Philosophy Commons^™

The Proportionality Trap: Why Retributivism's Core Principle Falls Short, Neely C. Kiihnl

Honors Theses

The notion that punishment should “fit” the crime dates back to legal retribution’s origins. Retributivism posits that offenders deserve punishment matching the severity of their crimes, lending intuitive appeal over utilitarianism, which critics argue ignores moral wrongdoing by focusing solely on social benefits like reduced harm.

Yet Adam Kolber’s work exposes proportionality’s vagueness: it raises more problems and questions than it solves. In the first section of this paper, the concept of proportionality is explored in more depth. The second section, led by Kolber’s critiques, casts doubt on the stability of proportionality. Finally, in the third section, I propose a …

What History Shows: A Structural Account Of Fixed-Point Theory Formation, Griselda Poe

Publications and Research

Theory generation has long been subsumed under categories such as creativity, genius, and innovation. These categories do not distinguish assembly-based conceptual synthesis from fixed-point theory generation.

This paper makes that distinction explicit. The termination condition of assembly is external: data, citation, endorsement, usability. The termination condition of fixed-point theory generation is internal: consistency with internally held constraints, resolution of structural contradiction. The two operate under different processing conditions.

The historical record confirms this distinction. What Darwin, Einstein, Spinoza, and Kant produced was not assembly. Their processes involved unresolved branch retention and decomposition necessity, arriving at internally constrained fixed-point termination. Freud …

Living Archaeology: A Comparative Perspective On How Archaeologists Can Study And Document The Present, Alia S. Moran

Honors Capstones

Archaeology has long remained a social science that has tended to exclude sustained consideration of contemporary societies in the analysis of material culture. In recent decades, approaches such as ethnoarchaeology and the archaeology of the contemporary have expanded the field to include the study of present-day societies through material culture. Inspired by my involvement in the Thais in Illinois Project, which focused on documenting the Thai American immigrant experience in the greater Chicago area to produce an oral history collection, alongside other goals, this thesis intends to further explore how archaeological practice can be used to understand everyday issues in …

Invisible Shipwrecks And Neurological Endangerment: The Trade-Off In Seeking Asylum - Reframing The Neurobiological Cost Of Forced Migration, Eisha Giran

CISLA Senior Integrative Projects

Forced migration along the Spain–Morocco route represents one of the most visible humanitarian crises of the twenty-first century, yet its neurological dimensions remain insufficiently examined. This paper investigates how prolonged displacement and trauma reshape neural systems involved in stress regulation, memory, and emotional processing. It introduces the concept of neurological endangerment, defined as a condition of prolonged and inescapable threat exposure during forced migration in which stress-response systems remain chronically activated, opportunities for recovery are structurally constrained, and cumulative neurobiological risk persists beyond the period of immediate danger.

To address the gap between biological measurement and lived experience, this paper …

Phenomenological Philosophy Of Psychedelics: Psychedelic Experience In The Modes Of Saturation And Flesh, Michael V. Kramer

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This work seeks to develop the nascent sub-field of the phenomenological philosophy of psychedelics. Beginning with a general overview of key aspects pertinent to psychedelic studies, the focus then turns to a general disciplinary discussion of current approaches within the philosophy of psychedelics, as well as psychedelic philosophy—a distinction which is technically deployed. Special consideration is given to the specific approach known as the “natural philosophy of psychedelics,” which is taken as the philosophical foil to the preferred approach of phenomenological philosophy. A survey of the extant literature regarding the implementation of phenomenology within psychedelic discourse is then provided …

The Proper Role Of Religion In Hegel's Philosophy Of Statecraft, Hunter Coates

The Corinthian

In section three of Elements of the Philosophy of Right, Hegel lays out a theory of statecraft that comprises what he deems to be the ethical state. The ethical state is the political state that has secured the rights of its citizens through the union of state power, civil society, and absolute spirit. This paper will investigate the relationship that religion has to the ethical state in Hegel’s philosophy. First, it will be important to explain what Hegel deems absolute spirit in the Science of Logic and Encyclopedia of Philosophical Sciences, Volume 3. Next, we will briefly apply …

Spinoza And The Reciprocity Of Nature, Kevin S. Jobe

Philosophy Faculty Publications

This paper develops an account of the reciprocity of Nature in Spinoza as a central yet underappreciated dimension of Spinoza’s relational metaphysics. Building on Ziporyn’s interpretation of Spinoza, the paper argues that any understanding of infinity and necessity is incomplete without Spinoza’s relational account of the reciprocity of God or Nature (Deus sive Natura). Through a close analysis of the Ethics, the Principles and Letter 32, the paper shows that for Spinoza all finite things are reciprocally determined by another singular thing to exist in a certain way through the infinite, eternal and equal force [ …

Searching For A Connection Between Intellectual Humility And Decision-Making Ability, Mansi Verma, Kristin Kirchner

Caravel Undergraduate Research Journal

The present study investigated whether there was a relationship between intellectual humility and decision-making. The participants were 32 undergraduate students recruited from the University of South Carolina. Data was collected through self-reported measures of intellectual humility from the participants and their answers to questions testing for decision-making ability in a single survey. Results indicate that there is a correlation between the scores on the Intellectual Humility Scale and CRT scores. Overall, there does appear to be a relationship between intellectual humility and decision-making.

Nietzsche And Socrates: Reflections Of Redefined Virtue In Greek Tragedy, Kyle M. Lowry

Senior Honors Theses

The works of Friedrich Nietzsche were used to study how Greek Tragedy was “born” and “died,” particularly in relation to the rise of Socratic philosophy in Ancient Greece. The intoxicated “Dionysian” and disciplinary, artistic “Apollinian,” are the elements Nietzsche claims encompass and catalyze human experience; the former containing the primal nature of the Being, and the latter containing the ordering through which identity is formed and art is created. Tragedy, the art form perfectly balancing these two elements was “born” within the conditions of a Dionysian Pessimism, by which the inevitable life of suffering was redeemed aesthetically. Socrates introduced rationality …

Spinoza On Invidia: A Social Theory Of Anti-Migrant Affect, Kevin Scott Jobe

Philosophy Faculty Publications

This paper develops a Spinozist social theory of anti-migrant affect by interpreting contemporary hostility toward immigration through the concept of invidia (envy). Drawing on recent empirical research on ‘superiority-seeking’, whereby individuals derive status utility from excluding others, the paper interprets invidia as an affective hatred of equality. For Spinoza, envy is caused not by actual material loss but from the imagination that misconceives shared goods as exclusive possessions. This social theory of invidia inverts readings that locate envy in migrants themselves, instead arguing that, in Spinoza’s Political Treatise, the democratic multitude harbours invidia against migrants when they are perceived as …

Soma: Exploring Touch As Performance And Performance As Therapy, Erica Pamson

Expressive Therapies Theses

This project investigated the role of touch within a performative context and its potential as a creative intervention within Expressive Arts Therapy. Grounded in phenomenology and intersubjectivity, the study draws on Expressive Arts Therapy (EXAT) and Performance Art frameworks that position meaning as emerging through embodied, co-created experience. Existing literature identifies touch as a primary mode of perception and communication, essential to both physical and emotional well-being, while also noting its increasing absence and regulation within contemporary Western culture. Performance art literature further highlights the body as both medium and site of relational exchange, often dissolving boundaries between performer and …

Processing Conditions In Narrative Interpretation: A Structural Account Of Cf/Ef Divergence In "The Clerk's Tale”, Griselda Poe

Publications and Research

This paper applies the framework established in Paper 19, "Cognition Is Not Content: A Structural Account of Processing Conditions," to re-describe Chaucer's "The Clerk's Tale" from The Canterbury Tales.

The same narrative produces two incompatible interpretations: a record of domestic violence, and a story of genuine love. This divergence does not arise from differences in ethical judgment or emotional response. It arises from structural differences in the conditions under which information is reconstructed.

This paper does three things. First, it analyzes the characters Walter and Griselda in terms of CF (Core-foregrounded) and EF (Modulation-foregrounded) processing conditions. Second, it describes …

Bioshock: An Objectivist Counter Discourse On Ayn Rand’S Atlas Shrugged, Tucker M. Hurst

Undergraduate Honors Thesis Collection

The aim for this thesis is to discuss the themes and story structure of Bioshock with respect to Ayn Rand’s Atlas Shrugged by deconstructing the relationship between both pieces of media as Bioshock representing a counter discourse to Rand’s objectivism. This will be done by examining both stories under a philosophical and economic lens to determine the main pillars of objectivism presented in Atlas Shrugged, then moving on to Bioshock’s dissection of these ideals when enforced on a secluded society. In doing so, not only is a better understanding of Rand’s philosophy obtained by presenting a form of case study …

Greek Basileus "King" As A Possible Borrowing From Semitic Mšl "To Rule’", Gerald Leonard Cohen

Arts, Languages and Philosophy Faculty Research & Creative Works

No abstract provided.

Sexual Violence, Rape Culture, And The Ethics Of Care In Promising Young Woman (2020), Blink Twice (2024), And Women Talking (2022), Naomi H. Fredgant

Film and Media Studies (MA) Theses

Evolving public discourse on rape and rape culture is reflected in contemporary cinema. This thesis analyzes Promising Young Woman (2020), Blink Twice (2024), and Women Talking (2022)—all directed by women—through the theoretical framework of the ethics of care, highlighting how these films expose the persistence of rape culture and the systemic failure of institutions to support victims of sexual violence. Drawing on scholarship about rape culture, this analysis shows how the rape myths and institutional gaslighting depicted in these films function to dismiss victims’ testimonies, mirroring broader patterns of invalidation. The films explore both individual and collective responses to sexual …

The Legitimacy Of International Law: A Kantian-Rawlsian Account, Taeyang Lee

Philosophy

This paper aims to answer the question of whether international law has legitimacy and value despite the absence of global centralized coercive enforcement and whether the concept of legitimacy developed in domestic law theory can be applied to international law. By avoiding the two extremes that claim that international law is nothing more than a non-binding agreement, or that it requires the centralized enforcement of a world government, I will defend a middle position that explains the moral binding force of international law when it satisfies conditions of legitimacy. Drawing on Kant's Universal Principle of Right and Ripstein's three defects …

Fantasies Of Just Torture: On Violent Efforts To Navigate The Intolerable, Tonya Sims

Philosophy Undergraduate Honors Theses

This thesis examines why torture, despite being among the clearest objects of moral revulsion available to us, remains imaginable as a serious moral possibility. I begin by refining the concept of torture through an examination of the United Nations Convention Against Torture, while arguing that insufficient attention has been paid to what I take to be its paradigmatic form, namely sadistic torture. Against definitions that treat torture primarily in instrumental terms, I argue that torture is best understood as the intentional infliction of extreme pain upon an unwilling person in order to dominate or otherwise manipulate their autonomy. Drawing on …

Believe It Or Not: An Examination Of The Nature And Implications Of Evidence-Resistant Beliefs, Jack Geruc

College of Arts & Sciences Senior Theses

The aim of this thesis is to contribute to a growing body of academic research regarding the nature and origin of evidence-resistant belief systems and examine the influence that they have upon our lives. This examination of the origin of these beliefs draws on two intellectual disciplines: psychology and epistemology. A psychological approach examines the cognitive mechanisms that allow for the formation and persistence of these beliefs. The psychological approach focuses on the biological drives of belief formation and resilience. Furthermore, an examination of the psychology of identity shows an entanglement of one’s identity with belief systems that allows for …

Concerned Philosophers For Peace, Vol. 34 (2026), Concerned Philosophers For Peace

Concerned Philosophers for Peace

In addition to organizational information, honors, awards, and calls for papers and abstracts, this issue contains the following articles:

• “Genocide, Evil, and The Madman's Bluff: The Moral Stain of President Trump's Shameful Threat to Annihilate Iran,” by Andrew Fiala
• “Lest We Forget,” by Anna Malavisi
• “Ancient Lessons on Peace from a Roman Dissident,” by Court Lewis

It's Okay, I'M Fine: A Communication Approach To Masculinity, Vulnerability, And Emotional Intimacy In Male Friendships, Nathan M. Spencer

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Fall 2023 to Present

Vulnerability is a key part of any relationship, as it allows people to feel more connected and closer to one another. However, toxic masculine norms are inhibiting men from being vulnerable in their relationships, especially in their friendships with other men. This study seeks to explore how vulnerable communication can lead to increased feelings of emotional intimacy and partner responsiveness within male friendships, even when it goes against the person’s expectations. Findings suggest that when a man is exposed to a vulnerable message, he will perceive an increase in both emotional intimacy and partner responsiveness. Another factor was that when …