A critical, philosophical engagement of the psychological structures that propagate the continued oppression of women. In this book, the Italian feminist thinker Lea Melandri argues that systemic violence against women has deep psychoanalytic roots. Drawing inspiration from the work of Freud and the psychiatrist and psychoanalyst Elvio Fachinelli, along with feminist practices of consciousness-raising, Melandri demonstrates how male dominance and female subservience are established by society through a binary and oppositional understanding of sex and gender. This understanding—and the oppression and (...) violence against women that results—is inscribed in the psyches of both men and women, and is replicated anew from generation to generation. Melandri analyzes women in media, politics, philosophy, and literature to show how this plays out, and calls for awareness of these deep psychic structures and expectations formed within the dynamics of society and primary family relations. Lea Melandri is one of Italy’s best-known feminist thinkers and activists. She is the author of many books and continues to write and advocate for women’s rights. In 2012, she was awarded by the city of Milan the Ambrogino d’oro, one of the city’s highest honors. Antonio Calcagno is Professor of Philosophy at King’s University College at Western University, Canada. He the editor of Contemporary Italian Political Philosophy and the coeditor (with Inna Viriasova) of Roberto Esposito: Biopolitics and Philosophy, both also published by SUNY Press. (shrink)

Circumcision of a male child was recently ruled illegal by a court in Germany on the grounds that it violates the child's rights to bodily integrity and self-determination. This paper begins by challenging the applicability of these rights to the circumcision debate. It argues that, rather than a sweeping appeal to rights, a moral analysis of the practice of circumcision will require a careful examination of the interests of the child. I consider three of these interests in some detail. The (...) first is the interest in avoiding a moderate decrease in expected future sexual pleasure. I argue that even if such a decrease were to occur, it is not wholly unreasonable to think that this might actually be a good thing for the child. Second, I consider the interest in self-determination. I argue that this interest is not as strong as it might appear because the adult's circumcision decision is subject to a variety of biases and a significant lack of information. Finally, I consider the child's interest in avoiding the future costs of adult circumcision. I argue that this interest becomes much stronger in the religious case because the child is quite likely to choose to become circumcised as an adult. The likelihood of the child choosing circumcision in the religious case also reduces the extent to which infant circumcision violates his interest in self-determination. I conclude that male infant circumcision falls within the prerogative of parental decision-making in the secular case and even more clearly so in the religious case. Finally, I distinguish male circumcision from female genital cutting in several important respects and argue that we can coherently hold that male circumcision is permissible without also endorsing all forms of female genital cutting. (shrink)

This article considers two competing types of conceptions of the pre-autonomous child’s right to bodily integrity. The first, which I call encroachment conceptions, holds that any physically serious bodily encroachment infringes on the child’s right to bodily integrity. The second, which I call best-interests conceptions, holds that the child’s right to bodily integrity is infringed just in case the child is subjected to a bodily encroachment that substantially deviates from what is in the child’s best interests. I argue in this (...) article that best-interests conceptions are more plausible than encroachment conceptions. They have more attractive implications regarding the permissibility of interventions in children’s bodies that are beneficial for the child but are not medically necessary. They are better able to explain the moral distinction between cases in which an encroachment on a child’s body is needed to benefit that child and cases in which an encroachment on one child’s body is needed to benefit another. Finally, best-interests conceptions are more consonant than encroachment conceptions with our understanding of adults’ right to bodily integrity. (shrink)

This article introduces an intuitive conservation dilemma called the Canyon Dilemma: Is it possible to condemn the mining of the Grand Canyon, even by a poor generation, while also permitting this generation’s mining of an unremarkable small canyon? It then argues that not one of several prominent theories of environmental justice, including various forms of egalitarianism, welfarism, deep-ecological theories, communitarianism and free-market environmentalism, can navigate this dilemma. The article concludes by highlighting the dilemma-navigating potential of the equal-claims idea – the (...) idea that the natural world is something to which every human being, present and future, has an equal, substantive claim. (shrink)

This article considers whether any interpretation of the idea of equal claims to the natural world can resolve the Canyon Dilemma (i.e. can justify protecting the Grand Canyon but not a small canyon from mining by a poor generation). It first considers and ultimately rejects the idea of subjecting natural resource rights to an intergenerational equal division. It then demonstrates that a pluralist theory of environmental justice committed to both respect for the separateness of persons and to the collective good (...) can justify a type of intergenerational non-absolute equal division of natural resource rights that can navigate the Canyon Dilemma. (shrink)

This book focuses on a question issued from The Architectonic of Pure Reason, one of the most important sections of Kant's first Critique: what is the human being? It suggests that the answer to this question is tied to a particular account of the unity of reason - one that stresses its purposive character.

Contrasting brain states when subjects are aware compared to unaware of a presented stimulus has allowed researchers to isolate candidate neural correlates of consciousness. Here we propose that an important next step in this research program is to investigate, perhaps paradoxically, brain states that covary with reports of absences of awareness. Specifically, we propose that in order to distinguish content-specific and content-invariant neural correlates of consciousness, a distinction needs to be made between the neural correlates of awareness of stimulus absence, (...) and the neural correlates of absence of awareness. We ground this distinction in higher-order computational models of consciousness, where the state of higher-order nodes is invariant to the specific contents of awareness. To map the different levels of these models to neurophysiological correlates, we suggest two empirical approaches – inverted designs and two-dimensional awareness reports – in which reports about awareness and stimulus presence can be dissociated. (shrink)

This article explores the tensions between cosmopolitanism and sovereignty as a means to conceptualize the ethics of European foreign policy. It starts by discussing the claim that, in order for the EU to play a meaningful role as an international actor, a definition of the common ethical values orienting its political conduct is required. The question of a European federation of states and its ethical conceptualization emerges clearly in some of the philosophical writings of the 17th and 18th centuries. I (...) seek to provide an outline of the main arguments presented by authors such as Saint Pierre, Rousseau and Kant regarding the implications of the emerging difference between cosmopolitanism and the law of nations in the ethics of international relations. The article focuses on the normative significance of the concept of sovereignty as it emerges in modern political philosophy and highlights its tensions with the ideas of moral and political cosmopolitanism. This exploration serves a double function: theoretical and practical. From the theoretical perspective it leads to a better understanding of the tensions involved in conceptualizing a common ethical orientation for the states of Europe. From the practical standpoint it sheds light on some persistent difficulties the European Union faces in trying to move beyond an intergovernmental political arrangement in the field of foreign policy. (shrink)

In his recent commentary on my work, entitled ‘Mazor on indirect obligations to conserve natural resources for future generations’ (Sachs, 2013), Benjamin Sachs explores whether the argument I have provided for grounding indirect obligations of justice to conserve natural resources for future people really succeeds. Sachs insightfully points out that it does not necessarily follow from the fact that profligate individuals increase the obligation of others to conserve natural resources, that those others can insist that the profligate individuals do (...) their fair share. Sachs argues that this only follows if those who are obligated to pick up the slack have been wronged (Sachs, 2013, pp. 209). Furthermore, he argues that in order to be wronged, they must have been harmed (Sachs, 2013, p. 210). And since the obligation to conserve natural resources is, according to Sachs, not taken seriously, those who do not pick up the slack for others’ overuse are not being harmed. Therefore, Sachs concludes, my argument for indirect obligations to conserve natural resources for future people is on shaky ground. (shrink)

This paper comments on Richard Bourke's Hegel and World Revolutions, focusing on its analysis of Hegel's relevance for debates on revolution, freedom, and the Enlightenment. While agreeing with Bourke's call for critically engaging with Hegel's ideas rather than dismissing them outright, the paper raises some questions concerning Bourke's reconstruction of Hegel's interpretation of Kant, his account of the French Revolution, and the impact of Hegel's work on contemporary debates.

This article explores the justification of states' territorial rights. It starts by introducing three questions that all current theories of territorial rights attempt to answer: how to justify the right to settle, the right to exclude, and the right to settle and exclude with reference to a particular territory. It proposes a ‘permissive’ theory of territorial rights, arguing that the citizens of each state are entitled to the particular territory they collectively occupy, if and only if they are also politically (...) committed to the establishment of a global political authority realizing just reciprocal relations. The article is developed by introducing some key features of the permissive theory and by explaining how such an account addresses the questions of settlement, exclusion and particularity in ways that significantly improve on existing rival accounts (most prominently: acquisition theories, legitimacy-based theories and nationalist theories). (shrink)

Global Justice and Avant-Garde Political Agency offers a fresh, nuanced example of political theory in an activist mode. Setting the debate on global justice in the context of recent methodological disputes on the relationship between ideal and nonideal theorizing, Ypi's dialectical account shows how principles and agency really can interact.

In this issue of Clinical Ethics, Jonathan Pugh rejects hypothetical consent-based conceptions of the child’s right to bodily integrity (RBI). Pugh also questions the relevance of adults’ regret of past bodily infringements in evaluating potential violations of children’s RBI. Pugh then argues that autonomy serves as the justification for our power to waive our bodily rights. Finally, Pugh claims that the child’s interest in developing the capacity for autonomy is key to evaluating potential RBI violations. In this article, I challenge (...) each of these arguments. First, I argue that it is the circumstances of parents vis-a-vis their children (rather than the difficulties in determining hypothetical agents' values) that should lead us to reject hypothetical-consent-based conceptions of the child’s RBI in favor of best-interests conceptions. Second, I argue that adults’ regret of childhood bodily interventions is highly relevant for evaluating these interventions’ permissibility. Third, I reject the claim that autonomy is the primary justification for our power to waive our bodily rights. Finally, I argue that Pugh overstates the importance of the child’s interest in developing the capacity for autonomy, at least when it comes to debates in contemporary liberal democracies over interventions in children’s bodies. (shrink)

A target question for the scientific study of consciousness is how dimensions of consciousness, such as the ability to feel pain and pleasure or reflect on one’s own experience, vary in different states and animal species. Considering the tight link between consciousness and moral status, answers to these questions have implications for law and ethics. Here we point out that given this link, the scientific community studying consciousness may face implicit pressure to carry out certain research programs or interpret results (...) in ways that justify current norms rather than challenge them. We show that because consciousness largely determines moral status, the use of nonhuman animals in the scientific study of consciousness introduces a direct conflict between scientific relevance and ethics—the more scientifically valuable an animal model is for studying consciousness, the more difficult it becomes to ethically justify compromises to its well-being for consciousness research. Finally, in light of these considerations, we call for a discussion of the immediate ethical corollaries of the body of knowledge that has accumulated and for a more explicit consideration of the role of ideology and ethics in the scientific study of consciousness. (shrink)

In this article, we shed light on the emergence, diffusion, and use of socio-technological future visions. The artificial intelligence future vision of the German federal government is examined and juxtaposed with the respective news media coverage of the German media. By means of a content analysis of frames, it is demonstrated how the German government strategically uses its AI future vision to uphold the status quo. The German media largely adapt the government´s frames and do not integrate alternative future narratives (...) into the public debate. These findings are substantiated in the framing of AI futures in policy documents of the German government and articles of four different German newspapers. It is shown how the German past is mirrored in the German AI future envisioned by the government, safeguarding the present power constellation that is marked by a close unity of politics and industry. The German media partly expose the government´s frames and call for future visions that include fundamentally different political designs less influenced by the power structures of the past and present. (shrink)

Models of category learning have been extensively studied in cognitive science and primarily tested on perceptual abstractions or artificial stimuli. In this paper, we focus on categories acquired from natural language stimuli, that is, words. We present a Bayesian model that, unlike previous work, learns both categories and their features in a single process. We model category induction as two interrelated subproblems: the acquisition of features that discriminate among categories, and the grouping of concepts into categories based on those features. (...) Our model learns categories incrementally using particle filters, a sequential Monte Carlo method commonly used for approximate probabilistic inference that sequentially integrates newly observed data and can be viewed as a plausible mechanism for human learning. Experimental results show that our incremental learner obtains meaningful categories which yield a closer fit to behavioral data compared to related models while at the same time acquiring features which characterize the learned categories. (shrink)

Whilst Rahimzadeh et al. (2023) apply a critical lens to the pedagogical use of LLM bioethics assistants, we outline here further reason for skepticism. Two features of LLM chatbots are of signific...

Confirmatory bias, defined as the tendency to misinterpret new pieces of evidence as confirming previously held hypotheses, can lead to implacable, even incorrect decision making. It is one of the biases, along with anchoring, framing, and other judgment heuristic errors, that may lead to non-optimal behavior. This paper tests for the existence of confirmatory bias behavior in a uniquely economic setting (tax policy) and in a context relatively lacking in ambiguity. It also tests whether the confirmatory bias phenomenon can be (...) prevalent enough to affect aggregate outcomes, a characteristic important in economic models in particular. The results indicate not only that confirmatory bias exists, but that the confirmatory bias effect may be stronger for evidence relating to losses than for comparable evidence relating to gains. (shrink)

Les programmes d’accompagnement des chômeurs peuvent se lire comme un temps prescrit institutionnellement, mesuré, optimisé, et moins orienté vers la sortie du chômage que vers la réhabilitation de l’employabilité. Nous nous intéressons aux logiques d’action qui président à la construction des normes de calendriers d’accès à l’emploi. Le temps de l’« employabilisation » ainsi défini est caractérisé par des événements dont la durée, le séquençage ou encore l’espacement sont rationnellement organisés. Le temps propre de l’accompagnement et de ses programmes apparaît (...) alors comme un objet de savoirs experts de diverses natures produits par des ingénieurs socio-économiques d’une part et des gestionnaires de l’activité des professionnels de l’emploi d’autre part. (shrink)

In a recent paper, M. Finkelberg has endorsed part of M.L. West's emendation of the fifth strophe of the second stasimon in Aeschylus’ Seven against Thebes. In her opinion, accepting West's emendation also allows adopting earlier emendations proposed by Schütz and Prien, leading to a better understanding of the passage. It is recalled that this is where the chorus relates the disasters that ensued from Oedipus’ discovery of the truth about his marriage. In the following short discussion, I intend to (...) revisit and defend once again the reading, according to which the two acts mentioned in connection with Oedipus’ discovery are gouging out his eyes and casting a curse on his sons, and not murdering his father and bedding his mother. (shrink)

I argue that the best way for journalists to enable their audience to determine the truth about international rights questions and to grant the parties’ claims a fair hearing is by adhering to strict impartiality—i.e., by producing coverage that does not reflect the journalist’s personal views on the rights question. I then argue that that the best way for journalists to provide strictly impartial coverage is by utilizing a legal trial, and more specifically an adversarial trial as a model for (...) impartial presentation. Unlike the traditional Just-the-Facts model, the adversarial model explicitly requires the journalist to challenge the narratives of the parties and to cover the relevant normative controversies. It solves the problem of partiality in content choice by asking the journalist to take up the perspective of a principled zealous advocate for both sides of the international rights question. (shrink)

This article defends a novel type of institutionalized mass deliberation: Citizen Duty. Citizen Duty would legally require every citizen to engage in one day of diverse, moderated political deliberation prior to major elections. This deliberation would realize a variety of benefits, including wiser electoral decisions and a more respectful electoral process, while avoiding the dangers of citizen deliberation. A comparison with jury duty and with non-deliberative alternatives suggests that Citizen Duty’s substantial economic and liberty costs are justified. Finally, an examination (...) of citizen attitudes towards politics and deliberation suggests that Citizen Duty is not as quixotic as it first appears. (shrink)

I wish to first thank the two respondents for seriously engaging with my arguments. Their responses suggest that they are both individuals of good conscience who are deeply committed to the quest for truth and to human welfare.Their responses also highlight the deep empirical disagreements that lie at the heart of the circumcision debate. Given such empirical disagreements, what can philosophers contribute? I wish to reply to my critics in a way that highlights four types of contributions that philosophers can (...) make.First, philosophers can provide conceptual clarity. For example, I argue in my paper that appeals to the rights of bodily integrity and self-determination in the context of the circumcision debate entails a misunderstanding of the nature of these rights. This supports the position of both of my respondents that the empirical details are morally relevant in this debate.David Lang criticises my use of the minor cleft lip operation example in making this argument. He points out that in the cleft lip case , there is a restoration of ‘the normal appearance of the body in its natural state’. Thus, the cleft lip operation does not constitute a violation of bodily integrity, properly understood.1Yet, Lang does not explain the moral significance of ‘the …. (shrink)

In this paper, I specifically consider the issue of corporate governance and normative stakeholder theory. In doing so, I arguethat stakeholder theory and responsibilities to non-shareholder constituencies can be made more intelligible by reference to Kant’sconception of perfect and imperfect duties. I draw upon Onora O’Neill’s (1996) work, Towards Justice and Virtue: A Constructivist Account of Practical Reasoning. In her text O’Neill underlines a number of relevant issues including: the integration of particularist and universalist accounts of morality; the priority of (...) obligations over rights; the importance of the distinction between imperfect and perfect duties; and the relation between the virtues and imperfect duties. On the basis of the foregoing analysis, the paper argues that business ethicists should avoid recommending the institutionalising of stakeholder responsibilities in terms of legally defined sets of stakeholder rights. Instead, we should regard stakeholder responsibilities as uniformalised imperfect duties. Conceiving responsibilities to all stakeholder groups in this manner, allows the firm the freedom to perfect these duties in ways appropriate to cultural and societal setting, and in accordance with the capacity to do so. (shrink)

This article considers the question of how much weight the infringement of children's right to bodily integrity should be given compared with competing considerations. It utilises the example of circumcision to explore this question, taking as given this practice's opponents' view of circumcision's harmfulness. The article argues that the child's claim against being subjected to circumcision is neither a mere interest nor a right so strong that it trumps all competing interests. Instead, it is a right of moderate strength. Indeed, (...) even the aggregate strength of children's rights against the practice of circumcision as a whole is not so weighty so as to always trump competing interests. The harms are not sufficiently serious to justify such a status. And the expressive wrongs associated with non-negligently benevolent harming are much less serious than those associated with intentional harming. The debate over banning circumcision thus cannot be conducted only in terms of competing rights. Competing interests, such as those that would be set back by the departure of religious citizens, should be considered as well and might plausibly justify allowing even a rights-infringing practice to continue. (shrink)

In clinical practice, evidence suggests that teaching ethics using normative ethical theory has little influence on the ethical actions of providers in practice. Thus, new training methods are needed that improve clinician response to ethical problems. A sensemaking approach to ethics training has demonstrated promise as an evidence-based pedagogical method to improve ethical reasoning and response. Project ECHO is theoretically linked to improved sensemaking. This study examines the effectiveness of ECHO and training in use of sensemaking approaches to ethical response (...) by clinicians. A quasi-experimental design study using univariate linear regression was used to examine the effect of the three types of ethics training on ethical response self-efficacy scores, while controlling for participant characteristics of years in practice, discipline and sex. We found evidence that training in sensemaking through participation in ECHO promotes improved ethical response self-efficacy of clinicians. However, results also suggest that a traditional ECHO format that does not explicitly introduce sensemaking strategies into the training does not result in the same learning outcomes as measured through an ethical response self-efficacy survey. This study found important preliminary results to support use of sensemaking approaches in clinical ethics training. (shrink)

Partnerships can play an important role in addressing environmental concerns and fostering environmental improvement. In this context, we argue that a more elaborate understanding is needed of how partners intend to reach beyond the partnership boundaries and target stakeholders at the firm, industry, supply-chain, or societal levels. As environmental improvement is intertwined with the process of change, we build on the theory of planned change to explain how the focus on selected partnership mechanisms may help partners anticipate and overcome barriers (...) when targeting environmental improvement at these different levels. We test our framework, using a sample of 566 environmental partnerships formed in the USA, and provide rich insights into how partners intend to reach beyond the partnership boundaries. From a practical perspective, these insights may inform corporate managers’ decision to configure environmental partnerships in terms of the target group and suitable partnership mechanism. From a theory perspective, the study helps develop a more systematic understanding of what partners intend to do and when partnerships may provide benefits in addressing level-specific change barriers. These insights provide a first step in positioning partnerships in the broader context of environmental change and encourage future research to move from the intentions to the actual outcomes. (shrink)

This article considers the question of why labor income may be permissibly redistributed to the poor even though non-essential body parts should generally be protected from redistribution to the infirm – the body-income puzzle. It argues that proposed solutions that affirm self-ownership but reject ownership of labor income are unsuccessful. And proposed solutions that grant individuals entitlements to resources based on the centrality of those resources to the individual’s personal identity are also unsuccessful. Instead, this article defends a solution to (...) the body-income puzzle based on a novel conception of respect for the separateness of persons. This conception holds that the sphere of moral authority protected from interference by respect for the separateness of persons includes both the body and labor income. And the strength of the negative rights constituting this sphere vary based on these rights' importance to the personal identity of the right-holder. It is shown that a commitment to helping the disadvantaged tempered by this conception of respect for the separateness of persons can solve the body-income puzzle. (shrink)

Many challenges to economic and social well-being require close collaboration between business, government, and civil-society actors. In this context, the involvement of multiple companies rather than a single company may enhance such cross-sector social partnerships’ outcomes. However, extant literature cautions about the tensions arising from companies’ competitive interests and the detrimental effects on the CSSP’s social outcome. Similarly, studies analyzing simultaneous collaboration and competition suggest shielding off competitive elements from the collaboration. Based on insights into two multi-company CSSPs, we conversely (...) find that government and NGO partnership managers deliberately leveraged competition through the CSSP design. They used similar segmentation mechanisms to enhance CSSP contributions, but differed in the way they integrated collaborative and competitive elements, leading to sustained corporate commitment in one CSSP and unmet promises in the other. These insights expose the paradoxical nature of coopetition at the interface of social and economic goals, and advance current research by indicating competition’s positive effects and the respective partnership design implications. On this basis, our study helps reveal and better understand sustainability-related tensions and opportunities at the inter-organizational level. (shrink)

Esta coletânea é uma homenagem aos 70 anos do professor Emmanuel Carneiro Leão. Reúne artigos de seus alunos, amigos e admiradores que foram atraídos pela abrangência e rigor de seu pensamento. A diversidade de temáticas, abordagens e premissas destes ensaios refletem bem a generosidade do espírito de Emmanuel Carneiro.

This essay compares the thoughts of Kant and Marx on revolution. It focuses in particular on two issues: the contribution of revolutionary enthusiasm to the cause of emancipatory political agents and its educative role in illustrating the possibility of progress for future generations. In both cases, it is argued, the defence of revolution is offered in the context of illustrating the possibility of moral progress for the species, even if not for individual human beings, and brings out the centrality of (...) collective agency in moving toward universal moral goals. Discussing the implications of these points is of significant historical interest: it allows us to defend an interpretation of Kant’s political thought which is sensitive to the material conditions of historical development and to rescue Marx from an amoral reading of his philosophy of history. Reflecting on the role and preconditions of transformative collective agency is also of normative interest: it allows us to better evaluate the significance of political events that, firstly, re-shape the boundaries of political feasibility and, secondly, play a crucial educative role in motivating future progressive initiatives. (shrink)

The proliferation of public–private partnerships for development as an answer to many public challenges calls for careful evaluation. To this end, tailored frameworks are fundamental for helping understand the PPPs’ impact and for guiding corrective adjustment. Scholars have developed frameworks focusing on the partners’ relationships, the order of effects, and the distinction between outputs and outcomes. To capture a PPP’s complexity and multiple linkages with its environment, we argue that a thorough evaluation should adopt a stakeholder-oriented approach and consider the (...) costs and benefits that a PPP implies for them—especially as taxpayers’ money is involved. For this purpose, we build on a stakeholder-oriented evaluation framework from the nonprofit business partnership literature. In line with our broad evaluation conception, we extend it with the manifold ripple effects that PPPs for development have and include the time dimension for the links between different PPP stages and related outcomes to become clearer. Applying this framework to an illustrative case, we highlight important direct and especially indirect stakeholder outcomes, which a narrow evaluation would omit, point to the challenges involved in the evaluation endeavor, and identify interesting future research areas. (shrink)

This article examines Kant’s and Marx’s analysis of religion in its relation to human emancipation. It highlights some important affinities in their accounts of human nature and their critique of religious authority including: the emphasis on freedom as distinguishing human beings from other species, the relation between moral and political progress, the critique of revealed religion, the role of political community and the importance of ethical community to achieve moral emancipation.

Is it possible to justify territorial rights? Provided a justification for territorial rights can be found, does it ground claims toparticularterritories? And provided a claim to particular territories can be justified, what kind of claim is it? Is it a claim to jurisdiction? A claim to control resources? A claim to control the movement of people across borders? In this paper I review some prominent accounts seeking to answer these questions. After outlining their main features, I focus on some difficulties (...) they encounter, in particular with regard to the justification of exclusion. (shrink)

Suppose that the following describes an intelligible scenario. A subject is wired up to another's body in such a way that she has bodily experiences ‘as from the inside’ caused by states and events in the other body, that are subjectively indistinguishable from ordinary somatosensory perception of her own body. The supposed intelligibility of such so-called crossed wire cases constitutes a significant challenge to the claim that our somatosensory judgements are immune to error through misidentification relative to uses of the (...) first person pronoun. After all, the subject in this case is liable to commit precisely the sort of error ruled out by such a claim. In this paper I argue that the proponent of this challenge must establish at least two things: that the subject is committing an error of misidentification, and that her judgement shares its epistemic grounds with our ordinary somatosensory judgements. Neither condition, I argue, can be reached from the stipulations permitted into the starting descriptions of the cases. (shrink)

In this innovative study, Lea David critically investigates the relationship between human rights and memory, suggesting that, instead of understanding human rights in a normative fashion, human rights should be treated as an ideology. Conceptualizing human rights as an ideology gives us useful theoretical and methodological tools to recognize the real impact human rights has on the ground. David traces the rise of the global phenomenon that is the human rights memorialization agenda, termed 'Moral Remembrance', and explores what happens once (...) this agenda becomes implemented. Based on evidence from the Western Balkans and Israel/Palestine, she argues that the human rights memorialization agenda does not lead to a better appreciation of human rights but, contrary to what would be expected, it merely serves to strengthen national sentiments, divisions and animosities along ethnic lines, and leads to the new forms of societal inequalities that are closely connected to different forms of corruptions. (shrink)

In the wake of contemporary controversies in France over feminist misandry, this article reflects on claimed hatred of men as a feminist discursive resource. I use the reception of Valerie Solanas’ SCUM Manifesto by some radical French feminists of the 1970s as a privileged case study, along with historian Colette Pipon’s study on misandry within French second-wave feminist movements and Judith Butler’s works on stigma reversal. I contend that in a seemingly paradoxical way, misandry is both an anti-feminist stigma and (...) a feminist discursive strategy: the inhibiting effects of such injurious term on feminist politics – the aggressive, castrating and hateful feminist you should at all cost avoid to become – can be managed, if not neutralized, by means of feminist misandry. From that point, I argue that claimed hatred of men can open fruitful political venues in challenging the stifling effects of respectability politics. (shrink)

Philosophical treatments of the self in a range of different traditions have positioned it outside the realm of ordinary worldly objects. This paper argues that part of the explanation for this seemingly widespread and persistent temptation to mystify the self is that the epistemic properties of I-thought are apt to give rise to an illusion of transcendence about their objects—that is, about ourselves.

In the 1870s, microscopy societies began to proliferate in the United States. Most of these societies attracted microscopists from surrounding cities, but the American Postal Microscopical Club, modelled on the British Postal Microscopical Society, used the postal system to connect microscopists scattered across the country. Club members exchanged microscope slides and notes following a chain-letter system. The main objective of the club was to teach its members how to make permanent slides. Preparation and mounting methods required technical skill, which was, (...) as even club members had to admit, difficult to learn without personal instruction. Yet members developed ways to share craft knowledge through the post. Drawing on the private notes of a member and published reports on the slides circulated, this paper challenges the widespread assumption that the generation of craft knowledge depended on the co-location of artisans. It argues that microscopists’ knowledge of preparation methods was intertwined with their skill in building and navigating information infrastructures, and that by tracing these infrastructures we gain a better understanding of how craft knowledge travelled in the late nineteenth century. (shrink)