The Reliable Revisionist,
2019
Augustana College, Rock Island Illinois
The Reliable Revisionist, Caitlyn Schaffer
Philosophy: Student Scholarship & Creative Works
The present text explores how the topic of head and heart is much more complicated than one would expect, according to Paul Henne and Walter Sinnot-Armstrong, contributors of Neuroexistentialism. “Does Neuroscience Undermine Morality” aims at figuring out the problem of which moral judgments we can trust, judgments from one’s head (revisionism) or judgments from one’s heart (conservatism). My hypothesis suggests the opposite of the authors, I believe that if you are a revisionist, your first order intuitions are reliable. After setting the framework, I make three main arguments. (A.) If you are able to self-correct then you can identify errors …
Darkness And Light: Absence And Presence In Heidegger, Derrida, And Daoism,
2019
Singapore Management University
Darkness And Light: Absence And Presence In Heidegger, Derrida, And Daoism, Steven Burik
Research Collection School of Social Sciences
The light metaphor is a perpetual favorite for philosophers, both East and West. I seek to revaluate its opposite, darkness. I claim that there are good reasons to favor darkness over light, or at least to not see them as mutually incompatible or in hierarchical fashion. In recent Western philosophy, both Heidegger and Derrida argue that what the light metaphor represents, the promise of clarity and objectivity, is exactly what makes Western metaphysics problematic. In Chinese philosophy, classical Daoism offers a thinking that does not favor the light metaphor over its opposite. Daoists have the good sense to acknowledge darkness …
Mentality And Fundamentality,
2019
The Graduate Center, City University of New York
Mentality And Fundamentality, Christopher D. Brown
Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects
Extant well-considered problems with physicalism primarily come from two sources: philosophers of mind arguing that subjective experience does not fit into a physicalist world-picture, and metaphysicians trying to figure out the particular commitments of the view. I examine the thesis of physicalism in order to produce a clearer notion of the physical and to help straighten out physicalism’s entailments, while simultaneously providing a strategy for physicalists to sidestep well known anti-physicalist arguments concerning consciousness. This involves both a critical and a positive effort: on the critical side, I expose an issue with a popular way of understanding physicalism called “via …
Yi-Jing Integral (Yi): A New Natural And Cosmic Ba-Gua,
2019
San Jose State University
Yi-Jing Integral (Yi): A New Natural And Cosmic Ba-Gua, Harry Donkers
Comparative Philosophy
In this paper we elaborate on the neo-Confucian interpretation of the Yi-Jing system. Based on a further exploration of the Diagram of the Supreme Polarity of Zhou Dunyi, we develop a cosmological-anthropological model in constructive engagement with Western thoughts and views on systems and on the universe. The vital energy (qi) and the pattern (li) play central roles in this model and also in the interpretation of the images and forces of the trigrams. This leads to a comparative model, based on a quadrant system with four perspectives: naturality, rationality, humanity and morality. This model fits …
Setting The Stage And Building Homes: Architecture Metaphors And Space In Donne's First Caroline Sermon,
2019
University of New Orleans
Setting The Stage And Building Homes: Architecture Metaphors And Space In Donne's First Caroline Sermon, Alexander S. Laws
University of New Orleans Theses and Dissertations
Through his use of "foundation" and "house" metaphors in his "First Sermon Preached to King Charles at St. James, 3 April 1625," John Donne discreetly presents his ideologies and principles before the new king, while simultaneously criticizing his contemporaries' misguided bickering over religio-political factions. This essay seeks to unpack the history surrounding, as well as the casuistical logic found within Donne's first sermon preached during the Caroline period, which both explicitly and implicitly addresses the foremost anxieties of the people of the changing age.
Divine Simplicity As A Necessary Condition For Affirming Creation Ex Nihilo,
2019
Abilene Christian University
Divine Simplicity As A Necessary Condition For Affirming Creation Ex Nihilo, Chance Juliano
Electronic Theses and Dissertations
Proponents of the Doctrine of Divine Simplicity (DDS) have frequently argued that God must lack any temporal, physical, or metaphysical composition on the grounds that God’s existence would be dependent upon God’s parts. This avenue of discourse has been tried and trod so often that most detractors of DDS find it insufficient to demonstrate DDS. Additionally, objectors to DDS have often rejected the doctrine on the count of the heap of metaphysical (often Aristotelian or Neoplatonist) assumptions that one must make before one can even arrive at DDS. Within this essay I will offer an argument for DDS that is …
Normative Pragmatic Selfhood: A Pragmatist Conception Of Value For Marginal Cases,
2019
University of Arkansas, Fayetteville
Normative Pragmatic Selfhood: A Pragmatist Conception Of Value For Marginal Cases, Sam Noel Johnson
Graduate Theses and Dissertations
I develop a theory of personal ontology called normative pragmatic selfhood (NPS) to explain what persons are and how they are morally valuable. I also demonstrate the applicability of NPS theory by using it to assess the moral status of marginal cases in bioethical dilemmas. I begin by discussing the concept of intrinsic value and why it is problematic when it comes to persons. I then draw upon John Dewey’s theory of value, specifically the concept of growth, and Kant’s concept of humanity to show that persons are objectively yet extrinsically valuable. Next, I discuss and argue how the psychological …
Hacking The Extended Mind: The Security Implications Of The New Metaphysics,
2019
Beloit College
Hacking The Extended Mind: The Security Implications Of The New Metaphysics, Robin L. Zebrowski
Computer Ethics - Philosophical Enquiry (CEPE) Proceedings
Computer security expert Paul Syverson has argued that there is a computer security equivalent of gaslighting: where a clever adversary could convince some system that some component that is not really a part of the system is in fact a part of the system. If non-biological items from our environments (or even pieces of our environments themselves) can be part of our minds (the standard Extended Mind hypothesis, EM), they are therefore part of our selves, and therefore subject to Syverson’s worry about boundary in a way that has not been explored before. If some version of EM holds, then …
Rethinking Algorithmic Bias Through Phenomenology And Pragmatism,
2019
Worcester State University
Rethinking Algorithmic Bias Through Phenomenology And Pragmatism, Johnathan C. Flowers
Computer Ethics - Philosophical Enquiry (CEPE) Proceedings
In 2017, Amazon discontinued an attempt at developing a hiring algorithm which would enable the company to streamline its hiring processes due to apparent gender discrimination. Specifically, the algorithm, trained on over a decade’s worth of resumes submitted to Amazon, learned to penalize applications that contained references to women, that indicated graduation from all women’s colleges, or otherwise indicated that an applicant was not male. Amazon’s algorithm took up the history of Amazon’s applicant pool and integrated it into its present “problematic situation,” for the purposes of future action. Consequently, Amazon declared the project a failure: even after attempting to …
Metaphysical Reduction Of Necessity : A Modified Account,
2019
Lingnan University
Metaphysical Reduction Of Necessity : A Modified Account, Pak Him Lai
Lingnan Theses and Dissertations (MPhil & PhD)
This thesis investigates the metaphysical nature of necessity. My study focuses primarily on the reduction of metaphysical necessity and the question of whether a necessary truth can be reductively defined. Theodore Sider (2011) develops a new reductive account of metaphysical necessity. Unfortunately, the multiple realizability problem posed by Jonathan Schaffer (2013) undermines the credibility of Sider’s account. This underlies my motivation to search for a revised Siderian account of necessity. On this basis, I propose a modified version of Sider’s account and argue that analytic, natural-kind and micro-reduction truths are necessary truths if and only if they express the same …
A Critical Analysis Of The Metaphysics Of Limit And Unlimited In Plato's Philebus,
2019
James Madison University
A Critical Analysis Of The Metaphysics Of Limit And Unlimited In Plato's Philebus, Ashley Lascano
Senior Honors Projects, 2010-2019
This paper examines several key passages within Plato’s Philebus and analyses the underlying metaphysics that exists at the heart of the dialogue. Plato implements the metaphysics in the dialogue by utilizing the terminology of “the limit” and “the unlimited”. This paper examines the Pythagorean origins of the limit and unlimited and depicts how Plato has adapted the terms from their original intent. The Philebus is examined to show the metaphysical importance of the limit and unlimited. The dialogue displays an example of the metaphysics of the limit and the unlimited through the debate between pleasure and intelligence, which is a …
Maximally Contiguous Simples,
2019
University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee
Maximally Contiguous Simples, Steven Canet
Theses and Dissertations
Much of the recent work done in mereology has been focused on answers to Ned Markosian’s Simple Question: What are the necessary and jointly sufficient conditions for an object’s being a simple i.e. a thing with no parts? In this paper, I analyze Markosian’s own answer, The Maximally Continuous View (MaxCon), and highlight a few of the strongest objections against that answer. I then argue that the objections only arise because Markosian assumes problematic conceptions of spacetime and matter. After updating each assumption with our best physics, I arrive at my own view, which I call the Maximally Contiguous View …
Nominalization And Interpretation: A Critique Of Global Nominalization Criteria,
2019
University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee
Nominalization And Interpretation: A Critique Of Global Nominalization Criteria, Jason Alen Dewitt
Theses and Dissertations
Nominalization is the process which removes abstract objects from our scientific theories. But what makes a proposed nominalization a good or successful one? In the paper “Is It Possible to Nominalize Quantum Mechanics,” Otávio Bueno develops criteria for any successful nominalization. In the present work, I discuss one of these criteria that I call the “interpretation criterion.” It claims that a nominalization of a scientific theory should be neutral with regards to the interpretations of that theory. I argue that the interpretation criterion is problematic, and that it should be replaced with an alternative criterion of nominalization. I first explicate …
Basic-Acceptance Teleosemantics,
2019
The Graduate Center, City University of New York
Basic-Acceptance Teleosemantics, Esteban Withrington
Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects
I propose an approach to naturalize semantics that combines the use-theory of meaning with teleosemantics. More specifically, I combine Horwich’s claim that the meanings of words are engendered by the acceptance of basic sentences that govern their deployment with the teleosemantic model, developed by Millikan, Papineau and Neander, according to which the meanings of symbols are related to functions determined by the history of their use and of the underlying biological mechanisms responsible for it.
Horwich’s account is general enough to offer plausible explanations of the meanings of all kinds of words and provides a plausible explanation of how meanings …
Queerness, Witchcraft, And Embodied Presence: Aesthetic Knowings Of What A Body Can Do,
2019
The Graduate Center, City University of New York
Queerness, Witchcraft, And Embodied Presence: Aesthetic Knowings Of What A Body Can Do, Megan Bigelow
Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects
Taking as a point of entry the critique of representation and affirming the limitations of the cuts that language makes, this capstone project explores the imbrications and assemblages between Foucault’s concept of subjugated knowledges, witchcraft and other body-based ways of knowing and being, and the consciousness of non-human forms such as plants and through the framework of non-representational theory, process philosophies, aesthetics, queerness, and the concept of difference itself.
Since such theories themselves are living, breathing entities, this capstone project explores the ideological split that has occurred between sacred and secular beliefs, moving through different figures such as nuns and …
What's Left Of Gender?: The Metaphysics Of Woman, Man, And Non-Binary Identities,
2019
The University of San Francisco
What's Left Of Gender?: The Metaphysics Of Woman, Man, And Non-Binary Identities, Nina Kamangar
Creative Activity and Research Day - CARD
There is a gender revolution underway. Progressive movements urge acceptance of transgender and non-binary gender identities apart from the male or female designations assigned at birth. Surrounding this, there has been confusion about what gender is and what it means to identify with one. Some accuse new perspectives on gender to be incoherent. Others support this movement, but acknowledge gender as an inherently restrictive concept to eventually be abolished. Is it true that genders are becoming empty categories, or can something be salvaged? I offer a pro-revolutionary theory of gender that is inclusive of these new identities while remaining intelligible.
The Moral Argument, Existential Problems Of Evil, And A Non-Existential Alternative,
2019
Liberty University
The Moral Argument, Existential Problems Of Evil, And A Non-Existential Alternative, Jonathan Smith
Senior Honors Theses
Within this paper, it is shown that certain ethical assumptions are implicit within the claim that certain kinds of evil exist. When taken in tandem with the moral argument for the existence of God, these assumptions can be arranged in such a way as to provide a contradiction. To avoid this contradiction, I posit a non-existential alternative to direct inductive arguments from evil, but the non-existential alternative gives rise to novel objections. When considering their respective ethical implications, both the existential and non-existential variations of direct inductive arguments fail. Since any direct inductive problem of evil must be either existential …
How To Distinguish Qualities And Dispositions,
2019
University of Missouri, St. Louis
How To Distinguish Qualities And Dispositions, Seth Reed
Theses
There is an intuitive difference between a qualitative and a dispositional predicate. Qualitative predicates seemingly refer to inherent features of an object, while dispositional predicates point outward to possible interactions. Attempts to further spell this distinction have proven difficult, however. Past approaches have either started from metaphysical assumptions or compared paradigmatic cases of each side-by-side. In this paper I offer a new approach to solving this puzzle. Starting with a qualitative or dispositional predicate of a property, we can examine how that differs from a predicate of the other kind that applies, in virtue of that property, to the same …
Anton Wilhelm Amo's Philosophy And Reception: From The Origins Through The Encyclopédie,
2019
University of South Florida
Anton Wilhelm Amo's Philosophy And Reception: From The Origins Through The Encyclopédie, Dwight Kenneth Lewis Jr.
USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations
Diversity and the concept of race are, or should be, central concerns both for the history of philosophy and for our current political reality. Within academic philosophy, these concerns are expressed in the growing demand for minority representation within the canon, which is overwhelmingly white and male, especially in early modern philosophy. Furthermore, until now, historians of philosophy have not spent the time necessary to uncover various designations such as “Negro”, “Moor”, “Ethiopian”, etc., in early modern Europe, and from there to understand how these shaped philosophical reflections on human diversity. In my research, I relate Anton Wilhelm Amo (c. …
Reconsidering What Nietzsche Meant By The Same In The Doctrine Of The Eternal Recurrence,
2019
Ateneo de Manila University
Reconsidering What Nietzsche Meant By The Same In The Doctrine Of The Eternal Recurrence, Wilhelm Patrick Joseph S. Strebel
Philosophy Department Faculty Publications
Hermeneutical considerations involving the nuances of words in translation have a bearing in interpreting philosophical concepts. Stambaugh highlighted the eternal in Nietzsche as well as the meaning of the Same in the doctrine of the Eternal Recurrence of the Same. As translation of the German word das Gleiche, she provided important considerations regarding the nuances of das Gleiche and the sense of how the English word “the same” could capture as well as leave out some meanings in the original. This paper builds on Stambaugh’s observations by providing a linguistic analysis of das Gleiche to open up to how it …