Some claim that digital phenotyping will revolutionize understanding of human psychology and experience and significantly promote human wellbeing. This paper investigates the nature of digital phenotyping in relation to its alleged promise. Unlike most of the literature to date on philosophy and digital phenotyping, which has focused on its ethical aspects, this paper focuses on its epistemic and methodological aspects. The paper advances a tetra-taxonomy involving four scenario types in which knowledge may be acquired from human “digitypes” by digital phenotyping. (...) These scenarios comprise two causal relations and a correlative and constitutive relation that can exist between information generated by digital systems/devices on the one hand and psychological or behavioral phenomena on the other. The paper describes several modes of inference involved in deriving knowledge within these scenarios. After this epistemic mapping, the paper analyzes the possible knowledge potential and limitations of digital phenotyping. It finds that digital phenotyping holds promise of delivering insight into conditions and states as well producing potentially new psychological categories. It also argues that care must be taken that digital phenotyping does not make unwarranted conclusions and is aware of potentially distorting effects in digital sensing and measurement. If digital phenotyping is to truly revolutionize knowledge of human life, it must deliver on a range of fronts, including making accurate forecasts and diagnoses of states and behaviors, providing causal explanations of these phenomena, and revealing important constituents of human conditions, psychology, and experience. (shrink)

The purpose of this paper is to look at some existing methods of semantic information quantification and suggest some alternatives. It begins with an outline of Bar-Hillel and Carnap’s theory of semantic information before going on to look at Floridi’s theory of strongly semantic information. The latter then serves to initiate an in-depth investigation into the idea of utilising the notion of truthlikeness to quantify semantic information. Firstly, a couple of approaches to measure truthlikeness are drawn from the literature and (...) explored, with a focus on their applicability to semantic information quantification. Secondly, a similar but new approach to measure truthlikeness/information is presented and some supplementary points are made. (shrink)

In this paper I look at Fred Dretske’s account of information and knowledge as developed in Knowledge and The Flow of Information. In particular, I translate Dretske’s probabilistic definition of information to a modal logical framework and subsequently use this to explicate the conception of information and its flow which is central to his account, including the notions of channel conditions and relevant alternatives. Some key products of this task are an analysis of the issue of information closure and an (...) investigation into some of the logical properties of Dretske’s account of information flow. (shrink)

In a 2017 AJP paper, Cevolani and Schurz propose a novel solution to the Preface Paradox that appeals to the notion of expected truthlikeness. This discussion note extends and analyses their approach by applying it to the related Lottery Paradox.

The merging/fusion of belief/data collections in propositional logic form is a topic that has received due attention within the domains of database and AI research. A distinction can be made between two types of scenarios to which the process of merging can be applied. In the first type, the collections represent preferences, such as the voting choices of a group of people, that need to be aggregated so as to give a consistent result that in some way best represents the (...) collective judgement of the group. In the second type, the collections represent factual data that is to be aggregated with an aim of obtaining a result that maximises factual correctness. After introducing a general framework for belief merging via some prominent literature on the topic, this paper then introduces and considers a method for belief merging with the second type of scenario in mind. Its suitability is corroborated by demonstrating how it can be seen as a special case of a merging procedure that combines aggregation of probabilities and maximisation of expected truthlikeness. (shrink)

The KK principle is typically rejected in externalist accounts of knowledge. However, a standard general argument for this rejection is in need of a supportive explication. In a recent paper, Samir Okasha argues that the standard externalist argument in question is fallacious. In this paper I start off with some critical discussion of Okasha’s analysis before suggesting an alternative way in which an externalist might successfully present such a case. I then further explore this issue via a look at how (...) Fred Dretske’s externalist epistemology, one of the exemplifying accounts, can explain failure of the KK principle. (shrink)

Recommender systems assist users in receiving preferred or relevant services and information. Using such technology could be instrumental in addressing the lack of relevance digital mental health apps have to the user, a leading cause of low engagement. However, the use of recommender systems for digital mental health apps, particularly those driven by personal data and artificial intelligence, presents a range of ethical considerations. This paper focuses on considerations particular to the juncture of recommender systems and digital mental health technologies. (...) While separate bodies of work have focused on these two areas, to our knowledge, the intersection presented in this paper has not yet been examined. This paper identifies and discusses a set of advantages and ethical concerns related to incorporating recommender systems into the digital mental health ecosystem. Advantages of incorporating recommender systems into DMH apps are identified as a reduction in choice overload, improvement to the digital therapeutic alliance, and increased access to personal data & self-management. Ethical challenges identified are lack of explainability, complexities pertaining to the privacy/personalization trade-off and recommendation quality, and the control of app usage history data. These novel considerations will provide a greater understanding of how DMH apps can effectively and ethically implement recommender systems. (shrink)

Simon D. Podmore claims that becoming a self before God is both a divine gift and an anxious obligation. Before we can know God, or ourselves, we must come to a moment of recognition. How this comes to be, as well as the terms of such acknowledgment, are worked out in Podmore’s powerful new reading of Kierkegaard. As he gives full consideration to Kierkegaard's writings, Podmore explores themes such as despair, anxiety, melancholy, and spiritual trial, and how they are (...) broken by the triumph of faith, forgiveness, and the love of God. He confronts the abyss between the self and the divine in order to understand how we can come to know ourselves in relation to a God who is apparently so wholly Other. (shrink)

We argue that the value of authenticity does not explain the value of self-knowledge. There are a plurality of species of authenticity; in this paper we consider four species: avoiding pretense (section 2), Frankfurtian wholeheartedness (section 3), existential self-knowledge (section 4), and spontaneity (section 5). Our thesis is that, for each of these species, the value of (that species of) authenticity does not (partially) explain the value of self-knowledge. Moreover, when it comes to spontaneity, the value of (that species of) (...) authenticity conflicts with the value of self-knowledge. (shrink)

In this paper I propose a set-theoretical interpretation of the logical square of opposition, in the perspective opened by generalized quantifier theory. Generalized quantifiers allow us to account for the semantics of quantificational Noun Phrases, and of other natural language expressions, in a coherent and uniform way. I suggest that in the analysis of the meaning of Noun Phrases and Determiners the square of opposition may help representing some semantic features responsible to different logical properties of these expressions. I will (...) conclude with some consideration on scope interactions between quantifiers. (shrink)

This paper offers an analysis of Kant’s account of the mathematical sublime with reference to his claim that ‘Nature is thus sublime in those of its appearances the intuition of which brings with them the idea of its infinity’. In undertaking this analysis I challenge Paul Crowther’s interpretation of this species of aesthetic experience, and I reject his interpretation as not being reflective of Kant’s actual position. I go on to show that the experience of the mathematical sublime is necessarily (...) connected with the progression of the imagination in its move towards the infinite. View HTML Send article to KindleTo send this article to your Kindle, first ensure [email protected] is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about sending to your Kindle. Find out more about sending to your Kindle. Note you can select to send to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be sent to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply. Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.Kant’s Mathematical Sublime and the Role of the Infinite: Reply to CrowtherVolume 20, Issue 1Simon D. Smith DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/S1369415414000302Your Kindle email address Please provide your Kindle [email protected]@kindle.com Available formats PDF Please select a format to send. By using this service, you agree that you will only keep articles for personal use, and will not openly distribute them via Dropbox, Google Drive or other file sharing services. Please confirm that you accept the terms of use. Cancel Send ×Send article to Dropbox To send this article to your Dropbox account, please select one or more formats and confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about sending content to Dropbox. Kant’s Mathematical Sublime and the Role of the Infinite: Reply to CrowtherVolume 20, Issue 1Simon D. Smith DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/S1369415414000302Available formats PDF Please select a format to send. By using this service, you agree that you will only keep articles for personal use, and will not openly distribute them via Dropbox, Google Drive or other file sharing services. Please confirm that you accept the terms of use. Cancel Send ×Send article to Google Drive To send this article to your Google Drive account, please select one or more formats and confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about sending content to Google Drive. Kant’s Mathematical Sublime and the Role of the Infinite: Reply to CrowtherVolume 20, Issue 1Simon D. Smith DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/S1369415414000302Available formats PDF Please select a format to send. By using this service, you agree that you will only keep articles for personal use, and will not openly distribute them via Dropbox, Google Drive or other file sharing services. Please confirm that you accept the terms of use. Cancel Send ×Export citation. (shrink)

The badness of having conflicting emotions is a familiar theme in academic ethics, clinical psychology, and commercial self-help, where emotional harmony is often put forward as an ideal. Many philosophers give emotional harmony pride of place in their theories of practical reason.1 Here we offer a defense of a particular species of emotional conflict, namely, ambivalence. We articulate an conception of ambivalence, on which ambivalence is unresolved inconsistent desire (§1) and present a case of appropriate ambivalence (§2), before considering two (...) alternative defenses of emotional conflict (§3). We then argue that inconsistent desires can be fitting (§4) and that it can be reasonable not to resolve inconsistent desires (§5), before considering an objection (§6) and concluding the discussion (§7). (shrink)

: Contemporary common sense holds that authenticity is an ethical ideal: that there is something bad about inauthenticity, and something good about authenticity. Here we criticize the view that authenticity is bad because it detracts from the wellbeing of the inauthentic person, and propose an alternative moral account of the badness of inauthenticity, based on the idea that inauthentic behaviour is potentially misleading.

In response to prevailing perceptions, I contend that Søren Kierkegaard (1813–55) conceives of the wholly otherness of God via his dialectical category of the ‘infinite qualitative difference’ between the human and the divine, initially through the self's consciousness of sin and ultimately through the self's acceptance of the gift of forgiveness. Therefore, I claim that while the common designation of Kierkegaard's God as ‘Wholly Other’ may initially evoke the alterity of sin; it is not ultimately sufficient to describe the divine (...) alterity which Kierkegaard regards as more faithfully manifest in the ‘impossible possibility’ of forgiveness. Through this reading, I finally suggest that the ‘Wholly Other’ is not ultimately representative of God in Kierkegaard's writings and might be more faithfully supplemented by the appellation of the Holy Other. (shrink)

The current debate as to whether the natural environment should be accorded stakeholder status involves an assumption that it is in some way ‘different’ from other stakeholders, requiring favourable discriminatory treatment. Essentially it is regarded as passive, requiring regulatory agencies to represent its interests or the wider public to demand its protection on the occasion of, for example, oil spills that leave wildlife in a visibly distressed state. But the natural environment does not have ‘consciousness’ as do traditional classes of (...) stakeholders such as employees, shareholders and contractors, nor does it negotiate in markets over the price at which it sells its output in the way that a trader haggles with potential buyers. This paper proposes that in the context of financial markets the natural environment possesses stakeholder status, founded upon the essentiality of ecosystem stability for their proper functioning and the structuring of instruments traded on them. (shrink)

By focusing discussion through Søren Kierkegaard's view of Martin Luther's initiation into the monastery , it is suggested that an analogy can be discerned for Kierkegaard's own sense of divine vocation and the ensuing self‐mortification of melancholy and religious scrupulosity which commentators have suspected in both figures. Kierkegaard's often ambivalent critique of Luther's Anfechtung is thus read as bearing ironic significance for his own struggles with ‘spiritual trial’ [Anfægtelse]. In this reading, Luther's Anfechtung is taken to signify for Kierkegaard both (...) the anguish inherent to the authentic God‐relationship and also the dangerous possibility of the individual imagination's [Phantasi] capitulation into the precariously embellished realm of ‘the fantastic’ [Phantastiske]. It is here that Kierkegaard's emphasis upon individual responsibility – contrasted with Luther's concentration upon the role of the devil – demonstrates the fundamental differentiation between Kierkegaard's anatomy of Anfægtelse and Luther's Anfechtung. (shrink)

(Mereological) nihilism states that there are no composite objects—there are only sub-atomic particles such as quarks. Nihilism’s biggest rival, (mereological) universalism, posits vast numbers of composite objects in addition to the sub-atomic particles, and so nihilism appears to be the more ontologically parsimonious of the two theories. If this is the case, it’s a significant result for the nihilist: ontological parsimony is almost always thought to be a theoretical virtue, so a nihilist victory in the parsimony stakes gives us a (...) defeasible reason to be nihilists. But things aren’t so straightforward. Karen Bennett (2009) has argued that nihilism is no more quantitatively parsimonious than universalism. Furthermore, her argument can be redirected so that it threatens the nihilist’s perceived advantage over universalism in the qualitative parsimony stakes too. I here argue that these arguments are flawed and that nihilism is indeed more quantitatively and qualitatively parsimonious than universalism. (shrink)

This volume examines Fichte's notion of the image in the systematic domains of ethics, philosophy of history, political philosophy, philosophy of language, aesthetics, and the philosophy of religion. Der vorliegende Band untersucht Fichtes bildtheoretisches Denken von der Theorie der Einbildungskraft bis in die systematischen Bereiche der Ethik, der Geschichtsphilosophie, der politischen Philosophie, der Sprachphilosophie, der Kunsttheorie und der Religionsphilosophie.

: Contemporary common sense holds that authenticity is an ethical ideal: that there is something bad about inauthenticity, and something good about authenticity. Here we criticize the view that authenticity is bad because it detracts from the wellbeing of the inauthentic person, and propose an alternative moral account of the badness of inauthenticity, based on the idea that inauthentic behaviour is potentially misleading.

The present volume collects contributions which contextualize Fichte’s theory of image in various respects, focusing on its relation to pre-modern theories of image, its changing role in the development of Fichte’s thinking and its place within Fichte’s foundation of philosophy in the area between theory of truth or validity and ontology. Der vorliegende Band versammelt Beiträge, die Fichtes Bildtheorie in verschiedenen Hinsichten kontextualisieren, wobei ihr Verhältnis zu prä-modernen Bildtheorien, ihre wechselnde Rolle in der Entwicklung von Fichtes Denken und ihre im (...) Spannungsfeld von Wahrheits- bzw. Geltungstheorie und Ontologie angesiedelte Stellung in Fichtes Grundlegung der Philosophie im Mittelpunkt stehen. (shrink)

Die Absicht des vorliegenden Buches ist es, das Geflecht der unterschiedlichen Fragestellungen, die mit dem Stichwort „Fichte und seine Zeit“ verbunden sind, in Betracht zu ziehen und ihre internen Zusammenhänge und ihre Geschlossenheit deutlich zu machen. The intention of this book is to take the network of different issues that are associated with the main theme " Fichte and his time" into consideration and make their internal relationships and their closeness significantly.

Mit dem Untertitel »Streitfragen« bringt dieser Band 44 der Fichte-Studien eine Gruppe von Beiträgen, die das Hauptthema »Fichte und seine Zeit« behandeln und es aus unterschiedlichen Gesichtspunkten entfalten.

Dieser Band ist in vier Teile gegliedert, die dem theoretischen, praktischen und politischen Gedanken des Philosophen gewidmet sind. Diesen folgen im vierten Teil Beiträge, die Fichtes philosophische Ansätze in den Dialog mit gegenwärtigen Autoren und Fragen der Philosophie bringen.