I bring several ecofeminist critiques of deep ecology to bear on mainstream animal rights theories, especially on the rights and utilitarian treatments of the animal research issue. Throughout, I show how animal rights issues are feminist issues and clarify the relationship between ecofeminism and animal rights.

The seventeenth century was a period of extraordinary invention, discovery and revolutions in scientific, social and political orders. It was a time of expansive automation, biological discovery, rapid advances in medical knowledge, of animal trials and a questioning of the boundaries between species, human and non-human, between social classes, and of the assumed naturalness of political inequality. This book gives a tour through those objects, ordinary and extraordinary, which captivated the philosophical imagination of the single most important French philosopher of (...) this period, Rene Descartes. Deborah J. Brown and Calvin G. Normore document Descartes' attempt to make sense of the complex, composite objects of human and divine invention, consistent with the fundamental tenets of his metaphysical system. Their central argument is that, far from reducing all the categories of ordinary experience to the two basic categories of substance, mind and body, Descartes' philosophy recognises irreducible composites that resist reduction, and require their own distinctive modes of explanation. (shrink)

In both the _Treatise and the first _Enquiry, Hume offers an argument from analogy comparing how humans and animals make causal inferences. Yet in these and other texts, he suggests that there are certain differences between human and animal reasoning. This paper discusses Hume's argument from analogy, and examines how Hume can argue for differences in human and animal reasoning without having to attribute to either a special capacity that the other lacks. Hume's empiricism and his claims about sympathy also (...) give him good reason to hold that in animals just as in humans, reason is a virtue. (shrink)

Aristotle, pundits often say, has a 'nous'-body problem. The psychophysical account that succeeds in the case of other psychological faculties and activities, they charge, breaks down in the case of the intellect. One formulation of this difficulty claims that the definition of the soul given in 'De Anima' II.1 is incompatible with the account of 'nous' in 'De Anima' lll and elsewhere in the corpus. Indeed there are four psychological concepts that raise the 'nous'-body problem: the faculty for thought as (...) described in 'De Anima' III.4, the intellection of indivisible objects of thought in 'De Anima' III.6, the active intellect of 'De Anima' III.5 and the type of thinking likened to the activity of the divine mind in _Metaphysics<D> XII.6-8 and _Nicomachean Ethics<D> X.6-8. I consider each in turn and argue that Aristotle is on firmer ground here than is often believed. (shrink)

Altruism has both an evolutionary and a psychological meaning. As the term is used in evolutionary theory, a trait is deemed altruistic if it reduces the fitness of the actor and enhances the fitness of someone else. In its psychological sense, the thesis that we have altruistic ultimate motives asserts that we care about the welfare of others, not just as a means of enhancing our own well-being, but as an end in itself. In Unto Others (hereafter UO), we consider (...) both evolutionary altruism (Part I) and psychological altruism (Part II) from an evolutionary perspective. We propose a multilevel selection theory to explain how altruism can evolve from group selection, based on Darwin’s solution to the problem. Our presentation of multilevel selection theory expands the range of topics beyond altruism in other respects as well. In Part I1 of UO, we evaluate the arguments, both conceptual and empirical, that philosophers and psychologists have advanced in an attempt to choose between psychological egoism and motivational pluralism. We conclude that these arguments are inconclusive. (shrink)

Descartes is often accused of having fragmented the human being into two independent substances, mind and body, with no clear strategy for explaining the apparent unity of human experience. Deborah Brown argues that, contrary to this view, Descartes did in fact have a conception of a single, integrated human being, and that in his view this conception is crucial to the success of human beings as rational and moral agents and as practitioners of science. The passions are pivotal in (...) this, and in a rich and wide-ranging discussion she examines Descartes' place in the tradition of thought about the passions, the metaphysics of actions and passions, sensory representation, and Descartes' account of self-mastery and virtue. Her study is an important and original reading not only of Descartes' account of mind-body unity but also of his theory of mind. (shrink)

Wilson outlines the basic principles of evolution with stories that entertain as much as they inform, and shows how, properly understood, these principles can illuminate the length and breadth of creation, from the origin of life to the nature of religion. Now everyone can move beyond the sterile debates about creationism and intelligent design to share Darwin's panoramic view of animal and human life, seamlessly connected to each other. Evolution, as Wilson explains, is not just about dinosaurs and human origins, (...) but about why all species behave as they do--from beetles that devour their own young, to bees that function as a collective brain, to dogs that are smarter in some respects than our closest ape relatives. And basic evolutionary principles are also the foundation for humanity's capacity for symbolic thought, culture, and morality.--From publisher description. (shrink)

Over the last decade or so, there has been a renewed interest in a view about properties known as quidditism. However, a review of the literature reveals that ‘quidditism’ is used to cover a range of distinct views. In this paper I explore the logical space of distinct types of quidditism. The first distinction noted is between quidditism as a thesis explicitly about property individuation and quidditism as a principle of unrestricted property recombination. The distinction recently drawn by Dustin Locke (...) between extravagant quidditism and austere quidditism is a distinction between quidditisms of the first type. It is then argued that austere quidditism may itself be further sub-divided into what I call ‘extremely austere quidditism’ and ‘moderately austere quidditism’. Moderately austere quidditism is argued to be preferable to extremely austere quidditism and further to be able to address many of the arguments leveled against quidditism in general. (shrink)

Although both philosophers and scientists are interested in how to obtain reliable knowledge in the face of error, there is a gap between their perspectives that has been an obstacle to progress. By means of a series of exchanges between the editors and leaders from the philosophy of science, statistics and economics, this volume offers a cumulative introduction connecting problems of traditional philosophy of science to problems of inference in statistical and empirical modelling practice. Philosophers of science and scientific practitioners (...) are challenged to reevaluate the assumptions of their own theories - philosophical or methodological. Practitioners may better appreciate the foundational issues around which their questions revolve and thereby become better 'applied philosophers'. Conversely, new avenues emerge for finally solving recalcitrant philosophical problems of induction, explanation and theory testing. (shrink)

In determining when sexual behavior in the workplace creates a hostile working environment, some courts have asked, Would a reasonableperson view this as a hostile environment? Two recent court decisions, recognizing male-female differences in the perception of social sexual behavior at work, modified this standard to ask, Would a reasonablevictim view this as a hostile environment? As yet, there is no consensus in the legal community regarding which of these standards is just.We propose that moral theory provides the framework from (...) which business people can construct just procedures regarding sexually hostile environments. We argue that the natural duty of mutual respect of persons and the natural duty not to harm the innocent compels business people to identify sexually hostile work environments from the perspective of the reasonable victim, usually from the woman's perspective. (shrink)

Autism is one of the most compelling, controversial, and heartbreaking cognitive disorders. It presents unique philosophical challenges as well, raising intriguing questions in philosophy of mind, cognitive science, and philosophy of language that need to be explored if the autistic population is to be responsibly served. Starting from the "theory of mind" thesis that a fundamental deficit in autism is the inability to recognize that other persons have minds, Deborah R. Barnbaum considers its implications for the nature of consciousness, (...) our understanding of the consciousness of others, meaning theories in philosophy of language, and the modality of mind. This discussion lays the groundwork for consideration of the value of an autistic life, as well as the moral theories available to persons with autism. The book also explores questions about genetic decision making, research into the nature of autism, and the controversial quest for a cure. This is a timely and wide-ranging book on a disorder that commends itself to serious ethical examination. (shrink)

Via the existential questioning outlook supplied by the Grasshopper’s three visions as relevant to the fate of humankind – oblivion, delusion, and really magnificent games – this article seeks to alleviate some of the ambiguity surrounding Bernard Suits’ provocative claim that Utopian existence is fundamentally concerned with game-playing. Specifically, after proposing an interpretation of Suits’ parable designed to enrich the logical intelligibility of his Utopian thesis, I advance the suggestion that the Grasshopper’s picture of people playing really magnificent games is (...) reasonably interpreted as a clue that the philosopher’s quest to discern games worthy of a Utopian might very well be that which saves humanity from the desolate oblivion-delusion paradox erected as a consequence of the initial two visions. (shrink)

Before sailing past the sirens' “flowery meadow,” Ulysses instructed his sailors to lash him to the mast so that he would not succumb to the siren's singing. His advance directive demonstrated that he valued his dispositional or long-term autonomy over his unquestioned right to make decisions. He also indicated to his oarsmen that he understood the nature of temptation and his inability to resist it. Ideas of autonomy and sexual choice are central to this discussion of new AIDS treatments, especially (...) the trials of preventative vaccines. Questions arise over the rights of individuals and the extent that these should be limited by concerns of the gay community. Should the gay community intervene in the risky decisions of individuals if no explicit advance directive exists? If so, how do they justify their paternalism? Could their aims not be better served through strengthening the individual dispositional autonomy of trial participants rather than making specific claims about the common good? (shrink)

Have social media sites like Facebook become such a significant part of our social fabric that people face negative consequences for not joining and sharing? What role does a right to privacy play in circumstances where self-disclosure is the norm? We surveyed students about teammate preferences for team members based on information availability and Facebook membership. Students report a strong preference for teammates for whom there is information and Facebook participation.

Australia's policy of mandatory indefinite detention of those seeking asylum and arriving without valid documents has led to terrible human rights abuses and cumulative deterioration in health for those incarcerated. We argue that there is an imperative to research and document the plight of those who have suffered at the hands of the Australian government and its agents. However, the normal tools available to those engaged in health research may further erode the rights and well being of this population, requiring (...) a rethink of existing research ethics paradigms to approaches that foster advocacy research and drawing on the voices of those directly affected, including those bestowed with duty of care for this population. (shrink)

Willful blindness is not an appropriate substitute for knowledge in crimes that require a mens rea of knowledge because an actor who contrives his own ignorance is only sometimes as culpable as a knowing actor. This paper begins with the assumption that the classic willfully blind actor—the drug courier—is culpable. If so, any plausible account of willful blindness must provide criteria that find this actor culpable. This paper then offers two limiting cases: a criminal defense lawyer defending a client he (...) suspects of perjury and a pain doctor who suspects his patient may be lying about her pain. The paper argues that each of these actors is justified in cultivating ignorance about his client’s or patient’s truthfulness. If this is right, then a good theory of willful blindness must distinguish these cases. The article argues that neither Husak & Callender’s motivation-based account of willful blindness nor the recklessness account is able to do so. The paper proposes the following alternative: contrived ignorance constitutes culpable blindness when the decision to remain blind or to cultivate blindness is not itself justified. This Justification approach meshes with our intuitions about willfully blind drug couriers as well as willfully blind lawyers and doctors. (shrink)

Clinical research employing the randomized clinical trial has, traditionally, been understood to pose an ethical dilemma. On the one hand, each patient ought to get the treatment that best meets her needs, as judged by the patient in consultation with her doctor. On the other hand, the method most helpful to advancing our understanding about what treatments are indeed best able to meet patient needs is the randomized trial, which necessitates that each patient's care is decided not by physician judgment (...) or patient choice but instead by random assignment. The tension can be described as a conflict between the interests of individual patients who are sick today, and the interests of the group of people who will become sick in the future and would benefit from advances in medical understanding. How one ought to balance these important and often competing interests is an important ethical question that resists easy resolution. (shrink)

Since their introduction about ten years ago the rapid methods for sequencing DNA based either on selective chemical degradation1 or primed enzymatic synthesis2 have been subject to a number of modifications and improvements.3, 4 Two recently published papers describe further advances in these technologies: a method for obtaining information about DNA sequences directly from uncloned mammalian genomic DNA5 and a possible first step towards the automation of DNA sequencing6.

This article presents a conceptual approach to feminist history that focuses on the strategies activists use in different temporal and spatial locations. The argument builds on recent insights within feminist theory and historiography that reveal an intimate relationship between historiography and epistemology in knowledge politics. This article, however, probes the limitations of this relationship by focusing on how current historiographical methods exclude or dilute the actions and events of history through representation and citation. By examining the work of Jamaican theatre (...) collective Sistren, and Bristol agit-prop group Sistershow, the article presents two ways to rethink temporality that makes those histories resistant to representation. This article argues for a more careful historiography that can do justice to the action of different historical temporalities. In the process, it opens emergent spaces and temporal challenges for feminist knowledge politics. (shrink)

In this paper I use the concept of forbidden knowledge to explore questions about putting limits on science. Science has generally been understood to seek and produce objective truth, and this understanding of science has grounded its claim to freedom of inquiry. What happens to decision making about science when this claim to objective, disinterested truth is rejected? There are two changes that must be made to update the idea of forbidden knowledge for modern science. The first is to shift (...) from presuming that decisions to constrain or even forbid knowledge can be made from a position of omniscience (perfect knowledge) to recognizing that such decisions made by human beings are made from a position of limited or partial knowledge. The second is to reject the idea that knowledge is objective and disinterested and accept that knowledge (even scientific knowledge) is interested. In particular, choices about what knowledge gets created are normative, value choices. When these two changes are made to the idea of forbidden knowledge, questions about limiting or forbidding lines of inquiry are shown to distract attention from the more important matters of who makes and how decisions are made about what knowledge is produced. Much more attention should be focused on choosing directions in science, and as this is done, the matter of whether constraints should be placed on science will fall into place. (shrink)

Group selection is increasingly being viewed as an important force in human evolution. This paper examines the views of R.D. Alexander, one of the most influential thinkers about human behavior from an evolutionary perspective, on the subject of group selection. Alexander's general conception of evolution is based on the gene-centered approach of G.C. Williams, but he has also emphasized a potential role for group selection in the evolution of individual genomes and in human evolution. Alexander's views are internally inconsistent and (...) underestimate the importance of group selection. Specific themes that Alexander has developed in his account of human evolution are important but are best understood within the framework of multilevel selection theory. From this perspective, Alexander's views on moral systems are not the radical departure from conventional views that he claims, but remain radical in another way more compatible with conventional views. (shrink)

The concept of innateness is central to Descartes's epistemology; the Meditations display a new, non-Aristotelian method of acquiring knowledge by attending properly to our innate ideas. Yet understanding Descartes's conception of innate ideas is not an easy task, and some commentators have concluded that Descartes held several distinct and unrelated conceptions of innateness. In Descartes on Innate Ideas, Deborah Boyle argues that Descartes's remarks on innate ideas in fact form a unified account. Addressing the further question of how Descartes (...) thinks innate ideas are known, the author shows that, for Descartes, thinkers have implicit knowledge of their innate ideas. Thus she shows that the actual perception of these innate ideas is, for Descartes, a matter of making them explicit, turning the intellect away from sense-perceptions and toward pure thought. The author also provides a new interpretation of the Cartesian "natural light," an important mental faculty in Descartes's epistemology. (shrink)

ABSTRACTThis article explores the influence and reception of the Kierkegaardian self in modern theology, focusing on the philosopher Martin Heidegger and the theologian Eberhard Jüngel. In an attempt to transcend the atheistic philosophy of modernity, Eberhard Jüngel responded to the active, choosing self of modernity, as propounded Heidegger, by proposing an account of existence that is instead passive before God. However, as Heidegger’s philosophy itself is deeply in debt to Kierkegaard’s account of existence, Jüngel’s response to this active, choosing self (...) both echoes and is radically distant from Kierkegaard’s account of selfhood, wishing to have transformative faith in God but to move away from the individual relationship to God to a more communal, relational model. This article explores the debt that these thinkers have to Kierkegaard, and whether, in changing the active repetition of faith for the passivity of relational faith, Jüngel manages to overcome his own debt to Kierkegaard’s account of the self before God. (shrink)

In “History of Sexuality” (Vol I.) Foucault argued that repression is the wrong model of power, understanding it in exclusively negative terms, as external to the body it constrains and inhibits. Power may also be positive, productive, and constitutive of the body and its possibilities. Thus, an adequate account of the relation between cultural forces and the body, Foucault argues, must challenge the “repressive hypothesis” (RH). Contemporary feminist accounts of the body are structured by this same oppositional view of power (...) Foucault assumed: to call on Rosi Braidotti’s distinction, discursive (cultural) forces are either negative or repressive (potestas) or positive and empowering (potentia). In this paper I argue that this opposition forecloses several possibilities for thinking the morphogenetic role of culture. In particular, it assumes wrongly that repressive relations cannot be productive. (shrink)

This study combines quantitative content and qualitative production analysis of two television news programs in Flanders to investigate the impact of a Charter of Diversity on the portrayal of ethnic minorities. Findings of interviews with news production and ethnic minority experts show the ineffectiveness of a Diversity Charter not implemented at the heart of the newsroom. It seems unable to have an impact on journalists' media literacy and social capital, on the discursive structure of the news or characteristics of the (...) production process itself – all more decisive factors in minority reporting. These findings are confirmed by the results of content analysis showing no gradual improvement of ethnic minority portrayal in a newscast produced under a Diversity Charter compared to news produced under no such Charter – both showing little changes in ethnic minority reporting. (shrink)

We thank Karen Canfell, Hamish Spencer and Ben Oldroyd for their commentaries. Below are some comments on the points they raise: 1. Is the Group Selection Debate Merely a Matter of Semantics? 2. Multi-Level Selection Theory versus Genic Selectionism 3. Heritability and Group Selection in Human Beings 4. Adaptationism.

This essay provides a sketch of religion as a set of biologically and culturally evolved adaptations that enable human groups to function as adaptive units. Recent developments in evolutionary biology make such a group-level interpretation of religion more plausible than in the past. A brief survey of relevant concepts is followed by a relatively detailed interpretation of Calvinism as a religious system in which explicit behavioral prescriptions, beliefs about God and his relationship with people, and numerous social control mechanisms combined (...) to change the city of Geneva from a collection of warring factions to a unified population. (shrink)

Those who emphasize complexity must show how it can be studied productively. Laland et al.'s target article partially succeeds but at times gets lost in a sea of possibilities. I discuss the challenge of understanding complexity, especially with respect to multilevel evolution.

Many of the central theses of Hume's philosophy – his rejection of real relations, universals, abstract objects and necessary causal relations – had precedents in the later medieval nominalist tradition. Hume and his medieval predecessors developed complex semantic theories to show both how ontologies are apt to become inflated and how, if we understand carefully the processes by which meaning is generated, we can achieve greater ontological parsimony. Tracing a trajectory from those medieval traditions to Hume reveals Hume to be (...) more radical, particularly in his rejection of abstraction and abstract ideas. Hume's denial of general, abstract ideas is consistent with his philosophical principles but fails to appreciate the more sophisticated nominalist approaches to abstraction, the result of which is a theoretically impoverished account of our capacity for generalization. (shrink)

Feminist literature sometimes posits that competition and cooperation are opposites. This dichotomy is important in that it is often invoked in order to explain why mainstream economics has focused on market activity to the exclusion of non-market activity, and why this fascination or focus is sexist. The purpose of this paper is to demonstrate that the competition/cooperation dichotomy is false. Once the dichotomy is dissolved, those activities which are seen as competitive (masculine) and those which are seen as cooperative (feminine) (...) are no longer mutually exclusive but are, in fact, dependent upon one another. It is shown that the outcome of competition (more and better knowledge) enhances, and in some cases makes possible, cooperation. The function of battle is destruction; of competition, construction. Ludwig von Mises. (shrink)

RÉSUMÉ: L'énigme de Hume au sujet de la connaissance de soi repose sur l'idée qu'il n'y a pour l'esprit que deux modes d'accès épistémique à soi-même: le contact direct ou non inférentiel avec le soi, d'une part, et la connaissance indirecte, à base d'inférence, d'autre part. Hume rejette le premier de ces modes en partant de ceci que nous n'avons dans l'introspection qu'une connaissance des expériences et jamais de la substance mentale, et il rejette le second comme incapable de contrer (...) le scepticisme, sa conclusion étant que ce nous appelons un soi n'est rien d'autre que l'amas des expériences que nous rencontrons. Il y a, cependant, en plus de ces deux modes d'accès, une troisième possibilité, que Hume ne semble jamais prendre en considération, mais qui était caractéristique de l'approche de Thomas d'Aquin à la connaissance de soi, comme de celle de Descartes. Pour ces auteurs, le mode d'accès que l'esprit a à lui même est une connaissance indirecte non inférentielle. Le présent article propose ainsi de repenser la façon dont ces philosophes ont conçu la connaissance qu'un individu a de lui-même. En particulier, l'un des aspects de la doctrine de Thomas d'Aquin qui est souvent négligé concerne le rôle que joue dans la connaissance du soi individuel la prise de conscience de l'implication de la volonté dans la pensée. (shrink)

This article explores the meanings of nature, and examines how understandings of this term inform the field of psychology. In this period of high, late, or post-modernity, many of the "givens" become contested, and perhaps nothing has become more contested than nature itself. There is a threefold purpose to this paper. This first goal is to unravel two types of nature in psychology, to be distinguished as nature and Nature. The second aim is to discuss how these types of nature/Nature (...) have been distinguished epistemologically, ontologically and methodologically within the field. The final purpose is to suggest points of unity within nature and Nature in psychology. 2012 APA, all rights reserved). (shrink)