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Articles 1 - 30 of 175
Full-Text Articles in Arts and Humanities
Confucian Family Ideal And Same-Sex Marriage: A Feminist Confucian Perspective, Sor-Hoon Tan
Confucian Family Ideal And Same-Sex Marriage: A Feminist Confucian Perspective, Sor-Hoon Tan
Research Collection School of Social Sciences
This article engages the views of PRC Confucian scholars who responded to the United States Supreme Court Justice Anthony Kennedy's citing of Confucius in his majority opinion on same-sex marriage in 2015. It questions their separation of tolerance for homosexuality from legalization of same-sex marriage and argue that tolerance is not enough. The arguments in the mainland Confucian discourse about same-sex marriage highlights the historical and persistent entanglement of Confucianism with patriarchy. Instead of reviving traditional patriarchal society, further entrenching and increasing gender inequality, contemporary Confucianism could shape its own unique modern society that aspires to (and hopefully one day …
An Integrated Theory Of Happiness: The Yang Zhu Chapter Of The Liezi, Devin K. Joshi
An Integrated Theory Of Happiness: The Yang Zhu Chapter Of The Liezi, Devin K. Joshi
Research Collection School of Social Sciences
This article examines the integrated approach to theorizing happiness in the Yang Zhu chapter of the book associated with the Daoist master Liezi. While ancient critics famously denounced Yang Zhu as an amoral, pleasure-seeking hedonist, I argue the Yang Zhu chapter offers an individually rational but socially non-conformist approach to well-being of considerable relevance to contemporary scholarship on happiness. Not only does the chapter offer an intriguing and counter-intuitive argument about what constitutes and causes well-being, but its philosophical implications address a large number of inescapably foundational conceptual questions that can serve as metrics for evaluating theories of happiness in …
Deontic Meta-Rules, Francesco Olivieri, Guido Governatori, Matteo Cristani, Antonino Rotolo, Abdul Sattar
Deontic Meta-Rules, Francesco Olivieri, Guido Governatori, Matteo Cristani, Antonino Rotolo, Abdul Sattar
Centre for Computational Law
The use of meta-rules in logic, i.e., rules whose content includes other rules, has recently gained attention in the setting of non-monotonic reasoning: a first logical formalisation and efficient algorithms to compute the (meta)-extensions of such theories were proposed in Olivieri et al. (2021, Computing defeasible meta-logic. In JELIA 2021, LNCS, vol. 12678, pp. 69-84. Springer.). This work extends such a logical framework by considering the deontic aspect. The resulting logic will not just be able to model policies but also tackle well-known aspects that occur in numerous legal systems. The use of Defeasible Logic to model meta-rules in the …
Merit Transference And The Paradox Of Merit Inflation, Matthew Hammerton
Merit Transference And The Paradox Of Merit Inflation, Matthew Hammerton
Research Collection School of Social Sciences
Many religious traditions and ethical systems hold that individuals accrue merit through their good intentions, acts, and character, and demerit through their bad intentions, acts, and character. This merit and demerit, accumulated by individuals throughout their lives, gives each person a kind of ethical “score” that can determine what they deserve, and influence whether good or bad things happen to them (e.g., divine punishments and rewards, a favourable or unfavourable rebirth, etc.). In some traditions (most notably Buddhism, but also to a limited extent in Hinduism, Islam, and Christianity), “merit transference” is a feature of these merit-based ethical systems. This …
Revisiting Tocqueville's American Woman, Christine Dunn Henderson
Revisiting Tocqueville's American Woman, Christine Dunn Henderson
Research Collection College of Integrative Studies
This paper revisits Tocqueville’s famous portrait of the American female, which begins with assertions of her equality to males but ends with her self-cloistering in the domestic sphere. Taking a cue from Tocqueville’s extended sketch of the “faded” pioneer wife in “A Fortnight in the Wilderness” and drawing connections to Tocqueville’s criticisms of the division of industrial labor, I argue that the American girl’s ostensibly free choice to remove herself from public life is not an act of freedom. Rather, it is a manifestation of a particular type of unfreedom that reveals underappreciated connections between the two great dangers about …
Climate Denialism Bullshit Is Harmful, Joshua Luczak
Climate Denialism Bullshit Is Harmful, Joshua Luczak
Research Collection College of Integrative Studies
This paper suggests that some climate denialism is bullshit. Those who spread it do not display a proper concern for the truth. This paper also shows that this bullshit is harmful in some significant ways. It undermines the epistemic demands imposed on us by what we care about, by the social roles we occupy, and by morality. It is also harmful because it corrodes epistemic trust.
'Kevin Vallier' Trust In A Polarized Age, Chandran Kukathas
'Kevin Vallier' Trust In A Polarized Age, Chandran Kukathas
Research Collection School of Social Sciences
Vallier offers a defence of liberalism that is publicly justified as an answer to political polarization. This critique argues that the philosophical solution he offers - a version of liberalism more likely to be endorsed by moderately idealized agents - may not succeed because the source of polarization lies elsewhere: in resentments arising out of changed social conditions and the alienation of parts of society unhappy with the very liberal narrative in question.
Algorithm's Cradle: Commemorating Al-Khwarizmi In The Soviet History Of Mathematics And Cold War Computer Science, Ksenia Tatarchenko
Algorithm's Cradle: Commemorating Al-Khwarizmi In The Soviet History Of Mathematics And Cold War Computer Science, Ksenia Tatarchenko
Research Collection College of Integrative Studies
This chapter investigates the origin narratives and commemoration practices that came hand in hand with the growing cultural authority of the algorithm after World War II, culminating in celebrations in honor of the 1,200th anniversary of the medieval scholar Abu MODIFIER LETTER LEFT HALF RINGAdallah Muhammad Ibn Musa al-Khwarizmi. I first show how al-Khwarizmi's legacy was claimed by Soviet historians of mathematics aiming to construct a history inspired by dialectical materialism, a goal that eventually led to arguments about the distinct, algorithmic character of mathematics in the East. Next, I study how these ideas were appropriated by the international community …
Deconstruction Of A Dialogue: Creative Interpretation In Comparative Philosophy, Steven Burik
Deconstruction Of A Dialogue: Creative Interpretation In Comparative Philosophy, Steven Burik
Research Collection School of Social Sciences
It is common knowledge that Martin Heidegger’s attempts at engaging non-Western philosophy are very much a construct of his own making. This article in no way seeks to disagree with those observations, but argues two things: first, that Heidegger’s “dialogue” with his two main other sources of inspiration, the ancient Greek thinkers and the German poets, is not different in kind or in principle from his engagement with East Asia. One can of course quite easily argue that Heidegger’s main interest was the ancient Greek thinkers, and then the poets, and only lastly Asia. But this hierarchy in preference does …
Man-Machine Dialogues: Computer Representations And Appropriations In The Soviet Union And The United States, Ksenia Tatarchenko
Man-Machine Dialogues: Computer Representations And Appropriations In The Soviet Union And The United States, Ksenia Tatarchenko
Research Collection College of Integrative Studies
What brought a plurality of information societies into existence? The global process of computerizations went hand in hand with political competition between the First and Second World during the second half of the twentieth century. Non-capitalist information societies were imagined and experienced under the socialistregimes alongside and in interaction with their better-known capitalist counterparts. Both capitalism and socialism asserted the power of the new machines to depict and create a better world.
What Is The Fallacy Of Approximation?, Matthew Hammerton, Sovan Patra
What Is The Fallacy Of Approximation?, Matthew Hammerton, Sovan Patra
Research Collection School of Social Sciences
Many philosophers appeal to the “fallacy of approximation”, or “problem of second best”. However, despite the pervasiveness of such appeals, there has been only a single attempt to provide a systematic account of what the fallacy is. We identify the shortcomings of this account and propose a better one in its place. Our account not only captures all the contexts in which approximation-based reasoning occurs but also systematically explains the several different ways in which it can be in error.
Well-Being And Meaning In Life, Matthew Hammerton
Well-Being And Meaning In Life, Matthew Hammerton
Research Collection School of Social Sciences
Many philosophers now see meaning in life as a key evaluative category that stands alongside well-being and moral goodness. Our lives are assessed not only by how well they go for us and how morally good they are, but also by their meaningfulness. In this article, I raise a challenge to this view. Theories of meaning in life closely resemble theories of well-being, and there is a suspicion that the former collapse into the latter. I develop this challenge showing that it is formidable. I then answer it by offering a novel account of what meaning in life is and …
The Fundamental Divisions In Ethics, Matthew Hammerton
The Fundamental Divisions In Ethics, Matthew Hammerton
Research Collection School of Social Sciences
What are the fundamental divisions in ethics? Which divisions capture the most important and basic options in moral theorizing? In this article, I reject the ‘Textbook View’ which takes the tripartite division between consequentialism, deontology, and virtue ethics to be fundamental. Instead, I suggest that moral theories are fundamentally divided into three independent divisions, which I call the neutral/relative division, the normative priority division, and the maximizing division. I argue that this account of the fundamental divisions of ethics better captures the main concerns that normative ethicists have when assessing moral theories. It also helps us make progress in comparative …
"Let’S See If We Can Go A Whole Day On The Road Eating Free Food": Encountering The Divine With Claire Dwyer In The Private Spaces Of Richmond’S Highway To Heaven, Justin K. H. Tse
"Let’S See If We Can Go A Whole Day On The Road Eating Free Food": Encountering The Divine With Claire Dwyer In The Private Spaces Of Richmond’S Highway To Heaven, Justin K. H. Tse
Research Collection School of Social Sciences
This article recounts the development of the author’s positionality in studying religion in a Canadian suburb through a collaborative project with the late feminist geographer of religion Claire Dwyer. The field site was No. 5 Road, the “Highway to Heaven” in Richmond, British Columbia with over 20 religious institutions on a three kilometre stretch of road. Building from Dwyer’s writing on “encountering the divine” through field work from 2010 to 2012, the author offers an account of a personal shift from evangelical religious exclusivism to an understanding of the plurality of interreligious experience. Using a reflexive writing style, the article …
Russian Logics And The Culture Of Impossible: Part Ii: Reinterpreting Algorithmic Rationality, Ksenia Tatarchenko, Anya Yermakova, Liesbeth De Mol
Russian Logics And The Culture Of Impossible: Part Ii: Reinterpreting Algorithmic Rationality, Ksenia Tatarchenko, Anya Yermakova, Liesbeth De Mol
Research Collection School of Social Sciences
This article reinterprets algorithmic rationality by looking at the interaction between mathematical logic, mechanized reasoning, and, later, computing in the Russian Imperial and Soviet contexts to offer a history of the algorithm as a mathematical object bridging the inner and outer worlds, a humanistic vision that we, following logician Vladimir Uspensky, call the “culture of the impossible.” We unfold the deep roots of this vision as embodied in scientific intelligentsia. In Part I, we examine continuities between the turn-of-the-twentieth-century discussions of poznaniye—an epistemic orientation towards the process of knowledge acquisition—and the postwar rise of the Soviet school of mathematical logic. …
Setiya On Consequentialism And Constraints, Ryan Cox, Matthew Hammerton
Setiya On Consequentialism And Constraints, Ryan Cox, Matthew Hammerton
Research Collection School of Social Sciences
It is widely held that agent-neutral consequentialism is incompatible with deontic constraints. Recently, Kieran Setiya has challenged this orthodoxy by presenting a form of agent-neutral consequentialism that he claims can capture deontic constraints. In this reply, we argue against Setiya's proposal by pointing to features of deontic constraints that his account fails to capture.
Beyond The "Formidable Circle": Race And The Limits Of Democratic Inclusion In Tocqueville's Democracy In America, Christine Dunn Henderson
Beyond The "Formidable Circle": Race And The Limits Of Democratic Inclusion In Tocqueville's Democracy In America, Christine Dunn Henderson
Research Collection School of Social Sciences
Despite his assertion that the first volume of Democracy in America (1835) would concentrate upon institutions, Tocqueville found himself finishing the draft manuscript in 1834 and unable to conclude his study without discussing race relations in the United States. In the end, he quickly penned a final chapter. That chapter—by far the book’s longest—offers “Some Considerations on the Present State and Probable Future of the Three Races That Inhabit the Territory of the United States.” Tocqueville begins the chapter by acknowledging that its subject “is American without being democratic” (DA, p. 516), and to the extent that it analyzes slavery …
Who Is A Wise Person? Zhuangzi And Epistemological Discussions Of Wisdom, Shane Ryan, Karyn Lai
Who Is A Wise Person? Zhuangzi And Epistemological Discussions Of Wisdom, Shane Ryan, Karyn Lai
Research Collection School of Social Sciences
This essay articulates the contribution that the Zhuangzi can make to contemporary epistemological discussions of wisdom. It suggests that wisdom in the Zhuangzi involves, in part, correctly distinguishing the "heavenly" (or the naturally given) from human artifice. It is important for humanity to understand naturally given conditions (e.g., seasons, climate, forces, mortality) to grasp what is within, and what beyond, our initiatives. To enable this, we need to be openly engaged with the world, rather than approach it with rigid convictions about outcomes or goals. We characterize such openness and readiness to engage as an attitude, that of "epistemic humility." …
What And Whose Confucianism? Sinophone Communities And Dialogical Geopolitics, Quan Gao, Justin K. H. Tse, Orlando Woods
What And Whose Confucianism? Sinophone Communities And Dialogical Geopolitics, Quan Gao, Justin K. H. Tse, Orlando Woods
Research Collection School of Social Sciences
This commentary responds to An et al.’s (2020) article, ‘Towards a Confucian geopolitics’ by re-examining ‘the political’ of Confucianism and its contribution to fostering a cosmopolitan form of Confucian geopolitics. By taking note of the differences within and between Sinophone communities, we discuss the variegated forms of Confucianism, and their various geopolitical implications. In doing so, we call for re-theorising Confucian geopolitics as dialogical geopolitics that challenges the cultural and ideological basis of statist and Sino-centric geopolitics.
The Intrinsic Values Of Confucian Democracy And Dewey's Pragmatist Method, Sor-Hoon Tan
The Intrinsic Values Of Confucian Democracy And Dewey's Pragmatist Method, Sor-Hoon Tan
Research Collection School of Social Sciences
Given the historical association of Confucianism, or rather the Ru school of thought, with autocratic government since the Han dynasty, one of the challenges for contemporary scholars of Confucianism is to interpret and reconstruct Confucianism to guard against authoritarian tendencies without surrendering its distinctive ethical-political vision. Confucianism is incompatible with the conventional understanding of democracy as liberal democracy best represented by the United States, focused on limiting government with checks and balances, prioritizing protection of the civil and political rights of individuals, regular elections of representatives in which partisan competition for power offers citizens very little real choice, and it …
Confucianism As Transformative Practice: Ethical Impact And Political Pitfalls, Sor-Hoon Tan
Confucianism As Transformative Practice: Ethical Impact And Political Pitfalls, Sor-Hoon Tan
Research Collection School of Social Sciences
No serious scholar today denies the close relationship between politics and ethics in Confucian thought and practice.
Humanist But Not Radical: The Educational Philosophy Of Thiruvalluvar Kural, Devin K. Joshi
Humanist But Not Radical: The Educational Philosophy Of Thiruvalluvar Kural, Devin K. Joshi
Research Collection School of Social Sciences
Humanist ideas in education have been promoted by both Western thinkers and classical wisdom texts of Asia. Exploring this connection, I examine the educational philosophy of an iconic ancient Tamil (Indian) text, the Thiruvalluvar Kural, by juxtaposing it with a contemporary humanist classic, Paulo Freire’s Pedagogy of the Oppressed. As this comparative study reveals, both texts offer humanist visions of relevance to education, politics, and society. Notably, however, the Kural takes what might be described as a more mainstream humanist stance vis-à-vis Freire’s radical humanist approach. Nevertheless, both educational philosophies share a common humanist bond representing important breakthroughs within their …
Humanist But Not Radical: The Educational Philosophy Of Thiruvalluvar Kural, Devin K. Joshi
Humanist But Not Radical: The Educational Philosophy Of Thiruvalluvar Kural, Devin K. Joshi
Research Collection School of Social Sciences
Humanist ideas in education have been promoted by both Western thinkers and classical wisdom texts of Asia. Exploring this connection, I examine the educational philosophy of an iconic ancient Tamil (Indian) text, the Thiruvalluvar Kural, by juxtaposing it with a contemporary humanist classic, Paulo Freire’s Pedagogy of the Oppressed. As this comparative study reveals, both texts offer humanist visions of relevance to education, politics, and society. Notably, however, the Kural takes what might be described as a more mainstream humanist stance vis-à-vis Freire’s radical humanist approach. Nevertheless, both educational philosophies share a common humanist bond representing important breakthroughs …
The Way Of Longevity: Blue Zones As Unselfconscious Models Of Daoist Living, Devin K. Joshi
The Way Of Longevity: Blue Zones As Unselfconscious Models Of Daoist Living, Devin K. Joshi
Research Collection School of Social Sciences
Demographic researchers have identified five geographic regions around the world with unusually high proportions of nonagenarians and centenarians. Studies of these longevity hotspots or “blue zones” are now trying to distill lessons for how people everywhere can live long and active lives with minimal impediments. In this study, I compare lifestyle observations and longevity prescriptions derived from studies of blue zone centenarians with long-standing recommendations for the practice of nourishing life (yangsheng) to achieve a long and healthy life in the Daoist tradition. Observing a high degree of similarity across the four lifestyle domains of diet, exercise, mindset, …
Wisdom, Not Veritism, Shane Ryan
Wisdom, Not Veritism, Shane Ryan
Research Collection School of Social Sciences
In this response to Pritchard's "In Defence of Veritism", I defend the view that it is wisdom rather than truth that is fundamental in epistemology. Given that recent philosophical discussions of the nature of wisdom may be unfamiliar to some epistemologists, a brief overview of these discussions is provided and that which is relevant for the subsequent discussion in this piece is highlighted. I explain that scholars working on the topic tend to accept that wisdom comprises at least one familiar epistemic standing and that, unlike other epistemic goods, wisdom is thought to be tied to a narrowly specified content. …
Country Report: The Teaching Of Philosophy In Singapore Schools, Steven Burik, Matthew Hammerton, Sovan Patra
Country Report: The Teaching Of Philosophy In Singapore Schools, Steven Burik, Matthew Hammerton, Sovan Patra
Research Collection School of Social Sciences
Singapore’s education system is widely regarded as one of the best in the world. In this report, we will focus on education at the primary, secondary, and junior college levels, and will not discuss the education offered in polytechnics (vocational colleges) and universities. We will also focus exclusively on Singapore’s public school system, which Singapore citizens are required to attend unless they are granted a special exemption. In addition to public schools, there are also international schools, which cater to the relatively large expatriate population in Singapore and typically offer a curriculum leading to the IB diploma. All public schools …
Deontic Constraints Are Maximizing Rules, Matthew Hammerton
Deontic Constraints Are Maximizing Rules, Matthew Hammerton
Research Collection School of Social Sciences
Deontic constraints prohibit an agent performing acts of a certain type even when doing so will prevent more instances of that act being performed by others. In this article I show how deontic constraints can be interpreted as either maximizing or non-maximizing rules. I then argue that they should be interpreted as maximizing rules because interpreting them as non-maximizing rules results in a problem with moral advice. Given this conclusion, a strong case can be made that consequentialism provides the best account of deontic constraints.
Agent-Relative Consequentialism And Collective Self-Defeat, Matthew Hammerton
Agent-Relative Consequentialism And Collective Self-Defeat, Matthew Hammerton
Research Collection School of Social Sciences
Andrew Forcehimes and Luke Semrau argue that agent-relative consequentialism is implausible because in some circumstances it classes an act as impermissible yet holds that the outcome of all agents performing that impermissible act is preferable. I argue that their problem is closely related to Derek Parfit's problem of ‘direct collective self-defeat’ and show how Parfit's plausible solution to his problem can be adapted to solve their problem.
Relativized Rankings, Matthew Hammerton
Relativized Rankings, Matthew Hammerton
Research Collection School of Social Sciences
In traditional consequentialism the good is position-neutral. A single evaluative ranking of states of affairs is correct for everyone, everywhere regardless of their positions. Recently, position-relative forms of consequentialism have been developed. These allow for the correct rankings of states to depend on connections that hold between the state being evaluated and the position of the evaluator. For example, perhaps being an agent who acts in a certain state requires me to rank that state differently from someone else who lacks this connection. In this chapter several different kinds of position-relative rankings related to agents, times, physical locations, and possible …
The Ehrenfests’ Use Of Toy Models To Explore Irreversibility In Statistical Mechanics, Joshua Luczak, Lena Zuchowski
The Ehrenfests’ Use Of Toy Models To Explore Irreversibility In Statistical Mechanics, Joshua Luczak, Lena Zuchowski
Research Collection School of Social Sciences
This article highlights and discusses the Ehrenfests’ use of toy models to explore irreversibility in statistical mechanics. In particular, we explore their urn and P–Q models and highlight that, while the former was primarily used to provide a simple counter-example to Zermelo’s objection to Boltzmann’s statistical mechanical underpinning of the Second Law of Thermodynamics, the latter was intended to highlight the role and importance of the Stoßzahlansatz as a cause of the tendency of systems to exhibit entropy increase. We also explain the sense in which these models are toy models and why agents can use them, as the Ehrenfests’ …