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Articles 31 - 60 of 159
Full-Text Articles in Philosophy
Husserl’S Concept Of Position-Taking And Second Nature, Alejandro Arango
Husserl’S Concept Of Position-Taking And Second Nature, Alejandro Arango
Philosophy Faculty Scholarship
I argue that Husserl’s concept of position-taking, Stellungnahme, is adequate to understand the idea of second nature as an issue of philosophical anthropology. I claim that the methodological focus must be the living subject that acts and lives among others, and that the notion of second nature must respond to precisely this fundamental active character of subjectivity. The appropriate concept should satisfy two additional desiderata. First, it should be able to develop alongside the biological, psychological, and social individual development. Second, it should be able to underlie the vast diversity of human beings within and across communities. As possible candidates, …
Social Enactive Perception: Practices, Experience, And Contents, Alejandro Arango
Social Enactive Perception: Practices, Experience, And Contents, Alejandro Arango
Philosophy Faculty Scholarship
This dissertation proposes the central elements of a Social Enactive Theory of Perception. According to SEP, perception consists in sensory-based practices of interaction with objects, events, and states of affairs that are socially constituted. I oppose the representational view that perception is an indirect contact with the world, consists of the passive receiving and processing of sensory input, is in need of constant assessment of accuracy, and is a matter of individuals alone. I share the basic enactivist insight that perception is a type of activity, but I depart from standard enactivism on the grounds of its individualistic bias and …
Kind Of Borrowed, Kind Of Blue, P.D. Magnus
Kind Of Borrowed, Kind Of Blue, P.D. Magnus
Philosophy Faculty Scholarship
In late 2014, the jazz combo Mostly Other People Do the Killing released "Blue", an album which is a note-for-note remake of Miles Davis' 1959 landmark album "Kind of Blue". MOPDtK (to abbreviate the band's cumbersome name) transcribed all of the solos and performed them with meticulous care so as to produce a recorded album that replicates, as much as they could, the sound of the original. This is a thought experiment made actual, the kind of doppelgänger which philosophers routinely just imagine. I explore some of the ontological and aesthetic puzzles which the album poses. I argue that what …
Hobbes On Natural Philosophy As “True Physics” And Mixed Mathematics, Marcus P. Adams
Hobbes On Natural Philosophy As “True Physics” And Mixed Mathematics, Marcus P. Adams
Philosophy Faculty Scholarship
In this paper, I offer an alternative account of the relationship of Hobbesian geometry to natural philosophy by arguing that mixed mathematics provided Hobbes with a model for thinking about it. In mixed mathematics, one may borrow causal principles from one science and use them in another science without there being a deductive relationship between those two sciences. Natural philosophy for Hobbes is mixed because an explanation may combine observations from experience (the ‘that’) with causal principles from geometry (the ‘why’). My argument shows that Hobbesian natural philosophy relies upon suppositions that bodies plausibly behave according to these borrowed causal …
Libertarian Welfare Rights? An Inquiry Into The Coherence Of Some Common Libertarian Commitments, Nicole Hassoun
Libertarian Welfare Rights? An Inquiry Into The Coherence Of Some Common Libertarian Commitments, Nicole Hassoun
Philosophy Faculty Scholarship
This paper argues that libertarians should endorse some welfare rights understood as rights that all states must guarantee to their subjects as a condition of legitimacy. For, it argues that libertarians, because they should be actual consent theorists, must agree to the following condition for state legitimacy: States must do what they can to ensure that their rights-respecting subjects secure the basic reasoning and planning capacities they need to consent to their rules.
How People Think About Distributing Aid, Nicole Hassoun, Emir Malikov, Nathan Lubchenco
How People Think About Distributing Aid, Nicole Hassoun, Emir Malikov, Nathan Lubchenco
Philosophy Faculty Scholarship
This paper examines how people think about aiding others in a way that can inform both theory and practice. It uses data gathered from Kiva, an online, non-profit organization that allows individuals to aid other individuals around the world, to isolate intuitions that people find broadly compelling. The central result of the paper is that people seem to give more priority to aiding those in greater need at least below some threshold. That is, the data strongly suggest incorporating both a threshold and a prioritarian principle into the analysis of what principles for aid distribution people accept. This conclusion should …
Conserving Nature; Preserving Identity, Nicole Hassoun, D. Wong
Conserving Nature; Preserving Identity, Nicole Hassoun, D. Wong
Philosophy Faculty Scholarship
Fundamental approaches to environmental ethics currently seem polarized between two broad varieties: the “conservationist” approach on which we should conserve the environment when it is in our interest to do so and the “preservationist” approach on which we should preserve the environment even when it is not in our interest to do so. The first approach obviously has a broader potential audience and is invoked even by preservationists when they seek to marshal the broadest possible support for environmental protection. For preservationists, however, the conservationist approach has obvious limitations. It permits damage to the environment whenever required by the balance …
Wilderness, The Wild, And Aesthetic Appreciation, Nicole Hassoun
Wilderness, The Wild, And Aesthetic Appreciation, Nicole Hassoun
Philosophy Faculty Scholarship
Wild nature is a source of wonder and inspiration in part because of its aesthetic value. This paper gives an account of the aesthetic value of wilderness and argues that wild nature is especially likely to give rise to what it will call the transformative aesthetic experience. This account satisfies three criteria John Fisher suggests for a good account of nature’s aesthetic value that might provide reasons for preservation. First, it retains a credible connection with canonical aesthetic theory. Second, it allows us to make a general distinction between our appreciation of nature and art. Third, it avoids the ‘the …
Visual Perception As Patterning: Cavendish Against Hobbes On Sensation, Marcus P. Adams
Visual Perception As Patterning: Cavendish Against Hobbes On Sensation, Marcus P. Adams
Philosophy Faculty Scholarship
In Margaret Cavendish's view, her Philosophical Letters are the "building" (1664, preface; hereafter Letters) that rests upon the foundation already laid in her Philosophical and Physical Opinions (first edition 1655; second edition 1663; hereafter Opinions). In the Letters, she criticizes Descartes, Hobbes, More, van Helmont, and others by arguing for the superiority of her philosophical system in its ability to explain various phenomena and to avoid the objections she highlights.
Animal Groups And Social Ontology: An Argument From The Phenomenology Of Behavior, Alejandro Arango
Animal Groups And Social Ontology: An Argument From The Phenomenology Of Behavior, Alejandro Arango
Philosophy Faculty Scholarship
Through a critical engagement with Merleau-Ponty’s discussion of the concepts of nature, life, and behavior, and with contemporary accounts of animal groups, this article argues that animal groups exhibit sociality and that sociality is a fundamental ontological condition. I situate my account in relation to the superorganism and selfish individual accounts of animal groups in recent biology and zoology. I argue that both accounts are inadequate. I propose an alternative account of animal groups and animal sociality through a Merleau-Pontian inspired definition of behavior. I criticize Merleau-Ponty’s individualistic prejudice, but show that his philosophy contains the resources necessary to overcome …
Unearthing The Process Roots Of Environment Ethics: Whitehead, Leopold, And The Land Ethic, Brian G. Henning
Unearthing The Process Roots Of Environment Ethics: Whitehead, Leopold, And The Land Ethic, Brian G. Henning
Philosophy Faculty Scholarship
The aim of this essay is twofold. First, I examine the role of Alfred North Whitehead and process thinkers in bringing about and shaping the field of environmental ethics. As we will see, our job is not so much to develop the connections between Whitehead and environmental thought as to recover them. Second, given this genealogical work, I invite process scholars to reconsider their generally hostile reception of Aldo Leopold and his land ethic. I suggest that a version of the land ethic grounded in a process axiology could make a significant contribution to contemporary environmental thought.
From The Anthropocene To The Ecozoic: Philosophy And Global Climate Change, Brian G. Henning
From The Anthropocene To The Ecozoic: Philosophy And Global Climate Change, Brian G. Henning
Philosophy Faculty Scholarship
No abstract provided.
The Global Health Impact Index: Promoting Global Health, Nicole Hassoun
The Global Health Impact Index: Promoting Global Health, Nicole Hassoun
Philosophy Faculty Scholarship
Millions of people cannot access essential medicines they need for deadly diseases like malaria, tuberculosis (TB) and HIV/AIDS. There is good information on the need for drugs for these diseases but until now, no global estimate of the impact drugs are having on this burden. This paper presents a model measuring companies' key malaria, TB and HIV/AIDS drugs' consequences for global health (global-health-impact.org). It aggregates drugs' impacts in several ways-by disease, country and originator-company. The methodology can be extended across diseases as well as drugs to provide a more extensive picture of the impact companies' drugs are having on the …
Preserving The Autographic/Allographic Distinction, P.D. Magnus, Jason R. D'Cruz
Preserving The Autographic/Allographic Distinction, P.D. Magnus, Jason R. D'Cruz
Philosophy Faculty Scholarship
In his study of forms of representation, Nel- son Goodman sought to explain why some representations, like words or musical scores, are considered replicable while others, such as paintings, are not. He named the replicable rep- resentations allographic and the ones we consider nonreplicable autographic (Goodman 1976, 113). His explanation of what grounds this distinction is in his theory of notations (chaps. IV–V). That theory essentially seeks to secure the possibility of identity for representations, as well as the possibility of knowing such identity, by setting out a number of requirements. Unless a repre- sentational practice satisfies the requirements (is …
John Stuart Mill On Taxonomy And Natural Kinds, P.D. Magnus
John Stuart Mill On Taxonomy And Natural Kinds, P.D. Magnus
Philosophy Faculty Scholarship
The accepted narrative treats John Stuart Mill's Kinds as the historical prototype for our natural kinds, but Mill actually employs two separate notions: Kinds and natural groups. Considering these, along with the accounts of Mill's 19th-century interlocutors, forces us to recognize two distinct questions. First, what marks a natural kind as worthy of inclusion in taxonomy? Second, what exists in the world that makes a category meet that criterion? Mill's two notions offer separate answers to the two questions: natural groups for taxonomy, and Kinds for ontology. This distinction is ignored in many contemporary debates about natural kinds and is …
Promising To Try, Jason R. D'Cruz, Justin Kalef
Promising To Try, Jason R. D'Cruz, Justin Kalef
Philosophy Faculty Scholarship
We maintain that in many contexts promising to try is expressive of responsibility as a promiser. This morally significant application of promising to try speaks in favor of the view that responsible promisers favor evidentialism about promises. Contra Berislav Marusˇic´, we contend that responsible promisers typically withdraw from promising to act and instead promise to try, in circumstances in which they recognize that there is a significant chance that they will not succeed.
Moral Clumsiness, Alejandro Arango
Moral Clumsiness, Alejandro Arango
Philosophy Faculty Scholarship
What would happen if one morning you wake up clumsy, as if your sense of touch were unreliable, arbitrarily on and off? And what would this clumsiness look like if we could transfer it to the moral sense? The article expounds an interesting analogy between the sense of touch, loosely construed, and the moral sense: just as a sort of consistency is necessary for the sense of touch to do its job, so it is for the moral sense to play its part. Touch enables us to navigate the everyday world of coffee pots and staircases; our moral sensibility comes …
Trust, Trustworthiness, And The Moral Consequence Of Consistency, Jason R. D'Cruz
Trust, Trustworthiness, And The Moral Consequence Of Consistency, Jason R. D'Cruz
Philosophy Faculty Scholarship
Situationists such as John Doris, Gilbert Harman, and Maria Merritt suppose that appeal to reliable behavioral dispositions can be dispensed with without radical revision to morality as we know it. This paper challenges this supposition, arguing that abandoning hope in reliable dispositions rules out genuine trust and forces us to suspend core reactive attitudes of gratitude and resentment, esteem and indignation. By examining situationism through the lens of trust we learn something about situationism (in particular, the radically revisionary moral implications of its adoption) as well as something about trust (in particular, that the conditions necessary for genuine trust include …
Demarcating Aristotelian Rhetoric: Rhetoric, The Subalternate Sciences, And Boundary Crossing, Marcus P. Adams
Demarcating Aristotelian Rhetoric: Rhetoric, The Subalternate Sciences, And Boundary Crossing, Marcus P. Adams
Philosophy Faculty Scholarship
The ways in which the Aristotelian sciences are related to each other has been discussed in the literature, with some focus on the subalternate sciences. While it is acknowledged that Aristotle, and Plato as well, was concerned as well with how the arts were related to one another, less attention has been paid to Aristotle’s views on relationships among the arts. In this paper, I argue that Aristotle’s account of the subalternate sciences helps shed light on how Aristotle saw the art of rhetoric relating to dialectic and politics. Initial motivation for comparing rhetoric with the subalternate sciences is Aristotle’s …
Nonconsequentialist Precaution, Christopher Morgan-Knapp
Nonconsequentialist Precaution, Christopher Morgan-Knapp
Philosophy Faculty Scholarship
How cautious should regulators be? A standard answer is consequentialist: regulators should be just cautious enough to maximize expected social value. This paper charts the prospects of a nonconsequentialist - and more precautionary - alternative. More specifically, it argues that a contractualism focused on ex ante consent can motivate the following regulatory criterion: regulators should permit a socially beneficial risky activity only if no one can be expected to be made worse off by it. Broadly speaking, there are two strategies regulators can use to help risky activities satisfy this criterion: regulators can mandate strict safety standards that protect those …
Consequentialism, Climate Harm And Individual Obligations, Christopher Morgan-Knapp, Charles Goodman
Consequentialism, Climate Harm And Individual Obligations, Christopher Morgan-Knapp, Charles Goodman
Philosophy Faculty Scholarship
Does the decision to relax by taking a drive rather than by taking a walk cause harm? In particular, do the additional carbon emissions caused by such a decision make anyone worse off? Recently several philosophers have argued that the answer is no, and on this basis have gone on to claim that act-consequentialism cannot provide a moral reason for individuals to voluntarily reduce their emissions. The reasoning typically consists of two steps. First, the effect of individual emissions on the weather is miniscule: the planet’s meteorological system is so large, and the size of individual emissions so tiny, that …
The Ethics Of Food, Fuel & Feed, Brian G. Henning
The Ethics Of Food, Fuel & Feed, Brian G. Henning
Philosophy Faculty Scholarship
As the collective impact of human activity approaches Earth's biophysical limits, the ethics of food become increasingly important. Hundreds of millions of people remain undernourished, yet only 60 percent of the global harvest is consumed by humans, while 35 percent is fed to livestock and 5 percent is used for biofuels and other industrial products. This essay considers the ethics of such use of edible nutrition for feedstock and biofuel. How humanity uses Earth's land is a reflection of its values. The current land-use arrangements, which divert 40 percent of all food to feed animals or create fuels, suggest that …
Creative Love: Eros And Agape In Whitehead And Pierce, Brian G. Henning
Creative Love: Eros And Agape In Whitehead And Pierce, Brian G. Henning
Philosophy Faculty Scholarship
No abstract provided.
Stewardship And The Roots Of The Ecological Crisis: Reflections On Laudato Si', Brian G. Henning
Stewardship And The Roots Of The Ecological Crisis: Reflections On Laudato Si', Brian G. Henning
Philosophy Faculty Scholarship
No abstract provided.
Epistemic Categories And Causal Kinds, P.D. Magnus
Epistemic Categories And Causal Kinds, P.D. Magnus
Philosophy Faculty Scholarship
Within philosophy of science, debates about realism often turn on whether posited entities exist or whether scientific claims are true. Natural kinds tend to be investigated by philosophers of language or metaphysicians, for whom semantic or ontological considerations can overshadow scientific ones. Since science crucially involves dividing the world up into categories of things, however, issues concerning classification ought to be central for philosophy of science. Muhammad Ali Khalidi's book fills that gap, and I commend it to readers with an interest in scientific taxonomy and natural kinds. He works through general issues to craft a useful philosophical conception and …
Science And Rationality For One And All, P.D. Magnus
Science And Rationality For One And All, P.D. Magnus
Philosophy Faculty Scholarship
A successful scientific community might require different scientists to form different beliefs even when faced with the same evidence. The standard line is that this would create a conflict between the demands of collective rationality which scientists face as members of the community and the demands of individual rationality which they face as epistemic agents. This is expressed both by philosophers of science (working on the distribution of cognitive labor) and by epistemologists (working on the epistemology of disagreement). The standard line fails to take into account the relation between rational belief and various epistemic risks, values of which are …
Are Digital Pictures Allographic?, Jason R. D'Cruz, P.D. Magnus
Are Digital Pictures Allographic?, Jason R. D'Cruz, P.D. Magnus
Philosophy Faculty Scholarship
Nelson Goodman's distinction between autographic and allographic arts is appealing, we suggest, because it promises to resolve several prima facie puzzles. We consider and rebut a recent argument that alleges that digital images explode the autographic/allographic distinction. Regardless, there is another familiar problem with the distinction, especially as Goodman formulates it: it seems to entirely ignore an important sense in which all artworks are historical. We note in reply that some artworks can be considered both as historical products and as formal structures. Talk about such works is ambiguous between the two conceptions. This allows us to recover Goodman's distinction: …
Nk≠Hpc, P.D. Magnus
Nk≠Hpc, P.D. Magnus
Philosophy Faculty Scholarship
The Homeostatic Property Cluster (HPC) account of natural kinds has become popular since it was proposed by Richard Boyd in the late 1980s. Although it is often taken to define natural kinds as such, it is easy enough to see that something's being a natural kind is neither necessary nor sufficient for its being an HPC. This paper argues that it is better not to understand HPCs as defining what it is to be a natural kind but instead as providing the ontological realization of (some) natural kinds.
The Wax And The Mechanical Mind: Reexamining Hobbes’S Objections To Descartes’S Meditations, Marcus P. Adams
The Wax And The Mechanical Mind: Reexamining Hobbes’S Objections To Descartes’S Meditations, Marcus P. Adams
Philosophy Faculty Scholarship
Many critics, Descartes himself included, have seen Hobbes as uncharitable or even incoherent in his Objections to the Meditations on First Philosophy. I argue that when understood within the wider context of his views of the late 1630s and early 1640s, Hobbes's Objections are coherent and reflect his goal of providing an epistemology consistent with a mechanical philosophy. I demonstrate the importance of this epistemology for understanding his Fourth Objection concerning the nature of the wax and contend that Hobbes's brief claims in that Objection are best understood as a summary of the mechanism for scientific knowledge found in his …
Gratitude And Displacement: The Political Obligations Of Refugees, Jason R. D'Cruz
Gratitude And Displacement: The Political Obligations Of Refugees, Jason R. D'Cruz
Philosophy Faculty Scholarship
On what basis, and to what extent, are refugees obligated to obey the laws of their host countries? Consideration of the specific case of asylum-seekers generates, I think, two competing intuitions: (1) the refugee has a prima facie obligation to obey the laws of her host country and (2) none of the popularly canvassed substrates of political obligation—consent, tacit consent, fairness, or social role—is at all apt to explain the presence of this obligation. I contend that the unfashionable gratitude account of political obligation does the best job of accounting for the intuitions. As has been noticed by other commentators, …