecessor as a Professor of Philosophy in Cambridge, wrote in 1993: «The history of the øanalytical! movement has not yet been written in full. With its increased diversification, it becomes pertinent to try to identify its most essential features and distinguish them from later additions which are alien to its origins.» In the same year A.J. Ayer's successor as a Wykeham Professor of Logic in Oxford, M. Dummett noted: (...) «I hope that such a history will be written: it would be fascinating.» The task of this book is to fulfill these hopes. (shrink)

This is a collection of essays on themes of legal philosophy which have all been generated or affected by Hart's work. The topics covered include legal theory, responsibility, and enforcement of morals, with contributions from Ronald Dworkin, Rolf Sartorius, Neil MacCormach, David Lyons, Kent Greenawalt, Michael Moore, Joseph Raz, and C.L. Ten, among others.

Pour l'economiste le plus celebre et le plus influent du vingtieme siecle, John Maynard Keynes (1883-1946), l'economie devrait occuper une place secondaire dans la vie humaine et sociale. La politique et surtout l'ethique devraient etre au poste de commande. L'oeuvre de Keynes, penseur multidimensionnel, s'appuyait sur un socle philosophique, ethique et epistemologique, qui en eclaire tous les aspects. Notre communication souligne en particulier l'influence determinante, dans la vision keynesienne, des Principia Ethica de Moore. A partir de ce livre, et (...) des Principles of Mathematics de Russell, Keynes a engage une reflexion philosophique qui a abouti ä la publication, en 1921, du Treatise on Probability, qui pose le probleme de Taction en contexte d'incertitude radicale, ce qui est le cas de Taction economique. C'est done sur la base d'une reflexion philosophique, encore peu connue, que Keynes condamne le laisser-faire et prone un interventionnisme indispensable pour eviter Tecroulement d'une civilisation menacee par les extremismes. (shrink)

Philosophers often invoke some sort of consensus in order to justify their analyses on knowledge. Such an appeal could be interpreted as a plea for common sense. Yet there are many senses of common sense. In this paper, I would like to explore G.E. Moore and L. Wittgenstein's appeal to such a folk consensus. I will argue that while the former attaches common sense with the everyday beliefs of plain men, the latter invokes the universal norms underlying human practice (...) and therefore invites an ideal common sense that can better serve as an epistemic criterion. (shrink)

Maclntyre's claim that contemporary moral language is, by traditional standards, merely chaotic somewhat exaggerates our chaos, and traditional order. He accuses. Moore and his disciples in particular of using moral language merely as propaganda, failing, like other critics, to reckon with the Platonic context of Moore's argument and the reasons why Goodness is an idea that rational inquiry should not abandon. Genuine moral action is done as the right thing, that produces more that is good than any alternative. (...) Plato's model of the threefold structure of human motivation, and his image of the cave, locates moral action at a higher level than action from desire or social prejudice. We discover our real selves, distinct from our physical and social natures, in seeing what Goodness requires. This neo?Platonism is a better bet than Maclntyre allows, and an answer to the barbarian puppeteers he rightly condemns. (shrink)

Kraus, O. Biographical sketch of Franz Brentano.--Stumpf, C. Reminiscences of Franz Brentano.--Husserl, E. Reminiscences of Franz Brentano.--Gilson, E. Brentano's interpretation of medieval philosophy.--Gilson, L. Franz Brentano on science and philosophy.--Titchener, E. B. Brentano and Wundt: empirical and experimental psychology.--Chisholm, R. M. Brentano's descriptive psychology.--De Boer, T. The descriptive method of Franz Brentano.--Spiegelberg, H. Intention and intentionality in the scholastics, Brentano and Husserl.--Marras, A. Scholastic roots of Brentano's conception of intentionality.--Chisholm, R. M. Intentional inexistence.--McAlister, L. L. Chisholm and Brentano on intentionality.--Chisholm, (...) R. M. Brentano's theory of correct and incorrect emotion.--Moore, G. E. Review of Franz Brentano's The origin of the knowledge of right and wrong.--Franks, G. Was G. E. Moore mistaken about Brentano?--Kotarbinski, T. Franz Brentano as reist.--Terrell, D.B. Brentano's argument for reismus.--Bergman, H. Brentano's theory of induction.--Kraus, O. Toward a phenomenognosy of time consciousness. (shrink)

At Moore’s time, the main-stream ethical theory is the doctrine that pleasure alone is good as an end as held by the hedonistic utilitarianism. Moore, however, asserts that good, not composed of any parts, is a simple notion and indefinable, and naturalistic ethical theories, in particular hedonistic utilitarianism, interpret intrinsic good as a property of a single natural object---pleasure, which is also the sole end of life, thus violates naturalistic fallacy. Moore seems to believe that there exist (...) things other than pleasure that are also intrinsically good and has searched for them. But Moore has not clearly stated what these things are, nor has he given any justification for why they are intrinsically good. This paper discusses Moore’s arguments and difficulties of utilitarianism. With the subjectivistic utilitarian theory of value, Unified Utilitarian Theory (UTT) discards the classification of value into intrinsic and instrumental and proves to be exempt of all theexisting difficulties with utilitarianism related to pleasure, including naturalistic fallacy, vagueness of pleasure and sole end of life, double counting, etc. (shrink)

In this paper I explore a positivist methodological tradition in early demand theory, as exemplified by several common traits that I draw from the works of V. Pareto, H. L. Moore and H. Schultz. Assuming a current approach to explanation in the social sciences, I will discuss the building of their various explanans, showing that the three authors agreed on two distinctive methodological features: the exclusion of any causal commitment to psychology when explaining individual choice and the mandate to (...) test the truth of demand theory on aggregate data by statistical means. However, I also contend, from an epistemological point of view, that the truth of demand theory was conceived of in three different ways by our authors. Inspired by Poincaré, Pareto assumed that many different theories could account for the same data on individual choice, coming close to a kind of conventionalism -though I prefer to refer to this position as theoreticism. Moore was himself akin to Pearson's approach, which could be named descriptivist insofar as it resolved scientific laws into statistical descriptions of the data. Finally, Schultz tried to reconcile both approaches in an adequationist stance with no success, as we shall see. (shrink)

Articles by two American mathematicians, E. V. Huntington and Oswald Veblen, are discussed as examples of a movement in foundational research in the period 1900-1930 called American postulate theory. This movement also included E. H. Moore, R. L. Moore, C. H. Langford, H. M. Sheffer, C. J. Keyser, and others. The articles discussed exemplify American postulate theorists' standards for axiomatizations of mathematical theories, and their investigations of such axiomatizations with respect to metatheoretic properties such as independence, completeness, and (...) consistency. (shrink)

In this paper I explore a positivist methodological tradition in early demand theory, as exemplified by several common traits that I draw from the works of V. Pareto, H. L. Moore and H. Schultz. Assuming a current approach to explanation in the social sciences, I will discuss the building of their various explanans, showing that the three authors agreed on two distinctive methodological features: the exclusion of any causal commitment to psychology when explaining individual choice and the mandate to (...) test the truth of demand theory on aggregate data by statistical means. However, I also contend, from an epistemological point of view, that the truth of demand theory was conceived of in three different ways by our authors. Inspired by Poincaré, Pareto assumed that many different theories could account for the same data on individual choice, coming close to a kind of conventionalism ? though I prefer to refer to this position as theoreticism. Moore was himself akin to Pearson's approach, which could be named descriptivist in so far as it resolved scientific laws into statistical descriptions of the data. Finally, Schultz tried to reconcile both approaches in an adequationist stance with no success, as we shall see. (shrink)

Metaethics is a perennially popular subject, but one that can be challenging to study and teach. As it consists in an array of questions about ethics, it is really a mix of (at least) applied metaphysics, epistemology, philosophy of language, and mind. The seminal texts therefore arise out of, and often assume competence with, a variety of different literatures. It can be taught thematically, but this sample syllabus offers a dialectical approach, focused on metaphysical debate over moral realism, which spans (...) the century of debate launched and framed by G. E. Moore's Principia Ethica. The territory and literature are, however, vast. So, this syllabus is highly selective. A thorough metaethics course might also include more topical examination of moral supervenience, moral motivation, moral epistemology, and the rational authority of morality. Authors Recommend: Alexander Miller, An Introduction to Contemporary Metaethics (Cambridge: Polity Press, 2003). This is one of the few clear, accessible, and comprehensive surveys of the subject, written by someone sympathetic with moral naturalism. David Brink, Moral Realism and the Foundations of Ethics (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989). Brink rehabilitates naturalism about moral facts by employing a causal semantics and natural kinds model of moral thought and discourse. Michael Smith, The Moral Problem (Oxford: Blackwell, 1994). Smith's book frames the debate as driven by a tension between the objectivity of morality and its practical role, offering a solution in terms of a response-dependent account of practical rationality. Gilbert Harman and Judith Jarvis Thomson, Moral Relativism & Moral Objectivity (Cambridge, MA: Blackwell, 1996). Harman argues against the objectivity of moral value, while Thomson defends it. Each then responds to the other. Frank Jackson, From Metaphysics to Ethics (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1998). Jackson argues that reductive conceptual analysis is possible in ethics, offering a unique naturalistic account of moral properties and facts. Mark Timmons, Morality without Foundations (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999). Timmons distinguishes moral cognitivism from moral realism, interpreting moral judgments as beliefs that have cognitive content but do not describe moral reality. He also provides a particularly illuminating discussion of nonanalytic naturalism. Philippa Foot, Natural Goodness (New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 2001). A Neo-Aristotelian perspective: moral facts are natural facts about the proper functioning of human beings. Russ Shafer-Landau, Moral Realism: A Defence (New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 2003). In this recent defense of a Moorean, nonnaturalist position, Shafer-Landau engages rival positions in a remarkably thorough manner. Terence Cuneo, The Normative Web (New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 2007). Cuneo argues for a robust version of moral realism, developing a parity argument based on the similarities between epistemic and moral facts. Mark Schroeder, Slaves of the Passions (New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 2007). Schroeder defends a reductive form of naturalism in the tradition of Hume, identifying moral and normative facts with natural facts about agents' desires. Online Materials: PEA Soup: http://peasoup.typepad.com A blog devoted to philosophy, ethics, and academia. Its contributors include many active and prominent metaethicists, who regularly post about the moral realism and naturalism debates. Metaethics Bibliography: http://www.lenmanethicsbibliography.group.shef.ac.uk/Bib.htm Maintained by James Lenman, professor of philosophy at the University of Sheffield, this online resource provides a selective list of published research in metaethics. Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy: http://plato.stanford.edu See especially the entries under 'metaethics'. Sample Syllabus: Topics for Lecture & Discussion Note: unless indicated otherwise, all the readings are found in R. Shafer-Landau and T. Cuneo, eds., Foundations of Ethics: An Anthology (Malden: Blackwell, 2007). (FE) Week 1: Realism I (Classic Nonnaturalism) G. E. Moore, Principia Ethica, 2nd ed. (FE ch. 35). W. K. Frankena, 'The Naturalistic Fallacy,'Mind 48 (1939): 464–77. S. Finlay, 'Four Faces of Moral Realism', Philosophy Compass 2/6 (2007): 820–49 [DOI: [DOI link]]. Week 2: Antirealism I (Classic Expressivism) A. J. Ayer, 'Critique of Ethics and Theology' (1952) (FE ch. 3). C. Stevenson, 'The Nature of Ethical Disagreement' (1963) (FE ch. 28). Week 3: Antirealism II (Error Theory) J. L. Mackie, 'The Subjectivity of Values' (1977) (FE ch. 1). R. Joyce, Excerpt from The Myth of Morality (2001) (FE ch. 2). Week 4: Realism II (Nonanalytic Naturalism) R. Boyd, 'How to be a Moral Realist' (1988) (FE ch. 13). P. Railton, 'Moral Realism' (1986) (FE ch. 14). T. Horgan and M. Timmons, 'New Wave Moral Realism Meets Moral Twin Earth' (1991) (FE ch. 38). Week 5: Antirealism III (Contemporary Expressivism) A. Gibbard, 'The Reasons of a Living Being' (2002) (FE ch. 6). S. Blackburn, 'How To Be an Ethical Anti-Realist' (1993) (FE ch. 4). T. Horgan and M. Timmons, 'Nondescriptivist Cognitivism' (2000) (FE ch. 5). W. Sinnott-Armstrong, 'Expressivism and Embedding' (2000) (FE ch. 37). Week 6: Realism III (Sensibility Theory) J. McDowell, 'Values and Secondary Qualities' (1985) (FE ch. 11). D. Wiggins, 'A Sensible Subjectivism' (1991) (FE ch. 12). Week 7: Realism IV (Subjectivism) & Antirealism IV (Constructivism) R. Firth, 'Ethical Absolutism and the Ideal Observer' (1952) (FE ch. 9). G. Harman, 'Moral Relativism Defended' (1975) (FE ch. 7). C. Korsgaard, 'The Authority of Reflection' (1996) (FE ch. 8). Week 8: Realism V (Contemporary Nonnaturalism) R. Shafer-Landau, 'Ethics as Philosophy' (2006) (FE ch. 16). T. M. Scanlon, What We Owe to Each Other (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1998), ch. 1. T, Cuneo, 'Recent Faces of Moral Nonnaturalism', Philosophy Compass 2/6 (2007): 850–79 [DOI: [DOI link]]. (shrink)

This book raises questions about the nature of philosophy by examining the source and significance of one central philosophical problem: how can we know anything about the world around us? Stroud discusses and criticizes the views of such philosophers as Descartes, Kant, J.L. Austin, G.E. Moore, R. Carnap, W.V. Quine, and others.

Benjamin Libet, Do we have free will? -- Adina L. Roskies, Why Libet's studies don't pose a threat to free will? -- Alfred r. mele, libet on free will : readiness potentials, decisions, and awareness? -- Susan Pockett and Suzanne Purdy, Are voluntary movements initiated preconsciously? : the relationships between readiness potentials, urges, and decisions? -- William P. Banks and Eve A. Isham, Do we really know what we are doing? : implications of reported time of decision for theories of (...) volition? -- Elisabeth Pacherie and Patrick Haggard, What are intentions? -- Mark Hallett, Volition : how physiology speaks to the issue of responsibility? -- John-Dylan Haynes, Beyond Libet : long-term prediction of free choices from neuroimaging signals? -- F. Carota, M. Desmurget, and A. Sirigu, Forward modeling mediates motor awareness? -- Tashina Graves, Brian Maniscalco, and Hakwan Lau, Volition and the function of consciousness? -- Deborah Talmi and Chris D. Frith, Neuroscience, free will, and responsibility? -- Jeffrey P. Ebert and Daniel M. Wegner, Bending time to one's will? -- Thalia Wheatley and Christine Looser, Prospective codes fulfilled : a potential neural mechanism of the will? -- Terry Horgan, The phenomenology of agency and the libet results? -- Thomas Nadelhoffer, The threat of shrinking agency and free will disillusionism? -- Gideon Yaffe, Libet and the criminal law's voluntary act requirement? -- Larry Alexander, Criminal and moral responsibility and the libet experiments? -- Michael S. Moore, Libet's challenge(s) to responsible agency? -- Walter Sinnott-Armstrong, Lessons from Libet?. (shrink)

The greatest philosopher of the twentieth century may not have been Wittgenstein, or Russell, or Quine (and he certainly wasn’t Heidegger), but he may have been a somewhat obscure and conservative Australian named David Stove (1927-94). If he wasn’t the greatest philosopher of the century, Stove was certainly the funniest and most dazzling defender of common sense to be numbered among the ranks of last century’s thinkers, better even—by far—than G. E. Moore and J. L. Austin. The twentieth century (...) was not a period in which philosophers distinguished themselves as essayists, or even as capable of writing interestingly on any subject outside their speciality (or even within it). Stove, though, was an essayist, polemicist, and wit of the highest order, rather like a super-intelligent H. L. Mencken. A heavyweight admirer was once led to write that “Reading Stove is like watching Fred Astaire dance. You don’t wish you were Fred Astaire, you are just glad to have been around to see him in action.”. (shrink)

Focusing on Truth explores the question of what truth is, balancing historical with issue-orientated discussion. The book offers a comprehensive survey of all the major theories of truth. Lawrence Johnson investigates a number of closely related matters of truth in his inquiry, such as: What sorts of things are true or false? What is attributed to them when they are said to be true or false? What do facts have to do with truth? What can we learn from previous theories? (...) The book opens with an analysis of the coherence theory of truth and then the correspondence theory of truth, as developed by Moore, Russell and Wittgenstein. Through a study of the semantic conceptions of truth, the author reveals that an adequate theory of truth must take account of the pragmatics of person, purpose, and circumstance. A full understanding of facts and truth bearers is considered central to Johnson's criticism of the opposing truth theories of J. L. Austin and P. F. Strawson. Drawing on the merits of these theories and others, while identifying their deficiencies, Johnson presents a new account of truth, based on the correlation of referential foci and the use of linguistic conventions. This account is defended as being adequate to meet the legitimate demands made on a theory of truth. Johnson argues that the account leaves scope for statements of many different sorts to be true in their own widely varying ways, without the existence of a need to posit fundamentally different kinds of truth. (shrink)

TABLE OF CONTENTS Introduction: Art, Metaphysics, & The Paradox of Standards (Christy Mag Uidhir) GENERAL ONTOLOGICAL ISSUES 1. Must Ontological Pragmatism be Self-Defeating? (Guy Rohrbaugh) 2. Indication, Abstraction, & Individuation (Jerrold Levinson) 3. Destroying Artworks (Marcus Rossberg) INFORMATIVE COMPARISONS 4. Artworks & Indefinite Extensibility (Roy T. Cook) 5. Historical Individuals Like Anas platyrhynchos & ‘Classical Gas’ (P.D. Magnus) 6. Repeatable Artworks & Genericity (Shieva Kleinschmidt & Jacob Ross) ARGUMENTS AGAINST & ALTERNATIVES TO 7. Against Repeatable Artworks (Allan Hazlett) 8. How (...) to be a Nominalist & a Fictional Realist (Ross Cameron) 9. Platonism vs. Nominalism in Musical Ontology (Andrew Kania) ABSTRACTA ACROSS THE ARTS 10. Reflections on the Metaphysics of Sculpture (Hud Hudson) 11. Installation Art & Performance: A Shared Ontology (Sherri Irvin) 12. What Type of ‘Type’ is a Film? (David Davies) 13. Musical Works: A Metaphysical Mash-Up (Joseph Moore) . (shrink)

Unconditionals are syntactic conditionals whose affirmation affirms their consequent, unconditionally. Prominent instances were addressed by J.L. Austin ('There are biscuits if you want some') and Nelson Goodman (even-if 'semifactuals'). Their detailed features are explained in a Decision-Theoretic Semantics (DTS) which extends, by certainty and relevance conditions, the "CCCP" conditional probability construal of conditionals due to Ernest Adams and others. The construal of assertions of conditionals as conditional acts, defended by Keith DeRose and Richard Grandy in 1999 against objections arising from (...) Austin's unconditionals, is shown to be incompatible with any known version of CCCP. However, an ad-hoc decision-theoretic construal of their proposal is seen to work for Austin's unconditionals, albeit for these only. The DTS account of unconditionals hinges on stochastic independence or irrelevance conditions. For Austin's variant, it also involves changes in the expectations of non-indicator random variables, i.e. properly valuational relevance relations. The widely assumed speaker's knowledge presumption for assertion in general is reconstrued non-transcendently as a proposal to update to ostensible common certainty. This imperative replaces the factive 'T-axiom', KA-> A, of modal logical explications of knowledge to yield an doxastically imperatival, but evidence-sensitive theory of assertoric truth claims. On such a basis, Max Black's and G.E. Moore's ostensibilist account of assertors representing themselves as knowing is defended against Tim Williamson's 1996 and Igor Douven's 2006 respective deontic proposals for a knowledge or rational credibility requirement. Moreover, ostensibly unconditional, unhedged assertion is reconciled with a reality of dimly perceived potential defeaters on recognizing it to be a tacit semifactual, if need be. (shrink)

Doug Husak suggests that sometimes an actor should be deemed reckless, and not merely negligent, with respect to the risks that she knowingly created but has forgotten at the moment of action. The validity of this conclusion, he points out, depends crucially on what it means to be aware of a risk. Husak’s neutral prompt and counterfactual actual belief criteria are problematic, however. More persuasive is his suggestion that we understand belief, in this moral and criminal law context, as a (...) concept whose meaning is determined by its function as a culpability standard. Husak concludes that inadvertent actors are often less culpable than knowing-but-later-forgetful actors; this is plausible, but there are also numerous counterexamples. Holly Smith focuses on negligence cases in which an agent’s failure to notice a risk stems, not from a prior culpable choice, but from an objectionable attitude or set of attitudes. She is right to emphasize that genuine moral culpability does not depend on conscious choice. However, Smith also asserts that decisions that flow from an actor’s objectionable attitudes are only rarely culpable, because they often do not arise from a reasonably full configuration of the actor’s motives. This last requirement is, I fear, an unrealistic and unnecessarily demanding criterion of culpability. Even when many of the actor’s evaluative attitudes are inactive in Smith’s sense, the actor might deserve blame for not bringing them to bear on his decision. Michael Moore and Heidi Hurd thoroughly explore, and find deficient, H.L.A. Hart’s unexercised capacity theory of negligence. They are correct that that theory requires a further judgment: an actor’s inadvertence is culpable only if he had the capacity to have adverted if X where X is the source of the actor’s moral desert. They overstate, however, in suggesting that the capacity issue falls out of the picture once we identify that underlying desert basis. The authors also worry that if desert is grounded on an underlying vice, we lack a reliable way of ranking the different vices that might explain the actor’s inadvertence; this is not a fatal objection, however, because negligence determinations are quite feasible even in the absence of clear rankings. Moore and Hurd conclude by identifying eight distinct categories in which criminal liability for negligence is justifiable. Negligence is indeed a surprisingly complex and pluralist concept. The three articles in this symposium brightly illuminate some of the most fundamental conceptual and normative issues in the debate over whether it is just to blame and punish the negligently inadvertent. (shrink)

Il rapporto dei filosofi analitici con la metafisica è stato per lungo tempo difficile e conflittuale. In un certo senso, il movimento analitico venne inizialmente caratterizzandosi proprio in contrapposizione alla tradizione filosofica dominante dell’Ottocento, tutta assorta nell’impresa di rispondere a Kant attraverso rielaborazioni più o meno dogmatiche dell’idealismo critico. In una Cambridge in cui Bradley e McTaggart dominavano incontrastati, Moore non esitava ad accusare di miopia le teorie metafisiche «che pretendono di fornire un’agevole strada per superare le difficoltà che (...) ostacolano il cammino dell’indagine accurata»1. Russell scriveva che i grandi problemi della metafisica nascevano per la maggior parte da confusioni e fraintendimenti legati alla «cattiva grammatica»2, ovvero a un uso improprio del linguaggio e alla sua interpretazione affrettata e superficiale. E di lì a poco Carnap sarebbe giunto a dichiarare che «le presunte proposizioni della metafisica si rivelano, all’analisi logica, pseudoproposizioni».3 Più che un vero e proprio rifiuto della metafisica, tuttavia, queste manifestazioni critiche costituivano un attacco a un certo modo di fare metafisica, troppo spesso improntato all’abuso di paroloni («l’ente», «l’assoluto», «l’idea») e costrutti oscuri («il nulla nulleggia») piuttosto che alla chiarezza e al rigore argomentativo. Soprattutto rispetto ad altri campi di indagine filosofica, gli studi di metafisica dell’Ottocento e dei primi anni del Novecento erano molto distanti dagli standard di accuratezza che la svolta analitica andava imponendo ed era naturale che si finisse col mettere sotto accusa l’intera disciplina. Tut-. (shrink)

I give an account of the absurdity of Moorean beliefs of the omissive form(om) p and I don’t believe that p,and the commissive form(com) p and I believe that not-p,from which I extract a definition of Moorean absurdity. I then argue for an account of the absurdity of Moorean assertion. After neutralizing two objections to my whole account, I show that Roy Sorensen’s own account of the absurdity of his ‘iterated cases’(om1) p and I don’t believe that I believe that (...) p,and(com1) p and I believe that I believe that not-p,is unsatisfactory. I explain why it is less absurd to believe or assert (om1) or (com1) than to believe or assert (om) or (com) and show that despite appearances, subsequent iterations of (om1) or (com1) do not decrease the absurdity of believing or asserting them. (shrink)

S. Adams, W. Ambrose, A. Andretta, H. Becker, R. Camerlo, C. Champetier, J.P.R. Christensen, D.E. Cohen, A. Connes. C. Dellacherie, R. Dougherty, R.H. Farrell, F. Feldman, A. Furman, D. Gaboriau, S. Gao, V. Ya. Golodets, P. Hahn, P. de la Harpe, G. Hjorth, S. Jackson, S. Kahane, A.S. Kechris, A. Louveau,, R. Lyons, P.-A. Meyer, C.C. Moore, M.G. Nadkarni, C. Nebbia, A.L.T. Patterson, U. Krengel, A.J. Kuntz, J.-P. Serre, S.D. Sinel'shchikov, T. Slaman, Solecki, R. Spatzier, J. Steel, D. Sullivan, (...) S. Thomas, A. Valette, V.S. Varadarajan, B. Velickovic, B. Weiss, J.D.M. Wright, R.J. Zimmer. (shrink)

Positive thinkers love Watty Piper's The little engine that could. The story features a train laden with toys for deserving children on the other side of the mountain. After the locomotive breaks down, a sequence of snooty locomotives come up the track. Each engine refuses to pull the train up the mountain. They are followed by a weary old locomotive that declines, saying "I cannot. I cannot. I cannot." But then a bright blue engine comes up the track. He manages (...) to chug over the mountain by averring "I think I can. I think I can. I think can.". (shrink)

One tradition of solving the surprise exam paradox, started by Robert Binkley and continued by Doris Olin, Roy Sorensen and Jelle Gerbrandy, construes surpriseepistemically and relies upon the oddity of propositions akin to G. E. Moore’s paradoxical ‘p and I don’t believe that p.’ Here I argue for an analysis that evolves from Olin’s. My analysis is different from hers or indeed any of those in the tradition because it explicitly recognizes that there are two distinct reductios at work (...) in the student’s paradoxical argument against the teacher. The weak reductio is easy to fault. Its invalidity determines the structure of the strong reductio, so-calledbecause it is more difficult to refute, but ultimately unsound because of reasons associated with Moore-paradoxicality. Previous commentators have not always appreciated this difference, with the result that the strong reductio is not addressed, or the response to the weak reductio is superfl uous. This is one reason why other analyses in the tradition are vulnerable to objections to which mine is not. (shrink)

Most attempts at defining or elucidating ’weak’ or ’strong’ supervenience introduce various forms of _physical indiscernibility_. After glancing at some definitions, I argue that they must fail if mental events are supposed to be genuinely causally efficacious and non-epiphenomenal. Then I elucidate Davidson’s account of supervenience (’D-supervenience’), first as an abstract relation between a predicate and a set of predicates (to be illustrated by uncontroversial examples), and then as applied to the mental/physical relation. I argue that Davidson must defend that (...) if two events are physically indiscernible in the light of a complete physical theory of the world then they must be identical in the Leibnizian sense (‘L-identity’): physical indiscernibility collapses into L-identity. It follows that mental differences between two numerically different events logically entail physical differences between them. I conclude by demonstrating how the Davidsonian account of the concept can explain some counterexamples to Moore’s approach to supervenience of moral on natural properties. The central tenet in this paper is that supervenience principles based on duplication create, rather than solve, problems in this problem area. (shrink)

J'examine d'abord trois sortes de fondations métaphysiques de l'éthique : ontologique (Aristote, G. E. Moore), non-cognitiviste (Stevenson, Havre), et rationnelle épistémologique (Kant). Ces théories ne donnent pas des fondations catégoriques et déterminées. Ensuite, je présente une esquisse de ma théorie selon laquelle l'action humaine donne la fondation ontologique et rationnelleépistémologique de l'éthique. First I examine three kinds of metaphysical foundations f or ethics: ontological (Aristotle, G. E. Moore), non-cognitivist (Stevenson, Hare) and rational-epistemological (Kant). These do not provide foundations (...) that are categorical and determinate.Then I briefly sketch my own theory that human action provides the ontological and rational-epistemological foundation of ethics. (shrink)

Abstract The paper, drawing on articles by J. M. E. McTaggart, G. E. Moore, D. Davidson, J. L. Austin, B. Russell, A. J. Ayer and G. E. M. Anscombe, argues that the philosophy of language in the analytic tradition has developed an “inchoative“ view of time , and history is a problem as regards the existence of events in the past and how these events can be known. An alternative view is hinted at through the work of L. Wittgenstein (...) and S. Cavell. (shrink)

One tradition of solving the surprise exam paradox, started by Robert Binkley and continued by Doris Olin, Roy Sorensen and Jelle Gerbrandy, construes surpriseepistemically and relies upon the oddity of propositions akin to G. E. Moore’s paradoxical ‘p and I don’t believe that p.’ Here I argue for an analysis that evolves from Olin’s. My analysis is different from hers or indeed any of those in the tradition because it explicitly recognizes that there are two distinct reductios at work (...) in the student’s paradoxical argument against the teacher. The weak reductio is easy to fault. Its invalidity determines the structure of the strong reductio, so-calledbecause it is more difficult to refute, but ultimately unsound because of reasons associated with Moore-paradoxicality. Previous commentators have not always appreciated this difference, with the result that the strong reductio is not addressed, or the response to the weak reductio is superfl uous. This is one reason why other analyses in the tradition are vulnerable to objections to which mine is not. (shrink)

O'Neill's critique of my account of Kant does point to serious inadequacies in that treatment, but I argue in reply that on some central points she is mistaken and that Kant's moral rigorism and his conception of what it is to be a rational agent are more open to the conventional objections than she allows. What needs to be put in question is the whole nature of rational justification in morality, for justification always in fact requires the context of a (...) tradition. In confronting Gaita's criticisms of my views on the relationship of moral philosophy to morality and of the teleological aspect of the virtues the relevant notion of tradition is further elaborated in a way that provides premises both for a response to Clark's defense of Moore and for an indication of how the social analysis of modernity in After Virtue might be defended. (shrink)

The most comprehensive collection of its kind, Ethics: History, Theory, and Contemporary Issues, Third Edition, is organized into three parts, providing instructors with flexibility in designing and teaching a variety of courses in moral philosophy. The first part, Historical Sources, moves from classical thought (Plato, Aristotle, Epicurus, and Epictetus) through medieval views (Augustine and Aquinas) to modern theories (Hobbes, Butler, Hume, Kant, Bentham, and Mill), culminating with leading nineteenth- and twentieth-century thinkers (Nietzsche, James, Dewey, Camus, and Sartre). The second part, (...) Modern Ethical Theory, includes many of the most important essays of the past century. The discussion of utilitarianism, Kantianism, egoism, and relativism continues in the work of major contemporary philosophers (Foot, Brandt, Williams, Wolf, and Nagel). Landmark selections (Moore, Prichard, Ross, Ayer, Stevenson, Hare, Baier, Anscombe, Gauthier, and Harman) reflect concern with moral language and the justification of morality. The concepts of justice (Rawls) and rights (Feinberg) are explored, as well as recent views on the importance of virtue ethics (Rachels) and an ethic influenced by feminist concerns (Held). In the third part, Contemporary Moral Problems, the readings present the current debates over abortion, euthanasia, famine relief, animal rights, the death penalty, and whether numbers should play a role in making moral decisions. The third edition expands Part II, Modern Ethical Theory, adding essays by Onora O'Neill, Ruth Barcan Marcus, Allan Gibbard, Nicholas L. Sturgeon, and Martha Nussbaum. Part III, Contemporary Moral Problems, features new essays on abortion by Mary Anne Warren, Don Marquis, and Rosalind Hursthouse; an essay on the death penalty by Stephen Nathanson; and a debate between John M. Taurek and Derek Parfit on when and why one should save from harm a greater rather than a lesser number of people. The book concludes with an essay by Judith Jarvis Thomson on the trolley problem. Wherever possible, each reading is printed in its entirety. (shrink)

Frankena, W. K. Morality and moral philosophy.--Soltis, J. F. Men, machines and morality.--Chazan, B. I. The moral situation.--Phenix, P. H. Ethics and the will of God.--Moore, G. E. The indefinability of good.--Morgenbesser, S. Approaches to ethical objectivity.--Sartre, J. P. Existentialism and ethics.--Hare, R. M. Decisions of principle.--Singer, M. G. Moral rules and principles.--Hare, R. M. Adolescents into adults.--Wilson, J. Assessing the morally educated person.--Kohlberg, L. The child as a moral philosopher.--Frankena, W. K. Toward a philosophy of moral education.--Archambault, R. (...) D. Criteria for success in moral instruction.--Raths, L., Harmin, M., and Simon, S. Teaching for value clarity.--Bibliography (p. 188-192). (shrink)

Nelson, L. The impossibility of the "Theory of knowledge."--Moore, G. E. Four forms of skepticism.--Lehrer, K. Skepticism & conceptual change.--Quine, W. V. Epistemology naturalized.--Rozeboom, W. W. Why I know so much more than you do.--Price, H. H. Belief and evidence.--Lewis, C. I. The bases of empirical knowledge.--Malcolm, N. The verification argument.--Firth, R. The anatomy of certainty.--Chisholm, R. M. On the nature of empirical evidence.--Meinong, A. Toward an epistemological assessment of memory.--Brandt, R. The epistemological status of memory beliefs.--Malcolm, N. A (...) definition of factual memory.--Martin, C. B. and Deutscher, M. Remembering.--Ayer, A. J. Basic propositions.--Reichenbach, H. Are phenomenal reports absolutely certain?--Goodman, N. Sense and certainty.--Lewis, C. I. The given element in empirical knowledge.--Alston, W. Varieties of privileged access.--Schlick, M. The foundation of knowledge.--Russell, B. Epistemological premisses, basic propositions, and factual premisses.--Firth, R. Coherence, certainty, and epistemic priority.--Sellars, W. Empiricism and the philosophy of mind.--Quinton, A. The foundations of knowledge. (shrink)

Of liberty and necessity, by D. Hume.--The doctrine of necessity examined, by C. S. Peirce.--Determinism in history, by E. Nagel.--Some arguments for free will, by T. Reid.--Has the self free will? by C. A. Campbell.--Dialogue on free will, by L. de Valla.--Can the will be caused? by C. Ginet.--Free will, by G. E. Moore.--A modal muddle, by S. N. Thomas.--Determinism, indeterminism, and libertarianism, by C. D. Broad.--An empirical disproof of determinism? by K. Lehrer.--Free will, praise and blame, by J. (...) J. C. Smart.--Bibliographical essay. (shrink)

Edward Aloysius Pace, philosopher and educator, by J. H. Ryan.-Neo-scholastic philosophy in American Catholic culture, by C. A. Hart.- The significance of Suarez for a revival of scholasticism, by J. F. McCormick.- The new physics and scholasticism, by F. A. Walsh.- The new humanism and standards, by L. R. Ward.- The purpose of the state, by E. F. Murphy.- The concept of beauty in St. Thomas Aquinas, by G. B. Phelan.- The knowableness of God: its relation to the theory of (...) knowledge in St. Thomas, by Matthew Schumacher.- The modern idea of God, by F. J. Sheen.- The analysis of association of its equational constants, by T. V. Moore.- Bibliography (p. 224-225) - Character and body build in children, by Sister M. Rosa McDonough. Bibliography (p. 248-249) - The moral development of children, by Sister Mary.- Medieval education (700-900) by T. J. Shahan.- The need for a Catholic philosophy of education, by George Johnson. (shrink)

This, the twenty-seventh volume in the annual series of publications by the American Society for Political and Legal Philosophy, features a number of distinguised contributors addressing the topic of criminal justice. Part I considers "The Moral and Metaphysical Sources of the Criminal Law," with contributions by Michael S. Moore, Lawrence Rosen, and Martin Shapiro. The four chapters in Part II all relate, more or less directly, to the issue of retribution, with papers by Hugo Adam Bedau, Michael Davis, Jeffrie (...) G. Murphy, and R. B. Brandt. In the following part, Dennis F. Thompson, Christopher D. Stone, and Susan Wolf deal with the special problem of criminal responsibility in government-one of great importance in modern society. The fourth and final part, echoing the topic of NOMOS XXIV, Ethics, Economics, and the Law , addresses the economic theory of crime. The section includes contributions by Alvin K. Klevorick, Richard A. Posner, Jules L. Coleman, and Stephen J. Schulhofer. A valuable bibiography on criminal justice by Andrew C. Blanar concludes this volume of NOMOS. (shrink)

The thesis defended is that ordinary perception does not present us with the existential independence of its objects from itself. The phenomenology of ordinary perception is mute with respect to the subject-object distinction. I call this view "phenomenal neutral monism" : though neutral monists are wrong about the metaphysics of perception (in every perceptual episode, there is a distinction between the perceptual act and its perceptual objet), they are right about its phenomenology. I first argue that this view is not (...) as counter-intuitive as it might initially seem, by stressing (i) that the lack of presentation of the mind-independence of perceptual objects does not entail their being presented as mind-dependent. (ii) That phenomenal neutral monism is true of ordinary perception in the thin sense, but not in the thick sense (that includes expectations, guesses, feelings etc. grounded on thin perception). (iii) That the concept of a perceptual perspective or point of view should not be confused with the concept of the subject or intentional act of perception. Second, I propose three positive arguments in favor of phenomenal neutral monism. (i) It does justice to the recurring idea that only resistance to our will presents us with the world qua independent from us. (ii) It does justice to the recurring idea that the most natural attitude towards the perceptual world is that of being absorbed in it. (iii) It is entailed by the view that intentional acts are phenomenally transparent (a view held by Russell and Moore, and most contemporary representationalists) together with the view that in order to be presented with a relation (here the act-object distinction) one has to be presented with its relata. (shrink)

Drawing inspiration from the ethical pluralism of G. E. Moore's Principia Ethica, I contend that one empty world can be morally better than another. By 'empty' I mean that it is devoid of concrete entities (things that have a position in space or time). These worlds have no thickets or thimbles, no thinkers, no thoughts. Infinitely many of these worlds have laws of nature, abstract entities, and perhaps, space and time. These non-concrete differences are enough to make some of (...) them better than others. (shrink)

In Darwin’s Sacred Cause, Adrian Desmond and James Moore contend that ‘‘Darwin would put his utmost into sexual selection because the subject intrigued him, no doubt, but also for a deeper reason: the theory vindicated his lifelong commitment to human brotherhood’’ (2009: p. 360). Without questioning Des- mond and Moore’s evidence, I will raise some puzzles for their view. I will show that attention to the structure of Darwin’s arguments in the Descent of Man shows that they are (...) far from straightforward. As Desmond and Moore note, Darwin seems to have intended sexual selection in non-human animals to serve as evidence for sexual selection in humans. However, Darwin’s account of sexual selection in humans was different from the canonical cases that Darwin described at great length. If explaining the origin of human races was the main reason for introducing sexual selection, and if sexual selection was a key piece of Darwin’s anti-slavery arguments, then it is puzzling why Darwin would have spent so much time discussing cases that did not really support his argument for the origin of human races, and it is also puzzling that his argument for the origin of human races would be so (atypically) poor. (shrink)

Drawing inspiration from the ethical pluralism of G. E. Moore's Principia Ethica, I contend that one empty world can be morally better than another. By ?empty? I mean that it is devoid of concrete entities (things that have a position in space or time). These worlds have no thickets or thimbles, no thinkers, no thoughts. Infinitely many of these worlds have laws of nature, abstract entities, and perhaps, space and time. These non-concrete differences are enough to make some of (...) them better than others. 1I thank Walter Sinnott-Armstrong, John Carroll, and Gideon Rosen for their comments and suggestions. (shrink)

This essay examines James Davison Hunter's claim that the moral education establishment is responsible for the death of character. I contend that although Hunter's rhetoric about the "death of character" is distracting and his claims against the moral education establishment are overstated, moral educators must grapple with his finding that effective moral education requires a coherent moral culture with a clear conception of public and private good. I attempt to draw out the implications of Hunter's finding by comparing past Soviet (...) and current American forms of moral education. Finally, I conclude that the effectiveness of moral education is threatened not only when character is separated from its nourishing social, historical and cultural moorings, but also when moral autonomy and respect for diversity is undermined. Thus, in the last part of the essay, I discuss three possibilities for how public education can both allow comprehensive approaches to moral education and adhere to liberalism's appreciation for moral autonomy and diversity. (shrink)