Affirmative action has been a particularly contentious policy issue that has polarised contributions to the debate. Over recent times in most western countries, support for affirmative action has, however, been largely snuffed out or beaten into retreat and replaced by the concept of ‹diversity management’. Thus, any contemporary study that examines the development of affirmative action would suggest that its opponents have won the battle. Nonetheless, this article argues that because the battle has been won on dubious ethical grounds it (...) is important that we do not allow affirmative action to sink unnoticed. This article explores and challenges the ethical and philosophical underpinnings of opponents’ views and finds their cases against affirmative action are not ethically sound. The article concludes there are strong ethical grounds for those organisations which seek to do well, to reassert affirmative action programmes in the global efforts to eradicate systemic discrimination and disadvantage. (shrink)

The Monarchia, Dante's treatise on political theory, addresses the fundamental question of what form of political organisation best suits human nature; it embodies a political vision of startling originality and power, and illuminates the intellectual interests and achievements of one of the world's great poets. The whole text is here presented in a new translation, the first for forty years, based on a more up-to-date and scholarly version of the Latin original than has previously been available. The translation, together with (...) accompanying introduction and notes, has been prepared by Prue Shaw. In this new and accessible form, the Monarchia will interest not only Dante specialists, but also students of literary studies, political history and philosophy. (shrink)

Recent years have seen a renewed debate over the importance of groupselection, especially as it relates to the evolution of altruism. Onefeature of this debate has been disagreement over which kinds ofprocesses should be described in terms of selection at multiple levels,within and between groups. Adapting some earlier discussions, we presenta mathematical framework that can be used to explore the exactrelationships between evolutionary models that do, and those that donot, explicitly recognize biological groups as fitness-bearing entities.We show a fundamental set (...) of mathematical equivalences between these twokinds of models, one of which applies a form of multi-level selectiontheory and the other being a form of ``individualism.'' However, we alsoargue that each type of model can have heuristic advantages over theother. Indeed, it can be positively useful to engage in a kind ofback-and-forth switching between two different perspectives on theevolutionary role of groups. So the position we defend is a``gestalt-switching pluralism.''. (shrink)

Despite the fact that animal behavior involves a particularly powerful form of niche construction, few researchers have considered how the environmental impact of behavior may feed back to influence the evolution of the cognitive underpinnings of behavior. I explore a model that explicitly incorporates niche construction while tracking cognitive evolution. Agents and their stimuli are modeled as coevolving populations. The agents are born with “weights” attached to behaviors in a repertoire. Further, these agents are able to change these weights based (...) on previous success and an inherited learning parameter. Both the agent and the stimulus receive payoffs through a behavioral interaction . The behaving agent exhibits niche construction through its effects on stimuli , which can feed back to influence the value of different cognitive strategies. Here I focus on two forms of niche construction: the stimulus and responding agent have common interests and the stimulus and agent have dissimilar interests . The form of niche construction qualitatively affects cognitive evolution . Given a mutualism between the stimulus and responding agent, rapid learning and “fixed” behavioral distributions evolve. Given an antagonism between the stimulus and agent, slower learning and “flexible” behavioral distributions evolve. I discuss these results in light of findings from the fields of ethology, psychology, and evolutionary ecology. (shrink)

The importance and urgency of using ethical principles in the creation and content of climate change policy is well recognised. This article closely examines the World Conservation Union’s (IUCN) engagement in ethical elements of international climate policy for abatement. The primary finding is the use of narrow framing around ‘nature based solutions’. The IUCNs’ own policy references to ethical principles such as fairness and justice are not adequately applied to the content of policy or to its critique. Recommendations are made (...) on how the IUCN (and NGOs generally) could enhance its ethical engagement to act consistently with the claim of moral leadership. (shrink)

Accounting educators are being called on to provide a greater emphasis on ethics education. This paper examines three important issues concerning ethics education in accounting. First, the question of whether ethics can indeed be taught is examined. Next, several innovative approaches are presented which have been used by accounting educators to integrate ethics into the classroom. Finally, results of a survey of students concerning their perspectives of ethical issues in accounting education, the accounting profession, and society at large are presented (...) and discussed. Survey results reveal that students consider a lack of ethics damaging to the accounting profession and society. Results also indicate that accounting students are seeking ethical and moral direction. (shrink)

Philosophies of creation -- The agent of creation -- The meaning of creation -- The causality of creation -- The object of creation -- The history of creation -- The end of creation.

This book contains a collection of selected papers from the 2017 Farm-to-Plate: Uniting for a Just and Sustainable Food System conference in Ithaca, New York, which explored what different advocates, stakeholders, growers, and community members today prioritize when it comes to justice, action, and transformation in the agri-food system. The research presented at this symposium shows the diverse range of approaches scientists have taken to investigate this aforementioned question. The papers represent a combined effort to creatively educate, share, and connect (...) work being done by stakeholders on food system transformation. Previously published in Agriculture and Human Values Volume 36, issue 4, December 2019. (shrink)

For both Spinoza and Santayana, freedom consists in a partial autonomy (enjoyed by a few) firmly situated within a naturalistic system; this makes no appeal to indetermination (although Santayana does not embrace determinism). Both have an earnest skepticism about the reliability of the conscious will and its place in free agency. Instead, they adopt a more classical account of freedom in terms of self-knowledge and reason. Despite many differences, their accounts of freedom draw close together for those obeying the dictates (...) of reason or leading a life of reason. For both, this leads to a measure of spirituality. (shrink)

Objective: To examine lay persons’ ability to identify methods of random allocation and their acceptability of using methods of random allocation in a clinical trial context.Design: Leaflets containing hypothetical medical, non-medical, and clinical trial scenarios involving random allocation, using material from guidelines for trial information leaflets.Setting and participants: Adults attending further education colleges , covering a wide range of ages, occupations, and levels of education.Main measures: Judgements of whether each of five methods of allocation to two groups was random in (...) a medical or non-medical scenario. Judgements of whether these allocation methods were acceptable in a randomised clinical trial scenario, with or without a scientific justification for randomisation.Results: The majority of our group of participants judged correctly that allowing people their preference was not random, and that the following were random: using a computer with no information about the individual , tossing a coin, drawing a name out of a hat. Judgements were split over allocating people in turn . Judgements were no different in medical and non-medical scenarios. Few of the correctly identified random methods were judged to be acceptable in a clinical trial scenario. Inclusion of a scientific justification for randomising significantly increased the acceptability of only one random method: allocation by computer.Conclusions: Current UK guidelines’ recommended description of random allocation by computer seems warranted. However, while potential trial participants may understand what random allocation means, they may find it unacceptable unless offered an acceptable justification for its use. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:The Summa Contra Gentiles and Aquinas's Way to GodGaven KerrThere is to be found in Aquinas's writings a way to God which is his own and most personal. This way to God is the way from existence (esse) and arrives at God as pure existence itself, the fount of all being, without which nothing would be. It is deployed in several contexts ranging from the De ente et essentia (...) to the Summa theologiae [ST]. Yet, in the Summa contra gentiles [SCG], it is peculiarly absent. The proofs of God's existence which Aquinas offers in the latter are almost exclusively drawn from Aristotle, and they do not exhibit any of the refined metaphysical thinking about esse that characterizes Thomas's thinking about God in other works.1 For a work that is intended to be both apologetical in nature and explicitly philosophical from the outset, this is strange. Thomas is always at home in his own metaphysics of esse, and he deploys it with ease and finesse especially when demonstrating God's existence and discussing the divine nature. But in the SCG his proofs of God's existence and the subsequent reasoning about the divine nature are awkward and, one could even say, clumsy. Why did he not just dispense with the Aristotelian thinking on motion and movers and all the clarifications that involves? Why not simply stick with his own favored account of act and potency interpreted in terms of the metaphysics of esse?In the current paper I wish to address these issues. I shall begin with an account of what I take to be Aquinas's way to God and why I think it is [End Page 1273] his way to God. Having done that, I will then address the issue as to why this way to God does not appear in the SCG reasoning, but slowly emerges only after God's existence has been demonstrated. I shall conclude that the apologetical and consciously philosophical nature of the SCG offer us an insight into why Thomas did not lean on his metaphysics of esse in his (initial) discussions of God there.Aquinas's Way to GodAquinas famously argues that there is a distinction between essence and esse in things. The context of this distinction is that of universal hylemorphism, which holds that in all composite things there are two principles: a principle of potency and a principle of actuality. In traditional Aristotelian fashion, defenders of universal hylemorphism held that the principle of actuality in a thing is its form, whereas the principle of potency is its matter.2 All things other than God are composed of matter and form, since all things other than God have some element of potency. But to locate the potentiality of anything other than God in the matter of the thing creates a problem when it comes to separated substances (angels) and the immaterial rational soul. Such substances (or components of substances in the case of the rational soul) are taken to be separated from matter and all material conditions. Nonetheless they are created and thereby dependent on God, so they must have some potentiality.So how do we attribute matter—that is, potency—to separate substances?According to defenders of universal hylemorphism, the answer is to distinguish between corporeal matter and incorporeal matter. The former is the kind of physical matter that we typically take to be the matter of things, whereas the latter is a kind of non-physical matter which the separate substances possess. Thus, it is not proper to say that such substances are [End Page 1274] immaterial, but rather that whilst material they are incorporeal. Universal hylemorphism has the advantage that it neatly distinguishes all things from God by isolating a principle of potency (matter) which all things other than God have. Nevertheless, universal hylemorphism presents problems of its own, not least the thorny one of making intelligible just what exactly a real (as opposed to conceptual) kind of matter is that is incorporeal.Aquinas for his part rejected universal hylemorphism from his earliest writings.3 He holds that it is precisely because separated substances are separated from all material conditions that... (shrink)

A number of recent discussions have argued that George Price's equationfor representing evolutionary change is a powerful and illuminatingtool, especially in the context of debates about multiple levels ofselection. Our paper dissects Price's equation in detail, and comparesit to another statistical tool: the calculation and comparison ofaverage fitnesses. The relations between Price's equation and equationsfor evolutionary change using average fitness are closer than issometimes supposed. The two approaches achieve a similar kind ofstatistical summary of one generation of change, and they (...) achieve thisvia a similar loss of information about the underlying fitnessstructure. (shrink)

New Blackfriars, Volume 102, Issue 1101, Page 772-794, September 2021.

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Dei Filius III:On FaithGaven KerrThe First Vatican council offers a straightforward, traditional, some might say perfunctory account of faith in its short chapter dedicated to the issue. Were it not for the particular stage in the history of thought out of which the Council emerged, one would be tempted to say that the chapter on faith is an exercise in Scholastic theology, recognizable to those who are familiar with (...) the treatment of the same in many of the Scholastic doctors, especially Aquinas. However, given the movement of thought in the nineteenth century, especially the emergence and predominance of certain philosophical views about human nature and the self, the chapter on faith not only (re)articulates a highly traditional account of the nature of faith but also envisages an account of man without which such an account of faith would be impossible.1In this essay, I propose to do two things. Firstly, I will set out Aquinas's account of faith and connect it with the Council's account of the same. Secondly, I will show that this account of faith is incompatible with modern accounts of man which present him as a disunified and disengaged self. Having done that I will conclude that in order to honor the Council's account of faith, we need to return to a pre-modern view of man in which he is seen in his engaged unity. [End Page 855]On FaithChapter 3 of Dei Filius is devoted to faith. Therein the Council document affirms a number of traditional tenets pertaining to faith that can be seen defended in the thought of St. Thomas Aquinas; indeed, one might argue that the text on faith is an engagement with and refinement of Aquinas's thought on the same.2Aquinas holds that faith is a particular habit of mind by which we are disposed to believe the things of God because they are from God. As we shall see, this habit of mind has God for its object, in which case it cannot be developed in us by natural reason or practice, but comes as a gift, a grace from God. Thus, the one who has faith is already in a relationship with God, since, in accepting the gift of faith from God, the faithful is not resistant to God. Faith is the beginning of the spiritual life, whereby the truth about what is revealed is accepted by the faithful and offers a glimpse of the vision of God that will be enjoyed by the blessed.3For Thomas, the formal object of faith is the first truth—God in himself—whereas its material objects are those things which pertain to God.4 The reason why God, the first truth, is the object of faith, is because formally speaking faith assents to something only because it has been revealed by God. Hence, the divine truth is the object on which the assent of faith is based. The other things of faith come under its assent because they are related to God in some way.5 [End Page 856]As the object of faith, this first truth is not an object of vision, for we do not have a direct and immediate intuition of God. Rather, faith's object is unseen (Heb 11:1). As something assented to but unseen, the intellect is not compelled by the certainty of what is seen, as in normal epistemic circumstances. Hence, there is required an act of the will by which the assent is willed rather than drawn by the natural light of the intellect itself.6 The act of faith then is a willed assent to those things about God which are not seen by the natural light of human reason. This assent is accompanied by certainty given that it is the first truth which moves the will to command the intellect to assent.7 The certitude of faith then does not lie in the intellect's being compelled by the evidence, but in the will's attachment to God as the good itself.8On the basis of the foregoing, there are three different modes by which the object of faith can... (shrink)

Formal methods developed for modeling levels of selection problems have recently been applied to the investigation of major evolutionary transitions. We discuss two new tools of this kind. First, the ‘near-variant test’ can be used to compare the causal adequacy of predictively equivalent representations. Second, ‘state-variable gestalt-switching’ can be used to gain a useful dual perspective on evolutionary processes that involve both higher and lower level populations.

Altruism is generally understood to be behavior that benefits others at a personal cost to the behaving individual. However, within evolutionary biology, different authors have interpreted the concept of altruism differently, leading to dissimilar predictions about the evolution of altruistic behavior. Generally, different interpretations diverge on which party receives the benefit from altruism and on how the cost of altruism is assessed. Using a simple trait-group framework, we delineate the assumptions underlying different interpretations and show how they relate to one (...) another. We feel that a thorough examination of the connections between interpretations not only reveals why different authors have arrived at disparate conclusions about altruism, but also illuminates the conditions that are likely to favor the evolution of altruism. (shrink)

Positive education seeks to enhance wellbeing in schools by establishing a culture where success is measured in terms of happiness. This goal aligns well with Dewey’s educational philosophy, which espouses the importance of a positive school experience in the nurturing of good citizenship and the creation of a harmonious community. Dewey’s ideas and those expressed within the field of positive education, however, diverge on some aspects of their approach to education and, importantly, in their perspective on the role of philosophy (...) in science. This thesis explores the possibility of a Deweyan contribution to positive education and advances the argument that embracing Dewey’s ethics and epistemology will augment efforts to create a culture of wellbeing in schools. Specifically, this thesis argues that Dewey’s work may contribute a perspective on the complementary role of philosophy and science; suggest an experiential pedagogy that contends with the nature of subjective experience; contribute a social focus that prioritizes the common good; and provide a unified philosophical stance on the purpose of schooling. These contributions may, however modestly, address concerns expressed by writers from within and outside of positive psychology about challenges such as a need for a more philosophical approach, the effects of psychology in education, the difficulties with avoiding normative content in order to remain scientific, the problem of subjective experience, the perceived focus on individualism, and the implication that positive psychology may be a fad. Ultimately, by creating a dialogue between positive education and the work of Dewey, this thesis seeks to elicit thinking about the possibility of a Deweyan contribution to both the theory and practice of positive education. (shrink)

A central question, if not the central question, of philosophy of perception is whether sensory states have a nature similar to thoughts about the world, whether they are essentially representational. According to the content view, at least some of our sensory states are, at their core, representations with contents that are either accurate or inaccurate. Tyler Burge’s Origins of Objectivity is the most sustained and sophisticated defense of the content view to date. His defense of the view is problematic in (...) several ways. The most significant problem is that his approach does not sit well with mainstream perceptual psychology. (shrink)

There is a strong case to be made for thinking that an obscure logic, KR, is better than classical logic and better than any relevant logic. The argument for KR over relevant logics is that KR counts disjunctive syllogism valid, and this is the biggest complaint about relevant logics. The argument for KR over classical logic depends on the normativity of logic and the paradoxes of implication. The paradoxes of implication are taken by relevant logicians to justify relevant logic, but (...) considerations on the normativity of logic show that only some of the paradoxes of implication are genuine. KR avoids all the genuine paradoxes of implication, unlike classical logic. Overall, KR avoids the genuine paradoxes of implication and avoids the major objection to relevant logics. This combination of features provides strong reason to give KR a place in the conversation about the right logic. (shrink)

Fergus Kerr's study - which is derived from his highly-regarded Stanton Lectures, delivered in the University of Cambridge in 1994/5 - focuses on the more or less obvious theological commitments of several much-discussed contemporary philosophers. By so doing, the author daringly extends the agenda of what is usually considered to be 'philosophy of religion.'. The ramifications of his study are extensive: even if philosophy is not at bottom theology, as von Balthasar once claimed, the theological preconceptions in much modern (...) philosophy would seem to deserve considerably more attention than they have received hitherto. (shrink)

In this paper I seek to consider the project of analytical Thomism with particular regard to Aquinas’s metaphysics of esse. My overall conclusion is that Thomas’s thought on esse is part and parcel of a way of philosophizing that is alien to analytical philosophy and is such that analytical philosophy is constitutionally unable to come to terms with it. In order to argue for such a conclusion, I begin with a presentation of Aquinas’s metaphysics of esse. I then respond to (...) the objection that arguably some analytical philosophers have already arrived at the same thought at which Aquinas arrived, thereby blocking the way to my denial of the possibility of an encounter between analytical philosophy and Thomist esse. Having removed that obstacle, I argue that analytical philosophy is constitutionally unable to come to terms with Thomist esse. (shrink)

How to engage farmers that have limited formal education is at the foundation of environmentally-sound and equitable agricultural development. Yet there are few examples of curricula that support the co-development of knowledge with farmers. While transdisciplinary and participatory techniques are considered key components of agroecology, how to do so is rarely specified and few materials are available, especially those relevant to smallholder farmers with limited formal education in Sub-Saharan Africa. The few training materials that exist provide appropriate methods, such as (...) compost making, but do not explain relationships and synergies between nutrition, social inequalities, climate change and agroecology. Some food sovereignty and agroecology courses aim at popular political education for those with more formal education. Here we describe the process of development of an innovative curriculum, which integrates agroecology, nutrition, climate change, gender and other dimensions of social equity across 2 weeks of training explicitly for smallholders in southern Africa with limited formal education. The curriculum is highly participatory; we use concepts in popular education, transformative and experiential-based learning, and theatre. It is also integrative; we link agroecology with climate change, human and soil nutrition, gender, and related components of social equity. Developed in partnership with Malawian farmers, community development experts and academics from five countries, the curriculum was piloted with 520 smallholder farming households in Malawi and Tanzania, and evaluated using qualitative techniques. Clashes of language, cultural norms, and terminology were as great of a challenge as agreeing on and conveying technical information, to weave into a coherent whole. However, farmers who participated in the curriculum training demonstrated high interest, comprehension of material and interest in immediate application to their lives. (shrink)

The emergence of individuality during the evolutionary transition from single cells to multicellularity poses a range of problems. A key issue is how variation in lower‐level individuals generates a corporate (collective) entity with Darwinian characteristics. Of central importance to this process is the evolution of a means of collective reproduction, however, the evolution of a means of collective reproduction is not a trivial issue, requiring careful consideration of mechanistic details. Calling upon observations from experiments, we draw attention to proto‐life cycles (...) that emerge via unconventional routes and that transition, in single steps, individuality to higher levels. One such life cycle arises from conflicts among levels of selection and invokes cheats as a primitive germ line: it lays the foundation for collective reproduction, the basis of a self‐policing system, the selective environment for the emergence of development, and hints at a plausible origin for a soma/germ line distinction. (shrink)

Much of the developing world, including Kenya, is rapidly urbanizing. Rising food and fuel prices in recent years have put the food security of the urban poor in a precarious position. In cities worldwide, urban agriculture helps some poor people gain access to food, but urban agriculture is less common in densely populated slums that lack space. In the Kibera slums of Nairobi, Kenya, households have recently begun a new form of urban agriculture called sack gardening in which vegetables such (...) as kale and Swiss chard are planted into large sacks filled with topsoil. This paper examines relationships among sack gardening, social capital, and food security in Kibera. We used a mixed methods approach, combining qualitative interviews with a household survey, as well as focus group discussions with both farmers and non-farmers. We present evidence that sack gardening increases social capital, especially for those households that undertake sack gardening in groups. We also find that sack gardening in the Kibera slums has a positive impact on household food security by improving household dietary diversity and by reducing the need to resort to painful coping mechanisms that are used during food shortages. (shrink)

Issues of balancing data accessibility with ethical considerations and governance of a genomics research biobank, Generation Scotland, are explored within the evolving policy landscape of the past ten years. During this time data sharing and open data access have become increasingly important topics in biomedical research. Decisions around data access are influenced by local arrangements for governance and practices such as linkage to health records, and the global through policies for biobanking and the sharing of data with large-scale biomedical research (...) data resources and consortia. We use a literature review of policy relevant documents which apply to the conduct of biobanks in two areas: support for open access and the protection of data subjects and researchers managing a bioresource. We present examples of decision making within a biobank based upon observations of the Generation Scotland Access Committee. We reflect upon how the drive towards open access raises ethical dilemmas for established biorepositories containing data and samples from human subjects. Despite much discussion in science policy literature about standardisation, the contextual aspects of biobanking are often overlooked. Using our engagement with GS we demonstrate the importance of local arrangements in the creation of a responsive ethical approach to biorepository governance. We argue that governance decisions regarding access to the biobank are intertwined with considerations about maintenance and viability at the local level. We show that in addition to the focus upon ever more universal and standardised practices, the local expertise gained in the management of such repositories must be supported. A commitment to open access in genomics research has found almost universal backing in science and health policy circles, but repositories of data and samples from human subjects may have to operate under managed access, to protect privacy, align with participant consent and ensure that the resource can be managed in a sustainable way. Data access committees need to be reflexive and flexible, to cope with changing technology and opportunities and threats from the wider data sharing environment. To understand these interactions also involves nurturing what is particular about the biobank in its local context. (shrink)

In recent years, the idea has been gaining ground that our traditional conceptions of knowledge and cognition are unduly limiting, in that they privilege what goes on inside the ‘skin and skull’ of an individual reasoner. Instead, it has been argued, knowledge and cognition need to be understood as embodied, situated, and extended. Whether these various interrelations and dependencies are ‘merely’ causal, or are in a more fundamental sense constitutive of knowledge and cognition, is as much a matter of controversy (...) as the degree to which they pose a challenge to ‘traditional’ conceptions of cognition, knowledge and the mind. In this paper we argue that when the idea of ‘extendedness’ is applied to a core concept in epistemology and the philosophy of science—namely, scientific evidence—things appear to be on a much surer footing. The evidential status of data gathered through extended processes—including its utility as justification or warrant—do not seem to be weakened by virtue of being extended, but instead are often strengthened because of it. Indeed, it is often precisely by virtue of this extendedness that scientific evidence grounds knowledge claims, which individuals may subsequently ascribe to themselves. The functional equivalence between machine-based gathering, filtering, and processing of data and human interpretation and assessment is the crucial factor in deciding whether evidence has been gathered, rather than the distinction between intra- and extracranial processes or individual and social processes. To prioritize biological processes here, and to assert the superiority of human cognitive capacities seems both arbitrary and unwarranted with respect to gathering evidence, and ultimately would lead to an unattractive skepticism about many of the methods used in science to gather evidence. In other words, conceiving of scientific evidence as ‘impersonal’ not only better captures the character of evidence-gathering in practice, but also makes sense of a large amount of evidence-gathering that ‘personal’ accounts fail to either acknowledge or accurately describe. Whilst we suggest it is likely that all internally-distributed evidence-gathering processes are merely contingently internal processes, a significant number of externally-distributed evidence-gathering processes are necessarily externally-distributed. Some evidence can only be gathered by extended epistemic agents. (shrink)

Artificial Intelligence (AI) pervades humanity in 2022, and it is notoriously difficult to understand how certain aspects of it work. There is a movement—_Explainable_ Artificial Intelligence (XAI)—to develop new methods for explaining the behaviours of AI systems. We aim to highlight one important philosophical significance of XAI—it has a role to play in the elimination of vagueness. To show this, consider that the use of AI in what has been labeled _surveillance capitalism_ has resulted in humans quickly gaining the capability (...) to identify and classify most of the occasions in which languages are used. We show that the knowability of this information is incompatible with what a certain theory of vagueness—_epistemicism_—says about vagueness. We argue that one way the epistemicist could respond to this threat is to claim that this process brought about the end of vagueness. However, we suggest an alternative interpretation, namely that epistemicism is false, but there is a weaker doctrine we dub _technological epistemicism_, which is the view that vagueness is due to ignorance of linguistic usage, but the ignorance can be overcome. The idea is that knowing more of the relevant data and how to process it enables us to know the semantic values of our words and sentences with higher confidence and precision. Finally, we argue that humans are probably not going to believe what future AI algorithms tell us about the sharp boundaries of our vague words unless the AI involved can be explained in terms understandable by humans. That is, if people are going to accept that AI can tell them about the sharp boundaries of the meanings of their words, then it is going to have to be XAI. (shrink)