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Epistemology And The Wikipedia, P.D. Magnus
Epistemology And The Wikipedia, P.D. Magnus
Philosophy Faculty Scholarship
Wikipedia is a free encyclopedia that is written and edited entirely by visitors to its website. I argue that we are misled when we think of it in the same epistemic category with traditional general encyclopedias. An empirical assessment of its reliability reveals that it varies widely from topic to topic. So any particular claim found in it cannot be relied on based on its source. I survey some methods that we use in assessing specific claims and argue that the structure of the Wikipedia frustrates them
Designer Babies: Choosing Our Children's Genes, Bonnie Steinbock
Designer Babies: Choosing Our Children's Genes, Bonnie Steinbock
Philosophy Faculty Scholarship
The phrase “designer babies” refers to genetic interventions into pre-implantation embryos in the attempt to influence the traits the resulting children will have. At present, this is not possible, but many people are horrified by the mere thought that parents might want to choose their children’s genes, especially for non-disease traits. I want to argue that the objections are usually not well articulated, and that even when they are, it’s far from obvious that such interventions would be wrong.
The Morality Of Killing Human Embryos, Bonnie Steinbock
The Morality Of Killing Human Embryos, Bonnie Steinbock
Philosophy Faculty Scholarship
Embryonic stem cell research is morally and politically controversial because the process of deriving the embryonic stem (ES) cells kills embryos. If embryos are, as some would claim, human beings like you and me, then ES cell research is clearly impermissible. If, on the other hand, the blastocysts from which embryonic stem cells are derived are not yet human beings, but rather microscopic balls of undifferentiated cells, as others maintain, then ES cell research is probably morally permissible. Whether the research can be justified depends on such issues as its cost, chance of success, and numbers likely to benefit. But …
Hume On Promises And The Peculiar Act Of The Mind, Rachel Cohon
Hume On Promises And The Peculiar Act Of The Mind, Rachel Cohon
Philosophy Faculty Scholarship
No abstract provided.
What’S New About The New Induction?, P.D. Magnus
What’S New About The New Induction?, P.D. Magnus
Philosophy Faculty Scholarship
The problem of underdetermination is thought to hold important lessons for philosophy of science. Yet, as Kyle Stanford has recently argued, typical treatments of the offer only restatements of familiar philosophical problems. Following suggestions in Duhem and Sklar, Stanford calls for a New Induction from the history of science. It will provide proof, he thinks, of “the kind of underdetermination that the history of science reveals to be a distinctive and genuine threat to even our best scientific theories” [Sta01, p. S12]. This paper examines Stanford’s New Induction and argues that it— like the other forms of underdetermination that he …