Where the old objectivity question asked, Objectivity or relativism: which side are you on?, the new one refuses this choice, seeking instead to bypass widely recognized problems with the conceptual framework that restricts the choices to these two. It asks, How can the notion of objectivity be updated and made useful for contemporary knowledge-seeking projects? One response to this question is the strong objectivity program that draws on feminist standpoint epistemology to provide a kind of (...) logic of discovery for maximizing our ability to block might makes right in the sciences. It does so by delinking the neutrality ideal from standards for maximizing objectivity, since neutrality is now widely recognized as not only not necessary, not only not helpful, but, worst of all, an obstacle to maximizing objectivity when knowledge-distorting interests and values have constituted a research project. Strong objectivity provides a method for correcting this kind of situation. However, standpoint approaches have their own limitations which are quite different from the misreadings of them upon which most critics have tended to focus. Unfortunately, historically limited epistemologies and philosophies of science are all we get to choose from at this moment in history. (shrink)

Purely parallel neural networks can model object recognition in brief displays – the same conditions under which illusory conjunctions have been demonstrated empirically. Correcting errors of illusory conjunction is the “tag-assignment” problem for a purely parallel processor: the problem of assigning a spatial tag to nonspatial features, feature combinations, and objects. This problem must be solved to model human object recognition over a longer time scale. Our model simulates both the parallel processes that may underlie illusory conjunctions and the serial (...) processes that may solve the tag-assignment problem in normal perception. One component of the model extracts pooled features and another provides attentional tags that correct illusory conjunctions. Our approach addresses two questions: How can objects be identified from simultaneously attended features in a parallel, distributed representation? How can the spatial selectional requirements of such an attentional process be met by a separation of pathways for spatial and nonspatial processing? Our analysis of these questions yields a neurally plausible simulation of tag assignment based on synchronizing feature processing activity in a spatial focus of attention. (shrink)

We introduce a distinction, unnoticed in the literature, between four varieties of objective Bayesianism. What we call ' strong objective Bayesianism' is characterized by two claims, that all scientific inference is 'logical' and that, given the same background information two agents will ascribe a unique probability to their priors. We think that neither of these claims can be sustained; in this sense, they are 'dogmatic'. The first fails to recognize that some scientific inference, in particular that concerning evidential relations, (...) is not (in the appropriate sense) logical, the second fails to provide a non-question-begging account of 'same background information'. We urge that a suitably objective Bayesian account of scientific inference does not require either of the claims. Finally, we argue that Bayesianism needs to be fine-grained in the same way that Bayesians fine-grain their beliefs. (shrink)

Sandra Harding is working on the reconstruction of scientific objectivity. Lorraine Daston argues that objectivity is a concept that has historically evolved. Her account of the development of "aperspectival objectivity" provides an opportunity to see Harding's "strong objectivity" project as a stage in this evolution, to locate it in the history of migration of ideals from moral philosophy to natural science, and to support Harding's desire to retain something of the ontological significance of objectivity.

The world as we find it -- Kant and the death of God -- Nietzsche: the tragic ethos and the spirit of music -- Max Weber, magic, and the politics of social scientific objectivity -- "What have we to do with morals?": Nietzsche and Weber on the politics of morality -- Sigmund Freud and the heroism of knowledge -- Lenin and the calling of the party -- Carl Schmitt and the exceptional sovereign -- Martin Heidegger and the space of (...) the political -- Without a banister: Hannah Arendt and roads not taken -- Conclusion: the world as it finds us. (shrink)

Although there is widespread opposition to reproductive cloning, some have argued that its use by infertile couples to have genetically related children would be ethically justifiable. Others have suggested that lesbian or gay couples might wish to use cloning to have genetically related children. Most of the main objections to human reproductive cloning are based on the child’s lack of unique nuclear DNA. In the future, it may be possible safely to create children using cloning combined with genetic modifications, so (...) that they have unique nuclear DNA. The genetic modifications could be aimed at giving such children genetic characteristics of both members of the couple concerned. Thus, cloning combined with genetic modification could be appealing to infertile, lesbian, or gay couples who seek genetically related children who have genetic characteristics of both members. In such scenarios, the various objections to human reproductive cloning that are based on the lack of genetic uniqueness would no longer be applicable. The author argues that it would be ethically justifiable for such couples to create children in this manner, assuming these techniques could be used safely. (shrink)

Don Marquis has put forward a non-religious argument against abortion based on what he claims is a morally relevant similarity between killing adult human beings and killing fetuses. He asserts that killing adults is wrong because it deprives them of their valuable futures. He points out that a fetus’s future includes everything that is in an adult’s future, given that fetuses naturally develop into adults. Thus, according to Marquis, killing a fetus deprives it of the same sort of valuable future (...) that an adult is deprived of in being killed and this makes abortion seriously wrong. Commentators have raised a number of objections to Marquis’s argument, to which he has satisfactorily responded. In this paper, difficulties with Marquis’s argument that have not been considered by previous commentators are pointed out. A main thesis of this paper is that Marquis does not adequately defend his argument against several important objections that he himself has raised. These new considerations support the view that Marquis’s argument is unsuccessful. (shrink)

ABSTRACT In previous articles I discussed the ethics of human reproductive cloning, focusing on a possible future scenario in which reproductive cloning can be accomplished without an elevated risk of anomalies to the children who are created. I argued that in such a scenario it would be ethically permissible for infertile couples to use cloning as a way to have genetically related children and that such use should not be prohibited. In ‘Reproductive Cloning and a (Kind of) Genetic Fallacy’, Neil (...) Levy and Mianna Lotz raise objections to my conclusions. They disagree with the view, for which I argued, that some couples can have defensible reasons for desiring genetically related children. They also offer several new arguments against reproductive cloning, including an argument that it would diminish the number of adoptions, thereby adversely affecting the welfare of children who need to be adopted. In this paper I point out that Levy and Lotz's criticisms misconstrue my arguments and that there are serious problems with their arguments for prohibiting infertile couples from using cloning, including their argument from adoption. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Barrow and Newton E. W. STRONG As E. A. Buxrr HAS ADDUCED,Isaac Barrow (1630-1677) in his philosophy of space, time, and mathematical method strongly influenced the thinking of Newton: The recent publication of an early paper written by Newton (his De gravitatione et aequipondio fluidorum)2 affords evidence not known to Burtt of Newton's indebtedness in philosophy to Barrow, his teacher. Prior to its publication in 1962, this paper (...) was utilized by Alexandre Koyrd in his essay, "Newton and Descartes," 3 a study based on the third Horblit Lecture in the History of Science which he gave at Harvard University, March 8, 1961. Koyr8 maintains that there is a radical opposition in Newton's Principia not only to Descartes' purely scientific theories but also to the Cartesian philosophy. Yet, as he remarks, "we do not find in the Principia an open criticism of the philosophy of Descartes.... " He attributes this fact principally "to the very structure of the Principia: it is essentially a book on rational mechanics, which provides principles for physics and astronomy. In such a book there is a normal place for the discussion of Cartesian optics, but not of the conception of the relations of mind and body, and other such things." Koyrd asserts, nonetheless, that the criticism is not absent. It lurks in Newton's carefully worded definitions of fundamental concepts--those of space, time, motion, and matter--and becomes more apparent in the Optice of 1706 and in the second odition of the Principia. In support of this argument, he makes much of young Newton's unfini.~hed paper. He holds that this essay is of exceptional value "as it enables us to get some insight into the formation of Newton's thought, and to recognize that preoccupation with philosophic problems was not an external additatmentum but an integral dement of his thinking." 4 As concerns "young Newton's conception of space in its being and in its relation to God and time," Koyrd remarks that we learn from this essay The Metaphysical Foundations of Modern Physical Science (New York, 1927), p. 144. A. Rupert Hall and Marie Boas Hall, Unpublished Scientific Papers of Isaac Newton (Cambridge, 1962), Introduction, pp. 75-88; Latin text, pp. 90-121; English translation, pp. 121156. " Newtonian Studies (Harvard University Press, 1965), pp. 53-114. " Newtonian Studies, pp. 82-83. In his De gravitatione et aequipondio fluidorum, Newton is indeed engrossed with philosophic problems. With regard, however, to the announced purpose of his paper, namely, "to treat of the science of gravity and solid bodies in fluids by two methods," does Newton represent kis metaphysical "explanation of the nature of body" as an element of his science essential to its completeness7 He does not do so. At the end of his explanation he remarks: "I have already digressed enough; let us return to the main theme." He proceeds to set forth fifteen more definitions and then turns to the demonstration of two "Propositions on Non-Elastic Fluids." [155] 156 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY "that space is necessary, eternal, immutz~ble, and unmovable, that though we can imagine that there is nothing in space we cannot think space is not.., and that if there is no space, God would be nowhere. We learn also that all points of space are simultaneous and that, therefore, the divine omnipresence does not introduce composition in God.... " What we here learn from Newton about space in confutation of Descartes is to be found in Barrow's tenth mathematical lecture, "'Of Space, and Impenetrability." 5 In this lecture, Barrow opposes both Descartes and Hobbes. He objects, as does Newton, to the position taken by Descartes in his Principia Philosophiae, namely, "it is necessary.forMatter to be infinitely extended." He proceeds, as does Newton, to show how "very much Cartesius's great Subtility has failed him in this Case" to conclude that there is space empty of matter and distinct from magnitude from which an infinity of matter cannot be deduced. The correspondence of arguments tendered by Barrow and Newton indicates that the tenth lecture constituted a source from which Newton gleaned principal objections to Descartes' Principia Philosophiae. Although Koyr~ makes reference to Burtt's... (shrink)

Background: Physicians sometimes are asked by co-workers for prescriptions to deal with their medical problems. These “hallway” requests typically occur outside a formal doctor-patient relationship. There are professional guidelines on serving as physician for family members and friends, but no guidelines address writing prescriptions for co-workers. The frequency of these requests and the factors physicians consider in responding to them have not been examined.Objectives: To obtain data on the frequency of these requests and physicians’ attitudes and practices in responding to (...) them, and to explore the ethical considerations in writing prescriptions for co-workers.Design: A survey was administered to all physician faculty and residents in an academic department of internal medicine. The questions included whether the respondent had ever been asked for a prescription by a co-worker and how often the respondent had received such requests and written such prescriptions in the previous three months. Respondents also were asked to rate how likely they would be to write such a prescription in 15 hypothetical scenarios.Results: Of the 113 respondents who completed surveys, 68 percent reported having been asked for a prescription by a co-worker. Among those who had ever been asked, 59 percent had been asked one or more times during the previous three months and 88 percent had ever written such a prescription. Also, 88 percent of all respondents stated they were “very likely” or “likely” to write the prescription in one or more of the hypothetical scenarios.Conclusions: Most physicians in our sample had been asked for prescriptions by co-workers, and most had written such prescriptions. Many respondents indicated a willingness to write such prescriptions in a variety of scenarios, despite the absence of a formal doctor-patient relationship. Further discussion of the ethical considerations in writing prescriptions for co-workers is needed. (shrink)

In my essay, a critique of “the best secular argument against abortion” I reconstructed and criticised two versions of Don Marquis’s well-known argument against abortion. In critiquing the version I call the “essence argument”, I presented counterexamples to one of the premises in that argument. In this issue of the journal, Ezio Di Nucci takes note of the fact that I used the term “valuable future” in the premise but used the term “future like ours” in the counterexamples. Because the (...) terms are different, Di Nucci claimed that my counterexamples had no bearing on the premise and are therefore unsuccessful. The main error in Di Nucci’s objection is a failure to acknowledge that Marquis uses the terms “valuable future” and “future like ours” interchangeably. For the purpose of reconstructing Marquis’s argument, the term “valuable future” is to be taken in a sense that means the same as “future like ours”. Once this point is recognised, Di Nucci’s objection falls apart. (shrink)

Casuistic methods of reasoning in medical ethics have been criticized by a number of authors. At least five main objections to casuistry have been put forward: (1) it requires a uniformity of views that is not present in contemporary pluralistic society; (2) it cannot achieve consensus on controversial issues; (3) it is unable to examine critically intuitions about cases; (4) it yields different conclusions about cases when alternative paradigms are chosen; and (5) it cannot articulate the grounds of its conclusions. (...) Two main versions of casuistry have been put forward, and the responses to these objections depend in part on which version one is defending. Jonsen has advocated a version modeled on the approach to casuistry used by moral theologians in the 15th and 16th century, involving comparison of the case at hand with a single paradigm and a lineup of cases. The present author has advocated another version, drawn from experience with cases in clinical ethics, which involves comparing the case at hand with two or more paradigms. Four of the five objections are unsuccessful when directed against Jonsen'sapproach, and all of them are unsuccessful when directed against the approach involving comparison with two or more paradigms. (shrink)

This paper focuses on epistemic practices within biomedical ethics that are related to disability. These practices are one of the reasons that there is tension between biomedical ethicists and disability advocates. I argue that appeals to conceptual neutrality regarding disability, which Anita Silvers recommends, are counterproductive. Objectivity as neutrality serves to obscure the social values and interests that inform epistemic practices. Drawing on feminist standpoint theory and epistemologies of ignorance, I examine ways that appeals to objectivity as neutrality (...) serve to maintain the status quo and ignorance regarding disability. I adapt Charles Mills’s notion of “white ignorance” in order to consider the systematic social ignorance regarding disability that is treated as knowledge. Bioethicists commonly dismiss the reports of disabled people regarding their quality of life as biased, while claiming that their own judgments are objective. Sandra Harding’s notion of strong objectivity is useful for thinking about ways that examination of values and interests informing epistemic practices related to disability in biomedical ethics could create better knowledge practices by taking the standpoint of disabled people seriously. (shrink)

In an earlier essay in this journal I critiqued Don Marquis's well-known argument against abortion. I distinguished two versions of Marquis's argument, which I refer to as ‘the essence argument’ and ‘the sufficient condition argument’. I presented two counterexamples showing that the essence argument was mistaken, and I argued that the sufficient condition argument should be rejected because Marquis had not adequately responded to an important objection to it. In response to my critique, Marquis put forward in this journal a (...) revised version of his argument. In his modified approach he no longer advocates the essence argument and he offers a new version of the sufficient condition argument. In the current essay, I discuss how Marquis's revised argument deals with my original objections, and I argue that his new sufficient condition argument is unsuccessful. (shrink)

This paper defends a 'punctivist' conception of consciousness from recent attacks by Ian Phillips and Matthew Soteriou. As we intend it, 'punctivism' is the view that a subject's experience over some interval is determined by their experiential states at each instant during it. Phillips and Soteriou both offer ingenious arguments purporting to show that the punctivist is unable to make sense of motion perception; and that only by adopting an 'holistic' conception -- whereby a subject's instantaneous experiences are determined by (...) their experience over the interval -- can we make sense of the puzzles such phenomena pose. We contend that both arguments invoke dubious claims, their proffered solutions come with highly controversial commitments, and, if we take punctivism seriously, it is difficult to see why the so-called puzzles should be puzzling in the first place. A punctivist model of motion perception is proposed in response, and objections anticipated. (shrink)

최근 온/오프라인에서 자주 등장하는 페미니즘에 대한 공격은 페미니즘을 주관주의나 특권주의로 간주하는 경향을 갖는다. 이에 이 글에서 나는 페미니즘에 대한 적대시가 페미니즘 입장론에 대한 오해나 무지에서 비롯된 것임을 보여주고자 한다.BR이를 논증하기 위해 나는 이 글에서 1991년도에 『누구의 과학이며 누구의 지식인가?』에서 정식화된 샌드라 하딩(Sandra Harding)의 “지적으로 강력한 페미니스트 입장론”과 도나 해러웨이(Donna Haraway)의 『유인원, 사이보그 그리고 여자』에서 논의되는 “상황적 지식들”을 분석하는 가운데 이들의 입장을 “비판적 입장론”으로 수렴시키고자 한다. 페미니스트 비판적 입장론은 무위치나 상대적 위치에서 출발하는 인식론을 비판하는 가운데 여성의 삶이라는 체현된 위치에서 시작하는 인식론이 (...) 덜 왜곡된 지식을 위한 토대를 제공한다고 본다. 나아가 비판적 입장론은 대상뿐 아니라 대상을 다루는 주체에 대한 성찰성과 비판성을 강조하는 가운데 전통과학보다 더 강한 객관성을 보장하고자 한다. 나아가 비판적 입장론은 주체에 대한 비판 능력을 담보하는 가운데 다양한 모순들을 가로질러 생각할 수 있는 교차적 사고로 나아갈 수 있게 된다.BR이를 통해 나는 비판적 입장론이 기계적 평등에 기반하는 추상적 민주주의를 권력의 차이에 민감한 깊이 있는 민주주의로 한 단계 발전시키는 데 매우 중요한 역할을 수행하고 있음을 분명히 하고자 한다. (shrink)

An objection often is raised against the use of reproductive technology to create "nontraditional families," as in ovum donation for postmenopausal women or postmortem artificial insemination. The objection states that conceiving children in such circumstances is harmful to them because of adverse features of these nontraditional families. A similar objection is raised when parents, through negligence or willful disregard of risks, create children with serious genetic diseases or other developmental handicaps. It is claimed that such reproduction harms the children who (...) are created. In reply to this Harm to the Child Argument, it has been pointed out that the procreative acts that supposedly harm the child are the very acts that create the child. This reply has been developed into an argument that, in most of the types of cases under consideration, creating the child does not harm her. This reply, the No Harm Argument, has been stated in three main ways, and it is one of the most misunderstood arguments in bioethics. This paper examines the main rebuttals that have been made to the No Harm Argument and argues that none of them is successful. (shrink)

The situated potentials for action between material things in the world and the interactional processes thereby afforded need to be seen as not only constituting the possibility of agency, but thereby also comprising it. Eo ipso, agency must be de-fused from any local, "contained" subject and be understood as a situational property in which subjects and objects can both participate. Any technological artifact should thus be understood as a complex of agential capacities that function relative to any number of social (...) and material factors. Keeping in mind that we are co-constituted by webs of relations involving increasingly complex collections of artefacts, networks, niches, and communities of practice, our investigation will be guided by interrogating the functional potential of a thing that in the last fifteen years has seamlessly worked its way into the everyday life of millions of human agents. This "thing," the smartphone, is merely a nodal point in a highly complex network. Recognizing this massive "collective," we nevertheless want to show some of the ways in which something as seemingly mundane as a smartphone can reflexively alter the range of actions available to a cognitive agent (Latour 1994). Specifically, we hope to shed light on some of the social-cognitive consequences of technological mediation by looking at the complementary, if not mutually implied, domains of memory and knowledge. (shrink)

In their target article, Zamina Mithani, Jane Cooper, and J. Wesley Boyd make a compelling case for the importance of “counter storytelling” in bioethics. They obse...

Jean E. Chambers and Timothy F. Murphy responded to my article “Cloning and Infertility” and extended the debate over human cloning in interesting ways. I had argued that none of the objections to cloning by somatic cell nuclear transfer are successful in the context of infertile couples who use cloning to have genetically related children, assuming the issue of safety is overcome by scientific advances.

According to strong pluralism, objects distinct by virtue of their modal properties can coincide. The most common objection towards such view invokes the so-called Grounding Problem according to which the strong pluralist needs to explain what the grounds are for supposed modal differences between the coincidents. As recognized in the literature, the failure to provide an answer to the Grounding Problem critically undermines the plausibility of strong pluralism. Moreover, there are strong reasons to believe that (...) class='Hi'>strong pluralists cannot provide an explanation of the Grounding Problem. In this paper, we argue that strong pluralism can be motivated independently of the successful answer to the Grounding Problem. In order to achieve that aim, we provide a haecceitistic interpretation of strong pluralism according to which strong pluralism should be read as a position committed to the existence of primitive individuals, i.e., the individuals that have their criteria of individuation independently of their qualitative profiles. That said, we do not aim at defending haecceitism. Instead, our aim is rather modest: we want to provide a new way for the strong pluralist to supplement his view to make it more watertight. (shrink)

Many philosophers with hedonistic sympathies (e.g., Mill, Sidgwick, Sumner, Feldman, Crisp, Heathwood, and Bradley) have claimed that well-being is necessarily experiential. Kagan once claimed something slightly different, saying that, although unexperienced bodily events can directly impact a person’s well-being, it is nonetheless true that any change in a person’s well-being must involve a change in her (i.e., either in her mind or in her body). Kagan elaborated by saying that a person’s well-being cannot float freely of her such that it (...) is affected by events that do not affect her (Kagan 1992, 169–189). These two claims—that well-being is necessarily experiential and that changes in well-being must involve changes in the person—are two different ways of specifying the general intuition that a person’s well-being must be strongly tied to her. This general intuition imposes an adequacy constraint on welfare theorizing: To be adequate, a welfare theory cannot allow that someone can be directly benefited by events that are not strongly tied to her. Call this the strong-tie requirement. The strong-tie requirement is easily satisfied by welfare hedonism, but it poses problems for desire-fulfillment welfare theories and objective-list welfare theories. Though a great deal has been written about desire-fulfillment welfare theories in relation to the strong-tie requirement, not as much has been written about objective-list welfare theories in relation to the strong-tie requirement. This paper argues that objective-list welfare theories can satisfy the strong-tie requirement, though probably only if they take a perfectionist form, as opposed to a brute-list form. (shrink)

Christopher Kirwan; III*—How Strong are the Objections to Essence?, Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, Volume 71, Issue 1, 1 June 1971, Pages 43–60, https.

According to Carson Strong, the future of value account of the wrongness of killing is subject to counterexamples. Ezio Di Nucci has disagreed. Their disagreement turns on whether the concepts of a future of value and a future like ours are equivalent. Unfortunately, both concepts are fuzzy, which explains, at least in part, the disagreement. I suggest that both concepts can be clarified in ways that seem plausible and that makes them equivalent. Strong claims that better accounts of (...) the wrongness of killing exist. I show that those alternative accounts are unsatisfactory. (shrink)

Christopher Kirwan; III*—How Strong are the Objections to Essence?, Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, Volume 71, Issue 1, 1 June 1971, Pages 43–60, https.

The assessments issued by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) aim to provide policy-makers with an objective source of information about the various causes of climate change, the projected consequences for the environment and human affairs, and the options for adaptation and mitigation. But what, in this context, is meant by ‘objective’? In practice, in an effort to address internal and external criticisms, the IPCC has regularly revised its methodological procedures; some of these procedures seem to meet the requirements (...) of objectivity, at least as understood in a specific sense, but the relationship between objectivity and value-neutrality requires further investigation. The aim of this paper is to offer an appropriate philosophical account of objectivity, reconcilable with the fact that the IPCC is not value-free. I argue that Sandra Harding’s notion of strong objectivity is particularly well suited to this goal, and I examine the extent to which the current IPCC procedures match her account. (shrink)

Some claim that the notion of strong emergence as involving ontological or causal novelty makes no sense, on grounds that any purportedly strongly emergent features or associated powers 'collapse', one way or another, into the lower-level base features upon which they depend. Here we argue that there are several independently motivated and defensible means of preventing the collapse of strongly emergent features or powers into their lower-level bases, as directed against a conception of strongly emergent features as having fundamentally (...) novel powers. After introducing the project (Section 1), we motivate and present the powers-based account (Section 2); we then canvass the two main versions of the collapse objection, show how these apply to the powers-based account, and problematize certain strategies of response (Section 3); we then present and defend four better strategies of response (Section 4). (shrink)

I argue that strong representationalism, the view that for a perceptual experience to have a certain phenomenal character just is for it to have a certain representational content (perhaps represented in the right sort of way), encounters two problems: the dual looks problem and the duplication problem. The dual looks problem is this: strong representationalism predicts that how things phenomenally look to the subject reflects the content of the experience. But some objects phenomenally look to both have and (...) not have certain properties, for example, my bracelet may phenomenally look to be circular-shaped and oval-shaped (and hence non-circularshaped). So, if strong representationalism is true, then the content of my experience ought to represent my bracelet as being both circular-shaped and non-circular-shaped. Yet, intuitively, the content of my experience does not represent my bracelet as being both circular-shaped and non-circular-shaped. The duplication problem is this. On a standard conception of content, spatio-temporally distinct experiences and experiences had by distinct subjects may differ in content despite the fact that they are phenomenally indistinguishable. But this undermines the thesis that phenomenal character determines content. I argue that the two problems can be solved by applying a version of an idea from David Chalmers, which is to recognize the existence of genuinely centered properties in the content of perceptual experience. (shrink)

Objectivity is a key concept both in how we talk about science in everyday life and in the philosophy of science. This Element explores various ways in which recent philosophers of science have thought about the nature, value and achievability of objectivity. The first section explains the general trend in recent philosophy of science away from a notion of objectivity as a 'view from nowhere' to a focus on the relationship between objectivity and trust. Section 2 (...) discusses the relationship between objectivity and recent arguments attacking the viability or desirability of 'value free' science. Section 3 outlines Longino's influential 'social' account of objectivity, suggesting some worries about drawing too strong a link between epistemic and ethical virtues. Section 4 turns to the value of objectivity, exploring concerns that notions of objectivity are politically problematic, and cautiously advocating in response a view of objectivity in terms of invariance. (shrink)

The evolutionist challenge to moral realism is the skeptical challenge that, if evolution is true, it would only be by chance, a “happy coincidence” as Sharon Street puts it, if human moral beliefs were true. The author formulates Street’s “happy coincidence” argument more precisely using a distinction between probabilistic sensitivity and insensitivity introduced by Elliott Sober. The author then considers whether it could be rational for us to believe that human moral judgments about particular cases are probabilistically sensitive to strongly (...) universal fundamental moral standards of cooperation and fair division. The author provides an explanation of why there would be a benign correlation between human moral judgments in particular cases and the requirements of strongly universal fundamental moral standards. The explanation of the benign correlation is based on group selection for groups of individuals with an egalitarian satisficing psychology and egalitarian norms, because of the ability of such groups to more efficiently solve gene-propagation collective action problems. (shrink)

Although the use of pronouns has been extensively investigated in children with autism spectrum disorders (ASD), most studies have focused on English, and no study to date has investigated the use of subject pronouns in null subject languages. The present study aims to fill this gap by investigating the use of subject and object pronouns in 5- to 8-year-old Greek-speaking high-functioning children with ASD compared to individually matched typically developing age and language controls. The ‘Frog where are you’ (Mayer, 1969) (...) narrative task was used to elicit subject and object pronouns as well as DPs. Greek is a null subject language, and as a result, subject pronouns most often remain without phonological content. The results showed that both groups used more null than overt subject pronouns, indicating that children with ASD know that Greek is a null subject language. TD children used more null subjects than subject DPs, whereas children with ASD used an equal proportion of null subjects and subject DPs. In terms of object pronouns, both groups produced more clitics and object DPs than strong object pronouns, but the difference between clitics and DPs did not reach significance in either of the groups. Importantly, the groups did not differ from each other in the use of ambiguous pronouns in both the subject and object position. The ASD children’s avoidance to use pronominal subjects can be taken as evidence that they use a strategy to avoid infelicitous reference. This would suggest that the ASD children’s difficulties with pronouns is not due to difficulties in core grammar. (shrink)

The strong intuition that the facts concerning the subjectivity of consciousness are simply beyond the grasp of objective science is the highest barrier to an intuitively convincing materialism in the philosophy of mind. We are steeped in a tradition which has it that there is, to state it from the first-person point of view, an epistemic difference in principle between my introspectible experience, which only I can apprehend and know, and the things which everyone can apprehend and which form (...) the domain of the natural sciences. This contrast is sometimes cast as that between the subjective stuff of first-person introspectible consciousness and the objective stuff of the natural sciences. In this essay, I will try to budge the view of the subjective-objective distinction which underlies this tradition from its position as tacit dogma. (shrink)

Strong pluralists hold that not even permanent material coincidence is enough for identity. Strong pluralism entails the possibility of purely material objects -- even if not coincident -- alike in all general respects, categorial and dispositional, relational and non-relational, past, present and future, at the microphysical level, but differing in some general modal, counterfactual or dispositional repscts at the macrophysical level. It is objectionable because it thus deprives us of the explanatory resources to explain why evident absurdities are (...) absurd. A second objection is to the suggestion that cases involving artefacts can illustrate strong pluralism. This offends against the principle that gien a complex intrinsic microphysical property instantiated in some regiion, the number of material things possessing it in that region cannot depend on the existence and nature of intentional activity taking place outside it. (shrink)

One common objection against the Principle of Sufficient Reason is that it leads to a highly counterintuitive position, namely, necessitarianism. In this paper, drawing on Avicenna’s modal theory, I differentiate between two versions of necessitarianism: strong necessitarianism and weak necessitarianism. I argue that the modal intuition driving this objection pertains to strong necessitarianism, while the Principle of Sufficient Reason, at most, leads to weak necessitarianism.

Strong comic immoralism maintains that every time a humorous demonstration (for example, a joke) involves a moral defect, it is enhanced aesthetically in virtue of having this moral defect. I want to show that strong comic immoralism is a coherent position, that it is possible to defend, and that there is, in fact, some reason to defend it. By doing this, my hope is that, moving forward, those who are interested in questions about the relationship between immorality and (...) the aesthetic value of jokes will take more seriously the objections that may be presented against their views by the strong comic immoralist, rather than claiming that “no one on this side of Satan” would be one. (shrink)

This paper examines the applicability of the object concept to the chemical senses, by evaluating them against a set of criteria for object‐hood. Taste and chemesthesis do not generate objects. Their parts, perceptible from birth, never combine. Orthonasal olfaction (sniffing) presents a strong case for generating objects. Odorants have many parts yet they are perceived as wholes, this process is based on learning, and there is figure‐ground segregation. While flavors are multimodal representations bound together by learning, there is no (...) functional need for flavor objects in the mouth. Rather, food identification occurs prior to ingestion using the eye and nose, with the latter retrieving multimodal flavor objects via sniffing (e.g.,sweetsmelling caramel). While there are differences in object perception between vision, audition, and orthonasal olfaction, the commonalities suggest that the brain has adopted the same basic solution when faced with extracting meaning from complex stimulus arrays. (shrink)

Drawing on her pioneering work in feminist standpoint theory, Harding articulates and defends the “strong objectivity” program, which she subsequently tests against recent discussions of objectivity and against postcolonialist science and technology studies. Strong objectivity starts with an examination of the experiences of individuals, such as women and minorities, who have traditionally been excluded from knowledge production in order to criticize prevailing standards of objectivity - especially the “weak objectivity” of allegedly value-neutral science (...) - and to articulate stronger standards of objectivity. This stance assumes that by adopting a standpoint outside of a discipline, one can achieve the distance required to critically assess the values, interests, and assumptions of that discipline. As Harding makes clear, this program is not merely interested in criticizing dominant research practices to improve the reliability and validity of science, but it is an inherently social and political project aimed at articulating standards that can produce science for social justice movements. After identifying various ways in which the strong objectivity program is consonant with major themes in recent science and technology studies research (e.g., historical work on the concept of objectivity, the dynamic co-evolution of science and society, theoretical pluralism), Harding responds to some potential objections to strong objectivity, e.g., accusations of relativism. By way of conclusion, Harding outlines her vision of a “new unification of multiple sciences” as a possible fruit of the strong objectivity program, wherein the global sciences are unified and harmonized by common goals of obtaining knowledge and developing more socially responsible societies. (shrink)

This Perspective traces the evolution of certain central notions in the theory of Generative Grammar (GG). The founding documents of the field suggested a relation between the grammar, construed as recursively enumerating an infinite set of sentences, and the idealized native speaker that was essentially equivalent to the relation between a formal language (a set of well-formed formulas) and an automaton that recognizes strings as belonging to the language or not. But this early view was later abandoned, when the focus (...) of the field shifted to the grammar's strong generative capacity as recursive generation of hierarchically structured objects as opposed to strings. The grammar is now no longer seen as specifying a set of well-formed expressions and in fact necessarily constructs expressions of any degree of intuitive “acceptability.” The field of GG, however, has not sufficiently acknowledged the significance of this shift in perspective, as evidenced by the fact that (informal and experimentally-controlled) observations about string acceptability continue to be treated as bona fide data and generalizations for the theory of GG. The focus on strong generative capacity, it is argued, requires a new discussion of what constitutes valid empirical evidence for GG beyond observations pertaining to weak generation. (shrink)

The first part of this book is of an epistemological nature and develops an original theory of scientific objectivity, understood in a weak sense (as intersubjective agreement among the specialists) and a strong sense (as having precise concrete referents). In both cases it relies upon the adoption of operational criteria designed within the particular perspective under which any single science considers reality. The "object" so attained has a proper ontological status, dependent on the specific character of the criteria (...) of reference (regional ontologies). This justifies a form of scientific realism. Such perspectives are also the result of a complex cultural-historical situation. The awareness of such a "historical determinacy" of science justifies including in the philosophy of science the problems of ethics of science, relations of science with metaphysics, and social dimensions of science that overstep the traditional restriction of the philosophy of science to an epistemology of science. It is to this "context" that the second part of the book is devoted. (shrink)

In this paper we discuss the two-system framework, examine its strengths, point out a fundamental weakness concerning the unity of conscious experience, and then propose a new hypothesis that avoids that weakness and other related concerns. According to our strong emergence hypothesis, what emerges are not merely mental properties in specialized, distributed neural areas, but also a new, irreducibly singular entity that functions in a recurrent manner to integrate its mental properties and to rewire its brain. We argue that (...) the former function is suggested, in part, by the effects of anesthetics on sensory integration, and that the latter function is suggested by evidence garnered from the neuroscience of mindfulness, constraint-induced movement therapy for stroke, and neuroimaging data surrounding mental illness. We then discuss how our strong emergence hypothesis relates to the description and treatment of neuropsychiatric disorders. Finally, potential objections are addressed. (shrink)

Chapter 1 discusses John Dewey's pragmatism and his reasons for rejecting a picture of the world which disallows human interest, striving, and concerns. Chapter 2 discusses the work of Richard Rorty's anti-foundationalism and attempts to reconstruct philosophy as hermeneutics. Chapter 3 discusses the work of Helen Longino, Lynn Hankinson Nelson, and Sandra Harding all of whom represent feminist attempts to reconstruct a concept of objectivity which is answerable to feminist concerns and which is built around an epistemolgical framework which (...) does not depend on the conception of a thing-in-itself and which emphasizes the social nature of epistemology. Longino makes clear how objects of inquiry are characterized differently in the context of different research projects. Nelson addresses the connection between moral reasoning and scientific reasoning. Harding's version of feminist standpoint theory constructs a version of 'strong objectivity'. In Chapter 4 I turn to a discussion of interpretations of Nietzsche. I argue that we need not see Nietzsche as denying truth, and I suggest the promising metaphor of omniperspectvism, found in The Genealogy of Morals, as a framework for a new concept of objectivity. Chapter 5 draws on the work of Lorraine Code to discuss how omniperspectivism and a discourse of epistemological virtue can be combined to define a better conception of objectivity than the traditional concept which emphasizes value-neutrality and disinterestedness. The major tenets of this chapter are that moral reasoning and scientific reasoning inform each other, and that these discourses interact together in the process of coming to know the world and each other; that feminist insights into the functioning of sexism and racism in scientific research, reasoning, and theory construction must be taken seriously, and that a new objectivity must allow us to evaluate and critically analyze presuppositions; that we will inevitably have problems of exclusion and disagreement, but that this need not undermine objectivity but may, in some instances, actually enhance it. (shrink)

Peter Unger's puzzle, the problem of the many, is an argument for the conclusion that we are grossly mistaken about what kinds of objects are in our immediate surroundings. But it is not clear what we should make of Unger's argument. There is an epistemic view which says that the argument shows that we don't know which objects are the referents of singular terms in our language. There is a linguistic view which says that Unger's puzzle shows that ordinary singular (...) terms and count nouns are vague. Finally, there is an ontological view which says that the puzzle shows that there are vague objects. ;The epistemic view offers the simplest solution to the problem of the many, but runs foul of a different problem, the problem of vague reference. The problem of vague reference is that given the presuppositions of the epistemic view there are too many too similar objects that might be the reference of a name such as 'Kilimanjaro' for it to be plausible that the name has a determinate reference. The linguistic view, spelled out in terms of semantic indecision and supervaluation, offers the same solution to the problem of the many and to the problem of vague reference. But it leaves no room for de re beliefs about ordinary material object. The ontological view offers a solution to the problem of the many that avoids the problem of vague reference and the problem of de re beliefs. For these reasons it is preferable to the other two. ;However, ontological vagueness has met strong objections. It has been argued that it is a fallacy of verbalism, that it is inconsistent and that once formulated in a consistent way it is not distinguishable from the linguistic view. These objections can be met, but not without cost. To avoid the charge of being inconsistent, friends of the ontological view have to give up the law of excluded middle. ;A positive account of vague parthood has two parts. First, parthood is not primitive but dependent on other primitive facts. The most important of the primitive facts are about to what kinds objects belong and how objects are casually related. Second, sometimes the primitive facts fail do determine of two objects whether one is part of the other. Given a notion of vague parthood, a notion of vague object can be defined roughly in the following way: An object O is vague if there is an object a such that it is indeterminate whether a is part of O. (shrink)

Background:The concept of conscientious objection is well described; however, because of its nature, little is known about real experiences of nursing professionals who apply objections in their practice. Extended roles in nursing indicate that clinical and value-based dilemmas are becoming increasingly common. In addition, the migration trends of the nursing workforce have increased the need for the mutual understanding of culturally based assumptions on aspects of health care delivery.Aim:To present (a) the arguments for and against conscientious objection in nursing practice, (...) (b) a description of current regulations and practice regarding conscientious objection in nursing in Poland and the United Kingdom, and (c) to offer a balanced view regarding the application of conscientious objection in clinical nursing practice.Design:Discussion paper.Ethical considerations:Ethical guidelines has been followed at each stage of this study.Findings:Strong arguments exist both for and against conscientious objection in nursing which are underpinned by empirical research from across Europe. Arguments against conscientious objection relate less to it as a concept, but rather in regard to organisational aspects of its application and different mechanisms which could be introduced in order to reach the balance between professional and patient’s rights.Discussion and conclusion:Debate regarding conscientious objection is vivid, and there is consensus that the right to objection among nurses is an important, acknowledged part of nursing practice. Regulation in the United Kingdom is limited to reproductive health, while in Poland, there are no specific procedures to which nurses can apply an objection. The same obligations of those who express conscientious objection apply in both countries, including the requirement to share information with a line manager, the patient, documentation of the objection and necessity to indicate the possibility of receiving care from other nurses. Using Poland and the United Kingdom as case study countries, this article offers a balanced view regarding the application of conscientious objection in clinical nursing practice. (shrink)

The general composition question asks “what are the necessary and jointly sufficient conditions any xs and any y must satisfy in order for it to be true that those xs compose that y?” Although this question has received little attention, there is an interesting and theoretically fruitful answer. Namely, strong composition as identity (SCAI): necessarily, for any xs and any y, those xs compose y iff those xs are identical to y. SCAI is theoretically fruitful because if it is (...) true, then there is an answer to one of the most difficult and intractable questions of mereology (The Simple Question). In this paper, I introduce the identity account of simplicity and argue that if SCAI is true then this identity account of simplicity is as well. I consider an objection to the identity account of simplicity. Ultimately, I find this objection unsuccessful. (shrink)

Strong Composition as Identity is the thesis that necessarily, for any xs and any y, those xs compose y iff those xs are non-distributively identical to y. Some have argued against this view as follows: if some many things are non-distributively identical to one thing, then what’s true of the many must be true of the one. But since the many are many in number whereas the one is not, the many cannot be identical to the one. Hence is (...) mistaken. Although I am sympathetic to this objection, in this paper, I present two responses on behalf of the theorist. I also show that once the defender of accepts one of these two responses, that defender will be able to answer The Special Composition Question. (shrink)

According to the view we may term “strong cognitivism”, all reasons for action are rooted in normative features that the motivated subject takes objects to have independently of her attitudes towards these objects. The main concern of this paper is to argue against strong cognitivism, that is, to establish the view that conative attitudes do provide subjects with reasons for action. The central argument to this effect is a top-down argument: it proceeds by an analysis of the complex (...) phenomenon of love and derives a conclusion regarding the nature of more basic mental phenomena—particular desires. More specifically, its starting point is the crude intuition that the significance conferred by love upon its objects is of a distinctively personal kind—an intuition that is expressed by the apparent non-substitutability of two similar subjects only one of whom is loved with respect to their importance for the lover. I argue that the initial notion of non-substitutability can be refined and modified so as to form a real challenge to all versions of strong cognitivism and to establish the existence of attitude-dependent reasons. (shrink)