Journal of Social Philosophy, EarlyView.

A response to a declaration in 'Le Monde', 'Luttons efficacement contre les théories du complot' by Gérald Bronner, Véronique Campion-Vincent, Sylvain Delouvée, Sebastian Dieguez, Karen Douglas, Nicolas Gauvrit, Anthony Lantian, and Pascal Wagner-Egger, published on June the 6th, 2016.

Both Watts and Beit-Hallahmi are enthusiastic about attachment theory as an important contribution to the psychology of religion, but they raise very different criticisms regarding other aspects of the book. I respond to Beit-Hallahmi by defending my assertion that a scientific approach to psychology of religion need not lead to the conclusion, nor rest on the premise, that the beliefs under study are ontologically false. I argue further that this "veridicality trap" has deep roots in prevailing, deeply mistaken assumptions about (...) how the mind/brain works, and show how an evolutionary approach clearly exposes such reasoning as fallacious and offers a powerful, alternative perspective on the problem. In response to Watts, I defend evolutionary psychology against the charge that it is not sufficiently empirical, and argue that the computational cognitive approach he prefers should be seen as complementary to an evolutionary approach rather than an alternative to it. (shrink)

Cool Characters tells the story of American political irony from World War II to the present: how irony came to seem politically subversive for American countercultural rebels; how mainstream culture allegedly co-opted countercultural irony; how irony became part of major critical theories of postmodernism; and how -- starting in the late 1980s -- innovative writers developed an idea of "postirony" with the hope of overcoming the political limitations of postmodern irony. To chart the shift from irony to postirony, and show (...) what relationship culture has to politics, the book offers intensive analyses of important American countercultural figures: the hipster, the punk, a figure the author calls "the believer," the coolhunter, and the occupier; and new interpretations of important works by Ralph Ellison, Thomas Pynchon, William S. Burroughs, Kathy Acker, Michael Muhammad Knight, David Foster Wallace, Dave Eggers, Alex Shakar, William Gibson, Jennifer Egan, Jonathan Lethem, and Rachel Kushner."--Provided by publisher. (shrink)

We investigate how two different types of conflict (task conflict and relationship conflict) at two different levels (individual-level and team-level) influence individual team commitment. The analysis was conducted using data we collected from 193 employees in 31 branch offices of a Korean commercial bank. The relationships at multiple levels were tested using hierarchical linear modeling (HLM). The results showed that individual-level relationship conflict was negatively related to team commitment while individual-level task conflict was not. In addition, both team-level task and (...) relationship conflict were negatively associated with team commitment. Finally, only team-level relationship conflict significantly moderated the relationship between individual-level relationship conflict and team commitment. We further derive theoretical implications of these findings. (shrink)

This paper presents a critical appraisal of the recent turn in comparative religious ethics to virtue theory; it argues that the specific aspirations of virtue ethicists to make ethics more contextual, interdisciplinary, and practice-centered has in large measure failed to match the rhetoric. I suggest that the focus on the category of the human and practices associated with self-formation along with a methodology grounded in “analogical imagination” has actually poeticized the subject matter into highly abstract textual studies on normative voices (...) within traditions, largely in isolation from considerations of socio-historical context, political and institutional pressures, and the lived ethics of non-elite moral actors. I conclude with some programmatic suggestions for how the field of comparative religious ethics can move forward. (shrink)

이 논문은 데이빗 루이스의 시간적 부분 이론(temporal part theory)과 물질적 구성(material consitution)에 대한 반 인와겐의 입장에 대한 논의를 출발점으로 삼는다. 먼저 필자는 루이스의 시간적 부분이론을 반박한다. 루이스의 이론의 핵심적인 내용을 똑같이 반영(mirror)하면서도 그 이론과 상충하는 이론을 구성하고 이 두 이론 중 어느 한 쪽을 선택하는 것은 결국은 임의적인(arbitrary) 결정을 하는 것인데 이 사실은 이 두 이론 모두를 매력적이지 않게 만든다고 주장한다. 이 두 이론을 모두 거부한다면 우리는 사물을 (특별히 문제되는 사물이 ‘자아’라면 더더욱) 어디에 위치시켜야 하는지 새로운 가능성을 탐색해 보게 된다. (...) 다음으로 이 논문은 떨어지지 않은 임의적인 부분(arbitrary undetached part)에 대한 반 인와 겐의 논증을 살펴보고 그 논증을 준거점으로 삼아 물질적 구성(material consitution)에 대한 여러 논문들에 등장한 이론적 가능성을 일별한다. 필자는 이 여러 입장들 뒤에 근본적인 전제로 기능하고 있는 철학적 원자론(philosophical atomism)과 그 이론이 내포하는 환원주의적 접근이 자아가 존재하고 시간 속에 지속한다(endure through time)는 근본적인 믿음을 포함하는 ‘자아의 선차성’ 논제를 위협한다는 것을 지적하고 루이스의 이론에 대한 논의에서 얻은 결론과 결합하여, 상당히 이상해보이지만 고려해볼만한 이론적 가능성으로 자아가 시간 속에 지속하는 영차원의(zero-dimensional) 존재라는 가능성을 제기한다. (shrink)

Where Taber and Lodge view belief polarization to indicate a “partisan motivation,” Lord et al. (1979) believed it to be consistent with a desire for accuracy: A “weak” study articulating an opposing viewpoint might simply sharpen participants' initial belief of the wisdom of their prior beliefs. This polarization, Taber and Lodge show, correlates with political sophistication: The more partisan a participant, the more time spent reading the opinions of the other side—in order to critically refute them. Taber and Lodge attribute (...) such findings to people's personal identification with their beliefs. However, participants may have spent so much time reading opinions of the other side because the arguments are unfamiliar. Further, Lord et al. (1984) were able to induce people to act with “skepticism” toward their own views by simply suggesting that they “consider the other side.”. (shrink)

ABSTRACTIn the Timaeus, Plato explicitly defines time as “the moving image of eternity”. This proposition affirms actually that time reflects the eternal that embodies the rational and lawful principle – namely the logos of proportionality – in the motion and change of visible objects in the universe. In other words,time determines the principle that every mutable being must follow to participate in the rational and nomological order of existence; the absolute logos which is given by God is hence intrinsic to (...) time. This idea of time is echoed by the theories of Augustine and Husserl. Both philosophers inherited some of Plato’s metaphysical views, and each of them developed a distinctive theory of the relations between Being, time, and the absolute logos. This paper attempts to compare their theories and to defend the following claim: Augustine fo-cuses on the immutable representation of time which is regarded as the image or reflection of God’s absolute logos, and explains temporal phenome... (shrink)

In the following essay, I argue for an alternative anthropocentrism that, eschewing failed appeals to traditional moral principle, takes (a) as its point of departure the cognitive, perceptual, emotive, somatic, and epistemic conditions of our existence as members of Homo sapiens, and (b) one feature of our experience of/under these conditions particularly seriously as an avenue toward articulating this alternative, the capacity for aesthetic appreciation. To this end, I will explore, but ultimately reject philosopher Allen Carlson's ecological aesthetics, and I (...) will adopt with modification aspects of the work of Ronnie Hawkins, Val Plumwood, and Donna Haraway. My central claim is that, equipped with a better understanding of our interdependent relationship to/within human and nonhuman nature, an understanding made especially available to those who occupy situations imbued by subjugation, we can come to understand our human-centeredness not as a justification of entitlement, but as an opportunity for critical self-reflection upon those actions which endanger the ecological conditions of human and nonhuman being. I suggest, then, that developing criteria for an aesthetic appreciation ground in such a centeredness can make a vital contribution to a more ecologically defensible moral and political activism. (shrink)

Popper Proposed the criterion of falsifiability as a solution to the problem of demarcation i.e. of distinguishing science from pseudo-science and not, as many of his contemporaries in the Vienna Circle mistook it to be, a solution to the quite different problem with which they themselves were preoccupied, viz. of providing a criterion of meaning to distinguish the meaningful from the meaningless. While the positivists were concerned to damn metaphysics and exalt science, by identifying the empirically verifiable with the meaningful, (...) Popper was concerned to separate science from scientism, to damn astrology and to extol astronomy. In other words his preoccupation belongs not to the philosophy of language but to the philosophy of science. (shrink)

Without doubt, Weighing Lives, like its precursor, Weighing Goods, is an excellent and thought-provoking piece of work. In the first place, it addresses a question of the most fundamental importance, namely: how should we aggregate the well-being of past, present and future members of the human race under the various possible states of the world that may, in the event, prevail? This involves, amongst other things, dealing with questions of aggregation across time, people and different states of the world; the (...) issue of what constitutes a “neutral” state of well-being and what is, in fact, the value of continuing to survive. (shrink)

The aim of this essay is to introduce an original and radical phenomenology of life into Heidegger’s earliest lectures at Freiburg University. The motivation behind this aim lies in the exclusion of life from the existential analytic despite Heidegger’s preoccupation with the question of life during this very early period. Principally, the essay demonstrates how Husserl’s phenomenological insight into the intentionality of life has the potential to be transformed into a living aporia. Although this demonstration is set within the general (...) context of obtaining knowledge in and of life, it is achieved via a reciprocal critique of the possibility of a philosophy of life and Husserlian phenomenology to reveal the congruence life philosophy has with the project of phenomenology. In contrast to fundamental ontology, the essay ends by exposing Heidegger’s latent and inexplicit formulation of phenomenology in terms of a radical correlation that holds aporetically between living and unliving experience. (shrink)

L’objectif de cet article est de proposer une analyse de deux conceptions distinctes de la causalité chez Spinoza. Selon la première la nature-dieu serait la cause directe de toute action qui a lieu au niveau des choses finies; tandis que, selon la seconde toute action finie ferait partie d’une chaîne infinie de causes qui est répandue dans la durée. Je montre que cette causalité-ci n’est ni illusoire ni simplement derivative, contre les suggestions de plusieurs travaux récents sur Spinoza. En deuxième (...) lieu nous proposons un modèle pour la causalité consécutive qui assure la possibilité que les êtres finis puissent fonctionner comme des causes adéquates au sens spinoziste dans le champ physique. Ici l’analyse s’oppose à plusieurs chercheurs qui soutiennent qu’il existe une rupture entre les attributs de la pensée et de l’étendue dans le système spinoziste.This study addresses the problem of analyzing two distinct conceptions of causality in Spinoza. According to the first god-nature is the direct cause of every action which occurs at the level of finite things; while, according to the second , every finite action would be part of an infinite chain of causes extended into duration. I show that sequential causality is neither illusory nor simply derivative, contrary to the suggestions made by several recent studies of Spinoza. Secondly, I offer a model for sequential causality which assures the possibility that finite beings may function as adequate causes within the physical field. Here my analysis is opposed to those commentators who argue for a rupture in Spinoza between the attributes of thought and extension. (shrink)

Kierkegaard's writings contain seemingly divergent pictures of the relation of God's grace and human works. The differences are evident in the ways that he portrays the connection of human beings’ natural loving capacities to God's gracious enabling of love. What is the relation of human affiliative dispositions, such as attachment to family and friends, to the more extraordinary forms of Christian love, such as loving strangers, enemies, and God? Kierkegaard sometimes stressed the continuity of natural loves and God's grace and (...) sometimes their discontinuity because in different contexts he was pursuing different edifying purposes. On the one hand, he emphasized the continuity of the two when he was attempting to stimulate the appropriate yearning that is a precondition for welcoming God's grace. On the other hand, elsewhere he stressed the difference of the natural loves and Christian love in order to foster an appreciation for the uniqueness and gratuity of God's self-giving. (shrink)

Kierkegaard’s texts suggest countervailing construals of the respective roles of divine and human agency in an individual’s pursuit of blessedness. Kierkegaard paradoxically suggests that the individual must depend entirely on grace for the birth and development of faith, and at the same time actively cultivate faithful dispositions and passions. But Kierkegaard did not espouse Calvinistic divine determinism, or Pelagian autonomous human agency, or the Arminian cooperation of the two. For Kierkegaard, the ostensible paradox of grace and free will is not (...) a cognitive conundrum but is rather a challenge to integrate faith as a gift and faith as a task. (shrink)

This book argues that Kierkegaard, influenced by Kant's critique of metaphysics, did not attempt to integrate human and divine agencies in any speculative theory. Instead, Kierkegaard deploys them to encourage different passions and dispositions that can be integrated in a coherent human life.

Benson: Certain logical principles govern explanations of human behavior: alleged causes must actually occur before their effects; men must be aware of events that allegedly affect them; explanations must jibe with generalizations about behavior and have intrinsic plausibility. Historians often neglect these principles. The best example is analysis of public opinion. Comparison of Thucydides with the historiography of the American Civil War shows both must assess public feeling on specific issues at a given time and place; but historians lack the (...) tools to do this, and have recourse to dubious assumptions . Sometimes even the principle of chronological priority is violated. Consistent application of the four logical principles above would at least narrow the range of potentially verifiable explanations and consequent disagreement.Strout: Specification of a "fundamental cause" of the Civil War or other events is best construed as a retrospective observation that the cited 16cause" figures centrally in some reconstructed story. Historians explain through stories, narrations, which aim at comprehending the dramatic "logic" of a sequence of events rather than at scientific explanation. At worst general questions of causality are an irrelevant source of interminable disagreement, at best a stimulus to research, potentially resulting in a more coherent story and increased understanding. Causal accounts seem indispensable largely because explanations often involve purposes and reasons in causal disguise. (shrink)

Unlike natural agents, artificial agents are, to varying extent, designed according to sets of principles or assumptions. We argue that the designer’s philosophical position on truth, belief and knowledge has far reaching implications for the design and performance of the resulting agents. Of the many sources of design information and background we believe philosophical theories are under-rated as valuable influences on the design process. To explore this idea we have implemented some computer-based agents with their control algorithms inspired by two (...) strongly contrasting philosophical positions. A series of experiments on these agents shows that, despite having common tasks and goals, the behaviour of the agents is markedly different and this can be attributed to their individual approaches to belief and knowledge. We discuss these findings and their support for the view that epistemological theories have a particular relevance for artificial agent design. (shrink)