Mainstream political liberalism holds that legal coercion is permissible only if it is based on reasons that all can share, access or accept. But these requirements are subject to well-known problems. I articulate and defend an intelligible reasons requirement as an alternative. An intelligible reason is a reason that all suitably idealized members of the public can see as a reason for the person who offers it according to that person’s own evaluative standards. It thereby permits reasons into public justification (...) that all cannot share, access, or accept, and so contrasts with standard approaches to public justification. The intelligible reasons requirement has two striking implications. First, it severs the connection between public justification and principles of deliberative restraint. Second, it pushes political liberals to appeal to other political processes to publicly justify law, specifically bargaining, adjudication, and social evolution. (shrink)

This piece defends the asymmetric convergence approach to public justification against James Boettcher's recent critique.

Husserl seems to have devoted roughly equal amounts of energy and pages to the description of perception, judgement, and imagination. By “description,” he meant the analysis of the traits and components of mental states or acts and their objects. As his views changed over the years about the nature of intentionality and philosophy, the descriptive psychology of the Logical Investigations (1900/01) gave way to descriptive programmes in which the objects of perception and of judgement were conceived of in terms of (...) a new, analytic framework; in particular Husserl lost interest in describing the things and processes in the real world that are the objects of perception and judgement and so too in describing their relations to these acts. His new analytic framework, particularly as it applies to perception, has been thoroughly expounded and discussed in the literature. My aim here is to expound Husserl's first descriptions of perception within the framework of the Investigations and to incorporate as far as possible his later descriptive results to the extent that these are separable from his later turn to idealism. (shrink)

Freedom of information requests are increasingly used in sociology, criminology and other social science disciplines to examine government practices and processes. University ethical review boards in Canada have not typically subjected researchers’ FOI requests to independent review, although this may be changing in the United Kingdom and Australia, reflective of what Haggerty calls ‘ethics creep’. Here we present four arguments for why FOI requests in the social sciences should not be subject to formal ethical review by ERBs. These four arguments (...) are: existing, rigorous bureaucratic vetting; double jeopardy; infringement of citizenship rights; and unsuitable ethics paradigm. In the discussion, we reflect on the implications of our analysis for literature on ethical review and qualitative research, and for literature on FOI and government transparency. (shrink)

It seems plausible that there can be “no win” moral situations in which no matter what one does one fails some moral obligation. Is there an epistemic analog to moral dilemmas? Are there epistemically dilemmatic situations—situations in which we are doomed to violate an epistemic requirement? If there are, when exactly do they arise and what can we learn from them? A team of top epistemologists address these and closely related questions from a variety of new, sometimes unexpected, angles. Anyone (...) interested in epistemic dilemmas, the nature of justification and evidential support, higher-order requirements, or suspension of judgment will find a range of useful arguments and fresh ideas in this cutting-edge anthology. (shrink)

Originally published in 1987, this book forms a conceptual account of the relationship between music and poetry in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth ...

Originally published in 1984, The Image of the Middle Ages in Romantic and Victorian Literature looks at the impact of medievalism in the 18th and 19th centuries and the importance of post-Enlightenment literary religious medievalism. The book suggests that religious medievalism was not a superficial cultural phenomenon and that the romantic spirit with which it was chronologically connected, was intimately associated with the metaphysical. The book suggests that this belief gave birth to the metaphysical yearning and cultural expression of the (...) eighteenth and nineteenth century. The book seeks to clarify the post-Enlightenment relationship between aesthetic culture and 'aesthetic' religion, romanticism, medievalism and religious trends. (shrink)

A comprehensive and accessible introduction to the development of and current debates in the aesthetics of food and drink.

I examine the positive and negative features of homeopathy from an ethical perspective. I consider: (a) several potentially beneficial features of homeopathy, including non-invasiveness, cost-effectiveness, holism, placebo benefits and agent autonomy; and (b) several potentially negative features of homeopathy, including failure to seek effective healthcare, wastage of resources, promulgation of false beliefs and a weakening of commitment to scientific medicine. A utilitarian analysis of the utilities and disutilities leads to the conclusion that homeopathy is ethically unacceptable and ought to be (...) actively rejected by healthcare professionals. (shrink)

Introduction -- Organization, society and politics -- An Aristotelian perspective -- The politics -- The public good -- The rhetoric -- Talk and texts -- The Nichomachean ethics -- Decision making and ethics -- The Poetics -- Bolshevism to ballet in three steps -- What is "public interest"?: a case study -- Where do we go from here?

This is a working paper that presents the first phase of what will eventually be a huge project, namely a critical appropriation of Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics. Early on it provides a sketch of the main strands of Aristotle’s theoretical web in his N. Ethics. Following that, the paper offers some critical commentary concerning some of Aristotle’s main positions: especially his views on moral virtue, the soul, intellectual virtue, and human well-being. The paper then turns to the development of some significantly (...) different ways of construing both intellectual virtue as well as moral virtue. With respect to intellectual virtue, I present my own perspective in interconnection with a process-oriented way of understanding reality, as opposed to Aristotle’s substance-oriented way. With respect to moral virtue, I present my interpretation in relation to a thisworldly understanding of the human spirit/soul, as well as a humanistic-Marxist interpretation of human well-being. Toward the paper’s end, I offer some suggestions concerning a modified “doctrine of the mean” that would be a sort of critical synthesis of the views of Aristotle and Confucius. (shrink)

The work of Michael Oakeshott has retained a striking currency in philosophical discourse about education. This is hardly surprising in view of his influence on Paul Hirst and Richard Peters, two philosophers whose work had an enormous impact on educational thinking and practice in the English-speaking world. And, although much of the detail in educational debate may change, the fundamental underlying concerns regarding the conception of the person, the nature of knowledge and the moral life and their expression in educational (...) institutions and activities remain subject of disagreement. In the light of this continuing interest and of Oakeshott’s extensive writing on so many aspects of education, it is timely that a book be published on his thinking on the subject. (shrink)

This article explores, in the French context, an aspect of what Terence McLaughlin (1991) has described in an unpublished paper as the ‘dilemma of substantiality’ faced by any school system endeavouring to promote neutrality. In France, in order that the public or common school be genuinely open to all students, not only is the wearing of conspicuous religious symbols forbidden but so too is any direct teaching of religion. The cultural consequences resulting from this prohibition have led to the mandating (...) of cross-curricular teaching about religion. This article aims to show that the civic principles (la laïcité) on which this teaching is based pose in an acute and problematic form the ‘dilemma of substantiality’. (shrink)

A number of recent legal cases in the United States have considered both disability‐based exceptions to Covid‐19‐related mask mandates and disability‐based claims to stronger masking rules in states restricting the abilities of local governments to enforce mask mandates. We argue that a proper legal and ethical analysis of such cases requires understanding the distinction between disability accommodations and disability modifications. Disability accommodations are individualized adjustments that enable qualified individuals to perform jobs or achieve access on terms comparable to those experienced (...) by others. Disability modifications are programmatic changes to structures or policies that increase accessibility. We contend that in the context of mask mandates, modifications rather than accommodations are ethically desirable because modification‐oriented policies promote disability access in a way that treats all individuals fairly, avoiding the risk of promoting misinformation and uncertainty about the health benefits of masking. (shrink)

Many churches are being asked to support new environmental initiatives, including those of the new food movement. In today’s cultural environment, it requires courage even to raise a question about programs to save the planet, protect helpless animals, or feed developing nations. Yet it is important for Christians to be aware of the agenda behind these initiatives, which looks to creation not for visible signs of God’s power and divinity but with a view to immortalizing the earth itself as the (...) source of life. It sees man not as uniquely made in the image and likeness of God, with the responsibility for stewardship over His creation, but as an animal himself, co-equal with other animals. Environmentalism has become in effect a new religion, with the food movement its frontier mission. National Catholic Bioethics Quarterly 11.3 (Autumn 2011): 465–475. (shrink)

This volume presents 15 studies occasioned by the 500th anniversary of the European discovery of America. It covers both the initial encounters between the Europeans and native Americans and the golden age of Hispanic philosophy that followed the discovery - specifically between 1500 and 1650.

I argue against Lori Watson and Christie Hartley's recent criticisms of convergence approaches to public justification. In particular, I argue that convergence approaches can capture what is distinctive about democratic decision‐making and provide an attractive account of stability for the right reasons.

Argues that ontological reduction of macroeconomics to microeconomics is untenable. Existence of macroeconomic aggregates; Microfoundations of macroeconomics; Examinations of the general price level; Limits of the scientific development of microeconomics.

The aim of this book is to set a limit to thought, or rather - not to thought, but to the expression of thoughts: for in order to be able to set a limit to thought, we should have to find both sides of the limit thinkable.