Arts and Humanities Commons^™

On Beliefs "Worth Risking" In Plato, Clayton Willis Carden

Doctoral Dissertations

In this dissertation, I ask and answer the question “What is a belief ‘worth risking’ in Plato?” This question arises in light of some peculiar passages in the dialogues, particularly in the Meno and the Phaedo, in which Plato’s Socrates appears to advocate for adopting certain beliefs specifically in virtue of their goodness rather than their likelihood of being true. I claim that the reason for this is that Socrates regards the meaningful possibility of successful inquiry as being uncertain given certain challenges: namely, Meno’s paradox (which threatens the possibility of inquiry as such) and the formidable threat of …

The Epistemic Value Of Resonance: Intuitive Thinking In Theoretical Understanding, Claire Dartez

Doctoral Dissertations

We commonly say that an explanation for something we do not quite understand ‘resonates’. And we seem to take the resonance of the explanation to count epistemically in its favor. What is resonance and what is its epistemic value? I propose that resonance is a psychological state in which a consciously considered explanation coheres with the unconscious representational content in the mind of an individual, and that this psychological state is metacognitively signaled by a feeling which we also call ‘resonance’. This account of resonance implies that theoretical understanding, rather than knowledge, is the epistemic domain of its functioning. That …

A Portfolio, Samuel Webb

Masters Theses

This master’s thesis is a portfolio of essays that were submitted to the philosophy department of the University of Tennessee at Knoxville in order to complete the competency requirements of the PhD program. This portfolio contains three essays that fall under each of the three broad divisions that are typically used to categorize the disparate areas of discourse that philosophy encompasses: ELMS, value theory, and the history of philosophy. In “Defending Practical Attitude Intellectualism”, I reconstruct an attempt by Yuri Cath to put forward an analysis of practical knowledge which synthesizes elements from two competing analyses of practical knowledge. Next, …

On The Possibility Of Single Correct Answers In Legal Interpretation, Francis Kwame Nyamekeh Jr

Masters Theses

My thesis examines Dworkin’s claim that there are objectively correct answers to controversial legal questions, and hence moral questions. A given moral statement is objectively true if it is true independently of what anyone believes or thinks about it. Dworkin asserts that the truth or objectivity of any moral claim depends solely on moral arguments. On the contrary, Leiter claims that any moral argument in favour of moral objectivity is empty and entails counterintuitive conclusions. Thus, moral arguments are neither necessary nor sufficient to support claims about moral objectivity.

Leiter nevertheless proposes that any forceful argument in favour of moral …

Content Externalism And Self-Knowledge, Donnie Gene Barnett Jr.

Doctoral Dissertations

There appears to be a tension between two widely held philosophical theses: content externalism and what is often called “privileged access”. The first is the metaphysical thesis that the contents of many propositional attitude-types are at least partially determined by properties external to the thinking subject. The second is the epistemological thesis that we have a priori access to the contents of our own propositional attitudes. Those who hold that at least one of these theses must be false are called incompatibilists. My goal is to show that the incompatibilists are wrong, that content externalism and privileged access can both …

Dignifying Decisions: The Role Of Dignity In Surrogate Decision-Making, Jeffrey Pannekoek

Doctoral Dissertations

Dignity refers, broadly speaking, to a kind of status that is intrinsically connected to certain norms. Often, we think of dignity as the status of having inherent value, which entails that certain kinds of treatment are morally impermissible. References to dignity are pervasive in clinical ethics, where the concept is called on to do a broad variety of work, including bolstering claims about patient-focused health care, advocating in favor of and against euthanasia, and supporting an infinite number of particular medical decisions. In stark contrast to its pervasiveness, the conceptualization of dignity is still an unsettled issue, in particular in …

Resituando El Cuerpo Femenino A Través De La Memoria Histórica Y La Ficción: Carlota De Bélgica Y Eva Perón En Las Novelas Noticias Del Imperio De Fernando Del Paso Y Santa Evita De Tomás Eloy Martínez, Krysheida Ayub - Unzon

Doctoral Dissertations

This dissertation analyzes the body and the memory of Charlotte of Belgium and Eva Perón in the historical novels Noticias del Imperio (1987) by the Mexican writer Fernando del Paso and Santa Evita (1996), by the Argentine Tomás Eloy Martínez. Through the conformation of these historical characters as literary protagonists, we observe how both are endowed with a new historical meaning from the articulation of fictional narratives that differ from traditional historiographical texts. From the analysis of the corporality and the memory of the female characters, we will attend to the resignification of the historical texts and their fictional ramifications …

Unpacking Personal Identity And Necessary Decision Properties To Improve Medical Decision-Making On Behalf Of Cognitively Declined Patients Without Capacity, Dakotah Marie Kinsella

Masters Theses

What does it mean to understand another person? Suppose physical information alone is insufficient for fully understanding another person. Suppose further that John Locke’s theory of continuity of consciousness (if a person can extend into the past and still be conscious of past experiences and be conscious of what is happening in their present life, then they are the same person) being necessary for maintaining personal identity is correct. In applying these theories to my argument regarding how “no individual can possess all the same conscious experiences as another” due to the private, subjectivity of the self resulting in “no …

Stability And Resilience In Rawls's Political Liberalism, Grace Campbell

Doctoral Dissertations

Stability and resilience are complementary attributes in John Rawls’s most developed liberal system. In his early theory, stable cooperation is guaranteed by liberal society’s single, shared conception of justice. Rawls’s more pluralist theory introduces a possibility of cooperation without a consensus about justice, but it does not explain stable cooperation. If citizens are committed to a family of reasonable, liberal conceptions of justice, a pluralist liberal system can be stable because it is also resilient. Though pluralism increases discord in dynamic conditions, citizens can appeal to a shared family of ideals to adapt and restore allegiance. This adaptive capacity is …

Negative Realism: Reading The Novels Of John Williams, William Wells

Masters Theses

This thesis attempts to posit a dynamic theory of literary realism that accounts not only for the commonly understood “historical” realisms of the 18^th and 19^th centuries, but for the more fluid realisms that arise in the modern and postmodern eras. Realisms of this sort are still understood to be expressions of particular, sociohistorical eras, but these expressions must be understood to be subject to material change in society. This paper breaks, then, with traditional Marxist conceptions of realism as the direct response to enlightenment thought and early capitalism, and instead argues for traceable eruptions of realism throughout …

Aristotle And Darwin Hand In Hand: Biologists In Pursuit Of Understanding The Underlying Mechanics Of The Natural World, Timothy Christopher Meidl

Chancellor’s Honors Program Projects

No abstract provided.

Caring For Fat Patients: Bioethical Considerations Surrounding The Duty Of Care, Anne Merrill

Masters Theses

Healthcare providers’ (HCP) duty of care explains what HCPs owe to all their patients, but this thesis will focus on how the duty of care informs the treatment of fat patients. Currently, the foundation of the duty of care is rooted in a set of principles enumerated by the American Medical Association. This current conception of the duty of care fails to provide basic protections against harm to fat individuals, primarily because it is unable to prevent the negative attitudes HCPs have about fat people from permeating healthcare. The negative attitudes HCPs have about fat patients stem from a societal …

Oppression, Civility, And The Politics Of Resistance, Alex M. Richardson

Doctoral Dissertations

Oppression based on social group membership has been and remains a major injustice which thrives in modern liberal democracies like the United States. Organized political resistance to oppression and the structures that perpetuate it has taken many forms throughout history, from the early acts of revolution that founded the United States, to the nineteenth century abolitionist movement against slavery, to the New Deal-era labor struggles and Black civil rights movement of the twentieth century and the LGBTQ+ rights movement of recent history. The moral and political legacy of these historical struggles, as well as the extent to which the surrounding …

A Critique Of John Mcdowell's Theory Of Moral Perception, Edward Ray Falls

Doctoral Dissertations

This dissertation examines an argument that John McDowell’s view is structurally analogous to Protagoreanism, and that arguments structurally analogous to Plato’s arguments against Protagoreanism apply to McDowell’s view. Through philosophical investigation, the dissertation shows that Plato’s arguments do not perfectly apply to McDowell’s view, but that the view nevertheless is unable to address the metastasized problem of constraint. The metastasized problem of constraint arises in at least two kinds of circumstances: situations where cultural relativism is a concern, and situations where there is pressure to adapt to unforeseeable natural developments.

An Ethics Of Amusement, Ashley Caroline Mobley

Doctoral Dissertations

Human beings often hold one another morally responsible for what we find funny or fail to find funny. Though this practice is common and so demands philosophical attention, it remains underexplored in the literature. The purpose of this project is to devote attention to this practice by developing an ethics of amusement.

In chapter 2, I argue for why amusement is an emotion according to incongruity theory—the dominant theory of humor and amusement. With this in mind, I argue in chapter 3 that we are responsible for our emotions insofar as we have emotional agency. In particular, while we cannot …

Temembe And Sven: The Ethics Of Racist Mirth, Stephen Wilke

Masters Theses

You walk past a crowd of people at a bar, grouped around one person. He’s in the middle of telling a joke, the kind you wouldn’t tell your parents but is often told in the amenable company of close friends. You realize that the butt of the joke, the punchline, assumes that people of color are lazy and entitled. This is not an assumption you agree wit, but you find yourself with a feeling of mirth while scoffing at the comedian. His timing is well executed, and the turn of phrase is witty. The joke was racist, and yet emotionally …

David Hume, "The Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion," And Religious Tolerance, Jarrett Delozier

Chancellor’s Honors Program Projects

No abstract provided.

Food Waste, Food Insecurity, And Food Donation Liability, Alessandra E. Ferrero

Chancellor’s Honors Program Projects

No abstract provided.

Policy Of Current Hospital Translation Services And Recommendations For Future Adjustments For Spanish-Speaking Patients, Isidora Rose Beach

Chancellor’s Honors Program Projects

No abstract provided.

Linearly Preconditioned Nonlinear Solvers For Phase Field Equations Involving P-Laplacian Terms, Wenqiang Feng

Doctoral Dissertations

Phase field models are usually constructed to model certain interfacial dynamics. Numerical simulations of phase-field models require long time accuracy, stability and therefore it is necessary to develop efficient and highly accurate numerical methods. In particular, the unconditionally energy stable , unconditionally solvable, and accurate schemes and fast solvers are desirable.

In this thesis, We describe and analyze preconditioned steepest descent (PSD) solvers for fourth and sixth-order nonlinear elliptic equations that include p-Laplacian terms on periodic domains in 2 and 3 dimensions. Such nonlinear elliptic equations often arise from time discretization of parabolic equations that model various biological and physical …

Rational Engagement As A Way Of Showing Respect To Oneself And Others: How We Ought To Respond To Persons Who Hold Unreasonable Beliefs, Elizabeth Cargile Williams

Masters Theses

We often encounter persons who hold unreasonable beliefs. I explore how respect informs our response to these persons. I conclude that we ought to be willing or disposed to engage in rational discussion sometimes and to some extent with persons who hold unreasonable beliefs as a way of recognizing and respecting their rational nature. I describe what the duty of rational engagement looks like in practice and apply the duty to individual cases. I then explore various considerations, including the consideration of self-respect, that influence whether we have reason to engage and how we should respond in different cases.

The Significance Of Rousseau’S Concept Of Amour-Propre In Rawls, Xinghua Wang

Doctoral Dissertations

This dissertation defends the view that there is a Rousseauvian interpretation of Rawls’s political philosophy by focusing on the significance of amour-propre in Rawls’s political philosophy. In the first chapter, I introduce my central thesis and chapter arrangements and compare my Rousseauvian interpretation with other interpretations of Rawls. In the second chapter, I introduce Rousseau’s concept of amour-propre and try to defend Rawls’s wide view of amourpropre, according to which, amour-propre has both a positive and a negative form. In the third chapter, I argue that Rousseau’s concept of amour-propre plays a significant role in Rawls’s conception of justice as …

Population, Consumption, And Procreation: Ethical Implications For Humanity’S Future, Trevor Grant Hedberg

Doctoral Dissertations

Human population growth is a contributing factor to a number of significant environmental problems. My dissertation addresses both the negative environmental effects of human population growth and what ought to be done to curtail them. Specifically, I defend two main claims: (1) we have a duty to reduce human population, particularly those of us with large ecological footprints, and (2) morally permissible social policies can satisfy this duty.

I begin by addressing three well-known issues in population ethics that could serve as the basis for objections to reducing population: the Repugnant Conclusion, the Non-Identity Problem, and the Asymmetry. I then …

The Beauty Of Understanding: Aesthetic Methods Of Theory Evaluation, Devon Craig Bryson

Doctoral Dissertations

Philosophers use a variety of methods to evaluate theories, theories that are sources of greater understanding. My dissertation argues that judgments of beauty are a justified part of how we evaluate theories. That is, I argue that beauty is part of what makes a philosophical theory better. I reach this conclusion by analyzing two powerful and popular methods of theory evaluation: reflective equilibrium and simplicity. The literatures on both reflective equilibrium and simplicity clarify how these methods work and why they are justified methods of theory evaluation. But I argue that the going accounts of reflective equilibrium and simplicity have …

Les Auteures Surréalistes : French And Francophone Women Surrealist Writers -- Joyce Mansour, Valentine Penrose And Gisèle Prassinos, Maitland Sierra Dunwoody

Masters Theses

The notion of the “author” and the purpose of its existence have been the subject of many contemporary debates, with Roland Barthes and Michel Foucault as key. For Barthes, language defines a literary work and the author is relegated to a minor place. And he believes that certain movements, surrealism as an example, effectively aided in the “death” of the author. Though that may sometimes be the case, within the movement of surrealism the author and their language are of almost equal importance – which differs entirely from Barthes’ view considering his notions on the surrealist movement and authorship. In …

Arguments Against Peter Klein's Infinitism, Jason A Dewitt

Chancellor’s Honors Program Projects

No abstract provided.

Religious Metaphor And Structural Complexity, Tyler E. Kibbey

Chancellor’s Honors Program Projects

No abstract provided.

Sketches, Impressions And Confessions: Literature As Experiment In The Nineteenth Century, Andrew Ragsdale Lallier

Doctoral Dissertations

In this dissertation, I argue for the existence and critical relevance of a program of experimental literature in the long nineteenth century, developed in the aesthetics of German Romanticism and adapted in a set of texts by Thomas De Quincey, Charles Dickens and George Eliot. My introduction positions this argument in context of larger debates concerning form, theory and literary capacity, provides points of connection between these authors, and outlines the most prominent features of experimental literature. In the first chapter, I present an unorthodox reading of Kant’s Critique of Judgment, accompanied by a brief account of the literary-critical …

Virtue, Evidence, And Epistemic Justification, Alexander Steven Hallam

Doctoral Dissertations

Evidence is a central concept in epistemology and more narrowly, theories of epistemic justification. Evidence is commonly thought to be what justifies our beliefs. On this view, a belief is justified for a person if that belief fits that person’s total body of evidence. But it is also commonly thought that evidence isn’t the only thing that justifies a belief. Some epistemologists even think that evidence isn’t what justifies a belief at all. Virtue epistemologists give epistemic or intellectual virtues an important and fundamental role in theories of epistemic justification. On such views, for a belief to be epistemically justified, …

Troubles At Coal Creek: Rhetorics Of Writing, Research, And The Archive, Sumner Stevenson Brown

Masters Theses

Digging through the past can uncover painful truths. As such, historiography that does not acknowledge negotiated spaces, cultural erasures, and flexible frameworks may fall short. It may limit both breadth and depth of the past, thereby (re)producing erasures, whereas a reflexive theoretical framework delivers not only depth and breadth, but it also adds texture and dimension to historical writing and research processes. It is for these purposes that the value of alternative methodologies is not situated at the margins of the rhetorical canons. Instead, it is embedded in the very core of the canons, defined as an element that works …