In this paper, I discuss the ethics of care as a response to impartialist ethical theories. In section 1, I contrast Gilligan’s critique of impartial ethical theories with other objections to impartialism. In section 2, I analyze some of the ways in which impartialists have attempted to understand the ethics of care since the publication of Gilligan’s text. In section 3, I argue against proponents of impartialism and show that care constitutes an ethical theory in its own right, (...) not one which is dependent or parasitic upon impartialism. In section 4, I contrast care ethic’s conception of the self with that offered by traditional ethical theories, and argue that the most important distinction between the care and impartialist accounts of morality lies in the conception of the moral self which informs each of these approaches. (shrink)

온건한 공평주의에 따르면 도덕은 기본적으로 공평성을 지니지만 그것은 편향성의 이유와도 양립 가능하다. 이러한 입장을 옹호하기 위해서는 편향성의 이유들을 적극적으로 논구할 필요가 있는데, 이러한 이유들을 이해하는 입장에는 크게 두 가지가 있다. 한편으로 환원주의에 따르면 편향성의 이유들은 근본적으로 도덕의 이유들에 의해 정당화되며, 다른 한편으로 비환원주의에 따르면 그 이유들은 주어진 편향성을 지지하는 구체적 가치들의 고유한 구조와 내용에 의해 담보되며 도덕의 이유들로 환원되지는 않는다. 비환원주의적 입장은 도덕의 이유들로 환원되지 않는 편향성의 이유들의 독립적 성격을 인정할 수 있다는 점에서 많은 지지를 받고 있다. 그리고 온건한 공평주의를 (...) 주장하는 철학자들도 대체로 비환원주의적 입장에 호의적이다. 하지만 필자는 이러한 비환원주의적 온건한 공평주의는 그렇게 매력적인 입장이 될 수 없음을 보인다. 이를 위해 우선 비환원주의의 독특한 특징, 즉 도덕의 이유들 및 도덕에 환원되지 않는 독립적인 편향성의 이유들을 동시에 인정하는 입장에 문제가 있음을 드러낸다. 비환원주의자들이 도덕의 이유들까지 인정한다면 그들은 필자가 제안하는 도덕적 평등의 원칙을 수용하는 셈이다. 도덕적 평등의 원칙은 동등한 존중과 동등한 대우를 구분하기 때문에 모든 사람을 항상 동등하게 대우해야 한다는 주장을 함축하지 않으며, 바로 이로 인해 이 원칙을 기반으로 하는 공평주의는 온건한 공평주의가 된다. 그런데 이러한 온건한 공평주의가 비환원주의와 결합될 때에는 여러 가지 문제점이 나타나게 된다. 특히 이러한 형태의 공평주의는 편향성의 이유들이 도덕의 이유들보다 더 강력한 규범성을 가지고 행위자에게 나타나는 경우들을 원칙 있게 설명하지 못한다. 결론적으로 필자는 최근 주목을 받고 있는 비환원주의적 온건한 공평주의를 비판적인 시각에서 바라볼 필요가 있다고 주장한다. (shrink)

Impartialism in ethics has been said to be the common ground shared by both Kantian and utilitarian approaches to ethics. Lawrence Blum describes this common ground as follows: Both views identify morality with a perspective of impartiality, impersonality, objectivity and universality. Both views imply the ‘ubiquity of impartiality” – that our commitments and projects derive their legitimacy only by reference to this impartial perspective.

Suppose a person lives in a sub-Saharan country that has won its independence from colonial powers in the last 50 years or so. Suppose also that that person has become a high-ranking government official who makes decisions on how to allocate goods, such as civil service jobs and contracts with private firms. Should such a person refrain from considering any particulars about potential recipients or might it be appropriate to consider, for example, family membership, party affiliation, race or revolutionary stature (...) as reasons to benefit certain individuals at some cost to the general public? Which of these factors should be considered unjust, or even corrupt, as a basis on which to allocate state goods and which should not? This chapter outlines an attractive moral theory with African content that forbids both impartialism and a strong form of partialism that would permit government officials to favour members of their families or political parties. Between these two extremes, a moderate partialism is prescribed. This permits government agents to occasionally favour veterans and victims of state injustices at some cost to the general public. This chapter seeks to provide a new, unified explanation of why sub-Saharan values permit some forms of partiality, such as the preferential hiring of those who struggled against colonialism, but prohibit other nepotistic forms of partiality. (shrink)

This book rewrites the story of classical Chinese philosophy, which has always been considered the single most creative and vibrant chapter in the history of Chinese philosophy. Works attributed to Confucius, Mozi, Mencius, Laozi, Zhuangzi, Xunzi, Han Feizi and many others represent the very origins of moral and political thinking in China. As testimony to their enduring stature, in recent decades many Chinese intellectuals, and even leading politicians, have turned to those classics, especially Confucian texts, for alternative or complementary (...) sources of moral authority and political legitimacy. Therefore, philosophical inquiries into core normative values embedded in those classical texts are crucial to the ongoing scholarly discussion about China as China turns more culturally inward. It can also contribute to the spirited contemporary debate about the nature of philosophical reasoning, especially in the non-Western traditions. -/- This book offers a new narrative and interpretative framework about the origins of moral-political philosophy that tracks how the three normative values, humaneness, justice, and personal freedom, were formulated, reformulated, and contested by early Chinese philosophers in their effort to negotiate the relationship among three distinct domains, the personal, the familial, and the political. Such efforts took place as those thinkers were reimagining a new moral-political order, debating its guiding norms, and exploring possible sources within the context of an evolving understanding of Heaven and its relationship with the humans. Tao Jiang argues that the competing visions in that debate can be characterized as a contestation between partialist humaneness and impartialist justice as the guiding norm for the newly imagined moral-political order, with the Confucians, the Mohists, the Laoists, and the so-called fajia thinkers being the major participants, constituting the mainstream philosophical project during this period. Thinkers lined up differently along the justice-humaneness spectrum with earlier ones maintaining some continuity between the two normative values (or at least trying to accommodate both to some extent) while later ones leaning more toward their exclusivity in the political/public domain. Zhuangzi and the Zhuangists were the outliers of the mainstream moral-political debate who rejected the very parameter of humaneness versus justice in that discourse. They were a lone voice advocating personal freedom, but the Zhuangist expressions of freedom were self-restricted to the margins of the political world and the interiority of one's heartmind. Such a take can shed new light on how the Zhuangist approach to personal freedom would profoundly impact the development of this idea in pre-modern Chinese political and intellectual history. (shrink)

This paper develops and explores the idea of moral entanglements: the ways in which, through innocent transactions with others, we can unintendedly accrue special obligations to them. More particularly, the paper explains intimacy-based moral entanglements, to which we become liable by accepting another's waiver of privacy rights. Sometimes, having entered into others' private affairs for innocent or even helpful reasons, one discovers needs of theirs that then become the focus of special duties of care. The general duty to (...) warn them of their need cannot directly account for the full extent of these duties, but does indicate why a silent retreat is impermissible. The special duties of care importantly rest on a transfer of responsibilities that accompanies the privacy waivers. The result is a special obligation of beneficence that, while grounded in a voluntary transaction, was never voluntarily undertaken. Impartialist views of beneficence cannot capture the relevant phenomena well. (shrink)

A hallmark of Confucian morality is its emphasis on duties to family and kin as weighty features of moral life. The virtue of ‘filiality’ or ‘filial piety’ (xiao 孝), for example, is one of the most important in the Confucian canon. This aspect of Confucianism has been of renewed interest recently. On the one hand, some have claimed that, precisely because it acknowledges the importance of kin duties, Confucianism should be seen as an ethics rooted in human nature that (...) remains a viable system of morality today. On the other hand, some have argued that the extreme emphasis on filial duties is precisely the aspect of Confucian moral philosophy that ought to be jettisoned in favor of greater impartialism; without mitigating its emphasis on filial piety, Confucianism risks irrelevance to modern concerns. In this paper, I will outline the nature of filial morality in the Confucian tradition and discuss these recent contributions to the literature. (shrink)

How can we justify partiality to those near to us, such as our own families, friends, neighbours and colleagues, when we could act in much more morally valuable ways by helping others who are merely distant from us? In 1972 Peter Singer used two now-famous examples, Pond and.

The debate between impartialists and their critics has dominated both moral and political philosophy for over a decade. Characteristically, impartialists argue that any sensible form of impartialism can accommodate the partial concerns we have for others. By contrast, partialists deny that this is so. They see the division as one which runs exceedingly deep and argue that, at the limit, impartialist thinking requires that we marginalise those concerns and commitments that make our lives meaningful. This book attempts to (...) show both that the dispute between impartialists and their critics runs very deep, and that it can nonetheless be resolved. The resolution begins by asking how impartialist political philosophy can defend the priority of justice when it conflicts with people's commitments to their conceptions of the good. It is argued that priority can only defended if political impartialism has a moral foundation, and that moral foundation must not be a foundation in the ideal of equality (as is often thought), but a foundation in the partial concerns we have for others. In short, impartialist moral philosophy must take our partial concerns as central if it is to gain allegiance. However, if it does take our partial concerns as central, then it can generate a defence of political impartialism which shows why justice must take priority, but which also acknowledges that pluralism about the good is permanent. (shrink)

In her provocative discussion of the challenge posed to the traditional impartialist, justice-focused conception of morality by the new-wave care perspective in ethics, Annette Baier calls for ‘a “marriage” of the old male and newly articulated female... moral wisdom,’ to produce a new ‘cooperative’ moral theory that ‘harmonize[s] justice and care.’ I want in this paper to play matchmaker, proposing one possible conjugal bonding: a union of two apparently dissimilar modes of what Nel Noddings calls ‘meeting the other (...) morally,’ a wedding of respect and care. (shrink)

I argue that partialist theories that require us to give special weight to the desires, needs, and interests of ourselves or our social group, are national. I depend this impartialist principle: if the only difference between two persons to some property, where having the property to dependent on luck, morality's demanding that we disfavor either person because the person has this property, to national.

Consequentialism is often charged with demandingness objections which arise in response to the theory’s commitment to impartiality. It might be thought that the only way that consequentialists can avoid such demandingness objections is by dropping their commitment to impartialism. However, I outline and defend a framework within which all reasons for action are impartially grounded, yet which can avoid demandingness objections. I defend this framework against what might appear to be a strong objection, namely the claim that anyone who (...) accepts the theory will be practically irrational. (shrink)

The association of women with caring dispositions and thinking has become a persistent theme in recent feminist writing. There are a number of reasons for this. One reason is the impetus that has been provided by the empirical work of Carol Gilligan on women’s moral development. The fact that this association is not merely an ideologically or philosophically postulated one, but is argued for on empirical grounds, tends to add to its credibility. Another reason for the resilience of the (...) association is the existence of an increasingly prominent theme in feminist thought and action that focuses on the importance of women’s difference from men, both as a fact and as a goal. Within this theme, there are various views on what the relevant differences are between women and men, and why the differences ought to be emphasized and properly respected. Women’s caring, as will be seen, turns out to have a firm presence in all of these views, and as a result, many women argue that caring should form the basis of a distinctive feminist ethic. On these views, women’s approaches to understanding moral situations, defining selfconceptions, choosing goals and roles, and guiding behaviour, should all be informed by and based upon dispositions of caring. However, if this idea of a feminist ethic of care is to be plausible, it will need to be reconciled with another strong theme in feminism, according to which in fundamental moral respects women ought not be considered or treated differently from men. We will examine the standing of a feminist ethic of care in the context of this tension between the difference theme and the sameness theme in feminism. The discussion begins by re-characterizing the justice and care debate in terms of impartialist and partialist ethical perspectives, and it then goes on to indicate the various ways in which women’s presumed disposition to caring and partialism finds prominence within the difference theme. The central focus of the discussion, however, will be the question of how to reconcile the conflict that exists between impartialist, justice-based moral thinking, and a partialist, caring approach to morality.. (shrink)

This essay critically assesses two strategies of accommodation used by defenders of impartialism in ethics to argue that the care orientation represents no genuine challenge to impartialist theoretical paradigms. One strategy focuses on impartiality as a constraint on moral deliberation, the other as a constraint on moral justification. While highlighting respects in which the commitment to impartiality is more consonant with the care orientation than many advocates of care have acknowledged, this essay attempts to clarify crucial ways (...) in which each accommodationist strategy falls, thus locating some of the more important contributions and challenges the care orientation offers to moral theory. (shrink)

In this paper I examine the particularist attack on deductive uses of moral principles, reviewing the critiques of the uniformity of moral reasons and impartiality in ethics, looking principally at arguments from Larry Blum, Jonathan Dancy, and Margaret Walker. I defend the action-guiding-ness of moral principles themselves, but consider various ways to accommodate the objections coming fromparticularism. I conclude that one objection to the impartialist theory of value must be conceded without qualification: generalism is unable to account (...) for the unique and irreplaceable value of individual persons. I present an example which supports my view andshows that, in the context of lived experience, replaceability is contradicted. Indeed there may be few constants of value in the narrative of one’s life, as experiences overlay supposed constants with continual new shading, and create even deeper sorts of transformation in valuing. In the end, both particularized moral judgment and the articulation of fact with principle contribute to moral discernment. (shrink)

In this article, I attempt to bridge the gap between partiality and impartiality in moral philosophy from an oft-neglected African perspective. I draw a solution for this moral-theoretical impasse between partialists and impartialists from Kwasi Wiredu's, one of the most influential African philosophers, distinction between an ethic and ethics. I show how an ethic accommodates partiality and ethics impartiality. Wiredu's insight is that partialism is not concerned with strict moral issues. -/- .

Work on representing women's voices in ethics has produced a vision of moral understanding profoundly subversive of the traditional philosophical conception of moral knowledge. 1 explicate this alternative moral “epistemology,” identify how it challenges the prevailing view, and indicate some of its resources for a liberatory feminist critique of philosophical ethics.

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Humaneness and Justice in the Analects:On Tao Jiang's Origins of Moral-Political Philosophy in Early ChinaHagop Sarkissian (bio)IntroductionOne of the central themes of Tao Jiang's Origins of Moral-Political Philosophy in Early China is the contestation of the values of partialist humaneness and impartialist justice across diverse thinkers and texts throughout the classical period. His departure point is the Analects, which displays a keen awareness of the difficulties in (...) balancing these opposing values. Jiang's analysis of this dynamic is skillful, filled with Sinological detail and philosophical analysis.Here, I hope to add to Jiang's discussion, focusing on two broad points. First, I suggest two different interpretations of Jiang's analysis of ren 仁 as preference for kin in the Analects, and argue that one of these interpretations is more successful than the other. Second, I argue that aligning humaneness with partiality on the one hand, and justice with impartiality on the other, may obscure some of the Analect's views on these topics, even while illuminating others. In particular, I try to argue that justice cannot be understood as consisting of impartiality alone.Humaneness and JusticeJiang provides "thin or baseline definitions" of the key values of humaneness and justice so as to "schematize … competing normative values operative in the moral-political project during the classical period while … leaving room for variations on these broad underlying values among different inherited texts and the thinkers they are attributed to" (p. 35). They are as follows:[H]umaneness is understood in this book as the … natural inclination to be partial toward those who are close to us, especially our family/kin members; justice is defined here as … our exercise of impartial judgment on the merits of persons and states of affairs, especially in lieu of articulated and publicized standards and codes, irrespective of their relations to us. In other words, humaneness is partialist in nature, whereas justice is impartialist. Humaneness is understood in relational terms, whereas justice is non-relational by contrast. More importantly, precisely because of the relational nature of humaneness, [End Page 429] agent and recipient cannot be switched or substituted, whereas in justice agent and recipient are switchable and substitutable.This framework is fruitful, allowing Jiang to draw connections across texts and thinkers, highlighting aspects of the debates that too often remain hidden from view. His detailed analyses of concepts such as xiao (filial piety), jianai (impartial care), fa (objective standards), tian (Heaven), and shu (conscientious perspective taking) show how they relate to these overarching values. The schematization works, and the book repays careful reading.There are also points, however, where the alignment of humaneness with partiality on the one hand, and justice with impartiality on the other, can lead those familiar with these texts to wonder whether the presentation has, as a result, oversimplified some complex issues. I discuss two of these in what follows.Ren and PartialityJiang claims that the concept of ren in the Analects has two components or elements to it. As he puts it,[T]he way ren is articulated by Confucius, it contains both a partialist element favoring one's family and an impartialist element when dealing with others. … To put it in terms of the central terminologies employed in this book, ren in the Analects is a comprehensive category that contains the elements of both humaneness and justice.Jiang 2021, p. 53)Jiang's analysis of ren in terms of impartiality is compelling, so I will focus on the other half of the analysis—specifically, the claim that the concept of ren itself is partialistic (or, more accurately, has a notable partialist element). This claim may surprise some readers. For example, ren has often been contrasted with the partialistic xiao (filial piety) as the more impartial, public-facing virtue in Confucianism. Indeed, this contrast has been the focus of a strenuous and strident debate in Confucian ethics in modern times (see, e.g., Guo 2007; Guo 2004; Liu 2003), and has a pedigree going at least as far back as the Hou Hanshu (Chan 2004). However, such debates span multiple texts and thinkers in the Confucian tradition. We can still ask the more pointed... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reply to Discussion of Origins of Moral-Political Philosophy in Early China:Contestation of Humaneness, Justice, and Personal FreedomTao Jiang (bio)I am grateful to all six commentators for their careful reading of and thoughtful engagements with my book, especially to Sungmoon Kim for spearheading this group effort. In the book, Origins of Moral-Political Philosophy in Early China: Contestation of Humaneness, Justice, and Personal Freedom, I try to tell a (...) new story about the foundational period of Chinese philosophy, with a focus on the deliberations of normative values in the respective texts. I make three key points. First, the central intellectual challenge during the Chinese classical period was how to negotiate the relationships between the personal, the familial, and the political domains (sometimes also characterized as the relationship between the private and the public) when philosophers were re-imagining and re-conceptualizing a new moral-political order. Philosophers offered a dazzling array of competing visions for that newly imagined order. Second, the competing visions can be characterized as a contestation between partialist humaneness and impartialist justice as the guiding norms of the newly imagined order, with the Confucians, the Mohists, the Laoists, and the so-called fajia thinkers being the major participants. This was the mainstream intellectual project that dominated the classical debate and set the terms and the parameters of that debate. Third, Zhuangzi and the Zhuangists were the outliers of the mainstream moral-political discourse during this period. They rejected the very parameters of humaneness versus justice in the mainstream debate and instead represented a lone voice advocating personal freedom. For the Zhuangists, the mainstream debate was intellectually banal, morally misguided, and politically dangerous. One critical overall context for these [End Page 475] philosophical endeavors is that they took place within an evolving understanding of Heaven and its relationship with humans.Loy Hui-chiehLet me begin with Loy Hui-chieh's comment on the book's methodology, laid out in the Introduction to my book, as it pertains to the broader norms of practices in contemporary analytic philosophy and Chinese philosophy. The purpose of the methodological reflection in the Introduction is to provide some tools in dealing with the challenges to Chinese philosophy from Sinology (historical and philological approaches to classical Chinese texts) and Western philosophy within Western academia. I argue that scholars of Chinese philosophy, situated between Sinology and Western philosophy in the West, need to be mindful of the constructed nature of the scholarly objects shaped by disciplinary norms and practices. Specifically, scholars of Chinese philosophy, in their philosophical endeavors, construct their scholarly objects based on the operative but often implicit ideas of inherited text, textual author, and textual intent, as opposed to Sinologists who are more motivated by their scholarly objects of original text, historical author, and authorial intent.Loy's comment frames my methodological reflections primarily through the lens of history of philosophy. There is another critical element in this endeavor, namely the philosophical lineage upon which the study of philosophy in the West has been built, conceptually and institutionally. With respect to history of philosophy, Loy's questions concern the presentist orientation in analytic philosophy and its relationship with history of philosophy. As he aptly points out, analytic philosophers are ultimately uninterested in the correct interpretation of who said what in the history of philosophy. Rather their interest lies in philosophical issues and problems themselves, irrespective of how/when/by whom those issues are formulated. Scholars in history of philosophy seek to convince analytic philosophers that the texts and the ideas they study should be recognized as good philosophy by contemporary standards, not just their historical values. The presentist bias is clear. Of course, we do not have to subscribe to such a norm since the present is not necessarily the be-all and end-all of everything philosophers are concerned with, or at least it should not be. Otherwise, our philosophical reflections, even those with the presentist concerns, would be significantly impoverished. As a profession, contemporary philosophers regularly draw upon history of ideas, especially from the Hellenistic and early modern European traditions, to frame their arguments and to seek new inspirations. Such a practice is heavily dependent on the... (shrink)

La publicación de Filosofía de la aritmética (1891) trajo consigo un notable avance en las investigaciones fenomenológicas de E. Husserl, a la vez que se abrió paso entre las indagaciones ya existentes sobre la fundamentación de las matemáticas. Fue precisamente dentro de esta constelación de publicaciones donde se originó una de las polémicas filosóficas más interesantes de las postrimerías del siglo XIX: la recensión de Filosofía de la aritmética hecha por Frege en 1894. Lo que ofreceré en este texto son (...) algunas claves de interpretación que permitirán hacer una revisión juiciosa de aquellos aspectos filosóficos no vistos por Frege en su crítica. Todo ello a través del intercambio epistolar entre ambos, de la exposición de la reseña de 1894 y de las recensiones de Filosofía de la aritmética que han permanecido desconocidas hasta ahora. PALABRAS CLAVE: Filosofía de la aritmética, Fenomenología, Filosofía analítica, Husserl, Frege. (shrink)

In this chapter, we discuss a selection of current views of the neural correlates of consciousness (NCC). We focus on the different predictions they make, in particular with respect to the role of prefrontal cortex (PFC) during visual experiences, which is an area of critical interest and some source of contention. Our discussion of these views focuses on the level of functional anatomy, rather than at the neuronal circuitry level. We take this approach because we currently understand more about experimental (...) evidence at this coarse level and because these results are appropriate for arbitrating between current theoretical frameworks. We discuss the Two-Visual-Systems Hypothesis (Milner & Goodale 1995; 2006), Local Recurrency (Lamme 2010; Lamme 2006), Higher Order (Lau 2008; Lau & Rosenthal 2011) and Global Workspace theories (Baars 1997; Baars 2005; Dehaene & Naccache 2001; Dehaene 2014). Despite the apparent stark differences between conscious and unconscious perceptual processing, available evidence suggests that their neural substrates must be largely shared. This indicates that the difference in neural activity between conscious and unconscious perceptual processing is likely to be subtle and highly specialized. We argue that current experimental evidence about the involvement of specific activity in prefrontal cortex supports the higher order neural theory of consciousness. In consequence, imaging techniques that focus only on marked differences between conscious and unconscious level of activity are likely to be insensitive to the relevant neural activity patterns that underlie conscious experiences. Finally, it follows from the evidence we discuss that the functional advantages of conscious over unconscious perceptual processing may be more limited than commonly thought. (shrink)

Arguably the most foundational principle in perception research is that our experience of the world goes beyond the retinal image; we perceive the distal environment itself, not the proximal stimulation it causes. Shape may be the paradigm case of such “unconscious inference”: When a coin is rotated in depth, we infer the circular object it truly is, discarding the perspectival ellipse projected on our eyes. But is this really the fate of such perspectival shapes? Or does a tilted coin retain (...) an elliptical appearance even when we know it’s circular? This question has generated heated debate from Locke and Hume to the present; but whereas extant arguments rely primarily on introspection, this problem is also open to empirical test. If tilted coins bear a representational similarity to elliptical objects, then a circular coin should, when rotated, impair search for a distal ellipse. Here, nine experiments demonstrate that this is so, suggesting that perspectival shapes persist in the mind far longer than traditionally assumed. Subjects saw search arrays of three-dimensional “coins,” and simply had to locate a distally elliptical coin. Surprisingly, rotated circular coins slowed search for elliptical targets, even when subjects clearly knew the rotated coins were circular. This pattern arose with static and dynamic cues, couldn’t be explained by strategic responding or unfamiliarity, generalized across shape classes, and occurred even with sustained viewing. Finally, these effects extended beyond artificial displays to real-world objects viewed in naturalistic, full-cue conditions. We conclude that objects have a remarkably persistent dual character: their objective shape “out there,” and their perspectival shape “from here.”. (shrink)

Introspection is a fundamental part of our mental lives. Nevertheless, its reliability and its underlying cognitive architecture have been widely disputed. Here, I propose a principled way to model introspection. By using time-tested principles from signal detection theory (SDT) and extrapolating them from perception to introspection, I offer a new framework for an introspective signal detection theory (iSDT). In SDT, the reliability of perceptual judgments is a function of the strength of an internal perceptual response (signal- to-noise ratio) which is, (...) to a large extent, driven by the intensity of the stimulus. In parallel to perception, iSDT models the reliability of introspective judgments as a function of the strength of an internal introspective response (signal-to-noise ratio) which is, to a large extent, driven by the intensity of conscious experiences. Thus, by modelling introspection after perception, iSDT can calibrate introspection’s reliability across a whole range of contexts. iSDT offers a novel, illuminating way of thinking about introspection and the cognitive processes that support it. (shrink)

I present here a case against the evidentialist approach that claims that in so far as our interests are epistemic what should guide our belief formation and revision is always a strict adherence to the available evidence. I go on to make the stronger claim that some beliefs based on admittedly “insufficient” evidence may exhibit epistemic virtue. I propose that we consider a form of courage to be an intellectual or epistemic virtue. It is through this notion of courage that (...) we can see a weakness in the evidentialist position. Adopting a doxastically courageous approach allows us to acknowledge the role that evidence has in epistemic justification and its connection with promoting epistemic value, but it avoids the narrowness of an evidentialist position. The epistemically courageous agent is not one who disregards the evidence entirely, but she also realizes that taking risks will not necessarily keep her from her epistemic goals. Believing something in the face of insufficient evidence is not always an epistemic vice to be avoided, and the agent that recognizes this is better off for it. (shrink)

In recent years, character traits in general and virtue-related concepts in particular have been of considerable interest to philosophers, psychological researchers, and practitioners in the business ethics field. Three approaches to character traits can be used to incorporate ethics into organizations: virtues, character strengths, and competencies. The aim of this article is to clarify the concept of character traits, or virtues, and provide a unified operational version of it for incorporation into management. To this end, we first discuss the analogy (...) among virtues, character strengths, and competencies. Then, we propose a list of moral competencies that can be implemented in competency-based human resource management. (shrink)

Metacognition is the capacity to evaluate the success of one's own cognitive processes in various domains; for example, memory and perception. It remains controversial whether metacognition relies on a domain-general resource that is applied to different tasks or if self-evaluative processes are domain specific. Here, we investigated this issue directly by examining the neural substrates engaged when metacognitive judgments were made by human participants of both sexes during perceptual and memory tasks matched for stimulus and performance characteristics. By comparing patterns (...) of fMRI activity while subjects evaluated their performance, we revealed both domain-specific and domain-general metacognitive representations. Multivoxel activity patterns in anterior prefrontal cortex predicted levels of confidence in a domain-specific fashion, whereas domain-general signals predicting confidence and accuracy were found in a widespread network in the frontal and posterior midline. The demonstration of domain-specific metacognitive representations suggests the presence of a content-rich mechanism available to introspection and cognitive control. (shrink)

Studying the neural correlates of conscious awareness depends on a reliable comparison between activations associated with awareness and unawareness. One particularly difficult confound to remove is task performance capacity, i.e. the difference in performance between the conditions of interest. While ideally task performance capacity should be matched across different conditions, this is difficult to achieve experimentally. However, differences in performance could theoretically be corrected for mathematically. One such proposal is found in a recent paper by Lamy, Salti and Bar-Haim [Lamy (...) D, Salti M, Bar-Haim Y. Neural correlates of subjective awareness and unconscious processing: an ERP study. J Cognitive Neurosci 2009,21:1435-46], who put forward a corrective method for an electroencephalography experiment. We argue that their analysis is essentially grounded in a version of High Threshold Theory, which has been shown to be inferior in general to Signal Detection Theory. We show through a series of computer simulations that their correction method only partially removes the influence of perfor- mance capacity, which can yield misleading results. We present a mathematical correction method based on Signal Detection Theory that is theoretically capable of removing performance capacity confounds. We discuss the limitations of mathemati- cally correcting for performance capacity confounds in imaging studies and its impact for theories about consciousness. (shrink)

Current frameworks on ethical decision-making process have some limitations. This paper argues that the consideration of moral competencies, understood as moral virtues in the workplace, can enhance our understanding of why moral character contributes to ethical decision-making. After discussing the universal nature of four moral competencies (prudence, justice, fortitude and temperance), we analyse their influence on the various stages of the ethical decision-making process. We conclude by considering the managerial implications of our findings and proposing further (...) research. (shrink)

El objetivo de este artículo es realizar una revisión del estado de la cuestión sobre el concepto de estado de naturaleza en el pensamiento de Thomas Hobbes. Dicha revisión permite articular una comprensión de la naturaleza humana, puesto que a diferencia del realismo político el estado de naturaleza en Hobbes no tiene un rol meramente hipotético. Precisamente, la idea de naturaleza humana articula una proto-moralidad que permite comprender la transición hacia el estado civil. Las investigaciones Kavka, Gauthier y Hampton han (...) construido una compleja compresión de la naturaleza humana, la cual permite entender cierto sustrato de proto-moralidad en el pensamiento hobbesiano. (shrink)

When a circular coin is rotated in depth, is there any sense in which it comes to resemble an ellipse? While this question is at the center of a rich and divided philosophical tradition (with some scholars answering affirmatively and some negatively), Morales et al. (2020, 2021) took an empirical approach, reporting 10 experiments whose results favor such perspectival similarity. Recently, Burge and Burge (2022) offered a vigorous critique of this work, objecting to its approach and conclusions on both philosophical (...) and empirical grounds. Here, we answer these objections on both fronts. We show that Burge and Burge’s critique rests on misunderstandings of Morales et al.’s claims; of the relation between the data and conclusions; and of the philosophical context in which the work appears. Specifically, Burge and Burge attribute to us a much stronger (and stranger) view than we hold, involving the introduction of “a new entity” located “in some intermediate position(s) between the distal shape and the retinal image.” We do not hold this view. Indeed, once properly understood, most of Burge and Burge’s objections favor Morales et al.’s claims rather than oppose them. Finally, we discuss several questions that remain unanswered, and reflect on a productive path forward on these issues of foundational scientific and philosophical interest. (shrink)

Stephenson (2022) has argued that Kant’s thesis that all transcendental truths are transcendentally a priori knowable leads to omniscience of all transcendental truths. His arguments depend on luminosity principles and closure principles for transcendental knowability. We will argue that one pair of a luminosity and a closure principle should not be used, because the closure principle is too strong, while the other pair of a luminosity and a closure principle should not be used, because the luminosity principle is too strong. (...) Stephenson’s argument also depends on a factivity principle for transcendental knowability, which we will argue to be false. (shrink)

Consciousness and confidence seem intimately related. Accordingly, some researchers use confidence ratings as a measure of, or proxy for, consciousness. Rosenthal discusses the potential connections between the two, and rejects confidence as a valid measure of consciousness. He argues that there are better alternatives to get at conscious experiences such as direct subjective reports of awareness (i.e. subjects’ reports of perceiving something or of the degree of visibility of a stimulus). In this chapter, we offer a different perspective. Confidence ratings (...) in general, and metacognitive measures in particular, may offer important advantages over subjective ratings. The arguments we offer here are supported by empirical, practical and socio-strategic considerations. However, we do not suggest consciousness and confidence are interchangeable. We recognize the limitations of confidence ratings in some experimental designs and for some research questions. Nevertheless, we also address a potential conceptual link between consciousness and confidence that stems from Rosenthal’s very own work on mental quality space theory. (shrink)

The objective of this work is to carry out a genetic study on the Husserlian concept of noema based in the givenness of the real body in the passive experience of pain. The development focuses, either, on the delimitation of the painful body given in its physical sphere in attention to its material properties, and in the eventual integration of this passively given body in the so-called noetic-noematic structure regarding the intentional revelation that pain implies. To do this, pain will (...) first be briefly examined in light of "original" passivity. Secondly, the way in which the body is given in its real disposition and its understanding as a bodily ego in experiencing pain will be contemplated. Thirdly, considering the “original” constitution of the body in pain in a broad sense, emphasis will be placed on its correspondence with intentionality, a matter that only confirms that pain is a form of perception. Finally, the deployment of the genetically viewed noema is given on the basis of the determination of the real body as a noematic object. (shrink)

Definiciones de epistemología hay muchas, al igual que clases y estilos. Sin embargo, más allá de esta diversidad, es necesario contar con una definición básica que guíe nuestra comprensión del tema. Dos serán las preguntas que nos ayuden a ello en este artículo: a) ¿qué es la epistemología? y b) ¿para qué le sirve al científico?

Our pains can be more or less intense, our mental imagery can be more or less vivid, our perceptual experiences can be more or less striking. These degrees of intensity of conscious experiences are all manifestations of a phenomenal property I call mental strength. In this article, I argue that mental strength is a domain-general phenomenal magnitude; in other words, it is a phenomenal quantity shared by all conscious experiences that explains their degree of felt intensity. Mental strength has been (...) largely overlooked in favor of mental states’ type, representational contents, domain-specific phenomenology, or processes such as attention. Considering mental strength in our reflections about the mind illuminates debates about the relation of representational contents and phenomenal character, and it also helps address questions about the structure and functions of consciousness. Mental strength provides a unifying construct to model what is shared in the phenomenology of different types of conscious experiences. (shrink)

To find the neural substrates of consciousness, researchers compare subjects’ neural activity when they are aware of stimuli against neural activity when they are not aware. Ideally, to guarantee that the neural substrates of consciousness—and nothing but the neural substrates of consciousness—are isolated, the only difference between these two contrast conditions should be conscious awareness. Nevertheless, in practice, it is quite challenging to eliminate confounds and irrelevant differences between conscious and unconscious conditions. In particular, there is an often-neglected confound that (...) is crucial to eliminate from neuroimaging studies: task performance. Unless subjects’ task performance is matched (and hence perceptual signal processing is matched), researchers risk finding the neural correlates of perception, rather than conscious perception. Here, we discuss the theoretical motivations for the performance matching framework and review empirical demonstrations of, and theoretical inferences derived from, obtaining differences in consciousness while controlling for task performance. We summarize signal detection theoretic modeling frameworks that explain how it is that we can derive performance-matched differences in consciousness without the effect being trivially driven by differences in criterion setting, and also provide principles for designing experimental paradigms that yield performance-matched differences in awareness. Finally, we address potential technical and theoretical issues that stem from matching performance across conditions of awareness, and we introduce the notion of “triangulation” for designing comprehensive experimental sets that can better reveal the neural substrates of consciousness. (shrink)

Este trabajo se ocupa de algunas ideas éticas del filósofo latinoamericano Andrés Bello (1781-1865), en especial de su “teoría de los sentimientos morales”. En la polémica del siglo XIX entre el llamado racionalismo ético (representado por Théodore Jouffroy) y el utilitarismo (Bentham), Bello adopta una postura intermedia, que pudiera calificarse de “hedonismo moderado” o de “eudemonismo”. Sus puntos de vista sobre la motivación moral o la manera en que la razón y el sentimiento se entrelazan para formar nuestras creencias (...) morales, se revelan como muy próximos a las doctrinas de Aristóteles y de algunos autores contemporáneos. (shrink)

In this paper I argue that many scholars involved in the contemporary free will debates have underappreciated the philosophical appeal of agent causation because the resources of contemporary emergentism have not been adequately introduced into the discussion. Whereas I agree that agent causation’s main problem has to do with its intelligibility, particularly with respect to the issue of how substances can be causally relevant, I argue that the notion of substance causation can be clearly articulated from an emergentist framework. According (...) to my proposal, a free agent is _a causally powerful substance that emerges in an anomic way from her constitutive mental events_, downwardly constraining, selecting and, in this way, having control on them. As we shall see, this particular concept of agent causation not only makes sense of the deep insight behind agent libertarianism, but it also provides us with the resources to solve some of the main objections that have been raised against it. It is true that here I cannot develop a complete defense of the evidential credentials of emergentism. Still, even if the considerations that follow do not serve to convince detractors of agent causal libertarian accounts of free will, they do suggest that libertarian agent causation is more promising than is typically acknowledged. (shrink)

This original and compelling book argues that previous studies of John Stuart Mill's work have neglected his egalitarianism and thus seriously misunderstood his views. Morales demonstrates that Mill was fundamentally concerned with how the exercise of unjust or arbitrary power by some individuals over others sabotages the possibility of human well-being and social improvement. Mill therefore believed that 'perfect equality'--more than liberty--was the foundation of democracy and that democracy was a moral ideal for the organization of human life in (...) all of its dimensions. By reinterpreting Mill, Morales also challenges twentieth-century views of liberalism, and addresses its contemporary communitarian and feminist critics. (shrink)

When visual attention is directed away from a stimulus, neural processing is weak and strength and precision of sensory data decreases. From a computational perspective, in such situations observers should give more weight to prior expectations in order to behave optimally during a discrimination task. Here we test a signal detection theoretic model that counter-intuitively predicts subjects will do just the opposite in a discrimination task with two stimuli, one attended and one unattended: when subjects are probed to discriminate the (...) unattended stimulus, they rely less on prior information about the probed stimulus’ identity. The model is in part inspired by recent findings that attention reduces trial-by-trial variability of the neuronal population response and that they use a common criterion for attended and unattended trials. In five different visual discrimination experiments, when attention was directed away from the target stimulus, subjects did not adjust their response bias in reaction to a change in stimulus presentation frequency despite being fully informed and despite the presence of performance feedback and monetary and social incentives. This indicates that subjects did not rely more on the priors under conditions of inattention as would be predicted by a Bayes-optimal observer model. These results inform and constrain future models of Bayesian inference in the human brain. (shrink)

On the powerful qualities view, every fundamental property is both dispositional and qualitative. Identity theory is the standard account of the view, which makes the stronger claim that a property’s dispositionality and qualitativity are identical to each other, and identical to the property itself. Recent defences of the powerful qualities view have involved novel theories of powerful qualities which are not also variants of identity theory. Giannotti (Erkenntnis 86:603–621, 2021a) has suggested a novel theory of his own, the dual aspect (...) account, which makes use of a particular notion of aspects. For Giannotti, dispositionality and qualitativity are each an aspect of a property, and an aspect is a property’s way of being. The importance of aspects is twofold. Firstly, by introducing aspects to identity theory, the theory becomes more precise. Secondly, aspects allow for a novel theory of powerful qualities, the dual aspect account, which maintains that dispositionality and qualitativity are aspects, but rejects the identity claim. Giannotti’s aim is to show that even if identity theory is false, the dual aspect account remains an available theory for advocates of powerful qualities. This paper will be a critical examination of Giannotti’s ideas. Firstly, I will clarify Giannotti’s notion of aspects, explaining how it involves a misunderstanding of supervenience, and why it does not offer the advantages that he claims it does. Secondly, in light of my discussion of aspects, I will argue that the dual aspect account lacks relative advantages over the compound view of powerful qualities. (shrink)