This essay presents Mendelssohn's neglected vindication of theism through a refutation of Spinoza's philosophy in the Morgenstunden and highlights its relevance for discussions in contemporary philosophy of religion by (i) contextualizing Mendelssohn's argument within the reception of Spinoza's philosophy at the dawn of the 18th century, (ii) tracing the path of Mendelssohn's argument from Spinoza's philosophy to theism, (iii) and applying Mendelssohn's argument to Linda Zagzebski's account of divine omniscience showing that her account is not only incoherent but also undermines (...) the theistic assumption that the world has an existence outside of God. (shrink)

Michael Della Rocca has claimed that using intuitions expressed in everyday language for philosophical purposes leads to a “taming of philosophy.” The present article uses an aspect of Christian Wolff's arguments from common notions as a test case for this claim. It is argued that arguments from common linguistic usage in Wolff's analysis of imputation allow for reasoned choices between competing philosophical theories and provide insights into aspects of social reality that are expressed in common notions. This is so because (...) Wolff does not analyze everyday concepts one by one but rather explores their mutual connections. (shrink)

Kant's comments on animal minds have provoked radically different readings, with some contending animals have clear and distinct awareness of their world and others contending animals lack consciousness altogether. This paper argues that Kant's comments have received such divergent responses because, according to Kant, we inevitably slide into a deceptive anthropomorphism when talking about non-human minds. While Kant follows contemporaries, such as H.S. Reimarus, in arguing humans can only conceive of animal minds by analogy with their own, Kant's transcendental idealism (...) shifts the meaning of this analogy. The upshot is that animal minds, just like the mind of God, are intrinsically unimaginable for humans. We can talk about them, but it is mere talk; we cannot know what we are talking about. (shrink)

Various early modern philosophers contested the nature, dignity, and powers of the oyster, including Montaigne, Cavendish, Locke, Hume, Reid, and Lichtenberg. This paper presents a conspectus of the debate. The author—who sometimes seems to get the wrong end of the stick—documents the major texts and advances an interpretation of the main lines of controversy.

G. E. Moore argued that goodness is not identical to any natural properties on the basis of the Open Question Argument. John Duns Scotus agrees, and for the same reason, at least with respect to transcendental being and goodness. Because it is not a “useless repetition” to say that being is goodness, or vice versa, they are not simply identical. Thus, Scotus rejects run-of-the-mill naturalism and avoids Moore's naturalistic fallacy. However, Scotus holds that “being is goodness,” and vice versa. He (...) therefore denies Moore's ultimate conclusion that goodness is independent of anything properly described under non-evaluative descriptions. (shrink)

This article rereads Benedict de Spinoza and recent interpretations of him as an epistemic democrat through the prism of contemporary debate on the conditions for deliberation in a democracy. Through a reconstruction of Spinoza's arguments and theories of deliberation and its preconditions, we argue that, for deliberation to produce the benefits Spinoza recognizes, the process must be inclusive, and those deliberating must be both intellectually humble and autonomous. This interpretation is new and diverges from those recently advanced by Justin Steinberg (...) and Sandra Leonie Field. In particular, on our reading, Spinoza's critique of humility does not extend to intellectual humility as it is understood today in political theory. Both autonomy and humility, as epistemologically conceived by political theorists today, can therefore be considered Spinozian civic virtues. (shrink)

This article examines the exchange between Montoro and Sor Juana about the nature of jealousy and its connection with romantic love. First, it shows that, while Montoro's position echoes Augustine's view of love, Sor Juana's position has strong parallels with views held in the courtly love tradition. Second, the article considers Sor Juana's responses to Montoro, which aim to establish that jealousy is not inherently wrong (as Montoro holds) and that it cannot be severed from love. Finally, the article shows (...) that Sor Juana's insights provide support for those who defend the importance of jealousy in human life. (shrink)

According to Kantian moral religion, because there is a duty to promote the highest good, we are warranted in believing in God and immortality. However, this article shows that the duty to promote the highest good is incoherent, and that popular conceptualizations of the highest good cannot avoid this incoherence. After arguing, additionally, against attempts to ground Kantian moral religion on the highest good in some role other than the object of duty, it is shown that Kant seems to have (...) been aware of the original problem, suggesting an explanation for why he abandoned the highest good around 1800. (shrink)

Contemporary philosophers have largely neglected Richard Taylor’s design argument. Given that the initial responses to the argument were largely negative, one might be tempted to conclude that the argument is simply philosophically inadequate. This paper rejects that conclusion by showing how Taylor’s argument has been misunderstood by his critics. In defending Taylor, it is shown that the two types of objections levied against him fail to even blemish his design argument, let alone refute it. Consideration is also given to the (...) argument’s historical lineage, along with a proposal for future considerations of the connection between epistemological realism and design. (shrink)

Leibniz claims that for every possible substance S there is an individual concept that includes predicates describing everything that will ever happen to S, if S existed. Many commentators have thought that this leads Leibniz to think that all properties are had essentially, and thus that it is not metaphysically possible for substances to be otherwise than the way their individual concept has them as being. I argue against this common way of reading Leibniz’s views on the metaphysics of modality. (...) I develop a model in which individual concepts are innocent; that is, individual concepts are divine ideas that permit God to know everything that will ever happen to all possible substances, if created, but these individual concepts neither require that all properties are had essentially nor require that it is metaphysically necessary for substances to be the way their individual concepts have them as being. (shrink)

It is sometimes said that Charles Darwin has a theory of emotional expression, but not a theory of emotion. This paper argues that Darwin does have a theory of emotion. Inspired by David Hartley and Erasmus Darwin, Charles Darwin claims that an emotion is a train of feelings, thoughts, and actions, linked by associations. Whereas Hartley and Erasmus insist that these associations are learned, Charles proposes that some of these associations are inherited. He develops this theory in his private notebooks (...) from 1838–1839 and then assumes it in The Expression of the Emotions in Man and Animals (1872). (shrink)

Avicenna says that intellectual cognition involves the emanation of an intelligible form by the ‘agent intellect’ upon the human mind. This paper argues that in order to understand why he says this, we need to think of intellectual cognition as a special case of a much more general phenomenon. More specifically, Avicenna's introduction of an agent intellect will be shown to be a natural consequence of certain assumptions about the temporality, the completion, and the teleology of the causal processes by (...) which things acquire forms. (shrink)

According to Spinoza, “... if we suppose that a person perceives his own lack of power because he recognizes that something is more powerful than himself... then we conceive that the person is simply understanding himself distinctly... ” (Ethics IV, Demonstration to Proposition 53, my italics). What does Spinoza mean by ‘something’ here? Given that there are two kinds of adequate cognition for Spinoza, which one is at stake when we understand that something is more powerful than ourselves? This paper (...) addresses these underexamined questions by considering different ways of conceiving our weakness against the backdrop of Spinoza's epistemological and metaphysical commitments. (shrink)