In Worrying about China, Gloria Davies pursues this inquiry through a wide range of contemporary topics, including the changing fortunes of radicalism, the ...

In this innovative book, Gloria Frost reconstructs and analyses Aquinas's theories on efficient causation and causal powers, focusing specifically on natural causal powers and efficient causation in nature. Frost presents each element of Aquinas's theories one by one, comparing them with other theories, as well as examining the philosophical and interpretive ambiguities in Aquinas's thought and proposing fresh solutions to conceptual difficulties. Her discussion includes explanations of Aquinas's technical scholastic terminology in jargon-free prose, as well as background on medieval (...) scientific views - including ordinary language explanations of the medieval physical theories which Aquinas assumed in formulating his views on causation and causal powers. The resulting volume is a rich exploration of a central philosophical topic in medieval philosophy and beyond, and will be valuable especially for scholars and advanced students working on Aquinas and on medieval natural philosophy. (shrink)

AI systems play an increasingly important role in shaping and regulating the lives of millions of human beings across the world. Calls for greater _transparency_ from such systems have been widespread. However, there is considerable ambiguity concerning what “transparency” actually means, and therefore, what greater transparency might entail. While, according to some debates, transparency requires _seeing through_ the artefact or device, widespread calls for transparency imply _seeing into_ different aspects of AI systems. These two notions are in apparent tension with (...) each other, and they are present in two lively but largely disconnected debates. In this paper, we aim to further analyse what these calls for transparency entail, and in so doing, clarify the sorts of transparency that we should want from AI systems. We do so by offering a taxonomy that classifies different notions of transparency. After a careful exploration of the different varieties of transparency, we show how this taxonomy can help us to navigate various domains of human–technology interactions, and more usefully discuss the relationship between technological transparency and human agency. We conclude by arguing that all of these different notions of transparency should be taken into account when designing more ethically adequate AI systems. (shrink)

According to the Extended knowledge dilemma, first formulated by Clark (Synthese 192:3757–3775, 2015) and subsequently reformulated by Carter et al. (in: Carter, Clark, Kallestrup, Palermos, Pritchard (eds) Extended epistemology, Oxford Univer- sity Press, Oxford, pp 331–351, 2018a), an agent’s interaction with a device can either give rise to knowledge or extended cognition, but not both at the same time. The dilemma rests on two substantive commitments: first, that knowledge by a subject requires that the subject be aware to some extent (...) of some features of that knowledge’s sources and, second, that cognitive processes can only be extended if the subject is mostly unaware of the external object. The overwhelming response to the dilemma by proponents of extended knowledge has been to reconcile the demands of knowl- edge with the requirement that genuine extended cognition must lack any conscious encountering of the external artifact that features in the putative extended cognitive process. My approach, thus far unexplored, will be the opposite: I show how extended cognition can be made compatible with a wide range of agential attitudes, including an active form of epistemic hygiene. Consequently, I open the door for a new way of vindicating the possibility of extended knowledge, and call into question some assumptions that lie at the core of extended cognition theory. (shrink)

In this paper I argue that the epistemology of trust and testimony should take into account the pragmatics of communication in order to gain insight about the responsibilities speakers and hearers share in the epistemic access they gain through communication. Communication is a rich process of information exchange in which epistemic standards are negotiated by interlocutors. I discuss examples which show the contextual adjustment of these standards as the conversation goes on. Our sensitivity to the contextual dimension of epistemic standards (...) make us more responsible communicators. (shrink)

Aunque construir el mundo humano implica violencia, hemos de reducir la depredación de la naturaleza y los riesgos de la industrialización y consumo masivos que amenazan con destruir totalmente nuestro soporte biótico. La necesidad de reconciliarnos con Gaia es imperativa, y para ello debemos const..

A compelling exploration of how reputation affects every aspect of contemporary life Reputation touches almost everything, guiding our behavior and choices in countless ways. But it is also shrouded in mystery. Why is it so powerful when the criteria by which people and things are defined as good or bad often appear to be arbitrary? Why do we care so much about how others see us that we may even do irrational and harmful things to try to influence their opinion? (...) In this engaging book, Gloria Origgi draws on philosophy, social psychology, sociology, economics, literature, and history to offer an illuminating account of an important yet oddly neglected subject. Origgi examines the influence of the Internet and social media, as well as the countless ranking systems that characterize modern society and contribute to the creation of formal and informal reputations in our social relations, in business, in politics, in academia, and even in wine. She highlights the importance of reputation to the effective functioning of the economy and e-commerce. Origgi also discusses the existential significance of our obsession with reputation, concluding that an awareness of the relationship between our reputation and our actions empowers us to better understand who we are and why we do what we do. Compellingly written and filled with surprising insights, Reputation pins down an elusive subject that affects everyone. (shrink)

Extended cognition brings with it a particular phenomenology. It has been argued that when an artifact is integrated into an agent’s cognitive system, it becomes transparent in use to the cognizing subject. In this paper, I challenge some of the assumptions underlying how the transparency of artifacts is described in extended cognition theory. To this end, I offer two arguments. First, I make room for some forms of conscious thought and attention within extended cognitive routines, and I question the close (...) association drawn between attention and effort. Second, I vindicate the importance of paying careful attention to individual differences and the diverse ways in which bodies and technologies can be experienced. I end by offering some hints toward an alternative, and more accurate, account of the phenomenology of extended cognition. (shrink)

This book defines the relationship between the thought of Adam Smith and that of the ancients---Plato, Aristotle, Cicero, and the Stoics. Vivenza offers a complete survey of all Smith's writings with the aim of illustrating how classical arguments shaped opinions and scholarship in the eighteenth century.

Language is both a biological and a cultural phenomenon. Our aim here is to discuss, in an evolutionary perspective, the articulation of these two aspects of language. For this, we draw on the general conceptual framework developed by Ruth Millikan (1984) while at the same time dissociating ourselves from her view of language.

A partir de la consideración de las cartas como un escrito de carácter privado dirigido por una persona a otra, en el presente trabajo, se realiza un relevamiento de diversos aportes teóricos que han contribuido a una renovadora caracterización del género epistolar, sin pretender agotarlos. Algunas de los aspectos revisados se ejemplifican con misivas del filósofo argentino Francisco Romero. Considering letters as private texts written by one person and addressed to another, this research studies the theoretical approaches which have contributed (...) to a renewed characterization of the genre, which does not attempt to be exhaustive. These characteristics are exemplified through reference to letters by Argentine philosopher Francisco Romero. (shrink)

Culture influences how people cope with interpersonal tensions, with those from more collectivistic contexts ) generally opting for strategies promoting social harmony w...

I present a definition of expertise that involves both epistemic and political authority. I argue that these two forms of authority require different treatments and defend a political epistemology that articulates a division of cognitive labor between political and epistemic authority.

El escrito pretende poner en diálogo la posición sobre qué sea el mal sostenida por san Agustín y lo que actualmente Hannah Arendt ha dado en llamar “la banalidad del mal” como un nuevo fenómeno de conducta normal del ser humano del siglo XX. Se busca marcar la relación que cabe entre el mal como aquello que no es una esencia y la idea de banalidad como algo que no tiene raíz, sino que es superficial. A partir de este diálogo, (...) nos adentraremos en los aspectos dilemáticos que tiene inclusive hoy, qué cosa sea el mal y cuál es su origen. (shrink)

BackgroundThe idea that individuals are responsible for their health has been the focus of debate in the theoretical literature and in its concrete application to healthcare policy in many countries. Controversies persist regarding the form, substance and fairness of allocating health responsibility to the individual, particularly in universal, need-based healthcare systems.ObjectiveTo examine how personal health responsibility has been framed and rationalised in Norwegian key policy documents on priority setting.MethodsDocuments issued or published by the Ministry of Health and Care Services between (...) 1987 and 2018 were thematically analysed. We developed a predefined conceptual framework that guided the analysis. The framework included: the subject and object of responsibility, the level of conceptual abstraction, temporality, normative justificatory arguments and objections to the application of personal health responsibility.ResultsAs an additional criterion, personal health responsibility has been interpreted as relevant if: the patient’s harmful behaviour is repeated after receiving treatment, and if the success of the treatment is conditional on the patient’s behavioural change. When discussed as a retrospective criterion, considerations of reciprocal fairness have been dominant. When discussed as a prospective criterion, the expected benefit of treatment justified its relevance.ConclusionPersonal health responsibility appears to challenge core values of equality, inclusion and solidarity in the Norwegian context and has been repeatedly rejected as a necessary criterion for priority setting. However, the responsibility criterion seems to have some relevance in particular priority setting decisions. (shrink)

Although there is widespread agreement that our epistemic dependence on other people's knowledge is a key ingredient of our cognitive life, the role of trust in this dependence is much more open to debate. Is trust in epistemic authority—or “epistemic trust” for short—an epistemological notion in any sense, or is it simply a bridge-concept that connects our epistemological concerns to moral issues? Should we depict it in terms of the more familiar sociological notion of trust as a basis for cooperation?

My aim in this paper is to critically evaluate John Campbell's (2002) characterization of the sense of demonstrative terms and his account of why an object's location matters in our understanding of perceptually-based demonstrative terms. Campbell thinks that the senses of a demonstrative term are the different ways of consciously attending to an object. I will evaluate Campbell's account of sense by exploring and comparing two scenarios in which the actual location of a seen object is different from its perceived (...) location. I do this in order to motivate the following point: Campbell's characterization of the sense of a demonstrative term turns sense into a psychologistic notion. As a consequence of this, it is difficult to see how sense could underwrite reference. In short, I shall be arguing that Campbell's account of the ways of perceiving an object is simply inadequate as an account of the Fregean notion of sense, according to which the senses of a demonstrative term are the different ways of thinking about an object. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Do People Defy Generalizations?Examining the Case Against Evidence-Based Medicine in PsychiatryGloria Ayob (bio)KeywordsPhilosophy, psychiatry, action, contentEvidence-based medicine (EBM) in psychiatry presupposes that it is possible to track the causal efficacy of treatments for psychopathological conditions using scientific methods. One central aim of EBM is to ascertain the causally efficacious component of the treatment of a given condition. This is done by collecting data from randomized control trials, where this (...) data are of groups rather than of individuals (Bolton, 2008).EBM is felt by many to have significant limitations when applied in the field of psychiatric medicine, and these limitations are thought to arise owing to a particular fact about psychiatry, namely that the subject of psychiatry is the human person. For brevity, I will refer to this broad claim as the Unsuitability Intuition (UI), which can be stated as follows:The UI is the intuition that EBM is somehow unsuitable for dealing with people.The aims of this paper are twofold. First, I try to pinpoint the source(s) of anxiety about EBM, and therein to clarify the exact sense(s) in which EBM might be said to be unsuitable or problematic. Second, I evaluate the validity of these concerns, focusing on two broad interrelated questions: (1) Is it actually something about human persons that creates trouble for EBM in psychiatry, and if so, what is the nature of this trouble?; and (2) What assumptions about EBM are made such that EBM is problematic in light of the fact that the subject of psychiatry is the human person?As an empirical point, EBM in psychiatry is applied to two methods of treatment: psychotropic drugs, and more recently, cognitive–behavioral therapies. Each of these throws up slightly different issues in light of the two questions just identified. To accommodate relevant differences, I structure this paper as follows. Bearing in mind that the overall aim of the paper is to scrutinize the intuition that EBM is somehow unsuitable for dealing with people, I begin by exploring one common suggestion as to what underpins this intuition: The problem we are confronted with, in applying EBM to people, is the problem of applying generalizations to particular instances (Wifstad 2008). To anticipate, I argue that this worry concerns a problem that, in fact, applies to the scientific method in general. That is, it is not a [End Page 167] problem arising specifically from the fact that the subject of psychiatry is the human person. So if this is the worry about EBM, then as it stands, it does not satisfactorily explain the intuition that EBM is somehow unsuitable for dealing with people.Against this, the UI theorist might defend his intuition by attempting to specify the reasons why persons, unlike physical material, present a special challenge to the scientific method presupposed by EBM. One way of doing this is to point out that the determinants of human behavior cannot be captured by generalizations (and in particular, by causal generalizations). There are two ways of worrying about EBM here: On the first, the problem of EBM in psychiatry is a pragmatic worry that arises in view of the complexity of the determinants of human behavior and the limited capacity for observation. If this is the worry, though, it can be overcome to a greater or lesser extent within psychiatric practice. The second worry consists in the thought that humans pose a constitutive problem for EBM in psychiatry. However, I argue that this worry turns out to rest on assumptions about human behavior that are not unproblematic in themselves. Thus, UI is underpinned either by a pragmatic worry that can be overcome to some extent, or else it is underpinned by certain assumptions that are problematic, if not altogether wrong. This means that UI cannot be founded on a constitutive point about persons—at least, it does not seem to be, if it arises from a concern about applying generalizations to individual human beings.But there is a very different type of worry that might underpin UI, one that does not issue from considerations about the relation between the general and the particular. UI theorists could be worried about specific... (shrink)

pt. 1. El pensamiento etico del Dr. Carlos Octavio Bunge.

The aim of this commentary is to complement Haslanger’s view of cognition as a skill shaped by culture. I start by presenting an empirically oriented account of the process of enculturation based on the cognitive integration framework. I then illustrate the active role of material (and not just symbolic) culture in cognition by drawing on extended cognition theory. Finally, I argue that embedding Haslanger’s work within these two theories of cognition better serves the objectives of her project and, at the (...) same time, promotes a critical philosophy of cognitive science. (shrink)

In this chapter, I propose a new framework for extended epistemology, based on a second-wave approach to extended cognition. The framework is inclusive, in that it takes into account the complex interplay between the diverse embodiments of extended knowers and the salient properties of technological artifacts, as well as the environment in which they are embedded. Thus it both emphasizes and exploits the complementary roles played by these different elements. Finally, I motivate and explain this framework by applying it to (...) a case of interaction with contemporary technologies. (shrink)

Lifestyle-induced diseases are becoming a burden on healthcare, actualizing the discussion on health responsibilities. Using data from the National Association for Heart and Lung Diseases ’s 2015 Health Survey, this study examined the public’s attitudes towards personal and social health responsibility in a Norwegian population. The questionnaires covered self-reported health and lifestyle, attitudes towards personal responsibility and the authorities’ responsibility for promoting health, resource-prioritisation and socio-demographic characteristics. Block-wise multiple linear regression assessed the association between attitudes towards health responsibilities and individual (...) lifestyle, political orientation and health condition. We found a moderate support for social responsibility across political views. Respondents reporting unhealthier eating habits, smokers and physically inactive were less supportive of health promotion policies. The idea that individuals are responsible for taking care of their health was widely accepted as an abstract ideal. Yet, only a third of the respondents agreed with introducing higher co-payments for treatment of ‘self-inflicted’ conditions and levels of support were patterned by health-related behaviour and left-right political orientation. Our study suggests that a significant support for social responsibility does not exclude a strong support for personal health responsibility. However, conditional access to healthcare based on personal lifestyle is still controversial. (shrink)

Miranda Fricker has introduced the insightful notion of epistemic injustice in the philosophical debate, thus bridging concerns of social epistemology with questions that arise in the area of social and cultural studies. I concentrate my analysis of her treatment of testimonial injustice. According to Fricker, the central cases of testimonial injustice are cases of identity injustice in which hearers rely on stereotypes to assess the credibility of their interlocutors. I try here to broaden the analysis of that testimonial injustice by (...) indicating other mechanisms that bias our credibility assessments. In my perspective, the use of identity stereotypes is just one case among many biases in our credibility judgments. (shrink)