Interpreting Bernard Williams’s ethical philosophy is not easy. His style is deceptively conversational; apparently direct, yet argumentatively inexplicit and allusive. He is moreover committed to evading ready-made philosophical “-isms.” All this reinforces the already distinct impression that the structure of his philosophy is a web of interrelated commitments where none has unique priority. Against this impression, however, I will venture that the contours of his philosophy become clearest if one considers that there is a single, unchanging root conviction from (...) which his ethical philosophy grows. Despite the perpetual motion of his philosophical thought—its erudition, originality, range, and unceasing forward momentum—still, I contend, there is something unchanging at the heart of it. I will show this by reference to three signature theses: internal reasons, the relativism of distance, and the porous borders of philosophy and history. I will argue that the root conviction of which these are the fruits is the conviction that the constraints of universal rationality seriously underdetermine how one should live. This, I believe, is the vision of the human ethical condition that constitutes the largely inexplicit yet utterly fundamental presupposition beneath Williams’s ethical philosophy taken as a whole. I label the object of this root conviction ethical freedom, and thus portray Williams as a philosopher of ethical freedom. (shrink)

Bernard Williams is a sceptic about the objectivity of moral value, embracing instead a qualified moral relativism—the ‘relativism of distance’. His attitude to blame too is in part sceptical. I will argue that the relativism of distance is unconvincing, even incoherent; but also that it is detachable from the rest of Williams's moral philosophy. I will then go on to propose an entirely localized thesis I call the relativism of blame, which says that when an agent's moral shortcomings by (...) our lights are a matter of their living according to the moral thinking of their day, judgements of blame are out of order. Finally, I will propose a form of moral judgement we may sometimes quite properly direct towards historically distant agents when blame is inappropriate—moral-epistemic disappointment. Together these two proposals may help release us from the grip of the idea that moral appraisal always involves the potential applicability of blame, and so from a key source of the relativist idea that moral appraisal is inappropriate over distance. (shrink)

Bernard Williams’ philosophy is shaped by a distinctive and abiding interest in the borderlands between Philosophy and History. He famously considers moral philosophy, and particularly moral theory, to over‐step the border that marks the real ‘limits’ of the discipline, and in his later work he explicitly advances the idea of doing ‘impure’ philosophy, by which he meant philosophy that mixed itself with history. By examining the complex impression left on Williams’ historical self‐consciousness by his engagements with two very different (...) figures in the history of philosophy, namely Descartes and Wittgenstein, I will explore a number of ways in which philosophy and history are closely intertwined for Williams. This will draw out the positive vision he modelled for us of ‘impure’ philosophy—a philosophical style he took to contribute to nurturing philosophy as a humanistic discipline. (shrink)

For Bernard Williams, philosophy and history are importantly connected. His work exploits this connection in a number of directions: he believes that philosophy cannot ignore its own history the way science can; that even when engaging with philosophy’s history primarily to produce history, one needs to draw on philosophy; and that when doing the history of philosophy primarily to produce philosophy, one still needs a sense of how historically distant past philosophers are, because the point of reading them is (...) to confront something different from the present. But Williams also holds that systematic philosophy itself needs to be done historically, engaging not just with its own history, but with that of the concepts it seeks to understand. To explore these different ways in which philosophy and history intertwine, this volume assembles specially commissioned contributions by A. W. Moore, Terence Irwin, Sophie-Grace Chappell, Catherine Rowett, Marcel van Ackeren, John Cottingham, Gerald Lang, Lorenzo Greco, Paul Russell, Carla Bagnoli, Peter Kail, David Owen, Giuseppina D’Oro, James Connelly, Matthieu Queloz, Nikhil Krishnan, John Marenbon, Ralph Wedgwood, Garrett Cullity, Hans-Johann Glock, Geraldine Ng, Ilaria Cozzaglio, Amanda R. Greene, and Miranda Fricker. They critically appraise Williams’s work in and on the history of philosophy as well as his historicist turn and his use of genealogy. The resulting collection uniquely combines substantive discussions of historical figures from Homer to Wittgenstein with methodological discussions of how and why the history of philosophy should be done, and how and why philosophy should draw on history. (shrink)

Why would philosophers interested in the points or functions of our conceptual practices bother with genealogical explanations if they can focus directly on paradigmatic examples of the practices we now have?? To answer this question, I compare the method of pragmatic genealogy advocated by Edward Craig, Bernard Williams, and Miranda Fricker—a method whose singular combination of fictionalising and historicising has met with suspicion—with the simpler method of paradigm-based explanation. Fricker herself has recently moved towards paradigm-based explanation, arguing that it (...) is a more perspicuous way of reaping the same explanatory pay-off as pragmatic genealogy while dispensing with its fictionalising and historicising. My aim is to determine when and why the reverse movement from paradigm-based explanation to pragmatic genealogy remains warranted. I argue that the fictionalising and historicising of pragmatic genealogy is well motivated, and I outline three ways in which the method earns its keep: by successfully handling historically inflected practices which paradigm-based explanation cannot handle; by revealing and arguing for connections to generic needs we might otherwise miss; and by providing comprehensive views of practices that place and relate the respects in which they serve both generic and local needs. (shrink)

Why did such highly abstract ideas as truth, knowledge, or justice become so important to us? What was the point of coming to think in these terms? This book presents a philosophical method designed to answer such questions: the method of pragmatic genealogy. Pragmatic genealogies are partly fictional, partly historical narratives exploring what might have driven us to develop certain ideas in order to discover what these do for us. The book uncovers an under-appreciated tradition of pragmatic genealogy which cuts (...) across the analytic-continental divide, running from the state-of-nature stories of David Hume and the early genealogies of Friedrich Nietzsche to recent work in analytic philosophy by Edward Craig, Bernard Williams, and Miranda Fricker. However, these genealogies combine fictionalizing and historicizing in ways that even philosophers sympathetic to the use of state-of-nature fictions or real history have found puzzling. To make sense of why both fictionalizing and historicizing are called for, the book offers a systematic account of pragmatic genealogies as dynamic models serving to reverse-engineer the points of ideas in relation not only to near-universal human needs, but also to socio-historically situated needs. This allows the method to offer us explanation without reduction and to help us understand what led our ideas to shed the traces of their practical origins. Far from being normatively inert, moreover, pragmatic genealogy can affect the space of reasons, guiding attempts to improve our conceptual repertoire by helping us determine whether and when our ideas are worth having. (shrink)

For over thirty years, Robert Audi has produced important work in ethics, epistemology, and the theory of action. This volume features thirteen new critical essays on Audi by a distinguished group of authors: Fred Adams, William Alston, Laurence BonJour, Roger Crisp, Elizabeth Fricker, Bernard Gert, Thomas Hurka, Hugh McCann, Al Mele, Walter Sinnott-Armstrong, Raimo Tuomela, Candace Vogler, and Timothy Williamson. Audi's introductory essay provides a thematic overview interconnecting his views in ethics, epistemology, and philosophy of action. The volume concludes (...) with his comprehensive response essay that yields an illuminating dialog with all his critics and often extends his previous work. (shrink)

Can genealogical explanations affect the space of reasons? Those who think so commonly face two objections. The first objection maintains that attempts to derive reasons from claims about the genesis of something commit the genetic fallacy—they conflate genesis and justification. One way for genealogies to side-step this objection is to focus on the functional origins of practices—to show that, given certain facts about us and our environment, certain conceptual practices are rational because apt responses. But this invites a second objection, (...) which maintains that attempts to derive current from original function suffer from continuity failure—the conditions in response to which something originated no longer obtain. This paper shows how normatively ambitious genealogies can steer clear of both problems. It first maps out various ways in which genealogies can involve non-fallacious genetic arguments before arguing that some genealogies do not invite the charge of the genetic fallacy if they are interpreted as revealing the original functions of conceptual practices. However, they then incur the burden of showing that the conditions relative to which practices function continuously obtain. Taking its cue from the genealogies of E. J. Craig, Bernard Williams, and Miranda Fricker, the paper shows how model-based genealogies can avoid continuity failures by identifying bases of continuity in the demands we face. (shrink)

Drawing on Bernard Williams's Truth and Truthfulness and Miranda Fricker's Epistemic Justice, this article presents an epistemic argument for democracy on the basis of its ability to incentivize more people to display the virtues of truth required for the social production and aggregation of knowledge. In particular, the article compares democracy respectively with autocracy and epistocracy, showing that it is likely to be, within the context of a modern pluralistic society, an epistemically superior regime in the sense that it (...) creates more favourable conditions for the pooling of epistemic resources. The article concludes with a multi-dimensional framework of democratic legitimacy, where democracy's epistemic value is directly tied with both the safeguard against elite domination and the development of citizens' ethical and intellectual capabilities. In this regard, the article also helps to bridge the gap between epistemic and non-epistemic approaches in democratic theory and unite what might be called the wisdom, power, and virtue of the multitude. (shrink)

Drawing on Bernard Williams's Truth and Truthfulness and Miranda Fricker's Epistemic Justice, this article presents an epistemic argument for democracy on the basis of its ability to incentivize more people to display the virtues of truth required for the social production and aggregation of knowledge. In particular, the article compares democracy respectively with autocracy and epistocracy, showing that it is likely to be, within the context of a modern pluralistic society, an epistemically superior regime in the sense that it (...) creates more favourable conditions for the pooling of epistemic resources. The article concludes with a multi-dimensional framework of democratic legitimacy, where democracy's epistemic value is directly tied with both the safeguard against elite domination and the development of citizens' ethical and intellectual capabilities. In this regard, the article also helps to bridge the gap between epistemic and non-epistemic approaches in democratic theory and unite what might be called the wisdom, power, and virtue of the multitude. (shrink)

Drawing on Bernard Williams's Truth and Truthfulness and Miranda Fricker's Epistemic Justice, this article presents an epistemic argument for democracy on the basis of its ability to incentivize more people to display the virtues of truth required for the social production and aggregation of knowledge. In particular, the article compares democracy respectively with autocracy and epistocracy, showing that it is likely to be, within the context of a modern pluralistic society, an epistemically superior regime in the sense that it (...) creates more favourable conditions for the pooling of epistemic resources. The article concludes with a multi-dimensional framework of democratic legitimacy, where democracy's epistemic value is directly tied with both the safeguard against elite domination and the development of citizens' ethical and intellectual capabilities. In this regard, the article also helps to bridge the gap between epistemic and non-epistemic approaches in democratic theory and unite what might be called the wisdom, power, and virtue of the multitude. (shrink)

Starting from the ‘Dewey Lectures’, Rawls presents his conception of justice within a contextualist framework, as an elaboration of the basic ideas embedded in the political culture of liberal-democratic societies. But how are these basic ideas to be justified? In this article, I reconstruct and criticize Rawls’s strategy to answer this question. I explore an alternative strategy, consisting of a genealogical argument of a pragmatic kind – the kind of argument provided by authors like Bernard Williams, Edward Craig and (...) Miranda Fricker. I outline this genealogical argument drawing on Rawls’s reconstruction of the origins of liberalism. Then, I clarify the conditions under which this kind of argument maintains vindicatory power. I claim that the argument satisfies these conditions and that pragmatic genealogy can thus partially vindicate the basic ideas of liberal-democratic societies. (shrink)

There is an under-appreciated tradition of genealogical explanation that is centrally concerned with social functions. I shall refer to it as the tradition of pragmatic genealogy. It runs from David Hume (T, 3.2.2) and the early Friedrich Nietzsche (TL) through E. J. Craig (1990, 1993) to Bernard Williams (2002) and Miranda Fricker (2007). These pragmatic genealogists start out with a description of an avowedly fictional “state of nature” and end up ascribing social functions to particular building blocks of our (...) practices – such as the fact that we use a certain concept, or live by a certain virtue – which we did not necessarily expect to have such a function at all. That the seemingly archaic device of a fictional state-of-nature story should be a helpful way to get at the functions of our actual practices must seem a mystifying proposal, however; I shall therefore endeavor to demystify it in what follows. My aim in this chapter is twofold. First, by delineating the framework of pragmatic genealogy and contrasting it with superficially similar methods, I argue that pragmatic genealogies are best interpreted as dynamic models whose point is to reveal the function – and non-coincidentally often the social function – of certain practices. Second, by buttressing this framework with something it notably lacks, namely an account of the type of functionality it operates with, I argue that both the type of functional commitment and the depth of factual obligation incurred by a pragmatic genealogy depend on what we use the method for: the dynamic models of pragmatic genealogy can be used merely as heuristic devices helping us spot functional patterns, or more ambitiously as arguments grounding our ascriptions of functionality to actual practices, or even more ambitiously as bases for functional explanations of the resilience or the persistence of practices. By bringing these distinctions into view, we gain the ability to distinguish strengths and weaknesses of the method’s application from strengths and weaknesses of the method itself. (shrink)

Philosophy & Social Criticism, Volume 48, Issue 3, Page 416-436, March 2022. Drawing on Bernard Williams's Truth and Truthfulness and Miranda Fricker's Epistemic Justice, this article presents an epistemic argument for democracy on the basis of its ability to incentivize more people to display the virtues of truth required for the social production and aggregation of knowledge. In particular, the article compares democracy respectively with autocracy and epistocracy, showing that it is likely to be, within the context of a (...) modern pluralistic society, an epistemically superior regime in the sense that it creates more favourable conditions for the pooling of epistemic resources. The article concludes with a multi-dimensional framework of democratic legitimacy, where democracy's epistemic value is directly tied with both the safeguard against elite domination and the development of citizens' ethical and intellectual capabilities. In this regard, the article also helps to bridge the gap between epistemic and non-epistemic approaches in democratic theory and unite what might be called the wisdom, power, and virtue of the multitude. (shrink)

The study of conscious experience has seen remarkable strides in the last ten years, reflecting important technological breakthroughs and the enormous efforts of researchers in disciplines as varied as neuroscience, cognitive science, and philosophy. Although still embroiled in debate, scientists are now beginning to find common ground in their understanding of consciousness, which may pave the way for a unified explanation of how and why we experience and understand the world around us. Written by eminent psychologist Bernard J. Baars, (...) In the Theater of Consciousness: The Workspace of the Mind brings us to the frontlines of this exciting discipline, offering the general reader a fascinating overview of how top scientists currently understand the processes underlying conscious experience. Combining psychology with brain science, Baars brilliantly brings his subject to life with a metaphor that has been used to understand consciousness since the time of Aristotle--the mind as theater. Here consciousness is seen as a "stage" on which our sensations, perceptions, thoughts, and feelings play to a vast, silent audience. Behind the scenes, silent context operators shape conscious experience; they include implicit expectations, self systems, and scene setters. Using this framework, Baars presents compelling evidence that human consciousness rides on top of biologically ancient mechanisms. In humans it manifests itself in inner speech, imagery, perception, and voluntary control of thought and action. Topics like hypnosis, absorbed states of mind, adaptation to trauma, and the human propensity to project expectations on uncertainty, all fit into the expanded theater metaphor. As Baars explores our present understanding of the mind, he takes us to the top laboratories around the world, where we witness some of the field's most exciting breakthroughs and discoveries. And throughout the book, Baars has sprinkled numerous and often highly amusing on-the-spot demonstrations that illuminate the ideas under discussion. Understanding consciousness is perhaps the most difficult puzzle facing the sciences today. In the Theater of Consciousness offers an invaluable introduction to the field, brilliantly weaving together the various theories that have emerged as scientists continue their quest to uncover the profound mysteries of the mind--and of human nature itself. (shrink)

This thesis argues for a radical understanding of personal autonomy as constitutively social-relational. Standard conceptualisations in liberalism construe autonomy broadly in line with Frankfurt and Dworkin’s accounts, which rely on the idea of an inner self as the authenticator of personal commitments. These conceptualisations suffer from serious theoretical limitations including problems of regress, manipulation and authority. I argue that attempts to address these problems from within the standard paradigm, for example by building in conditions of procedural independence to prevent commitments (...) from being manipulated, help to an extent. However, they remain reliant on an insufficiently explained idea of an inner self as the source of an autonomous agent’s motives, so they do not go far enough to capture what we want from autonomy: that it explains how a person can have the power to shape her life. I explore two sets of criticisms of the standard paradigm, from communitarianism and feminism; both argue that standard autonomy is excessively individualistic and fails to pay enough attention to the role of social factors. I enter the debate about how far, if at all, autonomy might be either causally (weakly) or constitutively (strongly) social-relational. I show that the liberal can accommodate the idea that autonomy is enabled by social relations, but is severely challenged by more strongly relational, constitutive claims. I make the original point that standard views cannot explain how individuals can be sure which of their motives are authentic and which should be endorsed. This is a significant gap in autonomy theory. I propose a methodological shift from analysing autonomous actions to analysing autonomous agency. Drawing on dialogical accounts of critical reflection, Axel Honneth’s inter-subjectivity, and Bernard Williams’ notion of ‘trustful conversation’ I contribute a constitutively social-relational condition for autonomous agency. From this I argue for a constitutive condition for autonomous actions. (PhD, 2014. Supervisors: Miranda Fricker and Susan James.). (shrink)

Reflections on the life and works of Scotus -- The early works of Scotus -- Duns Scotus at Oxford -- A Scotistic approach to the ultimate why-question -- God's knowledge : a study in Scotistic methodology -- William of Alnwick on Scotus and divine concurrence -- Scotus on the origin of possibility -- Scotus's lectures on the Immaculate Conception -- Scotus's ethics -- Scotus's eschatology : some reflections -- Scotism -- An Oxford dialogue on language and metaphysics -- Ockham and (...) the textbooks -- Ockham's conception of matter. (shrink)

In this paper, we analyze the astronomical tables in al-Zīj al-Muqtabis by Ibn al-Kammād (early twelfth century, Córdoba), based on the Latin and Hebrew versions of the lost Arabic original, each of which is extant in a unique manuscript. We present excerpts of many tables and pay careful attention to their structure and underlying parameters. The main focus, however, is on the impact al-Muqtabis had on the astronomy that developed in the Iberian Peninsula and the Maghrib and, more generally, on (...) the transmission and diffusion of Indian astronomy in the West after the arrival of al-Khwārizmī’s astronomical tables in al-Andalus (Muslim Spain) in the tenth century. This tradition of Indian origin competed with the Greek tradition represented by al-Battānī’s astronomical tables and was much more alive in the Iberian Peninsula and the Maghrib than previously thought. From Spain, the Indian tradition entered mainstream European astronomy, where we find echoes of it in all versions of the Alfonsine Tables, both in manuscript and in the printed editions (beginning in 1483), as well as in Copernicus’s De Revolutionibus, published in 1543. (shrink)

This study contextualizes business leaders’ perspectives on business-society interaction through the theoretical lens of wisdom. Morally effective interaction between business and society relies on shared perceptions of expected values grounded in leaders’ virtuous behavior. Through empirical fieldwork across industries in a developing society, the article documents how local business leaders perceive wise leadership in dealing with socially complex problems. Using grounded theory, we inductively developed a model of wisdom, executive wisdom, that identifies 14 characteristics of wisdom, located in three groups: (...) technē, wise decisions, and virtuous disposition. The findings broaden the view of the complex nature of wise decision-making in the business-society context. (shrink)

The anonymous set of astronomical tables preserved in Paris, Bibliothèque nationale de France, MS lat. 10262, is the first set of displaced tables to be found in a medieval Latin text. These tables are a reworking of the standard Alfonsine tables and yield the same results. However, the mean motions are defined differently, the presentation of the tables is unprecedented, and some new functions are introduced for computing true planetary longitudes. The absence of any instructions as well as unusual technical (...) terms in the headings make it difficult to appreciate the cleverness that went into the construction of these tables that are extant in a unique copy. In this article we provide a detailed analysis of these tables and their underlying parameters. The displaced tables are typical of a pervasive tendency in Islamic science to provide extensive and elegant numerical tables for the convenience of practitioners. The underlying astronomical theory is neither questioned nor affected.Edward S. Kennedy. (shrink)

This book aims to show that recent developments in neuroscience permit a defense of free will. Through language, human beings can escape strict biological determinism.

Theologian Erik Peterson’s thesis concerning the rupture of Christian theology away from the Greek and Roman pagan theologico-political problem and from Israel’s monotheism is well-founded theologically but historically problematic. This paper offers a critical analysis of this situation by exposing specifically Christian concepts for a political theology. These concepts have determined the permanence and flexibility of political theology since Constantine’s Empire up to contemporary liberal democracies.

ABSTRACT What has made progressives—self-styled champions of the people—the principal targets of populist resentment in contemporary politics? Perhaps it is progressives’ ambivalence about democracy, not merely the racist, sexist and nationalist passions that progressives prefer to blame. Indeed, one of the reasons that progressives find themselves under attack as out-of-touch elitists may be that they are out of touch with the nature and extent of their elitism. So long as progressives remain committed to enlightening the people as well as empowering (...) them, to bringing about social improvement as well as social justice, they are bound to express some discomfort with democracy, no matter how sincerely they may praise it. If they want to mount a more effective response to the populist challenge to progressive politics, then, they need first to acknowledge and address the sources of their ambivalence about democracy. (shrink)

Truth, knowledge, justice – to understand how our loftiest abstractions earn their keep, trace them to their practical origins.

An utterer may convey a message to her intended audience by means of an explicit statement; or by a non‐conventionally mediated one‐off signal from which the audience is able to work out the intended message; or by conversational implicature. I investigate whether the last two are equivalent to explicit testifying, as communicative act and epistemic source. I find that there are important differences between explicit statement and insinuation; only with the first does the utterer assume full responsibility for the truth (...) of what she communicates to her audience. (shrink)

Philosophy is a discipline of grand abstractions. Truth, justice, knowledge, goodness, democracy, beauty, freedom, and other venerable ideas have been at the center of philosophical inquiry at least since Socrates. To understand the nature of these things, philosophers have traditionally asked questions of the form ‘What is X?’. What is truth? What is justice? What is knowledge? These are familiar questions. Yet, these questions have proven to be vexing. After more than 2500 years of reflection, there has yet to emerge (...) consensus on what truth, knowledge, or justice are. Perhaps we are asking the wrong questions. Instead of asking ‘What is truth?’ or ‘What is justice?’’, it might be more fruitful to ask why we’ve come to think in these terms. What role do these ideas play in human life? What is the point of thinking in terms of these grand abstractions? If we lacked these concepts, what else would we lose? (shrink)

When we hope to explain and perhaps vindicate a practice that is internally diverse, philosophy faces a methodological challenge. Such subject matters are likely to have explanatorily basic features that are not necessary conditions. This prompts a move away from analysis to some other kind of philosophical explanation. This paper proposes a paradigm based explanation of one such subject matter: blame. First, a paradigm form of blame is identified—‘Communicative Blame’—where this is understood as a candidate for an explanatorily basic form (...) of blame. Second, its point and purpose in our lives is investigated and found to reside in its power to increase the alignment of the blamer and the wrongdoer's moral understandings. Third, the hypothesis that Communicative Blame is an explanatorily basic form of blame is tested out by seeing how far other kinds of blame can reasonably be understood as derivative, especially in respect of blame's point and purpose. Finally, a new and quasi-political worry about blame is raised. (shrink)