Are words like ‘woman’ or ‘man’ sex terms that we use to talk about biological features of individuals? Are they gender terms that we use to talk about non-biological features e.g. social roles? Contextualists answer both questions affirmatively, arguing that these terms concern biological or non-biological features depending on context. I argue that a recent version of contextualism from Jennifer Saul that Esa Diaz-Leon develops doesn't exhibit the right kind of flexibility to capture our theoretical intuitions or moral and political (...) practices concerning our uses of these words. I then float the view that terms like 'woman' or 'man' are polysemous, arguing that it makes better sense of the significance of some forms of criticisms of mainstream gender ideology. (shrink)

Upon doing something generous for someone with whom you are close, some kind of reciprocity may be appropriate. But it often seems wrong to actually request reciprocity. This chapter explores the wrongness in making these requests, and why they can nevertheless appear appropriate. After considering several explanations for the wrongness at issue (involving, e.g. distinguishing oughts from obligation, the suberogatory, imperfect duties, and gift-giving norms), a novel proposal is advanced. The requests are disrespectful; they express that their agent insufficiently trusts (...) the hearer to recognize their own reasons to reciprocate, and the close relationship between them morally requires this kind of trust. This proposal is articulated and situated in the recent discussion of the normativity of requests. The chapter concludes by explaining how these requests may appear appropriate. Agents in these relationships often have standing to make requests, though the standing is lacking in these particular cases. (shrink)

A critical survey of various positions on the nature, use, possession, and analysis of normative concepts. We frame our treatment around G.E. Moore’s Open Question Argument, and the ways metaethicists have responded by departing from a Classical Theory of concepts. In addition to the Classical Theory, we discuss synthetic naturalism, noncognitivism (expressivist and inferentialist), prototype theory, network theory, and empirical linguistic approaches. Although written for a general philosophical audience, we attempt to provide a new perspective and highlight some underappreciated problems (...) about normative concepts. (shrink)

Ethicists struggle to take reductive views seriously. They also have trouble conceiving of some supervenience failures. Understanding why provides further evidence for a kind of hybrid view of normative concept use.

On one way of talking about a traditional metaethical topic, realists accept that some items appear on the list of what exists in the moral or more broadly normative domain of inquiry. They then divide over whether those items are like what science and experience suggest that all other items on the list of what exists across all domains are like – naturalistic and secular. Reductive naturalists answer this further question affirmatively. Why don’t nonnaturalists? I explore the answer that it’s (...) because normative entities are “just too different” in the sense that they are countably different things. However, I argue that this answer rests on the subtle presupposition that the normative domain doesn’t also contain uncountable entities of the sort that analytic metaphysicians call “stuff”. Taking intuitions of difference seriously points the way to a novel form of metaethical reductive naturalism. The key is to identify the stuff that matters. (shrink)

Analytical study of the social theories of Muslim philosophers belonged to 9th to 18th centuries.

The Priestley duality for Wajsberg algebras is developed. The Wajsberg space is a De Morgan space endowed with a family of functions that are obtained in rather natural way.As a first application of this duality, a theorem about unicity of the structure is given.

NG van Kampen is a well-known theoretical physicist who has had a long and distinguished career. His research covers scattering theory, plasma physics, statistical mechanics, and various mathematical aspects of physics. In addition to his scientific work, he has written a number of papers about more general aspects of science. An indefatigable fighter for intellectual honesty and clarity, he has pointed out repeatedly that the fundamental ideas of physics have been needlessly obscured. As those papers appeared in various journals, partly (...) in Dutch, it was felt that it would be worthwhile to collect them (translating the Dutch material into English) and make them available to a larger audience. This is a book of major importance to scientists and university teachers. (shrink)

In Unbelievable Errors, Bart Streumer argues via elimination for a global error theory, according to which all normative judgments ascribe properties that do not exist. Streumer also argues that it is not possible to believe his view, which is a claim he uses in defending his view against several objections. I argue that reductivists and nonreductivists have compelling responses to Streumer's elimination argument – responses constituting strong reason to reject Streumer’s diagnosis of any alleged incredulity about his error theory.

The question to be discussed in this paper can be put in simple terms: at what date were the collections of scholia on classical Greek authors compiled? Scholars have given two conflicting answers. The first was put forward by J. W. White in his edition of the scholia to Aristophanes' Birds. Developing an opinion of Dindorf, he suggested that the archetype of the scholia was a large parchment codex of the fourth or fifth century, which contained in the margins a (...) commentary drawn from several sources. A very similar view has been expressed about the scholia to Apollonius Rhodius and Pindar. (shrink)

Analytic Philosophy, Volume 63, Issue 1, Page 16-27, March 2022.

As the editor of the new Budé edition of Diodorus Siculus 19 has said, R is ‘the more often correct’ of the two main manuscripts and the other, F, has a number of acceptable variants; and she reckons the division between R and F to have been ‘fairly ancient’. All other manuscripts are merely copies, more or less faithful, of R and F. For the passage which I wish to consider I quote the text as given in R.

The discovery of the inscription with the name of [M]iltiades, which confirmed the statement in Dionysius Halicarnassensis 7. 3. 1 that a Miltiades was archon at Athens in 524/3, prompts a reconsideration of the problems presented by the accounts in Herodotus and in Marcellinus Life of Thucydides concerning the Philaid family. To the question, who is this Miltiades, the following answers have been given. ‘He is not a Philaid.’ The objection to this answer is that the Peisistratids either occupied the (...) archonship themselves or gave it to members of leading families, such as Cleisthenes the Alcmeonid in 525/4; if then this Miltiades was a member of a leading family, he is almost certainly a member of the Philaid family. ‘He is the elder Miltiades who founded the settlement in the Chersonese.’ In Herodotus' account Miltiades left Athens, where he was already powerful, at the beginning of a tyranny by Peisistratus; then after several operations in the Chersonese Miltiades was rescued by Croesus. The year in which Miltiades left Athens was either 561/0 or 556/5 and almost certainly the latter; for in 561/0 Croesus was not on the throne. The year 546 may be excluded; for in 546 autumn and winter Croesus had neither the time nor the opportunity to concern himself with Miltiades, since Cyrus was then at war with Lydia and seized Sardis.2 If Miltiades was powerful in 556/5, he was at that date no youngster but at least in his thirties—a man born say c. 590. In 524/3, being well on in his sixties and having spent thirty years and more in the Chersonese, this Miltiades is unlikely to have been the eponymous archon. We conclude, then, that the archon Miltiades in 524/3 was a different and younger Miltiades. Having cleared the ground on these two points, I turn to the central problem, whether there were two men called Miltiades, one born c. 590 and the other the general who died of a wound soon after 489, or whether there were three men called Miltiades, one of whom was in a generation intermediate between Miltiades born c. 590 and Miltiades dead c. 489. Either solution is chronologically possible. (shrink)

In 1023ff. the poet explains that he has not been spoiled by success. The verb ༐κτελσαι in 1024 has been suspected, and though recent editors accept it, taking it as absolute, I am far from convinced that it is what the author wrote. Blaydes, in his usual fashion, records conjectures and makes some of his own, but though he hits the mark quite often in Aristophanes as he does in Sophocles, in this passage his efforts, e.g. ༐κγελσαι, fail to satisfy. (...) I propose instead ༐κχαλσαι, ‘relax’. It might be transitive, but I slightly prefer to take it as intransitive. It is a rare word and all the more likely to be corrupted. The best parallel I can find is Hippocrates, De Octimestri Partu 1.2 : ουες ༐υ oσι τυ ρχυ ༐τρøη, ὣσπερ τυ σταχωυ, ζεχλασαυ πρσθευ υαγκαζμευου 祴 τελεως ζαδρυυθυαι τυ καρπυ. The verb is correctly transmitted in the best MS, Marc.gr. 269, while the other main source of the treatise, Vat.gr. 276, offers ζεκλεσαυ9, which is clearly due to an error by a scribe who did not recognize the unusual word required by the context. As to the date of this treatise, it is believed by one of the best modern authorities to be no later than the end of the fifth century and is therefore nearly contemporary with Aristophanes. (shrink)

Although much of great interest has been written recently about the period of the socalled Peace of Philocrates, little or nothing has been said of a passage which provides important information in Justin's Epitome of the Historiae Philippicae of Pompeius Trogus. This passage, 8.3.12–15, comes between the destruction of Olynthus and the arrival of the Athenian envoys at Pella . In subject matter it corresponds with ‘the subjugation of Thrace and Thessaly’ in Prologue 8 of Pompeius Trogus – a topic (...) which Justin began in 8.3.1–6 and continued in our passage, 8.3.12–15. (shrink)

The reconstructions of the Orthagoras genealogy are so numerous and so different that it is rarely used for chronological purposes. The aim of this paper is to show that there is clear evidence on this subject, and that it has chronological value.

The source-criticism2 of Diodorus XVI has been dominated by the principle of argument from detail. Thus, if two details in Diodorus' text are found to conflict, they are assumed to derive from different sources and, if similar, from the same source; and, where a fragment of an ancient historian is found to resemble a passage in Diodorus, that historian is assumed to be the source employed by Diodorus in that passage; finally, when a sufficient mosaic of such details is pieced (...) together, general divisions are drawn to embrace each separate detail. But this principle is of questionable value: for it implies the tacit assumption that Diodorus made no mistake in compressing or transcribing detail, added no colour himself, and could only have derived a given detail, described in a given manner, from the one ancient historian whose description of that detail is preserved. When one remembers that Diodorus is a careless and unintelligent compiler of a compendious narrative, who aimed like Ephorus at lending each book a unity, and that the fragments of the many historians whom Diodorus may have excerpted are very scanty, it is clear that this principle admits of a large margin of error. (shrink)

As part of an ethics course, health professions students were asked to identify ethical issues and to propose resolutions before and after a class discussion of a case involving confidentiality and substance abuse. Students listed an average of 2.4 issues before and 3.6 issues after the discussion. After discussion 50 per cent of students made explicit changes in their proposed resolution. Opinions varied widely on breaching confidentiality and the responsibility for protecting the patient's health. After the discussion almost 20 per (...) cent of the class felt it was acceptable to breach confidentiality as long as the patient was unaware. Many students identified more with the health care provider than with the patient. The presence of substance abuse altered many students' views on confidentiality. In this experience students were less rigorous in their application of principles, creating an excellent opportunity for teaching through exploration of the complexity of ethical decision-making in a specific case. (shrink)

The revolution in science and technology is significantly changing the character of production and work. One of the important aspects of this change is that labor becomes a scientifically organized process that makes increased demands on development of the human factor in production. The most productive scientific ideas, the most perfect technologies, when combined with production, may fail to produce the desired "yield" unless a sufficient number of well-trained personnel, or of the required organizational structures corresponding to the level of (...) societal relationships, the habits of collective work, and human psychology, are available. Implementation of a truly scientific organization of work presumes as a condition that a considerable level of development will already have been achieved in socialist labor discipline, as well as habits of collectivism and ethical motivations for work, and not merely occupational skills and qualities. More precisely, the list of qualities that, while they may not be occupational in the strict sense are nonetheless necessary features of the person employed in socialist society, includes general cultural and moral development, social activity, and political consciousness. The transformation of work into a scientifically organized process presumes an increasing demand for a highly skilled labor force with comprehensive development. Moreover, the development of the labor force and the rise in its skills should run ahead of the development of the means of production. It is precisely this that determines the need for conscious management of the development of the human being. For comprehensive development of the labor force to run ahead of the means of production requires considerable outlays for occupational and general cultural training of the direct participants in production. A worker of a new type, with a higher level of general and occupational education, will emerge in the course of implementation of a complex of economic, social, and scientific-technological measures. (shrink)

Arrian was better qualified to understand the nature and significance of ‘the pursuit’ in Macedonian warfare than any modern scholar. He had himself fought and commanded in a very similar kind of warfare, and he was keenly interested in the study of military tactics. He was also better informed about the pursuits which Alexander had conducted, because he was able to use the accounts of Alexander's contemporaries, Ptolemy and Aristobulus. Anyone today who wishes to question the veracity of Arrian's reports (...) of these pursuits cannot do so of his own experience. He should therefore turn to comparable pursuits of recent times which have been reported accurately beyond any shadow of doubt. (shrink)