A beautifully written, deeply provocative inquiry into the intersection between animal and disability liberation--the debut of an important new social critic How much of what we understand of ourselves as "human" depends on our physical and mental abilities--how we move (or cannot move) in and interact with the world? And how much does our definition of "human" depend on its difference from "animal"? Drawing on her own experiences as a disabled person, a disability activist, and an animal advocate, author Sunaura (...) Taylor persuades us to think deeply, and sometimes uncomfortably, about what divides the human from the animal, the disabled from the nondisabled--and what it might mean to break down those divisions, to claim the animal and the vulnerable in ourselves, in a process she calls "cripping animal ethics." Beasts of Burden suggests that issues of disability and animal justice--which have heretofore primarily been presented in opposition--are in fact deeply entangled. Fusing philosophy, memoir, and science--including factory farming, disability oppression, or our assumptions of human superiority over animals--Taylor draws attention to new worlds of experience and empathy that will open up important avenues of solidarity across species and ability. Beasts of Burden is a wonderfully engaging and elegantly written work, both philosophical and personal, by a brilliant debut author. (shrink)

Critically examining popular ESL textbooks, this accessible and engaging book uncovers gender and ethnic representations that impact young English language learners in US public schools and provides equitable, egalitarian alternatives.

The German invasion of the Soviet Union in June of 1941 has long been attributed to errors by Joseph Stalin, yet a revisionist position known as the Icebreaker hypothesis has also emerged alleging that Stalin is not to blame. This essay examines why the Icebreaker theory is erroneous based on its lack of concrete facts. The reasons why Operation Barbarossa was so effective are also examined, leading to the conclusion that Stalin should still shoulder most of the blame for Soviet (...) disorganization prior to the invasion. (shrink)

We present a one per cent measurement of the cosmic distance scale from the detections of the baryon acoustic oscillations in the clustering of galaxies from the Baryon Oscillation Spectroscopic Survey, which is part of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey III. Our results come from the Data Release 11 sample, containing nearly one million galaxies and covering approximately 8500 square degrees and the redshift range 0.2 < z < 0.7. We also compare these results with those from the publicly released (...) DR9 and DR10 samples. Assuming a concordance Λ cold dark matter cosmological model, the DR11 sample covers a volume of 13 Gpc3 and is the largest region of the Universe ever surveyed at this density. We measure the correlation function and power spectrum, including density-field reconstruction of the BAO feature. The acoustic features are detected at a significance of over 7σ in both the correlation function and power spectrum. Fitting for the position of the acoustic features measures the distance relative to the sound horizon at the drag epoch, rd, which has a value of rd,fid = 149.28 Mpc in our fiducial cosmology. We find DV = at z = 0.32 and DV = at z = 0.57. At 1.0 per cent, this latter measure is the most precise distance constraint ever obtained from a galaxy survey. Separating the clustering along and transverse to the line of sight yields measurements at z = 0.57 of DA = and H =. Our measurements of the distance scale are in good agreement with previous BAO measurements and with the predictions from cosmic microwave background data for a spatially flat CDM model with a cosmological constant. © 2014 The Author Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the Royal Astronomical Society. (shrink)

MR. R. G. M. Nisbet has made the attractive suggestion that the Vinnius to whom Horace addressed his thirteenth epistle was the Vinnius Valens mentioned by the elder Pliny as a centurion of immense strength who had served in the praetorian guard of Augustus . To the points which he has made in support of this identification may be added the appropriateness, if Horace's Vinnius was a soldier, of the words victor propositi and the fact that Horace's comparison between Vinnius (...) and a pack-animal gains in point if Vinnius was famous for feats of strength involving wagons and beasts of burden. (shrink)

MR. R. G. M. Nisbet has made the attractive suggestion that the Vinnius to whom Horace addressed his thirteenth epistle was the Vinnius Valens mentioned by the elder Pliny as a centurion of immense strength who had served in the praetorian guard of Augustus. To the points which he has made in support of this identification may be added the appropriateness, if Horace's Vinnius was a soldier, of the words victor propositi and the fact that Horace's comparison between Vinnius and (...) a pack-animal gains in point if Vinnius was famous for feats of strength involving wagons and beasts of burden. (shrink)

The entwined history of humans and elephants is fascinating but often sad. People have used elephants as beasts of burden and war machines, slaughtered them for their ivory, exterminated them as threats to people and ecosystems, turned them into objects of entertainment at circuses, employed them as both curiosities and conservation ambassadors in zoos, and deified and honored them in religious rites. How have such actions affected these pachyderms? What ethical and moral imperatives should humans follow to ensure (...) that elephants are treated with dignity and saved from extinction? In Elephants and Ethics, Christen Wemmer and Catherine A. Christen assemble an international cohort of experts to review the history of human-elephant relations, discuss current issues of vital concern to elephant welfare, and assess the prospects for the ethical coexistence of both species. Part I provides an overview of the vexatious human-elephant relationship, from the history of our interactions to understanding elephant intelligence and sense of self. It concludes with a discussion of the issues of stress, pain, and suffering as experienced by elephants in human care and the problems inherent in assessing these subjectively. The second part explores how humans use elephants as tools and entertainment. It reviews domestic uses in Asia, examines the history and roles of elephants in zoos and circuses, and discusses the methods and ethics of training and caring for captive elephants. In Part III the contributors examine the fragile and conflict-filled world of human-elephant interactions in the wild. Each chapter delves into a different angle of the "elephant problem" -- the all-too-human problem of our growing populations taking over space that was historically the domain of these pachyderms. The chapters explore attempts to tame and "train" elephants in populous areas, the struggle over balancing species preservation while maintaining biodiversity in protected areas, and the conundrums posed by hunting, tourism, and human-elephant competition on rural land. That the future health and survival of elephants is dependent on human actions is irrefutable. In addressing these issues from multiple perspectives, Elephants and Ethics promotes mutual understanding of the cultural, conservation, and economic difficulties at the root of the many troublesome human-elephant interactions and poses new questions about our responsibility toward these largest of land mammals. (shrink)

In Economics individuals are defined by their preferences over the consequences of their own actions and the actions carried out by others. In contrast, Simone Weil depicts the individual as continuously re-constituted by the contact that he establishes with reality via his action. Such an action is aimed at achieving an effect in the physical world, but what makes it human is not success per se, but rather the fact that it stems from reasoning and planning. Affliction is caused by (...) effort carried out mechanically like that of a beast of burden, when the individual has no opportunity to exercise reason for choosing how to confront reality's ever-challenging hazards and necessity. (shrink)

This slender and interesting volume by three Dutch philosophers examines the manner in which eight prominent philosophers dealt with ostensibly paranormal experiences arising both spontaneously and also as the result of hypnosis. Hans Gerding covers both Immanuel Kant and Arthur Schopenhauer; Rico Sneller discusses Friedrich Joseph Schelling, Hans Driesch, and Gabriel Marcel; and Hein van Dongen considers William James, Henri Bergson, and Jacques Derrida. My guess is that JSE readers might already know about Kant’s apparent ambivalence (or perhaps just change (...) of heart) about Swedenborg’s vision of a Stockholm fire (and his other reported experiences), as well as William James’s investigations of mental mediumship (Mrs. Piper in particular) and his experiments with altered states. Nevertheless, I expect they will find much that they didn’t already know in those chapters, as well as in the others of course. (shrink)

[Eve] Sedgwick examines from an explicitly feminist, implicitly Marxist perspective the relation of homosexuality to more general social bonds between members of the same sex . She argues that the similarity between homosocial desire and homosexuality lies at the root of much homophobia. Moreover, she sees this tension as misogynist to the extent that battles fought over patriarchy within the homosocial world automatically exclude women from that patriarchal power. Thus she places homosexuality and its attendant homophobia within a wider dynamic (...) of social relationships.1Yet even as Sedgwick invents a more sophisticated definition of “homophobia,” she may permit misreading of a more elementary sort. Her use of vocabulary is troubling. In a slangy prose that regularly juxtaposes James Hogg and Louis Lepke, Tennyson and Howard Keel, references to the “campiness” of Thackeray’s “bitchy” bachelors or the “feminized” cuckolds of Wycherley’s The Country Wife seem tame enough. Yet there is a political difference between the jokes. One can burlesque fifties musicals or organized crime with impunity; to refer to sexually embattled men with feminine adjectives, however, is to reinforce a sexual stereotype that sees in the supposed effeminacy of homosexuals a sign of their deviance. Nor are women empowered when terms of female degradation like “bitch” are turned back against men: the ironic reversal does not challenge the terms’ validity but reaffirms it, showing they have an even wider range of applicability than had been thought. 1. Throughout my analysis, I use “homosexual” and “gay” exclusively in reference to male sexuality. I do so in part to echo Sedgwick’s emphasis and in part because the logic of my own argument does not empower me to speak on female homosexuality. David Van Leer is associate professor of English and American literature at the University of California, Davis. He is the author of Emerson’s Epistemology: The Argument of the Essays and articles on American literature and popular culture. (shrink)

Bornstein has proposed a manuscript submission process based on an adversary legal model, with the manuscript, like a criminal defendant, being presumed innocent unless and until proven guilty by the referees, who act as "prosecutors." The author would be provided with an opportunity for rebuttal, and the associate editor would serve as the trial judge, deciding whether the piece should ultimately be published. The editor-in-chief would hear appeals from decisions made by the associate editor. While there is much to be (...) said about this adversary approach, this paper points out certain problems in using the criminal case as a model. The most significant problem is that the burden of proof is not properly allocated. A better model would be that of the civil law suit, where the plaintiff carries the burden of proof to establish the strength of the claim . This paper also suggests certain modifications to Bornstein's proposal, such as publication of the referees' comments and the author's rebuttal. Although Bornstein's proposal, as modified herein, would not solve all of the problems Bornstein has identified with the current submission process, this paper concludes that the new procedure would do much to advance the science. (shrink)

This commentary was suggested to me in part by a colleague's remark that it would be nice if we could make William James's The Varieties of Religious Experience "respectable." The implication was that though there was something redeemable about the book, it somehow wasn't philosophically or scientifically proper. The remark awakened me to—or at least reminded me of—the fact that this has been a traditional take on James's text. As Julius Bixler points out, ridicule began soon after the book was (...) published: "The Varieties of Religious Experience, appearing at about the same time as Ernest Thompson Seton's book of animal stories, was soon nicknamed 'Wild Religions I Have Known'" (1926, 1). My awakening to this attitude—a prevalent if not a pervasive one among contemporary intellectuals—led me to consider that it would be better, and crucially important to James himself, to keep James "unrespectable." James may have been a renegade and... (shrink)

The Kyoto Protocol on global warming has provoked great controversy in part because it calls for heavier burdens on wealthy countries than on developing countries in the effort to control climate change. The U.S. Senate voted unanimously to oppose any agreement that does not require emissions reductions in low-income countries. The ethics of this position are examined in this paper which shows that there are good moral reasons for supporting the provisions of the Kyoto Protocol. Such a conclusion follows easily (...) from considerations of distributive justice but can also be supported by more narrowly self-interested arguments. (shrink)

The notion of burden of proof and its companion notion of presumption are central to argumentation studies. This book argues that we can learn a lot from how the courts have developed procedures over the years for allocating and reasoning with presumptions and burdens of proof, and from how artificial intelligence has built precise formal and computational systems to represent this kind of reasoning. The book provides a model of reasoning with burden of proof and presumption, based on (...) analyses of many clearly explained legal and non-legal examples. The model is shown to fit cases of everyday conversational argumentation as well as argumentation in legal cases. Burden of proof determines under what conditions an arguer is obliged to support a claim with an argument that backs it up and how strong that argument needs to be to prove the claim in question. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Animadversions:Tekhne After Capital/Life After WorkJennifer Bajorek (bio)The consumption of food by a beast of burden does not become any less a necessary moment of the production process because the beast enjoys what it eats.—Karl Marx, Capital1For a long time we have been used to thinking the relation, on the one hand, between language and tekhne and, on the other, between capital and the technical or technological. And yet, (...) for all the parallels that might be drawn between these two projects, it seems to me quite clear that they remain to be articulated in a way that does justice to either one. It is, moreover, entirely symptomatic of the failure of this articulation that almost all the parallels that have been drawn, in decades past, between capital and language—in the name of "political economies of the sign," for example, or of "symbolic economies"2—have been drawn without regard, precisely, to technical implications, and thus to the implication of capital and of language in and by the technical.What we might call, for purposes of exposition, the missing link—the term that would make this articulation possible—is, I will argue, labor and therefore, by extension, life. That this extension can be made with reference to Marx is by now axiomatic. Wasn't the point of all the charges of "economic determinism" and "class reductionism" that there is, in the end, "more to life" than work? That this extension must be made with reference to Marx is, however, a very different proposition and one that deserves a closer look. How does the notion that, for Marx, labor and life are coextensive stand up to close reading of his text?I shall begin with a fairly programmatic exposition of what I call Marx's two codefinitions of labor in Capital, the first being his definition of labor as a function of the human, the second being his definition of labor as a function of the living body. Each definition is a codefinition insofar as its converse is also true—insofar as, for Marx, the humanity of man and the life of his body are each, in turn, a function of work. [End Page 42] We will be surprised to find that these codefinitions are not equivalent, nor even necessarily consistent, and that the trajectory described by Marx's text is actually that of a radical divergence of humanity and life, whose consequences are serious, I will suggest, not only for any alleged "humanism" of Marx, but for the assumption that can be found almost everywhere—still, today—of an essential humanism of politics. At the same time, a more precise understanding of the labor-life relation we find in Marx, and of the concept of productivity that underwrites it, will give us some first indications as to why politics must of necessity pass through technics, as well as, therefore, through an essentially capitalist—or, at the very least, capitalizing—moment.1Codefinition (the Original Human Instrument)For the Marx of Capital, what distinguishes "man" from animal and, at the same time, defines labor is at least in part what we might call ideation. The essence of man is not simply that he effects a change of form in the materials of nature with the aim of fulfilling his needs—for animals do this, and some apparently more effectively than man—but rather that he is able to form an idea of those needs, and so to project or imagine their fulfillment. Thus Marx writes:A spider conducts operations which resemble those of the weaver, and a bee would put many a human architect to shame by the construction of its honeycomb cells. But what distinguishes the worst architect from the best of bees is that the architect builds the cell in his head before he builds it in wax. At the end of every labor process emerges a result which had already been conceived by the worker at the beginning, and so already existed in ideal form.[Capital 1: 284]3Conversely, the essence of labor is that it is something human: the mediation, by way of an exertion of force, of the "material... (shrink)

Since the 1980s, numerous scholars have applied the thought of Heidegger to environmental ethics—in particular, his critique of modern technology and his concept of ‘releasement.’ In this paper, I argue that these are an insufficient foundation for environmental ethics because they overlook a violence and destructiveness that is inextricable from our finite existence. Despite this critique, I claim that Heidegger’s analyses of violence in the 1930s and guilt in Being and Time can address some of these insufficiencies. To further develop (...) the ethical potential of his philosophy, I bring it into dialogue with environmental virtue ethics. (shrink)

A common objection to sufficientarianism is that it allows large inequalities above the threshold. A sharpened form of this objection highlights that this indifference also encompasses large inequalities in the distribution of burdens. Consider the burdens that follow from climate change. A theory that does not rule out placing these burdens on the worst off (of the sufficiently well off) will appear implausible to many. This paper assesses ways of addressing this objection and defends a revised conception of sufficientarianism that (...) can demand fair distribution of burdens (and benefits) above the sufficiency threshold, without giving up core sufficientarian theoretical commitments. (shrink)

This paper aims to rethink the problem of NATO burden sharing along ethical lines. It argues that the ethics of burden sharing reveals the tensions between utility of contribution and fairness of distribution. Inspired by Jarrod Hayes and Patrick James’s theory-as-thought method and using the traditions of normative ethics, this interpretive research looks at how the issues of sharing and contributing were discursively framed by its practitioners during NATO’s first decade. Focusing on one of the largest founding members, (...) Canada, the paper finds incoherence between the predominantly consequentialist discourse of government authorities with respect to Canada’s contributions and those authorities’ discourse on allied sharing in NATO, shaped by obligations and communitarian ethics. Consequently, this presence of different ethical logics points to a split discourse on NATO burden sharing in Canada. The paper sheds light on the normative roots of the burden-sharing problem and demonstrates the relevance of theoretical pluralism and eclectic methodology for foreign-policy analysis. (shrink)

This essay introduces a concept I call “burdened agency.” Burdened agency names a two-fold phenomenon in end-of-life ethics (with relevance beyond). First, the availability of control over the dying process may become an imperative to make choices about when and how death will occur. This is the burden of agency. Second, moral agency is increasingly burdened by “reflexivity.” No longer guided by norms that are taken-for-granted, individuals are, more or less, left to self-consciously negotiate the experience of dying on (...) their own. Increasingly we labor under the existential “weight” of ambiguity, instability, and uncertainty that accompanies highly reflexive moral action. (shrink)

The editors welcome letters from readers, although we cannot guarantee that all will be published. To ensure timeliness, correspondents must respond to an article within seven weeks, and not exceed two double‐spaced pages. Letters become the property of the editors and may be edited and shortened at our discretion.

Anthropologists of the ontological turn claim that certain entities, processes, and relations are in principle inaccessible to outsiders of specific communities. Philosophers of ethnobiology see a challenge to the integration of scientific and ethnoscientific knowledge of nature in this claim. They propose to negotiate integration within a framework of overlapping ontologies. I explicate the methodology of the ontological turn and claim that it offers a better understanding of knowledge integration than does the philosophers’ framework. Based on two case studies, I (...) argue for a revised notion of knowledge integration that takes scientific change and mutual influence between communities into account. (shrink)

We obtain some new results on the topology of unary definable sets in expansions of densely ordered Abelian groups of burden 2. In the special case in which the structure has dp‐rank 2, we show that the existence of an infinite definable discrete set precludes the definability of a set which is dense and codense in an interval, or of a set which is topologically like the Cantor middle‐third set (Theorem 2.9). If it has burden 2 and both (...) an infinite discrete set D and a dense‐codense set X are definable, then translates of X must witness the Independence Property (Theorem 2.26). In the last section, an explicit example of an ordered Abelian group of burden 2 is given in which both an infinite discrete set and a dense‐codense set are definable. (shrink)

In their paper ‘Responsibility, second opinions and peer-disagreement: ethical and epistemological challenges of using AI in clinical diagnostic contexts’, Kempt and Nagel discuss the use of medical AI systems and the resulting need for second opinions by human physicians, when physicians and AI disagree, which they call the rule of disagreement.1 The authors defend RoD based on three premises: First, they argue that in cases of disagreement in medical practice, there is an increased burden of proof for the physician (...) in charge, to defend why the opposing view is adopted or overridden. This burden for justification can be understood as an increased responsibility. In contrast, such burden does allegedly not arise, when physicians agree in their judgement. Second, in those medical contexts where humans collaborate with humans such justification can be provided, since human experts can discuss the evidence and reasons that have led them to their judgement, through which the sources of disagreement can be found and a justified decision can be made by the physician in charge. Third, unlike human-to-human collaboration, such communicative exchange is not possible with an AI system. Due to AI’s opacity, the physician in charge has no means of illuminating why the AI disagrees. Conclusively, the authors propose RoD as a solution. RoD suggests that a second human expert should be consulted for advise in cases of human–AI disagreement. Once AI systems become more widespread in clinical practice, it can be expected that such type of disagreement occurs more frequently. AI, after all, is being implemented, because it promises, among others, higher accuracy, which implies that some abnormalities will be detected that the physician would have missed.2 Hence, it is laudable to discuss the moral implications of …. (shrink)

Philosophers have traditionally concentrated on the qualities that make human beings different from other species. In _Beast and Man_ Mary Midgley, one of our foremost intellectuals, stresses continuities. What makes people tick? Largely, she asserts, the same things as animals. She tells us humans are rather more like other animals than we previously allowed ourselves to believe, and reminds us just how primitive we are in comparison to the sophistication of many animals. A veritable classic for our age, _Beast and (...) Man_ has helped change the way we think about ourselves and the world in which we live. (shrink)

Although an invasive medical intervention, Deep Brain Stimulation (DBS) has been regarded as an efficient and safe treatment of Parkinson’s disease for the last 20 years. In terms of clinical ethics, it is worth asking whether the use of DBS may have unanticipated negative effects similar to those associated with other types of psychosurgery. Clinical studies of epileptic patients who have undergone an anterior temporal lobectomy have identified a range of side effects and complications in a number of domains: psychological, (...) behavioural, affective and social. In many cases, patients express difficulty adjusting from being chronically ill to their new status as ‘treated’ or ‘seizure free’. This postoperative response adjustment has been described in the literature on epilepsy as the ‘Burden of Normality’ (BoN) syndrome. Most of the discussion about DBS postoperative changes to self is focused on abnormal side effects caused by the intervention (ie, hypersexuality, hypomania, etc). By contrast, relatively little attention is paid to the idea that successfully ‘treated’ individuals might experience difficulties in adjusting to becoming ‘normal’. The purpose of this paper is (1) to articulate the postoperative DBS psychosocial adjustment process in terms of the BoN syndrome, (2) to address whether the BoN syndrome illustrates that DBS treatment poses a threat to the patient’s identity, and (3) to examine whether the current framework for rehabilitation after DBS procedures should be updated and take into account the BoN syndrome as a postoperative self-change response. (shrink)

In order to perform certain actions – such as incarcerating a person or revoking parental rights – the state must establish certain facts to a particular standard of proof. These standards – such as preponderance of evidence and beyond reasonable doubt – are often interpreted as likelihoods or epistemic confidences. Many theorists construe them numerically; beyond reasonable doubt, for example, is often construed as 90 to 95% confidence in the guilt of the defendant. -/- A family of influential cases suggests (...) standards of proof should not be interpreted numerically. These ‘proof paradoxes’ illustrate that purely statistical evidence can warrant high credence in a disputed fact without satisfying the relevant legal standard. In this essay I evaluate three influential attempts to explain why merely statistical evidence cannot satisfy legal standards. (shrink)

This paper considers the probative burdens of proposing action or policy options in deliberation dialogues. Do proposers bear a burden of proof? Building on pioneering work by Douglas Walton (2010), and following on a growing literature within computer science, the prevailing answer seems to be “No.” Instead, only recommenders—agents who put forward an option as the one to be taken—bear a burden of proof. Against this view, we contend that proposers have burdens of proof with respect to their (...) proposals. Specifically, we argue that, while recommenders that Φ bear a burden of proof to show that □Φ (We should / ought to / must Φ), proposers that Φ have a burden of proof to show that ◇Φ (We may / can Φ). A burden of proposing may be defined as, which reads: Those who propose that we might Φ are obliged, if called upon, to show that Φ is possible in any of four ways which we call worldly, deontic, instrumental, and practical. So understood, burdens of proposing satisfy the standard formal definition of burden of proof. (shrink)

This paper considers the probative burdens of proposing action or policy options in deliberation dialogues. Do proposers bear a burden of proof? Building on pioneering work by Douglas Walton (2010), and following on a growing literature within computer science, the prevailing answer seems to be “No.” Instead, only recommenders—agents who put forward an option as the one to be taken—bear a burden of proof. Against this view, we contend that proposers have burdens of proof with respect to their (...) proposals. Specifically, we argue that, while recommenders that Φ bear a burden of proof to show that □Φ (We should / ought to / must Φ), proposers that Φ have a burden of proof to show that ◇Φ (We may / can Φ). A burden of proposing may be defined as, which reads: Those who propose that we might Φ are obliged, if called upon, to show that Φ is possible in any of four ways which we call worldly, deontic, instrumental, and practical. So understood, burdens of proposing satisfy the standard formal definition of burden of proof. (shrink)

‘Zero tolerance’ of avoidable infection events is explicit in UK and international policy documents describing strategies for the control of healthcare-associated infection. I consider what principles governing avoidable infections acquired in healthcare institutions might be reasonably rejected from the contractualist perspective of Thomas Scanlon. Many hospital infections can be cost-effectively avoided. There would seem to be additional reasons to take the prevention of avoidable infection acquired in hospitals seriously in addition to optimizing the cost-effectiveness of healthcare. These include the irretrievable (...) nature of the harm of some of the infections; the reasonable rejection of avoidable harm when the patient could not rationally consent to the risk of harm and the social consequences such as loss of trust in healthcare providers. Despite these reasons, a principle of ‘zero tolerance’ has implausible implications, promotes unrealistic patient expectations and can be reasonably rejected from the perspective of those who will suffer unacceptable opportunity costs. However, the contractualist perspective would also seem to reject a principle of tolerance of harm when there is a feasible reconfiguration of institutional arrangements that reduces the risk of harm without a redistribution of a proportionate or greater burden to others. (shrink)

We may think of principles which purport to fairly and reasonably adjudicate conflicting claims among human beings as principles of justice. To identify such principles John Rawls investigates what principles would be chosen by rational, self-interested persons who are ignorant of certain features of themselves which might be taken into account to promote their own advantage. The impartial viewpoint obtained by participants in a modified “original position” might be used, to identify principles which would reasonably and fairly adjudicate conflicting claims (...) among sentient creatures, i.e., human beings and animals. In what follows I attempt to sketch the beginnings of such a strategy, some reasons for exploring it, and conjecture as to a few of its implications for current disputes about the treatment of animals. (shrink)

In Neither Beast Nor God, Gilbert Meilaender elaborates the philosophical, social, theological, and political implications of the question of dignity, and ...

In this paper, a solution to the problem of analyzing burden of proof in argumentation is developed by building on the pioneering work of Erik C. W. Krabbe on metadialogues. Three classic cases of burden of proof disputes are analyzed, showing how metadialogue theory can solve the problems they pose. The solution is based on five dialectical requirements: (1) global burden of proof needs to be set at the confrontation stage of a dialogue, (2) there need to (...) be special mechanisms for resolving disputes about burden of proof at all four stages of the dialogue, (3) they are especially significant during the argumentation stage, where burden of proof often shifts back and forth at each move, (4) such local shifts need to be partly regulated by the global burden of proof already set, and (5) the connection between burden of proof and the speech act of making a presumption in a dialogue needs to be clarified. (shrink)

A classic objection to act-consequentialism is that it is overdemanding: it requires agents to bear too many costs for the sake of promoting the impersonal good. I develop the complementary objection that act-consequentialism is underdemanding: it fails to acknowledge that agents have moral reasons to bear certain costs themselves, even when it would be impersonally better for others to bear these costs.

In just a few years, the book became an underground classic. Neither Man Nor Beast takes Adams' thought one step further.