Perceptualists say that having a pain in a body part consists in perceiving the part as instantiating some property. I argue that perceptualism makes better sense of the connections between pain location and the experiences undergone by people in pain than three alternative accounts that dispense with perception. Turning to fellow perceptualists, I also reject ways in which David Armstrong and Michael Tye understand and motivate perceptualism, and I propose an alternative interpretation, one that vitiates a (...) pair of objections—due to John Hyman—concerning the meaning of ‘Amy has a pain in her foot’ and the idea of bodily sensitivity. Perceptualism, I conclude, remains our best account of the location of pains. (shrink)

This paper focuses on the possibility of conceiving a form of ontological nihilism, starting from D. M. Armstrong’s combinatorialism. This possibility has been suggested by Efird and Stoneham, by means of proposing an alternative strategy to the ‘subtraction argument’. They claim that it is possible to sustain such nihilism trough the concepts of construction and totality state of affairs. However, this hypothesis will require the acceptance of non-instanciated universals, that is, platonic universals. Yet this is opposite to requirements that are (...) basic for a combinatorial theory, which should uphold that universals exist only in their instantiations. Then, the assumption of platonic universals results in high costs for a combinatorial naturalism, according to which only exists what is located in space and time. (shrink)

This paper focuses on the possibility of conceiving a form of ontological nihilism, starting from D. M. Armstrong’s combinatorialism. This possibility has been suggested by Efird and Stoneham, by means of proposing an alternative strategy to the ‘subtraction argument’. They claim that it is possible to sustain such nihilism trough the concepts of construction and totality state of affairs. However, this hypothesis will require the acceptance of non-instanciated universals, that is, platonic universals. Yet this is opposite to requirements that are (...) basic for a combinatorial theory, which should uphold that universals exist only in their instantiations. Then, the assumption of platonic universals results in high costs for a combinatorial naturalism, according to which only exists what is located in space and time. (shrink)

This paper focuses on the possibility of conceiving a form of ontological nihilism, starting from D. M. Armstrong’s combinatorialism. This possibility has been suggested by Efird and Stoneham, by means of proposing an alternative strategy to the ‘subtraction argument’. They claim that it is possible to sustain such nihilism trough the concepts of construction and totality state of affairs. However, this hypothesis will require the acceptance of non-instanciated universals, that is, platonic universals. Yet this is opposite to requirements that are (...) basic for a combinatorial theory, which should uphold that universals exist only in their instantiations. Then, the assumption of platonic universals results in high costs for a combinatorial naturalism, according to which only exists what is located in space and time. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Protecting Human Research SubjectsThe Office for Protection from Research RisksJoan Paine Porter (bio)The office for Protection from Research Risks (OPRR), located within the National Institutes of Health, has two divisions: Human Subject Protections and Animal Welfare. This article will address the overall responsibilities and current projects relating to human subject protections.OPRR implements the Department of Health and Human Services' (HHS) regulations for the protection of human subjects (45 CFR (...) 46 (1991)). These regulations fulfill the responsibilities set forth in the Public Health Service (PHS) Act with regard to institutional review boards (IRB) and other protections for human subjects involved in biomedical and behavioral research conducted or supported by HHS. The PHS Act also mandates a program to clarify ethical issues in biomedical research involving human subjects and to address violations of the rights of human subjects of research (P.L. 99-158 (1985)).OPRR staff negotiate assurances of compliance with institutions conducting Federally-supported research involving human subjects. The assurances describe the policies and procedures each institution will follow to fulfill the requirements of the regulations, including specific IRB composition and functions.In addition, OPRR cosponsors with the Food and Drug Administration and awardee institutions a series of regional workshops that address human subject protections issues. These are attended by IRB members, institutional officials, research investigators, and others involved with human subject protections.Current ActivitiesNumerous activities are underway in OPRR. The following describes only a few of the initiatives and studies aimed at helping develop policies and procedures to protect human subjects of research."Points to Consider" DocumentsOPRR is currently working with the National Center for Human Genome Research (NCHGR) to develop a "points to consider" document for IRBs and others involved in large genetic pedigree studies. Many questions have emerged [End Page 279] on topics such as how subjects should be recruited, with whom information should be shared about others in the family, social risks of disclosure in employment and insurance, the circumstances and timing of informing subjects about study results, and involvement of children. OPRR and NCHGR hope to assemble a group this fall to review and refine the points that are now being developed jointly. A conference in South Carolina organized by the American Association for Advancement in the Sciences entitled "Project on the Ethical and Legal Implications of Genetic Testing," helped generate advice, and identified some of the more controversial issues in design and conduct of genetic research that involves large groups of family members.Another "points to consider" effort concerns enrollment of women and minorities in research. The PHS has established a policy that members of these groups must be included in research projects unless there are valid scientific justifications for their exclusion which can be made on a project by project basis (ADAMHA/NIH Policy 1990; NIH/ADAMHA Policy 1990). OPRR has commissioned several scholarly papers to help in developing "points to consider" for IRBs as they balance issues of equitable selection of subjects and protection of these selected individuals. Concerns about enrolling women of childbearing age in research that may be harmful to a fetus, and liability issues frequently dominate discussion in this area. The papers will address ethical, legal, and statistical aspects of enrollment of minorities and women as well as provide a description of various practices and roles of IRBs in addressing goals of fair selection of participants and appropriate protections.OPRR is also working with the PHS Panel on Women, Adolescents and Children to produce a document, also in the form of "points to consider" guidance, concerning enrollment of children who are wards of the state in HIV-related research. Subpart D of the regulations for the protection of human subjects (45 CFR 46) specifically addresses research involving children who are wards of the state, including the special protections that must be provided. State and local officials who have authority to enroll foster care children in research have indicated a desire to obtain advice in this area.The IRB GuidebookA major project that is now being completed under contract to the Poynter Center at Indiana University is the IRB Guidebook. It will revise and expand the current IRB Guidebook produced in the 1980s... (shrink)

The formative period of Latin and Hebrew astrology occurred virtually simultaneously in both cultures. In the second quarter of the twelfth century the terminology of the subject was established and the textbooks which became authoritative were written. The responsibility for this lay almost entirely with two scholars: John of Seville for the Latins, and Abraham ibn Ezra for the Jews. It is unlikely to have been by coincidence that the same developments in astrology occurred in these two cultures. John of (...) Seville and Abraham ibn Ezra were both brought up within the Islamic culture of Spain, and their astrology was Arabic astrology. Moreover, some scholars have thought that John’s origins were Jewish, while Ibn Ezra is known to have collaborated with Latin scholars . It cannot be a coincidence that they forged the science of astrology for their respect co-religionists at almost the same time. Yet, very little research has been done on the possible relations between the two scholars. The purpose of this paper is to begin to explore this relationship, and to illustrate it in particular by their shared doctrine concern the location of pain. (shrink)

This paper examines the question of whether a fetus can feel pain. The question is divided into four sub questions: What is pain? What is the neurology of pain processing? What is the fetus? Are there good reasons for holding that fetuses feel pain? Pain is suggested to be a multi‐dimensional phenomenon drawing on emotional and sensory processes – a consequence of a gradual development involving a number of noxious events rather than an automatic consequence (...) of injury or disease. The non‐automaticity of pain is emphasised in the discussion of pain neurology that defies explanations based on a specialised neuronal ‘pain‐centre’. The development of the fetus is considered with respect to developmental neurobiology, behavioural and neurological responses to stimulation, and hormonal and neurochemical responses to noxious stimulation. While acknowledging that the development of the fetus is complex, especially after 26 weeks gestation, considerable development is still to occur, even after birth. The fetal pain literature is criticised for tending to exaggerate fetal development. Finally, the difficulty of explaining the subjectivity of pain in materialist terms is discussed. Pain is suggested to arise with development of the necessary neurological, cognitive and emotional structures. Pain experience is placed at approximately 12 months of age, though this is within the context of a continuum of awareness rather than a straight ‘on‐off’ switch. The major moral implication of this stance is to place the burden of proof for analgesic use onto clinical measures, rather than relying upon the, so far, poorly supported assumption of pain awareness. (shrink)

Philosophers often assume that folk hold pain to be a mental state – to be in pain is to have a certain kind of feeling – and they think this state exhibits the classic Cartesian characteristics of privacy, subjectivity, and incorrigibility. However folk also assign pains (non-brain-based) bodily locations: unlike most other mental states, pains are held to exist in arms, feet, etc. This has led some (e.g. Hill 2005) to talk of the ‘paradox of pain’, whereby (...) the folk notion of pain is inherently conflicted. Recently, several authors have rejected the paradox view, arguing instead that folk hold a univocal, bodily view (i.e. pains are properties of various body parts, not of minds). This paper presents six objections to the bodily view of the folk concept of pain. We then outline a direction for future research – the ‘polyeidic approach’ – whereby the folk notion of pain is held to encompass various divergent (potentially conflicting) strands and we suggest that certain problems surrounding the treatment and communication of pain might be usefully be viewed through the lens of the polyeidic approach. (shrink)

The standard view of pains among philosophers today holds that their existence consists in being experienced, such that there can be no unfelt pains or pain hallucinations. The typical line of support offered for this view is that it corresponds with the ordinary or commonsense conception of pain. Despite this, a growing body of evidence from experimental philosophers indicates that the ordinary understanding of pain stands in contrast to the standard view among philosophers. In this paper, we (...) will survey this literature and add to it, detailing the results of seven new studies on the ordinary understanding of pain using both corpus analysis and questionnaire methods. (shrink)

I distinguish between two claims of transparency of experiences. One claim is weaker and supported by phenomenological evidence. This I call the transparency datum. Introspection of standard perceptual experiences as well as bodily sensations is consistent with, indeed supported by, the transparency datum. I formulate a stronger transparency thesis that is entailed by representationalism about experiential phenomenology. I point out some empirical consequences of strong transparency in the context of representationalism. I argue that pain experiences, as well as some (...) other similar experiences like itches, tickles, orgasms, hedonic valence, etc., are not transparent in this strong sense. Hence they constitute empirical counterexamples to representationalism. Given that representationalism is a general metaphysical doctrine about all experiential phenomenology for good reasons, I conclude that representationalism about phenomenal consciousness is false. Then, I outline a general framework about how the introspection of phenomenal qualities in perceptual experience works in light of the transparency datum, but consistent with the rejection of strong transparency. The result is a form of qualia realism that is naturalist and intentionalist, and has close affinities to the adverbialist views developed in the latter part of the last century. I then apply this framework to pain experiences and their bodily locations. (shrink)

Evaluativism is best thought of as a way of enriching a perceptual view of pain to account for pain’s unpleasantness or painfulness. Once it was common for philosophers to contrast pains with perceptual experiences (McGinn 1982; Rorty 1980). It was thought that perceptual experiences were intentional (or content-bearing, or about something), whereas pains were representationally blank. But today many of us reject this contrast. For us, your having a pain in your toe is a matter not of (...) your sensing “pain-ly” or encountering a sense-datum, but of your having an interoceptive experience representing (accurately or inaccurately) that your toe is in a particular experience-independent condition, such as undergoing a certain “disturbance” or being damaged or in danger (Armstrong 1962; Tye 1995). But even if such representational content makes an experience a pain, a further ingredient seems required to make the pain unpleasant. According to evaluativism, the further ingredient is the experience’s possession of evaluative content: its representing the bodily condition as bad for the subject. In this chapter, I elaborate evaluativism, locate it among alternatives, and explain its attractions and challenges. (shrink)

According to a bodily view of pain, pains are objects which are located in body parts. This bodily view is supported by the locative locutions for pain in English, such as that “I have a pain in my back.” Recently, Liu and Klein (Analysis, 80(2), 262–272, 2020) carry out a cross-linguistic analysis, and they claim that (1) Mandarin has no locative locutions for pain and (2) the absence of locative locutions for pain puts the bodily (...) view at risk. This paper rejects both claims. Regarding the philosophical claim, I argue that a language without locative locutions for pain only poses a limited challenge to the bodily view. Regarding the empirical claim, I identify the possible factors which might have misled Liu and Klein about the locative locutions for pain in Mandarin, and argue that Mandarin has a wide range of locative locutions for pain by conducting a corpus analysis. I conclude that compared to English, Mandarin lends no less, if not more, support to the bodily view of pain. (shrink)

Bodily pain strikes many philosophers as deeply paradoxical. The issue is that pains seem to bear both physical characteristics, such as a location in the body, and mental characteristics, such being mind-dependent. In this paper I clarify and address this alleged paradox of pain. I begin by showing how a further assumption, Objectivism, the thesis that what one feels in one’s body when one is in pain is something mind-independent, is necessary for the generation of the (...) paradox. Consequently, the paradox can be avoided if one rejects this idea. However, doing so raises its own difficulties, for it is not obvious how anything can possess all of the features we typically associate with bodily pain. To address this puzzle and finally put the paradox of pain to rest, I develop the Embodied View, a novel metaphysical account on which pains are constitutively mind-dependent features of parts of a subject’s body. (shrink)

Philosophical considerations regarding experiential spatial content have focused on exteroceptive sensations presenting external entities, and not on interoceptive experiences that present states of our own body. A notable example is studies on interoceptive touch, in which it is argued that interoceptive tactile experiences have rich spatial content such that tactile sensations are experienced as located in a spatial field. This paper investigates whether a similarly rich spatial content can be attributed to experiences of acute, cutaneous pain. It is argued (...) that such experiences of pain do not have field-like content, as they do not present distance relations between painful sensations. (shrink)

Michael Tye and I are both Representationalists. Nevertheless, we have managed to disagree about the semantic character of ‘in’ in ‘There is a pain in my fingertip’ (see Noordhof (2001); Tye (2002); Noordhof (2002)). The first section of my commentary will focus on this disagreement. I will then turn to the location of pain. Here, perhaps somewhat surprisingly, there seems to be much more agreement between Tye and me. I restrict myself to three points. First, I argue (...) that Tye has not succeeded in providing a decisive consideration against a related theory which takes pains as representationally unmediated objects of pain experiences. Second, I defend Tye against an objection from Murat Aydede. Third, following on from this, I question whether Tye’s characterisation of the content of pain experience is correct. The fact that there is so much to discuss is a testament to richness, interest and exemplary clarity of Tye’s work. (shrink)

Pain is far more than an aversive sensation. Chronic pain, in particular, involves the sufferer in a complex experience filled with ambiguity and paradox. The tensions thereby established, the unknowns, pressures, and oscillations, form a significant part of the painfulness of pain. This paper uses a phenomenological method to examine nine such paradoxes. For example, pain can be both immediate sensation and mediated by complex interpretations. It is a certainty for the experiencer, yet highly uncertain in (...) character. It pulls one to the present but also projects one outward to a feared or desired future. Chronic pain can seem located in the body and/or mind; interior to the self, or an alien other; confined to a particular point and/or radiating everywhere. Such fundamental paradoxes, existential and epistemological, can challenge those living with long-term pain. (shrink)

This chapter defends an axiological theory of pain according to which pains are bodily episodes that are bad in some way. Section 1 introduces two standard assumptions about pain that the axiological theory constitutively rejects: (i) that pains are essentially tied to consciousness and (ii) that pains are not essentially tied to badness. Section 2 presents the axiological theory by contrast to these and provides a preliminary defense of it. Section 3 introduces the paradox of pain and (...) argues that since the axiological theory takes the location of pain at face value, it needs to grapple with the privacy, self-intimacy and incorrigibility of pain. Sections 4, 5 and 6 explain how the axiological theory may deal with each of these. (shrink)

One use of the noun ‘pain’ is exemplified in sentences like ‘There is a pain in my foot’. According to the Experiential Theory, ‘pain’ in this context refers to an experience located in the mind or brain. According to the Bodily Theory, it refers to an extra-cranial bodily occurrence located in a body part. In this paper, I defend the Bodily Theory. Specifically, I argue that pains are proximal activations of nociceptors that cause experiences of pain. (...) This view is preferable to the Experiential Theory, because it accords better with common sense and offers a better interpretation or semantics of ordinary pain reports. (shrink)

Philosophical orthodoxy holds that pains are mental states, taking this to reflect the ordinary conception of pain. Despite this, evidence is mounting that English speakers do not tend to conceptualize pains in this way; rather, they tend to treat pains as being bodily states. We hypothesize that this is driven by two primary factors—the phenomenology of feeling pains and the surface grammar of pain reports. There is reason to expect that neither of these factors is culturally specific, however, (...) and thus reason to expect that the empirical findings for English speakers will generalize to other cultures and other languages. In this article we begin to test this hypothesis, reporting the results of two cross-cultural studies comparing judgments about the location of referred pains between two groups—Americans and South Koreans—that we might otherwise expect to differ in how they understand pains. In line with our predictions, we find that both groups tend to conceive of pains as bodily states. (shrink)

Two views on the nature and location of pain are usually contrasted. According to the first, experientialism, pain is essentially an experience, and its bodily location is illusory. According to the second, perceptualism or representationalism, pain is a perceptual or representational state, and its location is to be traced to the part of the body in which pain is felt. Against this second view, the cases of phantom, referred and chronic pain have (...) been marshalled: all these cases apparently show that one can be in pain while not having anything wrong in her body. Pain bodily location, then, would be illusory. I this paper I shall defend the representational thesis by presenting an argument against experientialism while conceding that the appearance / reality distinction collapses. A crucial role in such identification is played by deictics. In reporting that we feel pain here, the deictic directly refers to the bodily part as coinciding with the part as represented. So, pain location is not illusory. The upshot is that the body location is part and parcel of the representational content of pain states, a representation built up from the body map. (shrink)

In his ‘pains and Places’ (Philosophy 78, 2003), John Hyman is right that pains are not located in their causes or effects but in the hurting limbs. However, his position may be consonant with Wittgensteinian expressivism or the view that consciousness is the locus of pain: In producing its own parts, a living organism ‘autopoietically’ sustains itself as an activity functionally present in its limbs. It thus supplies the biological basis for pain consciousness as something wholly present in (...) organs that hurt. (Published Online October 13 2005). (shrink)

Selections from Paine's Common sense, Dissertation of the first principles of government, and Dissertations on government, the affairs of the bank, and paper money, along with several American federal documents and state constitutions, all in Spanish.

People seem to perceive and locate pains in bodily locations, but also seem to conceive of pains as mental states that can be introspected. However, pains cannot be both bodily and mental, at least according to most conceptions of these two categories: mental states are not the kind of entities that inhabit body parts. How are we to resolve this paradox of pain? In this paper, I put forward what I call the ‘Developmental Challenge’, tackling the second pillar of (...) this paradox, i.e. the introspectionist view of pain according to which genuine pain reports are introspective reports. This view forms an inconsistent triad with two other widely held positions: young children make genuine pain reports, and young children do not make introspective reports. After introducing the paradox and the introspectionist view of pain in part 1, I present the developmental challenge, and defend both and. I conclude that the inconsistent triad can only be resolved by reconsidering the introspectionist view of pain. In discussing three potential factors that lead to the puzzling intricacies of our concept of pain, I argue that the concept of pain might not be paradoxical after all. (shrink)

v. 1. Life of Thomas Paine, by W.M. Van der Weyde.--v. 2. Early essays. Common sense. The American crisis, I-IV.--v. 3. The American crisis, V-XIII. Patriotic papers.--v. 4. Political pamphlets.--v. 5. Open letters. Dissertations.--v. 6. Rights of man.--v. 7. Rights of man, concluded. Miscellaneous essays.--v. 8. The age of reason.--v. 9. Theological discussions.--v. 10. Miscellany. Songs and rhymes. Index.

This is a new release of the original 1942 edition.

Introduction.--From Common sense.--From The American crisis.--From Rights of man.--From Dissertation on first principles of government.--From The age of reason.--From Letter to George Washington.

Thomas Paine is one of history's most renowned thinkers and was indispensible to both the American and French revolutions. The three works included, Common Sense, The Rights of Man, and The Age of Reason, are among his most famous publications. Paine is probably best known for his hugely popular pamphlet, Common Sense, which swayed public opinion in favor of American independence from England. The Rights of Man and The Age of Reason further advocated for universal human rights, a republican instead (...) of monarchical government, and truth and reason in politics. The works of this moral visionary, whose ideas are as relevant today as ever, are now available as part of the Word Cloud Classics series, providing a stylish and affordable addition to any library. (shrink)

We can call Thomas Paine-eminent Founder, verbal bomb-thrower, Deist, revolutionary, and rationalist-the spark of the American Revolution. In his influential pamphlets, Paine codified both colonial outrage and the intellectual justification for independence, arguing consistently and convincingly for Enlightenment values and the power of the people. He was a master of political rhetoric, from the sarcastic insult to the diplomatic aperçu. Today, we are living in times that, as Paine said, try men's souls. Whatever your politics, if you're seeking a new (...) Paine-with rhetoric to ignite social and political transformations-where better to start than at the source? This is a work that provides quotes from Thomas Paine's writings. (shrink)

What is a crip politics of bodymind? Drawing upon Rosemarie Garland-Thomson's theory of the misfit, I explain my understanding of crip and bodymind within a feminist materialist framework, and argue that careful investigation of a crip politics of bodymind must involve accounting for two key, but under-explored, disability studies concepts: desire and pain. I trace the turn toward desire that has characterized DS theory for the last decade, and argue that while acknowledging disability desire, we must also attend to (...) the aspects of disability, including pain, that are sometimes bad. Although I don't argue that pain is always and only bad, I call for recognition of the ways pain complicates disability desire, as well as the possibilities it opens for specifically located, collective forms of care. (shrink)

Written in the years from 1792 to 1795 while Thomas Paine was in prison, The Age of Reason shocked 18th-century readers with its attack on the conventions of Christianity. Based on years of study and reflection by the author, the work is written from the deist point of view and questions Christian beliefs and the role of religion in society. Its resonance remains undiminished after two centuries, and it continues to influence thinkers around the world.

Explore Thomas Paine's political and philosophical ideology in this collection of his most famous works.

Explore Thomas Paine's political and philosophical ideology in this collection of his most famous works.

I. Rights of man; being the first volume of an entirely new and unabridged issue. Ed. by Hypatia Bradlaugh Bonner, with a biographical and critical introduction by John M. Robertson. -- II. The age of reason; being the second volume of an entirely new and unabridged issue of the chief works of Thomas paine. Ed., with historical introduction, by Hypatia Bradlaugh Bonner.

Thomas Paine was a hugely influential revolutionary pamphleteer, whose writings were instrumental in bringing about some of the greatest political changes the world has seen. Paine's enduring importance lies not so much in the depth of his political philosophy as in his great abilities as a communicator of political ideas. Conway's Writings was the first complete critical collection of Paine's works, and his Life was the first account to show Paine in a positive light.

Dr. Benjamin Rush, who was much impressed by the essay, says, " He [Paine] told me the essay to which I alluded was the first thing he had ever published in ...

Thomas Paine published this treatise defending the principles of freedom in 1791. He fought for independence in America, and was in France during the Revolution. He writes as a first-hand observer of political realities. He saw all government as arbitrary unless it conformed to the will of the people and argued for reforms in the British Parliament.

This paper examines the inferential framework employed by Palaeolithic cognitive archaeologists, using the work of Wynn and Coolidge as a case study. I begin by distinguishing minimal-capacity inferences from cognitive-transition inferences. Minimal-capacity inferences attempt to infer the cognitive prerequisites required for the production of a technology. Cognitive-transition inferences use transitions in technological complexity to infer transitions in cognitive evolution. I argue that cognitive archaeology has typically used cognitive-transition inferences informed by minimal-capacity inferences, and that this reflects a tendency to favour (...) cognitive explanations for transitions in technological complexity. Next I look at two alternative explanations for transitions in technological complexity: the demographic hypothesis and the environmental hypothesis. This presents us with a dilemma: either reject these alternative explanations or reject traditional cognitive-transition inferences. Rejecting the former is unappealing as there is strong evidence that demographic and environmental influences play some causal role in technological transitions. Rejecting the latter is unappealing as it means abandoning the idea that technological transitions tell us anything about transitions in hominin cognitive evolution. I finish by briefly outlining some conceptual tools from the philosophical literature that might help shed some light on the problem. (shrink)

Common sense -- African slavery in America -- An occasional letter on the female sex -- Agrarian justice -- The rights of man -- The age of reason.