There is a natural view of nonsense, which owes what attraction it has to the apparent absence of alternatives. In Frege and Wittgenstein there is a view which goes against the natural one, and the purpose of this paper is to establish that it is a possible view of nonsense.

Questions about perception remain some of the most difficult and insoluble in both epistemology and in the philosophy of mind. This controversial but highly accessible introduction to the area explores the philosophical importance of those questions by re-examining what had until recent times been the most popular theory of perception - the sense-datum theory. Howard Robinson surveys the history of the arguments for and against the theory from Descartes to Husserl. He then shows that the objections to the theory, (...) particularly Wittgenstein's attack on privacy and those of the physicalists, have been unsuccessful. He argues that we should return to the theory sense-data in order to understand perception. In doing so he seeks to overturn a consensus that has dominated the philosophy of perception for nearly half a century. (shrink)

The chapter introduces and characterizes the notion of fittingness. It charts the history of the relation and its relevance to contemporary debates in normative and metanormative philosophy and proceeds to survey issues to do with fittingness covered in the volume’s chapters, including the nature and epistemology of fittingness, the relations between fittingness and reasons, the normativity of fittingness, fittingness and value theory, and the role of fittingness in theorizing about responsibility. The chapter concludes with a brief discussion of issues to (...) do with fittingness that aren’t covered extensively by the volume’s chapters in order to indicate avenues for further research. (shrink)

While it is tempting to suppose that an act has moral worth just when and because it is motivated by sufficient moral reasons, philosophers have, largely, come to doubt this analysis. Doubt is rooted in two claims. The first is that some facts can motivate a given act in multiple ways, not all of which are consistent with moral worth. The second is the orthodox view that normative reasons are facts. I defend the tempting analysis by proposing and defending a (...) heterodox account of both normative and motivating reasons that is inspired by Donald Davidson’s primary reasons. We should adopt the heterodox view, I argue, because it addresses an overlooked but fatal defect in the orthodox conception of reasons, of which challenges to the tempting analysis are a special case. (shrink)

Howard J. Curzer - Aristotle's Painful Path to Virtue - Journal of the History of Philosophy 40:2 Journal of the History of Philosophy 40.2 141-162 Aristotle's Painful Path to Virtue Howard J. Curzer [P]unishment . . . is a kind of cure . . . . We think young people should be prone to shame . . . . 1. Two Questions FOR ARISTOTLE, THE GOAL OF MORAL development is, of course, to become virtuous. Aristotle provides a partial (...) description of the virtuous person in the following familiar passage. The virtuous person performing virtuous acts, must have knowledge, secondly he must choose the acts, and choose them for their own sakes, and thirdly his actions must proceed from a firm and unchangeable character. By my count, this passage lists five components of virtue. Presumably, the virtuous agent's knowledge consists in true beliefs concerning which acts are virtuous plus a correct account of why they are virtuous. Virtue thus includes both the ability to identify which acts are virtuous in a given situation and an understanding of why they are virtuous. Choice is deliberate desire, so choosing virtuous acts is a combination of determining and desiring virtuous acts. People want to carry out virtuous acts for various reasons. For example, some choose virtuous acts merely because they are fashionable or instrumentally valuable. But Aristotle specifies that the virtuous person desires virtuous acts for their.. (shrink)

This paper explores the financial reporting scandals of the past decade and the resulting U.S. legislative attempts to impose ethical behavior and control the incidence of new reporting problems via the Sarbanes-Oxley legislation. We begin with a brief historical perspective followed by assertions of ethical consequences of legislation with discussions of key recent corporate scandals, the motives for the frauds, and the consequences. Ethics related provisions of the Sarbanes-Oxley Act are discussed with the potential impact of the legislation on the (...) likelihood of similar future frauds and accompanying prognosis for future corporate ethical behavior. (shrink)

This study looks at the relationship between the two thinkers and demonstrates the viable alternative to Hobbes' orthodoxy that can be found in Kant's political writings. It also shows how Kant anticipated the development of a world-wide political order.

When people are making certain medical decisions – especially potentially transformative ones – the specter of regret may color their choices. In this paper, I ask: can predicting that we will regret a decision in the future serve any justificatory role in our present decision-making? And if so, what role? While there are many pitfalls to such reasoning, I ultimately conclude that considering future retrospective emotions like regret in our decisionmaking can be both rational and authentic. Rather than indicating that (...) one is about to make a mistake or that there is some underlying value that one already cares about but is overlooking, the prediction that one will regret a decision in the future makes one confront how her present values and priorities may change as a result of her choice in ways she cannot presently anticipate. (shrink)

Philosophers have recently come to focus on explaining the phenomenon of ​bad beliefs,​ beliefs that are apparently true and well-evidenced but nevertheless objectionable. Despite this recent focus, a consensus is already forming around a particular explanation of these beliefs’ badness called ​moral encroachment​, according to which, roughly, the moral stakes engendered by bad beliefs make them particularly difficult to justify. This paper advances an alternative account not just of bad beliefs but of bad attitudes more generally according to which bad (...) beliefs’ badness originates not in a failure of sufficient evidence but in a failure to respond adequately to reasons. I motivate this alternative account through an analogy to recent discussions of moral worth centered on the well-known grocer case from Kant’s ​Groundwork​, and by showing that this analogy permits the proposed account to generalize to bad attitudes beyond belief. The paper concludes by contrasting the implications of moral encroachment and of the proposed account for bad attitudes’ blameworthiness. (shrink)

In this essay I draw on the work of novelist J. M. Coetzee and philosophers Cora Diamond, Stanley Cavell, and Stephen Mulhall to reflect on what it might mean to do Christian ethics without denying the "difficulty of reality." I then turn to John Howard Yoder's 1987 SCE presidential address to show how his call to see history doxologically enables the Christian to acknowledge the "difficulty of reality" without succumbing to despair. To acknowledge humanity's limitations without falling into (...) despair or hopeless skepticism is only possible because the community founded on the crucified and risen Lord means we never bear reality alone. (shrink)

The aim of this paper is to bring the resources of virtue epistemology to bear on the issue of the epistemic objectivity of science. A distinction is made between theoretical virtues that may be possessed by scientific theories and epistemic virtues that may be exercised by individual scientists. A distinction is then made between ontological objectivity, objectivity of truth and epistemic objectivity, the latter being the principal focus of the paper. It is then noted that a role must be played (...) by deliberative judgement in determining how to apply the theoretical virtues. It is suggested that such judgement may be virtuous in light of the exercise of the epistemic virtues. It is argued that the primary location of epistemic objectivity is the theoretical virtues, whereas the epistemic virtues of scientists play a subordinate role. (shrink)

I look at a disagreement between Elizabeth Anscombe, on the one hand, and Peter Winch and Ilham Dilman, on the other, about whether it is legitimate to call something an error that counts as knowledge within some alien system of belief; and I look also at the question what Wittgenstein's view was. I try to show that our understanding of what is real cannot be adequately elucidated if we consider only its role within language‐games, and I argue that an important (...) element in our thinking about what is and is not real emerges in our response to conflicting modes of thought. (shrink)

This article advocates a naturalist and realist ethics of solidarity. Specifically, it argues that human needs should be met; and that they should be met in harmony with the environment. Realism should include respect for existing cultures and the morals presently being practiced – with reasonable exceptions. Dignity must come in a form understood and appreciated by the person whose dignity is being respected. It is also argued that naturalist ethics are needed to combat liberal ethics, not least because the (...) latter supports today’s inflexible and dysfunctional institutions. In arguing for these positions, reference is made to the naturalist realist ethics of Georges Canguilhem, C.H. Waddington, John Dewey and David Sloan Wilson, all of whom embed the social order in the natural order. (shrink)

The idea of a fundamental difference between humans and animals may be used to justify subordinating animals to human interests. The presupposition that may need to be examined is that the moral relation to animals must be based on some fundamental property. Much of the discussion concerning animal awareness is framed in Cartesian terms, suggesting that a different perspective might be helpful in improving human-animal relationships and understanding.

This paper explores Sean Kirkland’s thesis that relation is the fundamental concept in Aristotelian political philosophy. While substance is prior to relation in Aristotle’s metaphysics, Kirkland argues that since the human exists only in the context of a city which is defined by the essential diversity of views on the human good, relation precedes substantial unity in politics. I argue that the priority of the substantial unity of the city should not be seen to threaten the importance of political relations. (...) Already in his theoretical ontology, Aristotle sees relation as absolutely essential and integral to the identity and existence of any mortal individual. Because of the essentially dynamic and relational activity of any mortal substance, the city as political substance must include and preserve deep diversity and difference within itself. The priority of the substantial over the relational, which makes possible the constitutive power of relations in the life of substances, is as operative in politics as it is in metaphysics. (shrink)

This paper explores Sean Kirkland’s thesis that relation is the fundamental concept in Aristotelian political philosophy. While substance is prior to relation in Aristotle’s metaphysics, Kirkland argues that since the human exists only in the context of a city which is defined by the essential diversity of views on the human good, relation precedes substantial unity in politics. I argue that the priority of the substantial unity of the city should not be seen to threaten the importance of political relations. (...) Already in his theoretical ontology, Aristotle sees relation as absolutely essential and integral to the identity and existence of any mortal individual. Because of the essentially dynamic and relational activity of any mortal substance, the city as political substance must include and preserve deep diversity and difference within itself. The priority of the substantial over the relational, which makes possible the constitutive power of relations in the life of substances, is as operative in politics as it is in metaphysics. (shrink)

The wrong kind of reason (WKR) problem is a problem for attempts to analyze normative properties using only facts about the balance of normative reasons, a style of analysis on which the ‘Reasons First’ programme depends. I argue that this problem cannot be solved if the orthodox view of reasons is true --- that is, if each normative reason is numerically identical with some fact, proposition, or state-of-affairs. That’s because solving the WKR problem requires completely distinguishing between the right- and (...) wrong-kind reasons for an attitude. I argue that some facts give both right- and wrong-kind reasons for an attitude. Consequently, no such distinction between the two types of reasons is complete if reasons are facts or the like. I conclude by suggesting that reasons and facts are related by constitution, not identity. (shrink)

Those arguing that conscientious objection in medicine should be declared unethical by professional societies face the following challenge: conscientious objection can function as an important reforming mechanism when it involves health care workers refusing to participate in certain medical interventions deemed standard of care and legally sanctioned but which undermine patients’ rights. In such cases, the argument goes, far from being unethical, conscientious objection may actually be a professional duty. I examine this sort of challenge and ultimately argue that these (...) acts of conscience done in the interest of reforming professional norms or medical regulations are best understood as episodes of civil disobedience rather than episodes of conscientious objection. In contrast to the private, exempting nature of conscientious objection, civil disobedience is a public breach of a norm or law undertaken with the aim of bringing about a change in governmental policies or professional standards. Consequently, clinicians may have a duty to engage in civil disobedience even while professional societies are right to declare limitations on the ethical appropriateness of conscientious objection. (shrink)

Vision consists of four essays: “Seeing distance,” “Size,” “Perceptual inference,” and “A Gibsonian alternative?” The continuous thread is the Berkeleian treatment of the perception of spatial properties, particularly in connection with what is and is not “immediately perceived.” The first two essays are closely connected with specific Berkeleian arguments and modern responses to them. The second two essays deal more generally with modern discussions by psychologists of whether visual perception is “direct” or “indirect.” The claims on the cover that the (...) book is “unique in its blend of philosophical and historical perspectives on contemporary issues in vision studies” and that it is “clearly written” and suitable “for an interdisciplinary readership in philosophy of mind, philosophy of science, cognitive psychology and history of science” are all entirely justified. (shrink)

The practice of “lectio divina”–-devotional reading of the biblical text–-is popular these days. While people have explored this practice within Roman Catholic history, little research has been conducted regarding the character of devotional Bible-reading within evangelical traditions and its relationship to what is currently identified as lectio divina. The present article seeks to offer some reflections regarding the practice of devotional Bible-reading in evangelical Christianity and to do so using the categories commonly employed to describe lectio divina. First, it will (...) demonstrate how the devotional reading of Scripture has been regarded as a recognized spiritual practice in the history of evangelical Christianity, a practice that was expected to be employed in association with certain attitudes and assumptions. Next, the article examines the each of the elements of classical lectio divina–-reading, meditation, prayer, contemplation, and action. Finally, the article concludes by offering a few suggestions regarding more recent developments in evangelicalism and on the use of the practice of devotional Bible reading today. (shrink)