La discussione generale sulla filosofia della scienza contemporanea è complicata dal numero e dall’eterogeneità delle scienze, mentre lo studio di temi specifici porta inevitabilmente a dissertazioni specialistiche che mancano nel dare ragione della trama di senso sottostante. Questo Piccolo trattato di epistemologia intende occupare uno spazio vuoto, proponendo alcuni temi chiave per la comprensione dei meccanismi alla base della conoscenza scientifica: i rapporti tra filosofia e scienze, siano esse naturali o umane; la complessa relazione tra fatti e valori; la distinzione (...) tra scoperta e giustificazione; la necessità di un discorso etico sulla ricerca, che chiami in causa categorie come fiducia, empatia, altruismo ed egoismo. Con un approccio chiaro e rigoroso, il volume intende rivolgersi a quell’ampia fascia di pubblico interessata alle tematiche centrali dell’epistemologia, della filosofia e delle scienze. (shrink)

This paper focuses on negative exemplarity-related emotions (NEREs) and on their educational implications. In this paper, we will first argue for the nonexpendability of negative emotions broadly conceived (section 2) by defending their instrumental and intrinsic role in a good and flourishing life. In section 3, we will make the claim more specific by focusing on the narrower domain of NEREs and argue for their moral and educational significance by evaluating whether they fit the arguments provided in the previous section. (...) In section 4, we will propose three educational strategies to foster NEREs’ positive moral role. In conclusion, we will point out that an exemplarist approach to character education would greatly benefit from a more fine-grained account of the emotions involved in the educational process and from a broader perspective on which of these emotions should be taken as valuable for educational purposes. (shrink)

Decisions where there is not enough information for a well-informed decision due to unidentified consequences, options, or undetermined demarcation of the decision problem are called decisions under great uncertainty. This paper argues that public policy decisions on _how_ and _if_ to implement decision-making processes based on machine learning and AI for public use are such decisions. Decisions on public policy on AI are uncertain due to three features specific to the current landscape of AI, namely (i) the vagueness of the (...) definition of AI, (ii) uncertain outcomes of AI implementations and (iii) pacing problems. Given that many potential applications of AI in the public sector concern functions central to the public sphere, decisions on the implementation of such applications are particularly sensitive. Therefore, it is suggested that public policy-makers and decision-makers in the public sector can adopt strategies from the argumentative approach in decision theory to mitigate the established great uncertainty. In particular, the notions of framing and temporal strategies are considered. (shrink)

QUESTIONS DE METHODE I. Au contraire de Sartre qui, a partir de quelques elements cueillis dans les ecrits de HusserI concernant la conscience ima geante, a bllti sa propre doctrine de!'imagination, nous nous proposons de reconstituer, a partir de ces m~mes elements, ce qu'on pourrait appeler la theort:e husserlienne de l'imagination, c'est-a-dire la theorie que HusserI eut lui-m~me construite, s'il avait reuni en une synthese les elements qu'il a laisses epars. Une entreprise de ce genre est toujours delicate et souleve (...) des prob!emes difficiles - a commencer par celui de sa legitimite. N ous ecartons d'emblee l'objection d'ordre general qui contesterait Ie droit de systematiser dans l'reuvre d'un auteur ce que lui-m~me a laisse disperse et eventuellement inacheve. Par un tel scrupule, on sacrifie sans doute a la rigueur historique mais on est beaucoup moins soucieux de penetrer une pensee dans son dynamisme in terne et profond et, en derniere analyse, on protege les droits de l'archeologie mais non pas ceux de la culture et de son progreso Nous pensons a une difficulte beaucoup plus serieuse; de sa so lution depend l'attitude a adopter en face des textes dont nous devons nous servir dans notre etude. Nous utilisons des ouvrages qui couvrent la totalite de la car riere philosophique de HusserIl. (shrink)

In this conceptual article, we argue that defining corporate social responsibility and corporate social irresponsibility as opposite constructs produces a lack of clarity between responsible and irresponsible acts. Furthermore, we contend that the treatment of the CSR and CSI concepts as opposites de-emphasizes the value of CSI as a stand-alone construct. Thus, we reorient the CSI discussion to include multiple aspects that current conceptualizations have not adequately accommodated. We provide an in-depth exploration of how researchers define CSI and both identify (...) and analyze three important gray zones between CSR and CSI: the role of harm and benefit, the role of the actor and intentionality, and the role of rectification. We offer these gray zones as factors contributing to the present lack of conceptual clarity of the term CSI, as a concept in its own right, leading to difficulties that researchers and managers experience in categorizing CSI acts as distinct from CSR. (shrink)

The general definition of mental disorder stated in the fifth edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders seems to identify a mental disorder with a harmful dysfunction. However, the presence of distress or disability, which may be bracketed as the presence of harm, is taken to be merely usual, and thus not a necessary requirement: a mental disorder can be diagnosed as such even if there is no harm at all. In this paper, we focus on the (...) harm requirement. First, we clarify what it means to say that the harm requirement is not necessary for defining the general concept of mental disorder. In this respect, we briefly examine the two components of harm, distress and disability, and then trace a distinction between mental disorder tokens and mental disorder types. Second, we argue that the decision not to regard the harm requirement as a necessary criterion for mental disorder is tenable for a number of practical and theoretical reasons, some pertaining to conceptual issues surrounding the two components of harm and others pertaining to the problem of false negatives and the status of psychiatry vis-à-vis somatic medicine. However, we believe that the harm requirement can be maintained among the specific diagnostic criteria of certain individual mental disorders. More precisely, we argue that insofar as the harm requirement is needed among the specific diagnostic criteria of certain individual mental disorders, it should be unpacked and clarified. (shrink)

All the available evidence suggests that companies which are run with a view to the long term interests of their key stakeholders are more likely to prosper than those which take a short term, "shareholder first" approach. Indeed it is the central premise of this article that forces of economic globalisation and developments in the technology of mass communication will make stakeholder inclusion an increasingly essential component of corporate strategy in the 21st century. Put simply, companies, like governments and other (...) established institutions, need to listen, to process and to respond positively to the values and beliefs of their stakeholders – most especially their customers, employees and investors. Failure to do this will reduce competitiveness and increase the risk of corporate demise. (shrink)

In this paper we analyze an extension of Martin-Löf s intensional set theory by means of a set contructor P such that the elements of P are the subsets of the set S. Since it seems natural to require some kind of extensionality on the equality among subsets, it turns out that such an extension cannot be constructive. In fact we will prove that this extension is classic, that is “ true holds for any proposition A.

Esta propuesta se inscribe en el marco de análisis y comprensión de los procesos de subjetivación contemporáneos como maneras de imponer una esencia a una existencia. Puesto que hemos sido edificadas con las imágenes de otros, las mujeres hemos debido construirnos cada una con ellas. Siendo muy diversos los desenlaces de esta construcción, somos sin embargo parecidas al compartir una particular manera de vínculo: la experiencia que denomino del deseo de ser. Estando siempre sin hacer, somos siempre siendo y, aunque (...) dadas ya por hechas, cada mujer es el resultado de un tremendo esfuerzo y paciencia cuya resolución permite vivir. (shrink)

Psychological research on emotion perception anchors heavily on an object perception analogy. We present static “cues,” such as facial expressions, as objects for perceivers to categorize. Yet in the real world, emotions play out as dynamic multidimensional events. Current theoretical approaches and research methods are limited in their ability to capture this complexity. We draw on insights from a predictive coding account of neural activity and a grounded cognition account of concept representation to conceive of emotion perception as a stream (...) of synchronized conceptualizations between two individuals, which is supported and shaped by language. We articulate how this framework can illuminate the fundamental need to study culture, as well as other sources of conceptual variation, in unpacking conceptual synchrony in emotion. We close by suggesting that the conceptual system provides the necessary flexibility to overcome gaps in emotional synchrony. (shrink)

In this Interview, Professor Robert B. Brandom answered ten detailed questions about his philosophy of Rational Pragmatism and Semantic Expressivism, grouped into four topics. 1. Metaphysics and Anthropology, 2. Pragmatics and Semantics, 3. Epistemic Expressivism and 4. Philosophy of Logic. With his careful answers Professor Brandom offers many additional insights into his rigorously constructed account of the relationship “between what we say and think, and what we are saying and thinking about” around the human practice of asking for and giving (...) reasons. A final, additional question pointed at a principal motivation for putting together the present issue: how to reconcile Wittgenstein’s assertion that philosophy must not proffer any theories with the very explicit system of explanations Brandom has constructed. This same issue is addressed to some extent already in Professor Brandom’s new article contained in this issue, but his answer, asserting that he does not proffer a theory but only makes explicit what is already there, might be seen as an unambiguous statement of the continuous presence of a contested Wittgensteinian principle in Brandom’s work. (shrink)

ABSTRACTIn this paper, I argue for an Aristotelian way of accommodating supererogation within virtue ethics by retrieving an account of moral heroism and providing a picture of different degrees of virtue. This, I claim, is the most appropriate virtue-ethical background allowing us to talk about supererogation without falling prey to several dangers. After summarizing the main attempts to deny the compatibility of virtue and supererogation, I will present some recent proposals to accommodate supererogation within virtue ethics. Next, I will argue (...) that these proposals raise substantial worries. I will then offer an analysis of heroism and the degrees of virtue to outline my own alternative definition of supererogation in terms of heroic virtue. (shrink)

The present paper proposes an emergentist reading of Peirce, with special reference to his concept of evolution. Although the author never adopts the word “emergence” in a technical manner, it will be demonstrated that the core problem of emergence lies at the heart of his evolutionary doctrine, generally displayed by the interplay of his three well-known categories of Firstness, Secondness and Thirdness. Indeed, although the Classical pragmatists most quoted in connection to emergentism are Dewey and Mead (and William James to (...) some degree), scholars have recently suggested some emergentist readings of Peirce’s thought (cf. above all Tiercelin 1998, Quieroz & El-Hani 2006, Rose 2016), in particular with regard to semiotic process and cosmogony. Exploring further the path opened by those researches, the present paper aims to clarify the theoretical problem of emergent evolution from a pragmatist perspective and especially to illustrate Peirce’s emergentist standpoint. In order to reach this goal, the article is divided into four parts: after (1) a brief introduction to the contemporary debates on emergence, (2) I give a historical overview of Classical Pragmatism and British Emergentists, (3) with a special focus on the common roots of the British Emergentists and Peirce on evolution. Finally, (4) I offer an emergentist reading of Peirce’s theory of evolution. In particular, I show how his strong emphasis on chance and the “growth” of the universe go together with his arch-stone of synechism (that is his theory of continuity), through what he calls agapasm. (shrink)

A continuing need for care for elderly, combined with looser family structures prompt the question what filial obligations are. Do adult children of elderly have a duty to care? Several theories of filial obligation are reviewed. The reciprocity argument is not sensitive to the parent–child relationship after childhood. A theory of friendship does not offer a correct parallel for the relationship between adult child and elderly parent. Arguments based on need or vulnerability run the risk of being unjust to those (...) on whom a needs-based claim is laid. To compare filial obligations with promises makes too much of parents’ expectations, however reasonable they may be. The good of being in an unchosen relationship seems the best basis for filial obligations, with an according duty to maintain the relationship when possible. We suggest this relationship should be maintained even if one of the parties is no longer capable of consciously contributing to it. We argue that this entails a duty to care about one’s parents, not for one’s parents. This implies that care for the elderly is not in the first place a task for adult children. (shrink)

Ethicisation refers to the tendency to frame issues in ethical terms and can be observed in different areas of society, particularly in relation to policy-making on emerging technologies. The turn to ethics implies increased use of ethics expertise, or at least an expectation that this is the case. Calling for experts on ethics when ethically complicated questions need to be handled helps us to uphold central virtues, but there are also problems connected with ethicisation. In policy-making processes, the turn to (...) ethics may not always be a sign of a sincere aspiration to moral performance, but a strategic move to gain acceptance for controversial or sensitive activities, and ethicisation may depoliticise questions and constrain room for democratic participation. Nevertheless, ethicisation, and the ensuing call for ethics experts, suggests an expectation of confidence in ethics and ethics expertise, and that ethical guidance is an effective way of governing people’s behaviour in a morally desirable way. The purpose of this article is to explore democratic and epistemic challenges of ethicisation in the context of emerging technologies, with a specific focus on how the notions of _under-reliance_ and _over-reliance_ of ethics expertise can unpack the processes at play. By using biotechnology and the EU process of bio-patents and the publication of ethical guidelines for AI development as illustrations, it is demonstrated how ethicisation may give rise to democratic and epistemic challenges that are not explicitly addressed in discussions on the political use of ethics expertise. (shrink)

In the present paper, we explore the impact of singing for girls in rural Bangladesh. Previous findings in this field-based interview study (with 18 girls) have demonstrated that singing can act as a driving force in young girls’ psychological individuation processes, implying increased agency and autonomy. A critical question, however, is to what extent the village girls will manage to maintain a feeling of agency as they pass through puberty. How do they navigate between their own wish to continue singing (...) and pressure from cultural norms (such as getting married)? Using Margareth Archer’s morphogenetic approach and Arjun Appadurai’s approach to culture as a capacity as analytical tools, we connect different modes of reflexivity to the girls’ capacity to aspire. We discuss specific mechanisms that emerge as relevant for the girls/young women as they navigate their way through the Bengali rural society. (shrink)

In this article I analyze the connection between the concepts of “actuality”, “upcoming” and “origin” found in the early reflections of Walter Benjamin and Theodor W. Adorno to expose some of the defining borders of the transposition of criticisms made by both philosophers. Through the identification of “actuality” as a reflection on the conditions in which philosophy is legitimate, “upcoming” as a requisite for self-justification of philosophical knowledge, and “origin” as the claim of the historically unfinished, I show in what (...) sense a critical horizon is recovered by Benjamin and Adorno as an inexorable exercise of philosophical praxis. (shrink)

ABSTRACTThe continued rise of socio-economic inequality over the past decades with its connected political outcomes such as the Brexit vote in the UK, and the election of Donald Trump are currently a matter of intense debate both in academia and in journalism. One significant sign of the heightened interest was the surprise popularity of Thomas Piketty’s Capital in the twenty-first Century. The book reached the top of the bestseller lists and was described as a ‘media sensation’, with Piketty himself as (...) a ‘rock star economist’. This paper, drawing from a major international and cross-disciplinary study, investigates the print media treatment in four European countries of economic policy proposals presented in Capital. Applying social semiotic and critical discourse analysis, we specifically focus on articles which are in disagreement with these proposals and identify five categories of counterarguments used against Piketty: authorisation, moralisation, rationalisation, portrayal of victimhood and inevitab... (shrink)

The main aim of the present research is to analyze the predictive value of individual characteristics such as online self-efficacy, adaptability to uncertainty, and sources of stress during online learning on learning engagement. We also aimed to highlight if these relationships could be mediated by the online self-regulated learning strategies, during the COVID-19 pandemic. The participants were 529 university students and the design was cross-sectional. The results showed significant associations of the sources of stress in online learning with self-efficacy, leaning (...) engagement and self-regulated learning strategies. Self-regulated strategies—task strategies and goal setting represent mediators of stressors perceived by the students under the conditions of the sudden shift to online activity and online learning engagement. The most relevant self-regulation strategies seemed to be goal setting and task strategies, which confirm the need for a clear structure of learning in the context of online activities. The implications of this study reside in the increased awareness regarding how learning engagement in online learning can be predicted by individual characteristics. (shrink)

We show, first, that the normalization procedure for S4 modal logic presented by Dag Prawitz in [5] does not work. We then develop a new natural deduction system for S4 classical modal logic that is logically equivalent to that of Prawitz, and we show that every derivation in this new system can be transformed into a normal derivation.

In this article we aim to reconstruct some aspects of Davidson's idea of triangulation, and against this reconstruction, ask whether the idea is viciously circular. We begin by looking at the claim that without a triangularn setting, there is no saying what the cause of a being's responses is. In the first section we discuss the notion of relevant similarity, and what difference the presence of a second non‐linguistic being could make for the individuation of a common focus of attention. (...) In the second section we look at the role of a second person in language‐acquisition. It is important that being corrected to ‘go on as others do’ does not yet presuppose thought, and similarity standards can be applied to a learner's reactions even before she is aware of these standards. We also show why Davidson is not committed to any consensus view of correctness. In the last section we discern three charges of circularity that can be levelled against the idea of triangulation. We argue that Davidson can respond to the first two charges, and point to a way of answering the third. But the response we propound raises a new question, namely, why does the second being have to be a speaker or thinker even before the learner is aware of the three points of the triangle? (shrink)

This article tries to show that focusing on why and how subject and object are distinct is of key importance for understanding the nature of knowledge itself. It argues that: 1) cognition starts with an aliud which is present to a felt self in a way fundamentally different from one’s own modes of being; 2) individual human knowledge in its paradigmatic form is essentially first-personal, that is, its object-directedness requires a built-in, implicit awareness of a ‘self’ that provides the unifying (...) perspective from which the aliud is apprehended; 3) this is a first-order awareness which is crucially distinct from the second-order awareness which requires a reflexive cognitive act – a distinction which the author proposes to cash out in terms of ‘first-person knowledge’ versus ‘self-knowledge. (shrink)

Leading scholars examine the relation between Irigaray’s early writings and her later, more political work.

The rapid and unplanned change to teaching and learning in the online format brought by COVID-19 has likely impacted many, if not all, aspects of university students' lives worldwide. To contribute to the investigation of this change, this study focuses on the impact of the pandemic on student well-being, which has been found to be as important to student lifelong success as their academic achievement. Student well-being has been linked to their engagement and performance in curricular, co-curricular, and extracurricular activities, (...) intrinsic motivation, satisfaction, meaning making, and mental health. The purpose of this study was to examine how student perceptions of their degree completion and future job prospects during the pandemic impact their well-being and what role university support plays in this relationship. We used the conservation of resources theory to frame our study and to develop five hypotheses that were later tested via structural equation modeling. Data were collected from 2,707 university students in France, Germany, Russia, and UK via an online survey. The results showed that university support provided by instructors and administration plays a mediating role in the relationship between the perceived impact of COVID-19 on degree completion and future job prospects and levels of student well-being. Student well-being is decreased by their concerns for their degree completion but not by their concerns for future job prospects. In turn, concerns for future job prospects affect student well-being over time. These results suggest that in a “new normal,” universities could increase student well-being by making support to student studies a priority, especially for undergraduates. Also, universities should be aware of the students' changing emotional responses to crisis and ensure visibility and accessibility of student support. (shrink)

This special issue stresses the importance of material culture in diplomatic studies of science and technology. In our studies, objects are considered powerful tokens of complexity in diplomatic encounters and of asymmetry in international relations. The contributors are committed to theorizing about the role of objects in diplomatic exchanges during the postwar period and, at the same time, the role of diplomacy in constituting the materiality of nuclear things. Our approach combines attention to the political and diplomatic nuclear history with (...) recognition of the roles played by nuclear artifacts throughout the whole spectrum of diplomatic activities. On the whole, we argue that the material approach should be located at the center of the study of nuclear history and the diplomatic exchanges that made it possible. (shrink)

Cet ouvrage vigoureux, fruit d’une longue recherche que Christopher Moore a menée au cours des dix dernières années, propose une perspective nouvelle et stimulante sur les origines de la philosophie grecque. Plus précisément, comme l’explique Moore dans le premier chapitre introductif (p. 1-33), il ne s’est pas fixé pour objectif de reconstituer (la nième fois) le déroulement des doctrines des penseurs grecs à partir de Thalès, mais d’enquêter sur les significations prises par le terme philos...

El estudio y análisis de las argumentaciones cotidianas entendidas como interacciones discursivas e intencionales encaminadas a dar cuenta de algo con el fin de lograr que aquello que se sostiene sea aceptado, sería inconcebible sin la aparición de la teoría de los actos de habla de Austin (1962), la propuesta de Searle (1969), el trabajo de Grice sobre la teoría de la conversación (1975) y el importante estudio sistemático de Hamblin sobre el argumento falaz (1970). Como una reelaboración de dichas (...) obras cabe entender la teoría pragmadialéctica de la argumentación propuesta inicialmente por Frans H. van Eemeren y Rob Grootendorst (1984). Algunos autores (Blair, 2006: 11; Woods, 1992) creen ver en ella, más que una teoría, una amalgama de varias teorías y una particular versión de la teoría pragmadialéctica de la argumentación, entendiendo ésta bajo una acepción más general. Otros consideran que ni es útil ni tampoco especulativamente productivo sostener que de toda argumentación pueda buscarse un modelo según el cual ésta buscaría resolver una diferencia de opinión (Goodwin, 1999). (shrink)

The purpose of this qualitative study was to examine the perceptions related to ethics and cheating among a representative sample of primarily female undergraduate students, compared to trends reported in the literature. Focus groups were organized to discuss nine scripted questions. Transcripts and audiotapes were analyzed and four main themes emerged: demographics of those who cheat, students’ perceptions of cheating, the role of technology in cheating, and consequences of cheating, including students’ attitudes and behaviors related to reporting cheating incidents. Bandura’s (...) Social Cognitive Theory served as the theoretical framework to understand students’ varying perceptions of and justification for cheating, as well as the dynamics of honor code violations, via group discussion. Viewpoints on cheating were regularly discussed and contradictory views were identified related to frequency and justification for cheating. Utilizing the constant comparative method, students mentioned time limitations, and pressure from peers, parents, and professors as reasons to cheat. They also discussed pressures to achieve high grades for acceptance into graduate programs. Students were also reluctant to report their classmates for cheating incidents. Repeated and comprehensive education on ethical behavior is warranted. (shrink)

How do we perceive the agency of others? Do the same rules apply when interacting with others who are radically different from ourselves, like other species or robots? We typically perceive other people and animals through their embodied behavior, as they dynamically engage various aspects of their affordance field. In second personal perception we also perceive social or interactional affordances of others. I discuss various aspects of perceptible agency, which might begin to give us some tools to understand interactions also (...) with agents truly other than ourselves or “perhaps agents” like present and future social robots. Robots have various kinds of physical and behavioral presence and thus make their agency—if we want to call it that—perceptible in ways that computers and other forms of AI do not. The largely dualist assumptions pertaining to the hidden bodies of traditional Turing tests are discussed, as well as the social affordance effects of such indirect interactions as opposed to interactions in physically shared space. The question is what role various abilities to reveal, hide and dynamically control the body and broader behavior plays in heterogeneous tech or machine mediated interactions. I argue that the specifics and richness of perceptible agency matters to the kind of reciprocity we can obtain. (shrink)

Alongside the renowned male pioneers of medical cytogenetics, many women participated in investigations at the laboratory bench and the bedside, both in Europe and the Americas. These women were committed to this new biological and clinical practice—cytogenetics, the origins of contemporary genetic diagnosis—and contributed to the creation of new biological concepts and settings centered on the study of chromosome imaging. This paper will review the contributions made by a group of woman scientists from a wide geographical distribution, situating their names (...) and research agendas within the history of a field dating back to early plant and insect cytogenetics. Rather than an exhaustive compendium of women geneticists, this essay presents a kind of historical reconstruction that can be achieved by placing women at center stage in their geographies and networks of circulating cytogenetic knowledge and practices thereby relating a history of genetic images though the work carried out by women, retrieving their agency and constructing an inclusive history of an influential contemporary biomedical practice as it gained increasing influence in the laboratory and the clinic. (shrink)

Action, reason, and causes in Kant -- Can we act without feelings? Respect, sympathy and other forms of love -- A place for affects and passion in the Kantian system -- What can Kant teach us about emotions? -- Physiology and the controlling of affects in Kant's philosophy -- Virtue as a cure for affects and passions -- The beautiful and the good: refinement as an introduction to morality -- Women and emotion -- Evil and passion -- An emotional Kant?

In this paper, I will account for the importance of the notion of exemplarity within the contemporary virtue-ethical debate, both in its classic formulation (e.g., Hursthouse 1999) and in the recent exemplarist moral theory advanced by Linda T. Zagzebski (2015; 2017). Despite their differences, which I will discuss extensively, both theories are centered on a characterization of an exemplary virtuous agent that serves as a standard for determining what, in a given situation, is right, wrong, dutiful and forbidden. The first (...) two sections will be devoted to an assessment of the strengths and weaknesses of these two approaches. In the third, I will propose a different role of radical (i.e., exceptional) individuals, i.e., saints and heroes, within a virtue-ethical theory of right action. (shrink)

Durante la Ilustración escocesa se legitimó la “perspectiva del espectador imparcial” como garantía de juicios morales imparciales. Esta escuela de pensamiento se ha considerado tradicionalmente como la antesala del utilitarismo. Sin embargo, actualmente se sostiene que, aunque Hutcheson y Hume sí son protoutilitaristas, la teoría de Smith es la primera gran crítica al utilitarismo. En este ensayo atribuyo esta diferencia a la posición desde la que juzga el espectador —tercera o segunda persona— de la que se derivan estructuras metaéticas distintas (...) que condicionan, entre otras cosas, el significado de la noción de imparcialidad. (shrink)

One of Elizabeth Anscombe’s most decisive legacies is the rejection of modern legalistic morality, in the name of a rescue of Aristotelian-inspired natural normativity. However, as I will argue in this contribution, this legacy does not seem to have been fully collected, neither by those who, like Philippa Foot, are explicitly inspired by Anscombe’s work, nor by those who, while apparently opposing its assumptions, have also somehow recovered it by different routes, as emblematically does Christine Korsgaard in her constitutivist proposal. (...) In more detail, I aim to explore the relationship between teleology and normativity at the crossroads between neo-Aristotelian naturalism and constitutivism: both theories, though opposed, rest normativity on a link between function (the Aristotelian ergon) and practical reason and fail precisely in declining this relationship convincingly. (shrink)

Concepts as reasonable doubt, cognitive biases and emotions are now a theoretical problem for the practice of law, and the law understood as legal argumentation. From a theoretical point of view, the screenplay written by Reginald Rose, Twelve Angry Men, is an outstanding example to analyze some of these concepts, and its influence on procedural stage. Cognitive biases and informal fallacies are theoretical challenge to legal argumentation.

Was Iris Murdoch a virtue ethicist? At first sight, it would appear that she was not. She does not offer an explicit definition of account of the term ‘virtue’, and there are significant differences between her views and those of standard Aristotelian virtue ethicists. There is no reason, however, to think that the standard Aristotelian view represents the only legitimate form of virtue ethics. In this chapter, I begin by recalling (in section 1) the main commonalities between Murdoch’s criticisms of (...) the prevailing moral theories of her time and those of other first-wave virtue-ethicists. I then highlight (in section 2) some cornerstones of Murdoch’s peculiar approach to morality, which represent the background against which her account of virtue is developed, and I propose to trace these cornerstones back to a more diverse range of influences than the standard version of Aristotelianism. In section 3, I sketch the basics of Murdoch’s account of virtue, and I argue that there are at least three routes to vindicate it as a genuine virtue-ethical approach: the Buddhist, the Kantian and the Socratic-Aristotelian. I explore each of these routes in turn in sections 4, 5, and 6. In conclusion, I argue that the virtue-ethical field would benefit a great deal from the kind of pluralistic account of virtue that Murdoch offers. (shrink)

Philosophy with children often focuses on abstract reasoning skills, but as David Bohm points out the “entire process of mind” consists of our abstract thought as well as our “tacit, concrete process of thought.” Philosophy with children should address the “entire process of mind.” Our tacit, concrete process of thought refers to the process of thought that involves our actions such as the process of thought that goes into riding a bicycle. Bohm contends that we need to develop an awareness (...) or proprioception of thinking as well. When Socrates enters into dialogue with his interlocutors, he shows the limitations of purely abstract thought by leading them to admit that they really “don’t know.” But, of course, they know. We know what bravery is or what love is, even though we can never “explain” these concepts in abstract terms. Life has taught us through experience what these concepts mean and we have developed an understanding of them. We can recognize when a person acts bravely. This is where I see the link between our tacit, concrete process of thought and emotional intelligence. We need emotional intelligence to learn how to be brave, to learn how to love, and be just in the way we act in the world. Knowing what justice is abstractly does not make us act justly. We have to develop awareness of our actions in order to develop the skills necessary to act the part. This is also where emotional intelligence comes in. In the bulletin of the play Romeo and Juliet, director Barry Edelstein wrote the following: “To perform Romeo and Juliet, actors need a series of skills… they must have the emotional and psychological awareness and openness of uncommon depth; they must listen with acuteness, they must possess an imagination of real suppleness and subtlety…” An abstract portrayal would not bring these characters to life. We can surely agree – abstractly – that racism is destructive, but still act racist, without being even slightly aware of it. My contention is that while our abstract sense of racism has evolved, our tacit, concrete knowledge has not, which explains that racism is for the most part still rampant, even though we know abstractly that it is wrong. So how do we educate and develop the awareness of the tacit, concrete knowledge that informs our actions, and develop the emotional intelligence to give a depth of understanding to what we know and believe abstractly. (shrink)