On January 29, 2021, a police officer with the Rochester, New York, Police Department pepper-sprayed a 9-year old Black girl who had been handcuffed and forced into the back of a police car. In the struggle that proceeded this moment, an officer yelled at the girl with obvious frustration, “You’re acting like a child!” In this essay, I consider how the girl’s quick retort —“I AM a child!”—interjected a truth into the struggle that had been all but ignored by the (...) armed adults on the scene. I consider how the truth embedded in this girl’s call exposes the lies of law enforcement and, in doing so, lay the seeds of abolitionist imaginings—a call for a system, a world, that would treat a Black girl as if she were a child. (shrink)

This paper focuses on the defection of nuclear physicist Bruno Pontecorvo from Britain to the USSR in 1950 in an attempt to understand how government and intelligence services assess threats deriving from the unwanted spread of secret scientific information. It questions whether contingent agendas play a role in these assessments, as new evidence suggests that this is exactly what happened in the Pontecorvo case. British diplomatic personnel involved in negotiations with their US counterparts considered playing down the case. Meanwhile, the (...) press decided to play it up, claiming that Pontecorvo was an atom spy. Finally, the British secret services had evidence showing that this was a fabrication, but they did not disclose it. If all these manipulations served various purposes, then they certainly were not aimed at assessing if there was a threat and what this threat really was. (shrink)

Kant’s conception of the centrality of intellectual self-consciousness, or “pure apperception”, for scientific knowledge of nature is well known, if still obscure. Here I argue that, for Kant, at least one central role for such self-consciousness lies in the acquisition of the content of concepts central to metaphysical theorizing. I focus on one important concept, that of <substance>. I argue that, for Kant, the representational content of the concept <substance> depends not just on the capacity for apperception, but on the (...) actual intellectual awareness of oneself in such apperception. I then defend this interpretation from a variety of objections. (shrink)

Adults report that moral characteristics—particularly widely shared moral beliefs—are central to identity. This perception appears driven by the view that changes to widely shared moral beliefs would alter friendships and that this change in social relationships would, in turn, alter an individual's personal identity. Because reasoning about identity changes substantially during adolescence, the current work tested pre- and post-adolescents to reveal the role that such changes could play in moral cognition. Experiment 1 showed that 8- to 10-year-olds, like adults, judged (...) that people would change more after changes to their widely shared moral beliefs (e.g., whether hitting is wrong) than after changes to controversial moral beliefs (e.g., whether telling prosocial lies is wrong). Following up on this basic effect, a second experiment examined whether participants regard all changes to widely shared moral beliefs as equally impactful. Adults, but not children, reported that individuals would change more if their good moral beliefs (e.g., it is not okay to hit) transformed into bad moral beliefs (e.g., it is okay to hit) than if the opposite change occurred. This difference in adults was mediated by perceptions of how much changes to each type of belief would alter friendships. We discuss implications for moral judgment and social cognitive development. (shrink)

Salvaging the Concept of Nudge 1 makes a number of good points about how the concept of a nudge should be understood, and a number of important distinctions in specifying more precisely the important idea of freedom of choice. As Saghai suggests, this is a first cut, and more work needs to be done in clarifying the issues so as to make the idea of a nudge a useful tool for policy purposes.In this Commentary, I want to explore some of (...) the difficulties that remain in getting a clear understanding of the ideas used to clarify the idea of freedom of choice, in particular, the idea that some influences are easily resistible and some are not. In particular, I am interested in the use of various deceptive modes such as lying, failure to disclose and misleading utterances. I believe that there is an important ambiguity in thinking about these deceptive modes which throws some doubt on the adequacy of the idea of resistibility.The key definitions are the following:Substantial Non-control: A's influence to get B to α is substantially non-controlling when B could easily not α if she did not want to α.Easy resistibility: A's influence is easily resistible if B is able to effortlessly oppose the …. (shrink)

Posthumanist film and television is both a vehicle for reflection on discrimination and prejudice and a means of gratifying in fantasy deeply imbedded human impulses towards prejudice. Discrimination lies at the heart of posthuman narratives whenever the posthuman coalesces around an identifiable group in conflict with humans. We first introduce the idea of prejudice as a form of psychological defense, contrasting it with other accounts of prejudice in the philosophical literature. We then apply this notion to number of posthumanist film (...) and television narratives. An adequate account of prejudice tells us about posthumanism in film—the significance of posthumanist thinking, speculation and fantasy. It helps account for the proliferation of television series and films about people who—being at one time dead, still dead or partially dead, or only sometimes dead, or have powers and appetites we do not have—are borderline creatures: not fully us, but still near to us. (shrink)

RÉSUMÉ: L'herméneutique de Paul Ricœur est centrée sur le problème de l'interprétation de soi par le moyen de la référence sémantique du monde du texte. Bien que Ricœur poursuive un examen fort important du rapport entre le discours narratif et le processus de formation de l'identité, la façon dont il prolonge cette dynamique poury inclure la question du soi est problématique. La distinction qu'il tente de tracer entre deux types d'identités, liés l'un à «ce qu'est» une personne et l'autre à (...) «qui» elle est enchevêtre inévitablement sa compréhension de la pragmatique du soi dans la sémantique de l'identité. (shrink)

Gain not only murdered his brother and lied to God, but he also misled many preachers. And while he murdered and lied in a story, he has misled preachers in fact.

This volume features forty-two essays written in honor of Joseph Agassi. It explores the work and legacy of this influential philosopher, an exciting and challenging advocate of critical rationalism. Throughout six decades of stupendous intellectual activity, Agassi called attention to rationality as the very starting point of every notable philosophical way of life. The essays present Agassi’s own views on critical rationalism. They also develop and expand upon his work in new and provocative ways. The authors include Agassi's most notable (...) pupils, friends, and colleagues. Overall, their contributions challenge the received view on a variety of issues concerning science, religion, and education. Readers will find well-reasoned arguments on such topics as the secular problem of evil, religion and critical thinking, liberal democratic educational communities, democracy and constitutionalism, and capitalism at a crossroad.“/div>divTo Joseph Agassi, philosophy is the practice of reason, where reason is understood as the relentless search for criticisms of the best available explanations that we have to the world around us. This book not only honors one of the most original philosophers of science today. It also offers readers insights into a school of thought that lies at the heart of philosophy. (shrink)

: With the advent of the Genetic Age comes a unique new set of problems and ethical decisions. There is a tendency to take the scientific developments presented by modern genetics at face value, as if the science itself were value-neutral and not influenced by cultural and religious images. One example of the fallout of the Genetic Age is the development of a "genetic self," the idea that our essential selfhood lies in our genes. It is important to understand the (...) assumptions of the Genetic Age, the development of genetic selfhood, and the broader cultural trends and assumptions that underlie modern genetic thinking. It is equally important, however, to shape a reaction to the concept of a genetic self. Judaism has long carried on a unique discussion about the nature of selfhood in different times and places and about the relation of the corporeal self to the essential self. Insights from Judaism therefore may help to craft a reaction to the modern genetic self that incorporates the best of modern genetics as well as the integrity of a more transcendent selfhood. (shrink)

O, who hath done this deed?nobody; I myself."Yea, I am the atheist and the godless one, who, against the will that wills nothing, will tell lies, just as Desdemona did when she lay dying.” 1 There is a distinctively Nietzschean ring to this sentence, which is taken from Friedrich Heinrich Jacobi’s open letter to Fichte in 1799, the text in which the term “nihilism” seems to have been used in a philosophically significant way for the first time. There is, in (...) particular, an unmistakable resonance between the sentence quoted from Jacobi and the thought that begins and ends the Third Essay of GM: the thought that “man … prefers to will nothingness than not will” (GM III:1; KSA 5:339) 2 along with the idea that our .. (shrink)

I’m grateful to Professors Langton and Owens for their probing comments and to Mind for providing the occasion for this exchange. Both Langton and Owens helpfully push me to tackle interesting problems that I did not wrestle with in the book. I am game to try to answer them, but some of my responses are tentative and roughly hewn, offered more in the spirit of exploratory conversation than firm conviction.

Definition of the problem: The rapid pace of medical progress has drawn renewed attention to the various possible ways of treating dead or brain-dead pregnant women since the 1980's. The discussion today revolves around medical, social, legal and economic aspects. The historical areas of conflict which surrounded deliveries carried out on dead mothers (usually by means of a Sectio in mortua, nowadays known as a perimortem Caesarean section) and their significance in today's debate are, for the most part, regarded as (...) being of little relevance.Arguments: The history of the Sectio in mortua was, for a long time, influenced by the difficulty in establishing whether the mother and foetus were actually dead, by the degree of autonomy of the foetus in the womb, by religious issues, by the lack of acceptance among the people because of their irrational fears concerning the operation and by legal regulations and constraints especially in relation to operations carried out on the dying. Each of these areas shows remarkable parallels to the present-day medical and ethical discussion.Conclusion: The value of such considerations does not lie in the uncritical application of experience gained in the past, but rather in a growing awareness of the wide spectrum of parameters and in a deeper understanding of the various possible approaches to a given situation. The tradition in the Western world of carrying out a delivery on a dead mother, in spite of the conflict of interests between the mother and the foetus, is of particular importance. In practice, the many non-medical factors should be taken more into consideration, with special emphasis being placed on the informed consent of the relatives. (shrink)

When Dr. van Fleteren writes of the articles I criticized as dating from some twenty years ago, the unwary reader might infer that my criticism of those articles was, for its part, relatively recent. The fact is, however, that when the two connected articles I eventually criticized appeared in the volumes of Augustinian Studies, I wrote this reply while Fr. Robert Russell, of happy memory, was still at the helm, and was promised publication in the near future. Meanwhile, however, Fr. (...) Russell had the discourtesy to move on to a more intimate acquaintance with Augustine than any of us on this confused planet can boast of, and someone sowed cockle into field he had tended: in unaccountable fashion my article seems to have disappeared. Only a recent letter of inquiry on my part, and Fr. Allan Fitzgerald’s understanding reply, resulted in this renewal of dialogue between Dr. van Fleteren and me. Let me assure both Dr. van Fleteren and Fr. Fitzgerald that I am grateful for giving it exactly that form, a courteous dialogue. (shrink)

The term “anthropocene,” emerging around the time of Derrida's death, implies a shift in reference that his late production does not address or anticipate—and thus, if it is to be taken seriously as a ghost term, it poses today a question of a selective translation effect as regards “deconstruction.” This essay finds in Derrida's “last” interview and the “war with myself” that it avows a cipher and entry point for this broader question. Given official “deconstructions” withdrawn, conservative, and fallow state (...) today, as a minor academic camp dedicated to Derridean theology, the essay asks whether the arrival of the term is not a catalyst for the re-organization of deconstructive memes. It examines not only Derrida's systematic avoidance in his writing of eco-catastrophism, but how that occlusion parallels others—specifically, a certain “materiality” that lies outside binaries and, more surprisingly, cinema. In examining this “war” between the two Derridas the essay speculates on whether the anthropocene moves us beyond the sort of soft Derrideanism that, since his death, has paralyzed the franchise and fulfilled his prediction of his work's disappearance. (shrink)

Ever since the inception of its academic career, sociology has approached its subject-matter in two different ways; one positivist, the other critical. Important theories, such as those of Karl Marx or Emile Durkheim, have always emphasized either one of these perspectives, but could never completely ignore the other one. The result was that as an empirical science, sociology has been interested in latent structures, while as critical theory, it has pointed out that social reality is not what it seems to (...) be. Therefore, all attempts at building a unified theory of society on the basis of the critical/positivist distinction had to lead into the paradox of treating appearance and reality, or latent and manifest structures, as one and the same thing. This situation is now changing in radical ways which sociology has yet to appreciate. I am referring to recent interdisciplinary discussions about theories of self-referential systems, autopoietic system closure, the second-order cybernetics of observing systems, and constructivist epistemology and information processing. We can draw upon these recent discussions in order to understand society as a self-observing system that defines its own identity while, at the same time, leaving an "unmarked space" for the possibility to describe society in quite different ways. (shrink)

To relate theories of affordance and frame with the tradition of formal aesthetics, philosophical iconology and the life sciences (keyword Vitality Semiotics) is the starting point of the paper. According to this approach, the structural preconditions of images, as determined by materials, techniques and the composition of the design means, become essential. Through these structures, the producers are able to set impulses that become decisive for the interpretation of space and time or the "scene" as a dynamic event. Against the (...) social and cultural background of the recipients the "scene" gains a meaning to their life. This means to understand the productʼs conception and composition as an affordance which determines the framework of the reception conditions. The benefit of this approach lies in the identification of changes in the self-understanding and thus of trends in to new standards of societies. This is to be illustrated by Exekiasʼ drinking bowl around 540/30 BC in Munich. (shrink)

Most scholars of Islamic intellectual history now agree on the distortedness of the traditional Western portrayal of al-Ġazālī as the defender of Muslim orthodoxy whose Incoherence of the Philosophers was such a powerful critique that it caused the annihilation of philosophical activity in Islamic civilization. Some in fact are coming to the conclusion that al-Ġazālī's importance in the history of Islamic philosophy and theology derives as much from his assiduous incorporation of basic metaphysical ideas into central doctrines of Sunnī kalām (...) , as from his far more celebrated bashing of the falāsifa . What is less well known is that al-Ġazālī's role in the ‘‘philosophizing” of Sunnī theology was not a lonely struggle by a single genius, but part of a broader trend that seems to have begun during Avicenna’s lifetime and that picked up speed in the first and second generations after Avicenna's death in 1037, with the work of al-Ġazālī's teacher, the Aš‘arite al-Gˇuwaynī , as well as of the Māturīdite al-Bazdawī , work that was carried forward by dozens of subsequent members of those two major Sunnī theological schools. It is clear, in fact, that the dividing line between the Sunnī theologians commonly referred to in the later Islamic tradition as mutaqaddimūn , and those referred to as muta’a&hbrevu;h&hbrevu;irūn , lies not with al-Ġazālī but with Avicenna himself, and that the turn in Sunnī kalām was therefore Avicennian, not Ġazālian. (shrink)

I am lying on a small table in a tiny room, dizzy with nausea and apprehension. A young woman busies herself with the preparations of a plaster mold that will be used to position my arm and chest for the twenty five ‘shots’ of radiotherapy that I will undergo during the ensuing five weeks. I had called the hospital that morning to say that I was too sick to come for this appointment. I had better come, said a young man (...) from the department, because if I missed this appointment I would I might not get a new appointment in time start the treatments within the recommended time frame. So I am here, on the table. I mention the nausea to the technician. My apprehension at this moment is that I might become so dizzy as to somehow swirl out of control. The young woman gives me a mask to blunt the smell of the plaster. The procedure will take twenty-five minutes. I keep my mind focused on each breath and get through the ordeal breath by breath. She seems, in contrast to me, gloriously free of distress and worry, listening to the radio while she works. I envy her good fortune. As we finish up the procedure I take a chance and share my experience: I say that being a cancer patient can be tricky because you are sometimes utterly in the grip of the idea that the cancer will spread and you’ll die soon and in a very unpleasant way. After each round of chemo I was admitted to hospital for extreme nausea and dehydration. During those days in the cancer ward some of those who were dying called out and moaned distressingly, sometimes for hours, during the night. I was, at those moments, unable to shake off the belief that I too would be in that state within a few months. The signs of cancer had been missed on the mammogram two years earlier and, when the lump made itself evident, I was in Stage III. When I mentioned this experience of being gripped by the idea of death she said “Oh I know exactly what you mean, my mother has breast cancer, and every time she has an examination I go searching the internet to find out what I can.” This young woman was twenty four, and I fifty six at the time, and she had given me an unexpected small precious gift that I took with me out of that little cupboard of a room.. (shrink)

Two Experiments demonstrate the existence of a “collapse illusion”, in which reasoners evaluate Truthteller-type propositions (“I am telling the truth”) as if they were simply true, whereas Liar-type propositions (“I am lying”) tend to be evaluated as neither true nor false. The second Experiment also demonstrates an individual differences pattern, in which shallow reasoners are more susceptible to the illusion. The collapse illusion is congruent with philosophical semantic truth theories such as Kripke's (1975), and with hypothetical thinking theory's principle of (...) satisficing, but can only be partially accounted for by the model theory principle of truth. Pragmatic effects related to sentence cohesion further reinforce hypothetical thinking theory interpretation of the data, although the illusion and cohesion data could also be accounted for within a modified mental model theory. (shrink)

Surely [John R.] Searle must rely on a stable, formal conception of the point of view. He sets Las Meninas on a par with the antimony of the liar and the paradoxes of set theory. But nothing is an antimony or a paradox just because it seems so or just because it is confusing or difficult, even if it seems so to everyone. To deserve such a description, a thing must be, so to speak, intrinsically intractable, not merely resistant when (...) looked at in a particular way. If a man says "I do not believe I am alive," that would be odd, and it would be hard to understand just what he means, and it may even be hard or impossible to believe that he is telling the truth; but there is no antimony. If a man says "I am lying," then we have a primitive version of the antimony of the liar. Given the meaning of this utterance—and nothing else—there is no way to get a grip on it. If what the man says is true, then it's false; if what he says is false, then it's true. Joel Snyder, a practicing photographer, is associate professor of humanities and of art and design at the University of Chicago. His contributions to Critical Inquiry include "Photography, Vision, and Representation," written with Neil Walsh Allen , and "Picturing Vision" . Ted Cohen, associate professor of philosophy at the University of Chicago, has written on language, aesthetics, and taste. His previous contribution to Critical Inquiry, "Metaphor and the Cultivation of Intimacy," appeared in the Autumn 1978 issue. (shrink)

In ‘The Mind's I is Illiterate’, G. S. Miller discusses several paradoxes and paradoxical sentences which Miller claims are related by a common abuse of language. The Whiteley sentence ‘Lucas cannot consistently believe this sentence’ fails to be meaningful for want of a referent outside of the sentence for the phrase ‘this sentence’; the Liar Paradox when formulated as ‘I am lying’ is similarly disposed of when it is seen that the verb is defective and the sentence fails to refer (...) to anything outside of itself. The same point is made concerning the Russell Paradox of the set of all sets that do not belong to themselves. The moral made is that philosophers are simply to be more careful about the laneuaee that thev are usine and then the paradoxes will go away. (shrink)

I am interested in fear of non-existence, which is often discussed in terms of fear one’s own death, or as it is sometimes called, fear of death as such. This form of fear has been denied by some philosophers. Cognitive theories of the emotions have particular trouble in dealing with it, granting it a status that is simultaneously paradigmatic yet anomalous with respect to fear in general. My paper documents these matters, and considers a number of responses. I provide examples (...) from philosophy and literature of fear of non-existence, and distinguish it from other death-related fears. I then look at the success that cognitive theories of the emotions have had in dealing with other “problematic” fears, such as phobias, and examine how the solutions here fail to apply to fear of non-existence. The problem lies with the perceptual-centred model of fear that is typically called upon. Against this I recommend a retreat to a belief-centred model for fear of non-existence. I argue that there are other fears that are better explained by a belief-centred rather a perceptual-based approach. This reinforces the plausibility of the belief-centred model, and goes some way to alleviating the anomalous and problematic status of the fear of non-existence. (shrink)

I am interested in the use Kant makes of the pure intuition of space, and of properties and principles of space and spaces (i.e. figures, like spheres and lines), in the special metaphysical project of MAN. This is a large topic, so I will focus here on an aspect of it: the role of these things in his treatment of some of the laws of matter treated in the Dynamics and Mechanics Chapters. In MAN and other texts, Kant speaks of (...) space as the “ground,” “condition,” and “basis” of various laws, including the inverse-square and inverse-cube laws of attractive and repulsive force, and the Third Law of Mechanics. Moreover, in his proofs of all the laws just mentioned, the language of “construction” figures prominently, which suggests that Kant’s proofs (somehow) rest on or involve mathematical construction in his technical sense. Such claims give rise to a number of questions. How do properties and principles of space and spaces serve to ground this particular set of laws? Which spatial properties and principles is Kant appealing to? What, if anything, does the spatial grounding of the inverse-square and inverse-cube laws of diffusion (treated in the Dynamics Chapter) have in common with that of the Third treated in the Mechanics Chapter)? What role—if any—does mathematical construction play in Kant’s proofs of these laws? Finally, how if at all, are Kant’s grounding claims consistent with his other commitments—for example, how are they consistent with his notorious denial in Prolegomena §38 that there are any laws that “lie in space” (Prol 4:321)? I offer answers to these questions. (shrink)

I am grateful to the Journal of Medical Ethics for asking these critics to discuss my book, and am grateful to each of the critics themselves for raising interesting and often difficult issues for me to think about.Alan Wertheimer makes a number of good points. One of the most significant, to me, is how paternalism might function at what I will call an institutional level. In my book, I endorse paternalistic actions by the state, when the cost benefit analysis justifies (...) that. I have not supported paternalistic interventions by private individuals, though. For one thing, private individuals will make decisions without public input, and without their justification being examined by experts in the field, and for these reasons they are too likely to make mistakes as to when intervention is appropriate. For another, the interventions by random individuals haranguing us about our failure to eat our broccoli is likely to drive us crazy—unexpected interference from people with no particular authority will give us just that sense of harassment I say paternalists need to avoid.However, between the public, authorised actions of a democratic state and the private actions of individuals with no authority lies the significant area of non-state institutions. Such institutions develop regulations and standards their members are expected to act in accordance with, and these in turn can have a significant impact on private persons. Of course, there have also been legal actions, notably court decisions, that have played a role here, but much of the specific interpretation of things like consent has been determined by the medical community developing what it believes to be an appropriate ethic for itself. And we know, here, that in recent years there has been a movement away from the paternalism that was once common, and a reorientation towards respect for …. (shrink)

In the past couple of decades, there were a few major attempts to establish the thesis of pragmatic infringement – that a significant pragmatic ingredient figures significantly in the truth-conditions for knowledge-ascriptions. As candidates, epistemic contextualism and Relativism flaunted conversational standards, and Stanley's SSI promoted stakes. These conceptions were propelled first and foremost by obviously pragmatic examples of knowledge ascriptions that seem to require a pragmatic component in the truth-conditions of knowledge ascriptions in order to be accounted for. However, if (...) such examples can be adequately explained purely pragmatically, the need that such examples seem to invoke in such a pragmatic component is undermined. Here I lay out a new pragmatic account – of action-directed pragmatics, offering a different account of such examples and their pragmatic flavor. If adequate, it obviates the above need for pragmatic enrichment. Specifically, I develop and I argue for a well-entrenched pragmatic feature – that of a steering role. The assertions of knowledge ascriptions and their denials as well as of simple assertions (that don't invoke knowledge) play a pragmatic role of steering audiences in joint deliberational setups toward, or away from, the speaker's preferred action (as well as in assertions of 'I am sure', of epistemic modals, taste assertions, causal assertions, and more.) Various features and consequences of this account are drawn. Specifically, I explain why in the bank example (and related ones) the husband, in denying the knowledge ascription, neither lies nor misleads. (shrink)

I am grateful to my critics for their careful attention to Art and Art-Attempts. Here I’ll respond to their central challenges.1As David Davies notes, I argue that Jerrold Levinson’s historical-intentional definition of art, despite the emphasis it places on intentions, does not pass my test of taking intention-dependence seriously. This is because it construes art-making as an activity that cannot fail: if we accept Levinson’s picture, every art-attempt is guaranteed to be a success. Davies suggests that, if we understand art-making (...) along the same lines as lying, Levinsonian art-attempts can, in fact, fail, just as lie-attempts can.Before addressing Davies’s defense, let me clarify my criticism. Is making... (shrink)

I am grateful for the extraordinarily kind comments that Professors Nancy Snow and Joseph Wagner have made about my essay. I find their criticisms useful as they point to some important weaknesses in that essay. Fortunately, I believe that these weaknesses lie mainly in the exposition of my argument and not in its substance. As anyone who has read even a few works in the vast secondary literature on utopianism will attest, “utopia” is an extremely difficult word to define. It (...) seems that, despite my best efforts, this difficulty has caused problems in my essay, too, as I believe that the objections raised by Snow and Wagner are based on my failure to be clear about my views on the nature of “utopia” and “utopianism.” In these comments, I will try to clarify what I mean by each term. Then, I will argue that, given my definitions, my arguments are untouched by my colleagues’ objections. (shrink)

I am not trying to present a full concept of professional ethics of an academic. I would like to focus on philosophical and ethical reflection of the specific area of an academic work in Slovakia. Almost two hundred years ago, the Slovak enlightenment philosopher Ján Feješ (1764 - 1823) responded to the situation of his era and he stated that a reviewer must, in the given area, be even better educated than the author himself. A different example can be found (...) in Honoré de Balzac’s great novel Lost Illusions where he also described journalistic practice of the first half of the 19th century. Part of the novel was based on his own experience with acrimonious critique. The situation concerning, for example academic reviewing in Slovakia in the present day is, possibly in some instances, even more critical than Feješ or Balzac suggested. This no longer concerns the quality of papers and book of essays but the number of works published; and evaluation of academics is partly dependant on whether they have published in a reviewed or a non-reviewed book, indexed journals, worldly known publishers, etc. There has to be a just requirement placed on critical reviews, as Feješ and others cautioned, and that is that they should not be informative reviews only for the sake of someone getting a reviewed work but truly critical reviews from people qualified in the given area of academic subjects and the aim of which should not lie in settling scores or expressing personal preferences but a constructive view of the issue. The problem in Slovak academic community (especially in humanities and social sciences), however, lies in the fact that critical reviews are not considered a challenge for discussion or polemics but are shifted to the personal level including settling scores with the critical reviewer. Quoting and referencing is another problematic area in Slovak academic life, which, in the present period, has almost become a fetish, as it is a criterion of qualification enhancement and evaluation of academics. That is why quotations and references are artificially made for colleagues, friends and acquaintances, or even already published works are faked to contain quotes and references for the needs of future qualification enhancement. To summarise, I would like to propose three aims which could become a part of professional ethics of the academics (in Slovakia). (shrink)

I am told that you raised your hand against yourselfAnticipating the butcher.[…]So the future lies in darkness and the forces of rightAre weak. All this was plain to youWhen you destroyed a torturable body.-- Bertold Brecht“On the Suicide of the Refugee W.B.”Like many influential contemporary thinkers, Arjun Appadurai and Giorgio Agamben suggest that globalization invites us to rethink our relationship with the nation or “postnation” (Appadurai; Agamben). One emblematic figure crystallizes the urgency of such a challenge: the refugee (Nyers; Shemak; (...) Bohmer; Chetail). In European urban centers--regardless of whether we speak as refugees, to refugees, or about refugees--complex transnational dialogues emerge. They .. (shrink)

For many liberals, the question "Do others live rightly?" feels inappropriate. Liberalism seems to demand a follow-up question: "Who am I to judge?" Peaceful coexistence, in this view, is predicated on restraint from morally evaluating our peers. But Rahel Jaeggi sees the situation differently. Criticizing is not only valid but also useful, she argues. Moral judgment is no error; the error lies in how we go about judging. One way to judge is external, based on universal standards derived from ideas (...) about God or human nature. The other is internal, relying on standards peculiar to a given society. Both approaches have serious flaws and detractors. In On the Critique of Forms of Life, Jaeggi offers a third way, which she calls "immanent" critique. Inspired by Hegelian social philosophy and engaged with Anglo-American theorists such as John Dewey, Michael Walzer, and Alasdair MacIntyre, immanent critique begins with the recognition that ways of life are inherently normative because they assert their own goodness and rightness. They also have a consistent purpose: to solve basic social problems and advance social goods, most of which are common across cultures. Jaeggi argues that we can judge the validity of a society's moral claims by evaluating how well the society adapts to crisis--whether it is able to overcome contradictions that arise from within and continue to fulfill its purpose. Jaeggi enlivens her ideas through concrete, contemporary examples. Against both relativistic and absolutist accounts, she shows that rational social critique is possible.--. (shrink)

i am honored to have the opportunity to think with Patricia Hill Collins about community as a political construct. Collins has argued that, like concepts of family and love, community often has been considered to be part of a nonpolitical sphere, something personal and private even as it is not individualistic. As feminists have shown, however, the personal is political, and as Collins urges, an intersectional understanding of the political can and also should apply to the concept of community. In (...) Collins's words, "instead of being a natural, apolitical space, or even an empty category that can be used for political purposes, the construct of community may lie at the heart of politics itself". The concept of... (shrink)

I am the full-time father of two very curious boys aged 7 and 8 for whom I do the daily school run commute and drop off, before I do my other job of teaching high school philosophy. It is a constant challenge to keep my car companions occupied every day, so I’m indebted to the ‘ABC Short and Curly’ podcast. My boys are big fans of the show, and our daily car journeys have been enlivened with often heated discussions about (...) who we would save in a fire, or should we rob the rich to help the poor? Such questions have transformed my humble family car into a mobile ‘Philosophy in Schools’ classroom for our morning commute. The podcast provides the stimulus, while I facilitate the discussion as I navigate rush-hour traffic—it is a great way to prepare me for my school day. As a result, I was excited to receive a copy of the accompanying series book 'The Short and Curly guide to life. 'The book is written by the Short and Curly’s resident Philosopher and Ethicist Dr Matt Beard and Kyla Slaven. The book approaches ethical issues in the style of a collection of ‘field research reports’ that are completed by characters from the ‘Brains Trust’ who take on the role of research agents. Twelve ethical issues are investigated at length, with a chapter being allocated to each—examples being lying, happiness, fairness, promises, friendship, bravery and integrity. (shrink)

The thesis of this article is that there has never been any ground for the controversy between the doctrine of free will and determinism, that it is based upon a misapprehension, that the two assertions are entirely consistent, that one of them strictly implies the other, that they have been opposed only because of our natural want of the analytical imagination. In so saying I do not tamper with the meaning of either phrase. That would be unpardonable. I mean free (...) will in the natural and usual sense, in the fullest, the most absolute sense in which for the purposes of the personal and moral life the term is ever employed. I mean it as implying responsibility, merit and demerit, guilt and desert. I mean it as implying, after an act has been performed, that one " could have done otherwise " than one did. I mean it as conveying these things also, not in any subtly modified sense but in exactly the sense in which we conceive them in life and in law and in ethics. These two doctrines have been opposed because we have not realised that free will can be analysed without being destroyed, and that determinism is merely a feature of the analysis of it. And if we are tempted to take refuge in the thought of an "ultimate ", an "innermost" liberty that eludes the analysis, then we have implied a deterministic basis and constitution for this liberty as well. For such a basis and constitution lie in the idea of liberty. -/- The thesis is not, like that of Green or Bradley, that the contending opinions are reconciled if we adopt a certain metaphysic of the ego, as that it is timeless, and identifies itself with a desire by a " timeless act". This is to say that the two are irreconcilable, as they are popularly supposed to be, except by a theory that delivers us from the conflict by taking us out of time. Our view on the contrary is that from the natural and temporal point of view itself there never was any need of a reconciliation but only of a comprehension of the meaning of terms. (The metaphysical nature of the self and its identity through time is a problem for all who confront memory, anticipation, etc.; it has no peculiar difficulties arising from the present problem.) -/- I am not maintaining that determinism is true; only that it is true insofar as we have free will. That we are free in willing is, broadly speaking, a fact of experience. That broad fact is more assured than any philosophical analysis. It is therefore surer than the deterministic analysis of it, entirely adequate as that in the end appears to be. But it is not here affirmed that there are no small exceptions, no slight undetermined swervings, no ingredient of absolute chance. All that is here said is that such absence of determination, if and so far as it exists, is no gain to freedom, but sheer loss of it; no advantage to the moral life, but blank subtraction from it. -- When I speak below of "the indeterminist" I mean the libertarian indeterminist, that is, him who believes in free will and holds that it involves indetermination. (shrink)

Some philosophers think that Paul Feyerabend is a clown, a great many others think that he is one of the most exciting philosophers of science of this century. For me the truth does not lie somewhere in between, for I am decidedly of the second opinion, an opinion that is becoming general around the world as this century comes to an end and history begins to cast its appraising eye upon the intellectual harvest of our era. A good example of (...) this opinion may be found in the admiration for Feyerabend's philosophy of science expressed by Grover Maxwell in his contribution to this volume. Maxwell, recalling his own intellectual transformation, says also that it was Feyerabend who "confirmed my then incipient suspicions that most of the foundations of currently fashionable philosophy and even a great deal of the methodology to which many scientists pay enthusiastic lip service are based on simple mistake- assumptions whose absurdity becomes obvious once attention is directed at them". And lest the reader thinks, as many still do, that however sharp Feyerabend's attacks upon the philosophical establishment may have been, he does not offer a positive philosophy (a complain made by C.A. Hooker and some of the other contributors), Paul Churchland argues otherwise. (shrink)

That brings me to the crux of my disagreement with Hillis Miller. The central contention is not simply that I am sometimes, or always, wrong in my interpretation, but instead that I—like other traditional historians—can never be right in my interpretation. For Miller assents to Nietzsche's challenge of "the concept of 'rightness' in interpretation," and to Nietzsche's assertion that "the same text authorizes innumerable interpretations : there is no 'correct' interpretation."1 Nietzsche's views of interpretation, as Miller says, are relevant to (...) the recent deconstructive theorists, including Jacques Derrida and himself, who have "reinterpreted Nietzsche" or have written "directly or indirectly under his aegis." He goes on to quote a number of statements from Nietzsche's The Will to Power to the effect, as Miller puts it, "that reading is never the objective identifying of a sense but the importation of meaning into a text which had no meaning 'in itself.'" For example: "Ultimately, man finds in things nothing but what he himself has imported into them." "In fact interpretation is itself a means of becoming master of something."2 On the face of it, such sweeping deconstructive claims might suggest those of Lewis Carroll's linguistic philosopher, who asserted that meaning is imported into a text by the interpreter's will to power: "The question is," said Alice, "whether you can make words mean so many different things.""The question is," said Humpty Dumpty, "which is to be master—that's all." But of course I don't believe that such deconstructive claims are, in Humpty Dumpty fashion, simply dogmatic assertions. Instead, they are conclusions which are derived from particular linguistic premises. I want, in the time remaining, to present what I make out to be the elected linguistic premises, first of Jacques Derrida, then of Hillis Miller, in the confidence that if I misinterpret these theories, my errors will soon be challenged and corrected. Let me eliminate suspense by saying at the beginning that I don't think that their radically skeptical conclusions from these premises are wrong. On the contrary, I believe that their conclusions are right—in fact, they are infallibly right, and that's where the trouble lies. · 1. "Tradition and Difference," Diacritics 2 : 8, 12.· 2. Ibid. M. H. Abrams’s contributions to Critical Inquiry include "Rationality and Imagination in Cultural History: A Reply to Wayne Booth" and "Behaviorism and Deconstruction: A Comment on Morse Peckham's 'The Infinitude of Pluralism'". (shrink)

According to the free energy principle biological agents resist a tendency to disorder in their interactions with a dynamically changing environment by keeping themselves in sensory and physiological states that are expected given their embodiment and the niche they inhabit :127–138, 2010. doi: 10.1038/nrn2787). Why would a biological agent that aims at minimising uncertainty in its encounters with the world ever be motivated to seek out novelty? Novelty for such an agent would arrive in the form of sensory and physiological (...) states that are unexpected. Such an agent ought therefore to avoid novel and surprising interactions with the world one might think. Yet humans and many other animals find play and other forms of novelty-seeking and exploration hugely rewarding. How can this be understood in frameworks for studying the mind that emphasise prediction error minimisation? This problem has been taken up in recent research concerned with epistemic action—actions an agent engages in to reduce uncertainty. However that work leaves two questions unanswered, which it is the aim of our paper to address. First, no account has been given yet of why it should feel good to the agent to engage the world playfully and with curiosity. Second an appeal is made to precision-estimation to explain epistemic action, yet it remains unclear how precision-weighting works in action more generally, or active inference. We argue that an answer to both questions may lie in the bodily states of an agent that track the rate at which free energy is being reduced. The recent literature on the predictive brain has connected the valence of emotional experiences to the rate of change in the reduction of prediction error :e1003094, 2013. doi: 10.1371/journal.pcbi.1003094; Van de Cruys, in Metzinger and Wiese Philosophy and predictive processing, vol 24, MIND Group, Frankfurt am Main, 2017. doi: 10.15502/9783958573253). In this literature valenced emotional experiences are hypothesised to be identical with changes in the rate at which prediction error is reduced. Experiences are negatively valenced when overall prediction error increases and are positively valenced when the sum of prediction errors decrease. We offer an ecological-enactive interpretation of the concept of valence and its connection to rate of change of prediction error. We show how rate of change should be understood in terms of embodied states of affordance-related action readiness. We then go on to apply this ecological-enactive account of error dynamics to provide an answer to the first question we have raised: It may explain why it should feel good to an agent to be curious and playful. Our ecological-enactive account also allows us to show how error dynamics may provide an answer to the second question we have raised regarding how precision-weighting works in active inference. An agent that is sensitive to rates of error reduction can tune precision on the fly. We show how this ability to tune precision on the go can allow agents to develop skills for adapting better and better to the unexpected, and search out opportunities for resolving uncertainty and progressing in its learning. (shrink)

My intention is to show that, starting from an empiricist philosophy of mind, it is possible to give a systematic account of aesthetic experience. I argue that empiricism involves a certain theory of meaning and truth; one problem is to show how this theory is compatible with the activity of aesthetic judgment. I investigate and reject two attempts to delimit the realm of the aesthetic: one in terms of the individuality of the aesthetic object, and the other in terms of (...) 'aesthetic properties'. I go on to argue that aesthetic descriptions must not be thought to ascribe properties to their objects, and I show how the suggestion that they are non-descriptive need not conflict with the empiricist view of meaning. The problem is then seen to lie with the analysis of the 'acceptance-conditions' of aesthetic descriptions. I counter certain idealist objections to this approach, and then present a theory of imagination, in terms of which the acceptance conditions of aesthetic judgments may be described. This theory attempts to explain how the element of thought in aesthetic appreciation may become inseparable from an experience of its object, and how the aesthetic emotions are both like and unlike their equivalents in life. The first part concludes with an analysis of the general conditions of aesthetic experience. I try to show that aesthetic experience can be described in terms of certain 'formal' properties, independently of its material object. In the second part I am concerned to show that this empiricist theory of aesthetics does not, like most empiricist theories, make nonsense of our appreciation of art. First, I attempt to show that 'understanding' art is not merely a cognitive process, but involves certain experiences that can be accounted for in terms of the previous theory. I then analyse the concepts of representation and expression, and in the course of this analysis I attempt to refute what I take to be the most serious rival analysis of our appreciation of art - the semantic theory. (shrink)

Preparing for the journey -- Memory: who am I? -- True being -- The Lucifer effect -- Blame is socially contagious -- The spiritual quest -- The meaning of it all -- Pets and an afterlife -- Crime and punishment -- The dream within the dream -- A rich inner life -- Love thy neighbor -- What if there were no chapter 13? -- Pursuit of happiness -- The drive for power -- Innocent -- Camelot -- Human rights -- E (...) followed by F -- Certainty -- Biases? -- Growing up -- Meaning: it's all a simulation -- The little lie -- Discernment -- The unexamined life -- Conclusion: the exam. (shrink)

In this paper, I am concerned with certain phenomenological contributions to person-centred practices in healthcare. I propose a meaning-centred phenomenological approach to illness and contrast it with certain body-centred and feeling-centred accounts. I suggest that the proposed approach complements, rather than competes with, these other accounts in the area of phenomenology of illness. This is illustrated, for example, by the way the proposed meaning-centred approach tackles certain general challenges to the phenomenology of illness. I pursue this approach to develop an (...) account of illness as involving a loss of meaning. However, I point out that at the heart of illness lies the possibility of resilience. Resilience is existentially understood as enacting a reconstruction of meaning. I point out that resilience and certain related cognitive mechanisms make well-being possible. Here, to be well is existentially understood as being able to find meaning in life. The phenomenological analysis of existential resilience and well-being I offer in this paper indicates that resilient ways of being which enable well-being can be learned; the analysis thus brings to light deep motivations for supporting resilient learning through healthcare practices and policies. (shrink)

While humanists have pondered the subject of love to the point of obsessiveness, philosophers have steadfastly ignored it. One might wonder whether the discipline of philosophy even recognizes love. The word philosophy means “love of wisdom,” but the absence of love from philosophical discourse is curiously glaring. So where did the love go? In The Erotic Phenomenon, Jean-Luc Marion asks this fundamental question of philosophy, while reviving inquiry into the concept of love itself. Marion begins his profound and personal book (...) with a critique of Descartes’ equation of the ego’s ability to doubt with the certainty that one exists—“I think, therefore I am”—arguing that this is worse than vain. We encounter being, he says, when we first experience love: I am loved, therefore I am; and this love is the reason I care whether I exist or not. This philosophical base allows Marion to probe several manifestations of love and its variations, including carnal excitement, self-hate, lying and perversion, fidelity, the generation of children, and the love of God. Throughout, Marion stresses that all erotic phenomena, including sentimentality, pornography, and even boasts about one’s sexual conquests, stem not from the ego as popularly understood but instead from love. A thoroughly enlightening and captivating philosophical investigation of a strangely neglected subject, The Erotic Phenomenon is certain to initiate feverish new dialogue about the philosophical meanings of that most desirable and mysterious of all concepts—love. (shrink)

It is common for people to misstate their bargaining positions during business negotiations. This paper will focus on cases of the following sort: I am selling a house and tell a prospective buyer that $90,000 is absolutely the lowest price that I will accept, when I know that I would be willing to accept as little as $80, 000 for the house. This is a lie according to standard definitions of lying-it is a deliberate false statement which is intended to (...) deceive others. I will defend the following two theses:a. Appearances to the contrary, this kind of bluffing typically does not constitute lying. (I will argue that standard dictionary definitions of lying are untenable and defend an alternative definition hinted at, but never clearly formulated by, W. D. Ross. On my definition, deliberate false statements about one's negotiating position would rarely constitute lies in this society.)b. It is usually permissible to misstate one's bargaining position when one has good reason to think that one's negotiating partner is doing the same and it is usually impermissible to misstate one's negotiating bargaining if one does not have good reason to think that the other party is misstating her position. (shrink)

THE IMMORTAL FLY: ETERNAL WHISPERS. WHO IS SHE? Author: Rituparna Ray Chaudhuri. Hello, Recently my book named, ‘The Immortal Fly: Eternal Whispers : Based On True Events of a Family' been published from Partridge (USA) In Association with Penguin Random House (UK) and achieved a separate Google identity. -/- As being # the author of the book, I thought to define self in the book what is definition of 'Depression'. I wanted to explain self in many ways, but the best (...) quotation appeared to me : “My life will end someday, but it will end at my convenience.’’ -/- ***** I am missing "her". By now, years passed without 'her' . Even though, unlike before, everything is becoming to be more scattered, gloomy and desolate. She is no-where whom I share my feelings. Even now, when I do close my eyes, I can visualize the same that I had left years since on 7th February, 2019 at 8.20 A.M. in the hospital struggling a continuous period of fifty days : on the fifty one day, my father said, ”The End of our Fifty Years relationship has been completed with the Fifty Days”….’Whoever’ she was to others , but she is our legend…To me, she is ‘My Ma’. -/- The story could begin, 'I failed preciously on success of my life.' Simplicity, Innocence, Belief, Faith and Personality met unknowingly with filthy waves skillfully immersed in Betray, Sorcery, Jealousy, Greediness, Revenge, Lie... ‘’ ******* The Daughter writes, “I had asked Ma many times, but her ‘impenetrable personality’ and dynamic words to everyone with a tinge of smile as reflected on her face, she was reluctant to continue her conversation with me. I had thought, hence, I must not be indefinite on my spoken words. Who shall I blame!” Based on true story of a family came from South Calcutta (India) to a suburb, on staying at home of the Daughter’s maternal grandmother’s house, this book reveals in facts and true events how Destiny had unknowingly ‘further’ played an abominable role to Fate of The Daughter, when eventually one day on 7th February, 2019 everything was finished within 8.20A.M. The Daughter is, therefore, left alone on terrestrial with immortal words as written in her Diary, ‘Eternal Whispers’: “My words to self that I am to fulfill my Ma’s - wish. ’’ ‘’ -/- • Keywords: 1. Diary and True Events 2. The Chaotic Society 3. Fatality 4. Of A-Family 5. Science , Philosophy and Literature 6. Severe Depression 7. Medical Journey. -/- The Alternative Title of the Book: The Greatest Mistake or Fortune:: The book is mainly carrying with intense words of a journey of the relationship between a Mother with her Daughter has left readers in an abrupt situation where ,perhaps, I can define "Man is the innocent creature with 'his' personality under circumstances..." -/- . (shrink)

Der vorliegende Band enthalt sechs teilweise stark iiberarbeitete Aufsatze, die in der Zeit zwischen der Niederschrift des Buches Theorienstrnkturen und Theoriendynamik, Springer-Verlag 1973, im folgenden mit [Theoriendynamik] bezeichnet, und der Monographie The Strncturalist View of Theories. A Pos­ sible Analogue of the Bourbaki Programme in Physical Science, Springer-Ver­ lag 1979, im folgenden kurz [Strnkturalismus] genannt, entstanden sind. In diesen Abhandlungen werden jeweils gewisse Aspekte des strukturalistischen Theorienkonzeptes behandelt. Am starksten iiberarbeitet wurden die Auf­ satze II, IV, V und VI, die (...) urspriinglich in englischer Sprache erschienen waren. Vier der sechs Arbeiten, namlich I, III, IV und VI, bilden auBerdem erweiterte Fassungen von Vortragen. Obwohl das zweite Buch [Strnkturalismus] durch P. Feyerabends ausftihr­ liche Diskussion der strukturalistischen Auffassung im British Journal for the Philosophy of Science, Dezember 1977, angeregt worden ist, stellt es seinem Ansatz und Aufbau nach eher den Versuch einer systematischen Kurzdarstel­ lung des strukturalistischen Vorgehens nach seinem letzten Stande dar. Dem­ gegeniiber entstanden die hier verOffentlichten Artikel stets aus einem ganz be­ stimmten AnlaB. Diese Anlasse konnte man schematisch in drei Klassen unter­ teilen: Entweder ging es darum, eine anschauliche intuitive Ein/iihrnng zu lie­ fern ; oder die Aufgabe bestand darin, die Beziehung zu anderen philosophischen Positionen. wie z. B. derjenigen L. Wittgensteins, H. Putnams, K. Poppers oder T. S. Kuhns. zu analysieren ; oder es sollte zu den wichtigsten und bis dahin verOffentlichten Kritiken Stellung bezogen wer­ den. (shrink)

The problem of lying to, or deceiving oneself is currently one of the most debated in analytical philosophy. Now, since analytical philosophers are aware that Sartre defined "bad faith" as lying to oneself, as self-deception, and since moreover they find relatively coherent arguments in Sartre's text, they do not hesitate to include these arguments in their debates, if only to contest them. "To be dead is to be a prey for the living," one reads in Being and Nothing- ness* (p. (...) 695). One imagines Sartre rolling over in his grave. For this philosophy of mind is truly the Other of Sartre's philosophy. Yet, at the price of a treacherous translation, this philosophy gets some thing from Sartre, and perhaps gives him something in return. In a slightly surreal, perhaps even monstrous way, I am going to make the two philosophies engage in a dialogue on the prob lem of lying to oneself. (shrink)

At the bedside, nurses are expected to be precise when they read indications on screens and on the bodies of patients and decide on the meaning of words framed by the context of acute care. In academia, although there is no incident report to fill when we misread or misrepresent complex philosophical ideas, the consequences of inaccurate reading include misplaced epistemological claims and poor scholarship. A long and broad convention of nursing phenomenological research, in its various forms, claims a philosophical (...) grounding in the ideas of Husserl, Heidegger, and other thinkers. But for nearly two decades, nurse phenomenologists' knowledge claims have been challenged by well‐informed criticisms, most notably by John Paley. At the heart of criticism lies an observation that Continental phenomenological thought is misrepresented in many nursing sources and that nursing phenomenology, both descriptive and interpretive, cannot appeal to the authority of either Husserl or Heidegger. Taking these criticisms seriously, I am asking, Is phenomenology after Paley possible? If misreading seems to be an issue, how can – or should – we read rigorously? My thinking through these questions is influenced by the ideas of Jacques Derrida. Under a condition of a play of language, of Derridian différance, when meaning is never self‐identical and never fully arrives, I suggest that one has to negotiate meanings through reading for differences. I develop this idea in relation to the methodological conventions of phenomenological nursing research and argue for a careful rereading of the whole field of phenomenological nursing research. Such rereading presupposes and necessitates interdisciplinary engagement between nursing and the humanities and interpretive social sciences. Greater familiarity with research practices of those disciplines that stress theoretical and writing rigour might make visible the limits of nursing research approaches and their quality criteria. An understanding of philosophical and theoretical works – a condition of quality scholarship – depends on our reading of both originary texts and contemporary literature from the humanities and the social sciences. This understanding, far from obliging researchers to always trace their work to its philosophical roots, opens other, often more sound, methodological possibilities. (shrink)

Much recent work in metaontology challenges the so-called ‘Quinean tradition’ in metaphysics. Especially prominently, Amie Thomasson argues for a highly permissive ontology over ontologies which eliminate many entities. I am concerned with disputing not her ontological claim, but the methodology behind her rejection of eliminativism – I focus on ordinary objects. Thomasson thinks that by endorsing the Quinean criterion of ontological commitment eliminativism goes wrong; a theory eschewing quantification over a kind may nonetheless be committed to its existence. I argue (...) that, contrary to Thomasson's claims, we should retain the Quinean criterion. Her arguments show that many eliminativist positions are flawed, but their flaws lie elsewhere: the Quinean criterion is innocent. Showing why reveals the importance of pragmatism in ontology. In §1 I compare Thomasson's account and the eliminativist views to which it stands in opposition. In §2 I re-construct Thomasson's reasons for rejecting the Quinean criterion. In §3 I defend the Quinean criterion, showing that the eliminativists’ flaws are not consequences of applying the Quinean criterion, before explaining the criterion's importance when properly understood. I conclude that Thomasson, though right to criticise the methodology of ordinary-object eliminativists, is wrong to identify the Quinean criterion as the source of their mistake. (shrink)

The ambiguity of the word ‘nature’ is so remarkable that I need not remark upon it. Except perhaps to emphasise that this ambiguity — scarcely less apparent, as Aristotle long ago pointed out, in its Greek near-equivalent physis — is by no means a merely accidental product of etymological confusions or conflations: it faithfully reflects the hesitancies, the doubts and the uncertainties, with which men have confronted the world around them. For my special purposes, it is enough to say, I (...) shall be using the word ‘nature’ in one of its narrower senses — so as to include only that which, setting aside the supernatural, is human neither in itself nor in its origins. This is the sense in which neither Sir Christopher Wren nor St Paul's Cathedral forms part of ‘nature’ and it may be hard to decide whether an oddly shaped flint or a landscape where the trees are evenly spaced is or is not ‘natural’. The question I am raising, then, is what our attitudes have been, and ought to be, to nature in this narrow sense of the word, in which it excludes both the human and the artificial. And more narrowly still, I shall be devoting most of my attention to our attitudes towards that part of nature which it lies within man's power to modify and, in particular, towards what Karl Barth calls ‘the strange life of beasts and plants which lies around us’, a life we can by our actions destroy. (shrink)