The traditional square of opposition is generalized and extended to a cube of opposition covering and conveniently visualizing inter-sentential oppositions in relational syllogistic logic with the usual syllogistic logic sentences obtained as special cases. The cube comes about by considering Frege–Russell’s quantifier predicate logic with one relation comprising categorical syllogistic sentence forms. The relationships to Buridan’s octagon, to Aristotelian modal logic, and to Klein’s 4-group are discussed.GraphicThe photo shows a prototype sculpture for the cube.

The Metaphysics of Free Will provides a through statement of the major grounds for skepticism about the reality of free will and moral responsibility. The author identifies and explains the sort of control that is associated with personhood and accountability, and shows how it is consistent with causal determinism. In so doing, out view of ourselves as morally responsible agents is protected against the disturbing changes posed by science and religion.

(1994). Why immortality is not so bad. International Journal of Philosophical Studies: Vol. 2, No. 2, pp. 257-270.

In this paper, we aim to clarify and evaluate the contention that immortality would be necessarily boring . It will emerge that, just as there are various importantly different kinds of immortality, there are various distinct kinds of boredom. To evaluate the Necessary Boredom Thesis, we need to specify the kind of immortality and the kind of boredom. We argue against the thesis, on various specifications of “immortality” and “boredom.”.

This collection highlights the new trend away from rationalism and toward empiricism in the epistemology of modality. Accordingly, the book represents a wide range of positions on the empirical sources of modal knowledge. Readers will find an introduction that surveys the field and provides a brief overview of the work, which progresses from empirically-sensitive rationalist accounts to fully empiricist accounts of modal knowledge. Early chapters focus on challenges to rationalist theories, essence-based approaches to modal knowledge, and the prospects for naturalizing (...) modal epistemology. The middle chapters present positive accounts that reject rationalism, but which stop short of advocating exclusive appeal to empirical sources of modal knowledge. The final chapters mark a transition toward exclusive reliance on empirical sources of modal knowledge. They explore ways of making similarity-based, analogical, inductive, and abductive arguments for modal claims based on empirical information. Modal epistemology is coming into its own as a field, and this book has the potential to anchor a new research agenda. (shrink)

Common arguments for realism about phenomenal consciousness contend that this is a folk concept, with proponents expecting it to be lexicalised in ordinary language. In English, the word ‘experience’ is typically regarded as the best candidate. This predicts that ‘experience’ will be used to refer to mental states and episodes, not only in philosophical but also in ordinary discourse. We conduct a corpus study in order to assess this claim and to understand the actual use of the word in non-academic, (...) academic, and philosophical discourse. In non-academic discourse, uses that refer to knowledge or sources of knowledge, and to public events, are found to dominate. Uses that refer to mental states or episodes dominate only in the philosophy of mind (and not even in philosophy at large). (shrink)

There are many ways that accountants and managers can influence the reported accounting results of their organizational units. When such influence is directed at changing the amount of reported earnings, it is known as earnings management. The purpose of this paper is to present the results of surveys of undergraduate students, MBA students, and practicing accountants concerning their attitudes on the ethical acceptability of earnings management. Analysis of the survey results reveals how the attitudes of the three groups differ and (...) what variables are associated with these differences. Based on the analysis, the authors suggest changes in accounting education curriculum and ethics awareness programs in business which might increase students'' and practitioners'' sensitivity to the ethical ramifications of earnings management. (shrink)

A definition of the concept of "Intuitionist Modal Analogue" is presented and motivated through the existence of a theorem preserving translation from MIPC to a bimodal S₄-S₅ calculus.

I present two different models of moral responsibility -- two different accounts of what we value in behavior for which the agent can legitimately be held morally responsible. On the first model, what we value is making a certain sort of difference to the world. On the second model, which I favor, we value a certain kind of self-expression. I argue that if one adopts the self-expression view, then one will be inclined to accept that moral responsibility need not require (...) alternative possibilities. (shrink)

Some have argued (following Epicurus) that death cannot be a bad thing for an individual who dies. They contend that nothing can be a bad for an individual unless the individual is able to experience it as bad. I argue against this Epicurean view, offering examples of things that an individual cannot experience as bad but are nevertheless bad for the individual. Further, I argue that death is relevantly similar.

The paper builds on a methodological idea from experimental philosophy and on findings from psycholinguistics, to develop and defend ordinary language analysis (OLA) as practiced in J.L. Austin’s Sense and Sensibilia. That attack on sense-datum theories of perception focuses on the argument from illusion. Through a case-study on this paradoxical argument, the present paper argues for a form of OLA which is psychologically informed, seeks to expose epistemic, rather than semantic, defects in paradoxical arguments, and is immune to the main (...) objections to ordinary language philosophising, including those arising from the semantic/pragmatics distinction: A key project in current experimental philosophy is to develop psychological explanations of philosophically relevant intuitions that help us determine what warrant thinkers have for accepting them. Psycholinguistic work on the role of stereotypes in verb-comprehension has shown that intuitive judgments can be generated by automatic cognitive processes that duplicate both semantic and pragmatic inferences and are shaped by dominant uses of words. For systematic reasons, philosophers are prone to unwittingly deviate from such dominant uses. Where this happens, they are liable to automatically infer unwarranted conclusions that strike them as intuitively compelling. OLA helps us to determine those dominant uses, to identify unwitting deviations from them, and thus to expose unwarranted intuitions – e.g., in the premises of paradoxical arguments. Ordinary language does not determine the bounds of sense but shapes our leaps of thought. The paper shows how this enables its ‘Austinian’ analysis to contribute to a novel, epistemic, resolution of philosophical paradoxes and problems. (shrink)

Ed Gein was a serial killer, grave robber, and body snatcher who made a lampshade from human skin. Now consider the detective who found that lampshade. Let's suppose that he would never want to own it; however, he does find that he wants a synthetic one just like it – a perfect replica. We assume that there is something morally problematic about the detective having such a replica. We then argue that, given as much, we can reach the surprising conclusion (...) that it's morally problematic to consume realistic fake-meat products. After explaining why we might the detective's replica lampshade morally problematic, we clarify the analogy between the replica and fake meat products. Then, we defend it against a number of objections, the most notable one being we can sever any association between fake meat and the real stuff without moral cost. We conclude by pointing out that our argument generalises: if it works, then there is something morally problematic about many fake animal products, including fake leather and fur. (shrink)

In this reply, I discuss some important issues raised in two commentaries. One relates to the distinction between hate and revenge, which also touches upon the more general problem of the usefulness of distinguishing between various related emotions. I argue that emotion researchers need to define specific emotions carefully in order to be able to examine such emotions without necessarily using emotion words. A second comment focusses on the factors influencing the development of hate over time. The question is whether (...) there is an intrapersonal mechanism leading to an increase or decrease of hate over time. I think it is the social environment that is essential in the maintenance of hate. (shrink)

In this paper I argue that the distinction between moral responsibility and autonomy can illuminate various debates about the Zygote Argument. Having made this distinction, one can see how these manipulation arguments are unsuccessful. Building on previous work, I also argue that this distinction can provide a framework for understanding other important work in agency theory, including that of Harry Frankfurt and Gary Watson.

Suppose that disgust can provide evidence of moral wrongdoing. What account of disgust might make sense of this? A recent and promising theory is the social contagion view, proposed by Alexandra Plakias. After criticizing both its descriptive and normative claims, I draw two conclusions. First, we should question the wisdom of drawing so straight a line from biological poisons and pathogens to social counterparts. Second, we don’t need to explain the evidential value of disgust by appealing to what the response (...) tracks. These lessons point toward an alternative: namely, that disgust is a moral heuristic. On the heuristic view, disgust is a trigger for the subconscious use of a particular rule: I show how this view fits with a plausible hypothesis about the social function of disgust, and then apply it to Leon Kass’s famous use of repugnance to criticize cloning. (shrink)

Previous research on sustainable entrepreneurship has mainly aimed to understand the antecedents of entrepreneurs’ sustainability-oriented behavior. Yet the literature lacks a more nuanced understanding of how entrepreneurs implement sustainability strategies when creating a new venture. Drawing on sustainability concepts, we first examine how entrepreneurs balance the economic, environmental, and social dimensions as part of their ventures’ strategic ambitions. We show that sustainable entrepreneurs prioritize the three sustainability dimensions and possibly reprioritize them in response to stakeholder interests. Applying a stakeholder theory (...) perspective, we theorize that how entrepreneurs balance their sustainability dimensions and goals depends on the degree of stakeholder involvement and of external expectations. Our contributions refine the growing sustainable entrepreneurship literature and call attention to the importance of including weightings and time when examining the dimensions of sustainability. (shrink)

In this paper I develop a sketch of an overall theology that dispenses with “alternative-possibilities” freedom in favor of “actual-sequence” freedom. I hold that acting freely does not require freedom to do otherwise, and that acting freely is the freedom component of moral responsibility. Employing this analytical apparatus, I show how we can offer various important elements of a theology that employs only the notion of acting freely. I distinguish my approach from the important development of Open Theism by William (...) Hasker. My view about God’s foreknowledge is in-between comprehensive foreknowledge and no foreknowledge. (shrink)

Besides their skepticism about universal reason and universal morality, the Frankfurt Schools of Critical Systems Theory and Critical Theory share basic assumptions: (1) the thinking in societal-systemic, institutional concepts, which transcend simple reciprocal relations by dint of their complexity; (2) the assumption that society is based on fundamental paradoxes, antagonisms, antinomies; (3) the strategy to conceptualize justice as a contingent and transcendental formula; (4) the form of immanent (and not morality-based, external) critique as an attitude of transcendence; (5) the aim (...) of societal (and not only political) emancipation in an ‘association of free individuals’ (Marx). The article focuses on those parallels and aims to conceptualize a critical turn-around of autopoietic systems theory. (shrink)

Accounts of modal knowledge are many and varied. How should we choose between them? I propose that we employ inference to the best explanation, and I suggest that there are three desiderata that we should use to rank hypotheses: conservatism, simplicity, and the ability to handle disagreement. After examining these desiderata, I contend that they can’t be used to justify belief in the modal epistemology that fares best, but that they can justify our accepting it in an epistemically significant sense. (...) Finally, I outline a modal epistemology that seems to do well by the standards I’ve recommended. (shrink)

Conceptual metaphors facilitate both productive and pernicious analogical reasoning. This article addresses the question: When and why does the frequently helpful use of metaphor become pernicious? By applying the most influential theoretical framework from cognitive psychology in analysing the philosophically most prominent example of pernicious metaphorical reasoning, we identify a philosophically relevant but previously undescribed fallacy in analogical reasoning with metaphors. We then outline an explanation of why even competent thinkers commit this fallacy and obtain a psychologically informed ‘debunking’ explanation (...) of the kind experimental philosophy’s ‘sources project’ seeks. (shrink)

I have argued that a proponent of the Frankfurt Cases as showing that the Principle of Alternative Possibilities is false can successfully reply to the Dilemma Defense. In their 2013 paper, Widerker and Goetz offer a critique of my view, especially as regards the deterministic horn of the dilemma. Here I clarify my strategy of response to the Dilemma Defense and reply to the critique developed by Widerker and Goetz.

aída hernández castillo has given US a profound meditation on feminist dialogical activist inquiry as a pathway to knowledge. What strikes me most powerfully is Hernández Castillo's voice. The path she describes is one on which the methodological, the moral, and the existential merge into spiritual transformation.In this response, I will point out three characteristics of Hernández Castillo's path that leapt out at me: The experiences lead, the self is wrenched, and the self is quieted. Now, this is an odd (...) list. Pragmatists speak of experience as doing and undergoing, and these are all characteristics of undergoing. Scholars think of knowledge as the result of doing, of something constructed. Descartes... (shrink)

Sympathy for animals is regarded by many thinkers as theoretically disreputable. Against this I argue that sympathy appropriately underlies moral concern for animals. I offer an account of sympathy that distinguishes sympathy with from sympathy for fellow creatures, and I argue that both can be placed on an objective basis, if we differentiate enlightened from folk sympathy. Moreover, I suggest that sympathy for animals is not, as some have claimed, incompatible with environmentalism; on the contrary, it can ground environmental concern. (...) Finally, I show that the traditional concept of anthropomorphism has no coherent basis, and I argue that the attempt to prove that animals lack thoughts is both unsuccessful and irrelevant to sympathy for languageless creatures. (shrink)

Stocks and flows are building blocks of dynamic systems: Stocks change through inflows and outflows, such as our bank balance changing with withdrawals and deposits, or atmospheric CO2 with absorptions and emissions. However, people make systematic errors when trying to infer the behavior of dynamic systems, termed SF failure, whose cognitive explanations are yet unknown. We argue that SF failure appears when people focus on specific system elements, rather than on the system structure and gestalt. Using a standard SF task, (...) SF failure decreased by a global as opposed to local task format; individual global as opposed to local processing styles; and global as opposed to local perceptual priming. These results converge toward local processing as an explanation for SF failure. We discuss theoretical and practical implications on the connections between the scope of attention and understanding of dynamic systems. (shrink)

The paper develops a novel account of the nature and genesis of some philosophical problems, which motivates an unfamiliar form of philosophical criticism that was pioneered by the later Wittgenstein. To develop the account, the paper analyses two thematically linked sets of problems, namely problems about linguistic understanding: a set of problems Wittgenstein discusses in a core part of his Philosophical Investigations, and the ‘problem of linguistic creativity’ that is central to current philosophy of language. The paper argues that these (...) problems are generated by tacit and unwarranted presuppositions at odds with warranted beliefs the philosophers raising the problems reflectively hold at the same time. For a rigorous conceptualisation of this phenomenon, the paper develops the notion of a ‘philosophical picture’ first proposed by Wittgenstein, and specifies the particular class of philosophical problems that may be raised due to adherence to such pictures. The results motivate a new form of philosophical criticism: the systematic exposure of relevant philosophical pictures, and efforts to overcome their tacit influence on philosophical reflection. (shrink)

Previously, I have argued that moral responsibility for actions is associated with guidance control. This sort of control does not necessarily involve the freedom to do otherwise. In this paper I extend the view to apply to omissions. That is, moral responsibility for an omission is associated with guidance control of that omission. This helps to provide a systematic, unified account of moral responsibility.

"The constant student of philosophy is merely the professional musician of reflective thought."President Theodore Roosevelt's warning mirrored the public's outrage: "When compared with the suppression of anarchy, every other question sinks into insignificance."2 In March 1908 when Chicago Police Chief George Shippy shot Lazarus Averbuch, claiming self-defense against an anarchist plot, a supporting public filled the air with denunciations against such lawless traitors. Jane Addams refused to join the outcry, declaring that social settlement houses had the obligation to interpret rather (...) than denounce. While interpretation is recognized as a major intellectual category for some of the classical American pragmatists.. (shrink)

Humanitarian aid professionals frequently encounter situations in which one is conscious of the morally appropriate action but cannot take it because of institutional obstacles. Dilemmas like this are likely to result in a specific kind of stress reaction at the individual level, labeled as moral stress. In our study, 16 individuals working with international humanitarian aid and rescue operations participated in semistructured interviews, analyzed in accordance with a grounded theory approach. A theoretical model of ethical decision making from a moral (...) stress perspective was developed. The practical implications of the study are discussed. (shrink)

We study regularity properties related to Cohen, random, Laver, Miller and Sacks forcing, for sets of real numbers on the Δ31\documentclass[12pt]{minimal} \usepackage{amsmath} \usepackage{wasysym} \usepackage{amsfonts} \usepackage{amssymb} \usepackage{amsbsy} \usepackage{mathrsfs} \usepackage{upgreek} \setlength{\oddsidemargin}{-69pt} \begin{document}$${\varvec{\Delta}^1_3}$$\end{document} level of the projective hieararchy. For Δ21\documentclass[12pt]{minimal} \usepackage{amsmath} \usepackage{wasysym} \usepackage{amsfonts} \usepackage{amssymb} \usepackage{amsbsy} \usepackage{mathrsfs} \usepackage{upgreek} \setlength{\oddsidemargin}{-69pt} \begin{document}$${\varvec{\Delta}^1_2}$$\end{document} and Σ21\documentclass[12pt]{minimal} \usepackage{amsmath} \usepackage{wasysym} \usepackage{amsfonts} \usepackage{amssymb} \usepackage{amsbsy} \usepackage{mathrsfs} \usepackage{upgreek} \setlength{\oddsidemargin}{-69pt} \begin{document}$${\varvec{\Sigma}^1_2}$$\end{document} sets, the relationships between these properties follows the pattern of the well-known Cichoń diagram for cardinal characteristics of the continuum. It is known that (...) assuming suitable large cardinals, the same relationships lift to higher projective levels, but the questions become more challenging without such assumptions. Consequently, all our results are proved on the basis of ZFC alone or ZFC with an inaccessible cardinal. We also prove partial results concerning Σ31\documentclass[12pt]{minimal} \usepackage{amsmath} \usepackage{wasysym} \usepackage{amsfonts} \usepackage{amssymb} \usepackage{amsbsy} \usepackage{mathrsfs} \usepackage{upgreek} \setlength{\oddsidemargin}{-69pt} \begin{document}$${\varvec{\Sigma}^1_3}$$\end{document} and Δ41\documentclass[12pt]{minimal} \usepackage{amsmath} \usepackage{wasysym} \usepackage{amsfonts} \usepackage{amssymb} \usepackage{amsbsy} \usepackage{mathrsfs} \usepackage{upgreek} \setlength{\oddsidemargin}{-69pt} \begin{document}$${\varvec{\Delta}^1_4}$$\end{document} sets. (shrink)

This chapter contains sections titled: Democracy Democracy and Social Justice Democracy, Social Justice and Peace Democracy and War.

At many slaughterhouses, if a pregnant cow is killed, then medical companies pay to harvest the fetus's blood. When you communicate the details of this process to people, many of them are disgusted. I submit that those who are repulsed thereby acquire a reason to believe that this practice is morally wrong. However, it is controversial to maintain that disgust can provide moral guidance. So, I develop a theory of disgust’s moral salience that fits with the empirical work that’s been (...) done on it, and I apply it to the collection of bovine fetal blood. I conclude by suggesting how this theory may be of use in animal ethics generally. (shrink)

This research uses a normative approach to examine the relationship between basic income and migration. The decisive variable is the effect of labour automation, which increases economic insecurities globally, leaving some nation states in a position to cope with this and others not. The insecurities will increase migratory pressures on one hand but also justify the introduction of basic income on a nation state level on the other. The normative guideline is the republican conception of freedom as non-domination. This is (...) used to justify a basic income, analyse how labour automation creates dominating structures and how borders dominate migrants seeking to move to countries which introduce a basic income. The result is that nation states that introduce a basic income to counter internal domination through labour automation, also have to look outside of their nation state. The imposition of borders in order to keep a basic income sustainable as well as labour automation itself, establish a form of domination over less developed countries and thus demand international regulation. (shrink)