Babylonian Oracle Questions. By W. G. Lambert. Mesopotamian Civilizations, vol. 13. Winona Lake, Ind.: Eisenbrauns, 2007. Pp. xiv + 216, plates. $49.50.

The Royal Inscriptions of Ashurbanipal, Aššur-etel-ilāni, and Sîn-šarra- iškun. Edited by Jamie Novotny and Joshua Jeffers. The Royal Inscriptions of the Neo-Assyrian Period, vol. 5/1. University Park, PA: Eisenbrauns, 2019. Pp. xxx + 449. $89.95.

In this groundbreaking book, Daniel D. Novotny explores one of the most controversial topics of Suarez's philosophy: "beings of reason." Beings of reason are impossible intentional objects, such as blindness and square-circle.

Ethicists, policy-makers, and the general public have questioned whether artificial entities such as robots warrant rights or other forms of moral consideration. There is little synthesis of the research on this topic so far. We identify 294 relevant research or discussion items in our literature review of this topic. There is widespread agreement among scholars that some artificial entities could warrant moral consideration in the future, if not also the present. The reasoning varies, such as concern for the effects on (...) artificial entities and concern for the effects on human society. Beyond the conventional consequentialist, deontological, and virtue ethicist ethical frameworks, some scholars encourage “information ethics” and “social-relational” approaches, though there are opportunities for more in-depth ethical research on the nuances of moral consideration of artificial entities. There is limited relevant empirical data collection, primarily in a few psychological studies on current moral and social attitudes of humans towards robots and other artificial entities. This suggests an important gap for psychological, sociological, economic, and organizational research on how artificial entities will be integrated into society and the factors that will determine how the interests of artificial entities are considered. (shrink)

Aside from constructing a compelling case for how rereading evolution from a neomaterialist and radical empiricist perspective undermines an enduring binary of sexual difference, Luciana Parisi underscores a tension in the work of Elizabeth Grosz, known both for her novel, feminist, neomaterialist study of Darwinian evolution and her staunch support of sexual difference. Parisi contends, and I suspect Grosz herself is keenly aware, that there is a paradox in holding these views simultaneously. Thus, this paper will not only expand upon (...) Parisi's argument for preaccelerated, unbounded, creative, inhuman, neomaterialist, and radical empirical accounts of matter and sex but also propose a reading of Grosz's work that could potentially wrest her from the perceived paradox. I call this the “theory sex” reading, which can be characterized as a metatheoretical difference materially embodied in the unbridgeable gap between Grosz's two theoretical stances. Theory sex is not an ontology but a concept in line with a Deleuzo–Guattarian understanding of the philosopher's mode of living with chaos. Theory sex produces vibrations and dissonance, which reproduce or chart lines of flight toward theories like Parisi's. These vibrations compose the requiem both honoring and retaining the virtual legacy of sexual difference into the future. (shrink)

Plato's earthly life ended in the year 347 B. C. At the same time, however, began his posthumous life - a life of great influence and fame leaving its mark on aU eras of the history of European learning -lasting until present times. Plato's philosophy has taken root earlier or later in innumerable souls of others, it has matured and given birth to new ideas whose proliferation further dissemi nated the vital force of the original thoughts. It happened sometimes, of (...) course, that by various interpretations different and sometimes altogether contradictory thoughts were deduced from one and the same Platonic doctrine: this possibility is also characteristic of Plato's genius. Even though in the history of Platonism there were times less active and creative, the continuity of its tradition has never been completely interrupted and where there was no growth and progress, at least that what had been once accepted has been kept alive. When enquiring into Plato's influence on the development of learning, we shall above all consider the individual approach of various personalities to Plato's philosophy, personal Platonism, which at its best concerns itself with the literary heritage of Plato and though accessible was not always much sought for. (shrink)

In this work, Jamie Mayerfeld undertakes a careful inquiry into the meaning and moral significance of suffering. Understanding suffering in hedonistic terms as an affliction of feeling, he claims that it is an objective psychological condition, amenable to measurement and interpersonal comparison, although its accurate assessment is never easy. Mayerfeld goes on to examine the content of the duty to prevent suffering and the weight it has relative to other moral considerations. He argues that the prevention of suffering is (...) morally more important than the promotion of happiness, and that the duty to relieve suffering is much stronger than most of us acknowledge. (shrink)

The paper describes the problem for robust moral realism of explaining the supervenience of the moral on the non-moral, and examines five objections to the argument: The moral does not supervene on the descriptive, because we may owe different obligations to duplicates. If the supervenience thesis is repaired to block, it becomes trivial and easy to explain. Supervenience is a moral doctrine and should get an explanation from within normative ethics rather than metaethics. Supervenience is a conceptual truth and should (...) be explained by the nature of our concepts rather than by a metaphysical theory. The moral does not supervene on the descriptive, because moral principles are not metaphysically necessary. It concludes that none of these objections is successful, so Robust Realists do have an explanatory debt to worry about. (shrink)

This paper uses the strengthened liar paradox as a springboard to illuminate two more general topics: i) the negation operator and the speech act of denial among speakers of English and ii) some ways the potential for acceptable language change is constrained by linguistic meaning. The general and special problems interact in reciprocally illuminating ways. The ultimate objective of the paper is, however, less to solve certain problems than to create others, by illustrating how the issues that form the topic (...) of this paper are more intricate than previously realised, and that they are related in delicate and somewhat surprising ways. (shrink)

This article reports the findings from a study of discursive representations of the future role of technology in the work of the US National Intelligence Council. Specifically, it investigates the interplay of ‘techno-optimism’ and propositional certainty in the NIC’s ‘Future Global Trends Reports’. In doing so, it answers the following questions: To what extent was techno-optimism present in the discourse? What level of propositional certainty was expressed in the discourse? How did the discourse deal with the inherent uncertainty of the (...) future? Overall, the discourse was pronouncedly techno-optimist in its stance towards the future role of technology: high-technological solutions were portrayed as solving a host of problems, despite the readily available presence of low-technology or no-technology solutions. In all, 75.1% of the representations were presented as future categorical certainties, meaning the future was predominantly presented as a known and closed inevitability. The discourse dealt with the inherent uncertainty of the subject matter, that is, the future, by projecting the past and present into the future. This was particularly the case in relation to the idea of technological military dominance as a guarantee of global peace, and the role of technology as an inevitable force free from societal censorship. (shrink)

Volume 23, Issue 2, April 2024, Page 237-242.

The past thirty years have seen a surge of empirical research into political decision making and the influence of framing effects — the phenomenon that occurs when different but equivalent presentations of a decision problem elicit different judgments or preferences. During the same period, political philosophers have become increasingly interested in democratic theory, particularly in deliberative theories of democracy. Unfortunately, the empirical and philosophical studies of democracy have largely proceeded in isolation from each other. As a result, philosophical treatments of (...) democracy have overlooked recent developments in psychology, while the empirical study of framing effects has ignored much contemporary work in political philosophy. In Framing Democracy, Jamie Terence Kelly bridges this divide by explaining the relevance of framing effects for normative theories of democracy. -/- Employing a behavioral approach, Kelly argues for rejecting the rational actor model of decision making and replacing it with an understanding of choice imported from psychology and social science. After surveying the wide array of theories that go under the name of democratic theory, he argues that a behavioral approach enables a focus on three important concerns: moral reasons for endorsing democracy, feasibility considerations governing particular theories, and implications for institutional design. Finally, Kelly assesses a number of methods for addressing framing effects, including proposals to increase the amount of political speech, mechanisms designed to insulate democratic outcomes from flawed decision making, and programs of public education. -/- The first book to develop a behavioral theory of democracy, Framing Democracy has important insights for democratic theory, the social scientific understanding of political decision making, economics, and legal theory. (shrink)

It was Hume's concept of knowledge that marked Masaryk's philosophy more than influential Kant. Masaryk devoted Hume his inaugural lecture The Probability Calculus and Hume's Scepticism at Prague University in 1882. He tried to face his scepticism concerning causation and induction by a formula P = n: or P = : where P means the increasing probability that an event that had happened n times in the past will happen again. Hume stresses that there is an essential difference between probability (...) and certainty, and we have no logical reason to presuppose that the past experience is legitimate for expectation that the future will resemble to the past. Only our belief, not knowledge, leads us to that. Although Masaryk did not accept Hume's scepticism, he had deep understanding for his way of thinking. Reflection of Hume's influence on Masaryk in Czech philosophy is unsatisfactory, which is stated in this article. (shrink)

We all know what water is, and we often take it for granted. But the spectre of a worldwide water crisis suggests that there might be something fundamentally wrong with the way we think about water. Jamie Linton dives into the history of water as an abstract concept, stripped of its environmental, social, and cultural contexts. Reduced to a scientific abstraction – to mere H20 – this concept has given modern society licence to dam, divert, and manipulate water with (...) apparent impunity. Part of the solution to the water crisis involves reinvesting water with social content, thus altering the way we see water. An original take on a deceptively complex issue, What Is Water? offers a fresh approach to a fundamental problem. (shrink)

ABSTRACT The emerging consensus in the secondary literature on Duhem is that his notion of ‘good sense’ is a virtue of individual scientists that guides them choosie between empirically equal rival theories : 149–159; Ivanova 2010. “Pierre Duhem’s Good Sense as a Guide to Theory Choice.” Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part A 41 : 58–64; Fairweather 2011. “The Epistemic Value of Good Sense.” Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part A 43 : 139–146; Bhakthavatsalam. “Duhemian Good (...) Sense and Agent Reliabilism.” Studies in History and Philosophy of Science Part A 64: 22–29). In this paper, I argue that good sense is irrelevant for theory choice within Duhem’s conception of scientific methodology. Theory choice, for Duhem, is either a pseudo-problem or addressed purely by empirical and formal desiderata depending on how it is understood. I go on to provide a positive interpretation of good sense as a feature of scientific communities that undergo particular forms of education that allow scientists to abandon theory pursuit. I conclude by suggesting that this interpretation entails that virtue epistemological readings of Duhem are insufficient for understanding good sense; we must employ a social epistemological perspective. (shrink)

This study builds upon the top management literature to predict and test antecedents to firms’ engagement in corruption. Building on a survey of 341 executives in India, we find that if executives have social ties with government officials, their firms are more likely to engage in corruption. Further, these executives are likely to rationalize engaging in corruption as a necessity for being competitive. The results collectively illustrate the role that executives’ social ties and perceptions have in shaping illegal actions of (...) their respective firms. (shrink)

To anyone vaguely aware of Feyerabend, the title of this paper would appear as an oxymoron. For Feyerabend, it is often thought, science is an anarchic practice with no discernible structure. Against this trend, I elaborate the groundwork that Feyerabend has provided for the beginnings of an approach to organizing scientific research. Specifically, I argue that Feyerabend’s pluralism, once suitably modified, provides a plausible account of how to organize science. These modifications come from C.S. Peirce’s account of the economics of (...) theory pursuit, which has since been corroborated by empirical findings in the social sciences. I go on to contrast this approach with the conception of a ‘well-ordered science’ as outlined by Kitcher (Science, truth, and democracy, Oxford University Press, New York, 2001), Cartwright (Philos Sci 73(5):981–990, 2006), which rests on the assumption that we can predict the content of future research. I show how Feyerabend has already given us reasons to think that this model is much more limited than it is usually understood. I conclude by showing how models of resource allocation, specifically those of Kitcher (J Philos 87:5–22, 1990), Strevens (J Philos 100(2):55–79, 2003) and Weisberg and Muldoon (Philos Sci 76(2):225–252, 2009), unwittingly make use of this problematic assumption. I conclude by outlining a proposed model of resource allocation where funding is determined by lottery and briefly examining the extent to which it is compatible with the position defended in this paper. (shrink)

This volume re-examines some of the major themes at the intersection of traditional and contemporary metaphysics. The book uses as a point of departure Francisco Suárez’s _Metaphysical Disputations_ published in 1597. Minimalist metaphysics in empiricist/pragmatist clothing have today become mainstream in analytic philosophy. Independently of this development, the progress of scholarship in ancient and medieval philosophy makes clear that traditional forms of metaphysics have affinities with some of the streams in contemporary analytic metaphysics. The book brings together leading contemporary metaphysicians (...) to investigate the viability of a neo-Aristotelian metaphysics. (shrink)

El artículo se refiere a una de las tesis de R. Barbaras, a saber, que « […] todo sentimiento es sentimiento de la naturaleza”. Este sentimiento es, en definitiva, el amor del mundo y corresponde a la apertura enigmática de la subjetividad por el mundo. Esta apertura hace posible el paso del proceso anónimo de la manifestación del mundo a su aparición para los sujetos, centralizada alrededor de sus movimientos desecantes. Si esta motricidad del deseo es desencadenada por el sentimiento, (...) el origen de este último es el acontecimiento de la separación del mundo que, sin embargo, se encuentra en la más estrecha adhesión a él. El sentimiento equivale, así, a un desgarramiento del aparecer de las realidades intramundanas, lo que recuerda la descripción de la trascendencia del Otro en E. Levinas. Si nada del mundo se manifiesta en el rostro del Otro según Levinas, porque toda su fenomenalidad se desvanece, éste no es el caso para Barbaras, para quien el sentimiento es una manera de participar en la manifestación primaria del Mundo, es decir, en la physis. De ahí nuestra propuesta de vincular el sentimiento al rostro de la naturaleza. (shrink)

Allocating access to unapproved COVID-19 drugs available via Pre-Approval Access pathways or Emergency Use Authorization raises unique challenges at the intersection of clinical care and research....

In this review study, I reflect on Richard Horton’s book and his thesis that Western countries failed in their response to the current epidemic in the first half of 2020, with a few exceptions. In the five sections of the paper, after an initial modification of Horton’s thesis (A), I discuss briefly: the suppression approach in China (B), the mitigation approach in the West (C), the SARS epidemic as the key global public health event (D), the causes of Western failure (...) (epistemic, political, ethical, cultural, etc.) (E), and final envoi (F). (shrink)

Until recently Francisco Suárez (1548–1617) has been regarded as the “last medieval philosopher,” representing the end of the philosophically respectful scholastic tradition going back to the Early Middle Ages. In fact, however, Suárez stood at the beginning, rather than at the end, of a distinguished scholastic culture, which should best be labeled “Baroque scholasticism,” and which flourished throughout the seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries. In this paper I offer some ideas on why the study of this philosophical culture has been (...) so far neglected by the mainstream Anglo-American philosophical historiography and argue that more attention should be paid to it. (shrink)

The impact of machine learning in healthcare on patient informed consent is now the subject of significant inquiry in bioethics. However, the topic has predominantly been considered in the context of black box diagnostic or treatment recommendation algorithms. The impact of machine learning involved in healthcare resource allocation on patient consent remains undertheorized. This paper will establish where patient consent is relevant in healthcare resource allocation, before exploring the impact on informed consent from the introduction of black box machine learning (...) into resource allocation. It will then consider the arguments for informing patients about the use of machine learning in resource allocation, before exploring the challenge of whether individual patients could principally contest algorithmic prioritization decisions involving black box machine learning. Finally, this paper will examine how different forms of opacity in machine learning involved in resource allocation could be a barrier to patient consent to clinical decision-making in different healthcare contexts. (shrink)