For many years—and with some energy since Laudan’s “Confutation of Convergent Realism” —the scientific realist has sought to accommodate examples of false-yet-successful theories in the history of science. One of the most prominent strategies is to identify ‘success fueling’ components of false theories that themselves are at least approximately true. In this article I develop both sides of the debate, introducing new challenges from the history of science as well as suggesting adjustments to the divide et impera realist strategy. A (...) new ‘recipe’ for the prospective identification of working/idle posits is considered. (shrink)

One of the popular realist responses to the pessimistic meta-induction is the ‘selective’ move, where a realist only commits to the ‘working posits’ of a successful theory, and withholds commitment to ‘idle posits’. Antirealists often criticise selective realists for not being able to articulate exactly what is meant by ‘working’ and/or not being able to identify the working posits except in hindsight. This paper aims to establish two results: sometimes a proposition is, in an important sense, ‘doing work’, and yet (...) does not warrant realist commitment, and the realist will be able to respond to PMI-style historical challenges if she can merely show that certain selected posits do not require realist commitment. These two results act to significantly adjust the dialectic vis-à-vis PMI-style challenges to selective realism. (shrink)

This article analyzes the moral relevance of technological artifacts and its possible role in ethical theory, by taking the postphenomenological approach that has developed around the work of Don Ihde into the domain of ethics. By elaborating a postphenomenological analysis of the mediating role of ultrasound in moral decisions about abortion, the article argues that technologies embody morality and help to constitute moral subjectivity. This technological mediation of the moral subject is subsequently addressed in terms of Michel Foucault’s ethical position, (...) in which ethics is about actively co-shaping one’s moral subjectivity. Integrating Foucauldian ethics and postphenomenology, the article argues that the technological mediation of moral subjectivity should be at the heart of an ethical approach that takes the moral dimensions of technology seriously. (shrink)

We take up the challenge of developing an international network with capacity to survey the world’s scientists on an ongoing basis, providing rich datasets regarding the opinions of scientists and scientific sub-communities, both at a time and also over time. The novel methodology employed sees local coordinators, at each institution in the network, sending survey invitation emails internally to scientists at their home institution. The emails link to a ‘10 second survey’, where the participant is presented with a single statement (...) to consider, and a standard five-point Likert scale. In June 2023, a group of 30 philosophers and social scientists invited 20,085 scientists across 30 institutions in 12 countries to participate, gathering 6,807 responses to the statement Science has put it beyond reasonable doubt that COVID-19 is caused by a virus. The study demonstrates that it is possible to establish a global network to quickly ascertain scientific opinion on a large international scale, with high response rate, low opt-out rate, and in a way that allows for significant (perhaps indefinite) repeatability. Measuring scientific opinion in this new way would be a valuable complement to currently available approaches, potentially informing policy decisions and public understanding across diverse fields. (shrink)

The paper discusses al-Kindī's response to doctrines held by contemporary theologians of the Mu‘tazilite school: divine attributes, creation, and freedom. In the first section it is argued that, despite his broadly negative theology, al-Kindī recognizes a special kind of “essential” positive attribute belonging to God. The second section argues that al-Kindī agreed with the Mu‘tazila in holding that something may not yet exist but still be an object of God's knowledge and power. Also it presents a new parallel between al-Kindī (...) and John Philoponus. The third section gives an interpretation of al-Kindī as a compatibilist, in other words as holding that humans may be free even though their actions are necessitated. In all three cases, it is argued, al-Kindī is close to the Mu‘tazilite point of view, though he departs from them in the arguments he gives for that point of view. (shrink)

The most comprehensive compilation of the works of Abelard and Heloise ever presented in a single volume in English, _The Letters and Other Writings_ features an accurate and stylistically faithful new translation of both _The Calamities of Peter Abelard_ and the remarkable letters it sparked between the ill-fated twelfth-century philosopher and his brilliant former student and lover—an exchange whose intellectual passion, formal virtuosity, and psychological drama distinguish it as one of the most extraordinary correspondences in European history. Thanks to (...) this edition, Latin-less readers will be better placed than ever to see why this undisputed milestone in the intellectual life of medieval France is also a masterpiece of Western literature. In addition to the _The Calamities_ and the letters--the first complete English translation of all seven in more than eighty years--this volume includes an Introduction, a map, and a chronology, Abelard's _Confession of Faith_, letters between Heloise and Peter the Venerable, the Introduction to _The Questions of Heloise_, and selected songs and poems by Abelard, among them a previously untranslated shaped poem, Open Wide Your Eyes. Extracts of lost letters sometimes ascribed to Abelard and Heloise are given in appendixes. (shrink)

Even among critics not particularly concerned with detective fiction, Dashiell Hammett’s fourth novel, The Glass Key , is famous for carrying the so-called objective method to almost obsessive lengths: we are never told what the characters are thinking, only what they do and look like. Anyone’s decisions about anyone else’s intentions are interpretive decisions, dependent on correct presuppositions—on having the right interpretive key. The novel’s title, in part, refers to this kind of key. Ned Beaumont, the protagonist, has to decide (...) how to govern his relationship with Janet Henry; one of his major clues to her mind is a dream that she tells him, a dream that climaxes in an attempt to lock a door against an onslaught of snakes. Dream interpretation is difficult enough to begin with, and Janet Henry compounds that difficulty by telling the dream twice. In the first version, the attempt to lock the door succeeds; in the second, the key turns out to be made of glass and it shatters. Ned Beaumont, in deciding which dream to us as his key, chooses the second —but it is a choice based on an intuitive mix of experience and faith, knowledge and hunch.A reader often faces the same difficulties that Ned Beaumont does. Reading a book, too, requires us to make a choice about what key to use to unlock it, and that choice must often be based on an intuitive mix of experience and faith, knowledge and hunch. For example, as I shall show, the experience of reading certain texts—not all, but a significant number of them—is problematic because it depends in part on whether the reader has chosen, before picking them up, to approach them as popular or serious. My argument hinges on two prior claims. First, I contend that one way of defining genres is to consider them as bundles of operations which readers perform in order to recover the meanings of texts rather than as sets of features found in the texts themselves. To put this crudely but more modishly, genres can be viewed as strategies that readers use to process texts. Second, I argue that popular literature and serious literature can be viewed as broad genre categories. Peter J. Rabinowitz is associate professor of comparative literature at Hamilton College. He is currently working on a book about literary conventions and is also active as a music critic for such publications as Fanfare and Ovation. His previous contributions to Critical Inquiry are “Truth in Fiction: A Reexamination of Audiences” and “Who Was That Lady? Pluralism and Critical Method”. (shrink)

School leaders are optimally positioned to identify teachers who would make strong and inspiring administrators. Today's Teachers, Tomorrow's Leaders: A Guide to Identifying and Developing Future Administrators by Peter Marshall guides leaders on how to spot teachers with the potential to lead and how to model the skills and behaviors that will make them successful. Marshall describes ten Ways of Being of the impactful school leader and presents his Situational Leadership Model to help leaders identify teachers who exhibit strong (...) leadership qualities and to inspire them to take the leap. Thoroughly researched with real-life applications, Today's Teachers, Tomorrow's Leaders is a practical guide full of sample meeting planners, planning pages, and other useful resources to streamline the selection process. (shrink)

The theory proposed by Fitouchi et al. misses the core of puritanical morality: Cruel punishment for harmless actions. Punishment is mutually harmful, unlike cooperation which is mutually beneficial. Theories of moral judgment should not obscure this fundamental distinction.

Young’s paper (2012) offers an interesting and fruitful extension to recent work on Cotard’s syndrome, and in particular, a philosophical investigation of how and why beliefs around death and non-existence frequently co-occur with beliefs around immortality. In this brief response, we discuss a few issues from the paper. Namely, the issue of Cotard delusion being a natural kind, the seeming paradox of death and immortality and its relation to wider culture and literature, and the utility of the concept of misplaced (...) being. (shrink)

The aim of this paper is to shed some light on the distinction between justified and unjustified religious diversity, a problem that Dirk-Martin Grube only hinted at in his article ‘Justified Religious Difference.’ This article’s focus is not so much on the epistemological question of justifying religious difference, but on how to deal with it in the societal sphere. This implies that religions and religious diversity will be approached from a practical perspective, that is, as ways of life. I start (...) by examining the opportunities and problems of religious diversity, opposing a universalist and a particularist view on this issue. Religious difference is an opportunity, because it is intertwined with creativity and innovation, but it is also a problem, because it confronts us with incompatible judgments, irreconcilable values, and contrary principles. Notwithstanding the legitimate objections that can be raised against the particularist position, the above observations seriously undermine Grube’s idea that the distinction between justified and unjustified religious difference can be made unambiguously, because of the heterogeneous character of the idea of justification itself. In order to deal with this issue, I propose a re-examination of the idea of tolerance, defined as a virtue: I disapprove of your manner of living, but I respect in it your liberty to live as you please and I recognize your right to manifest it publicly. But this virtue makes only sense against the background of the intolerable, which is the translation of the idea of unjustified religious difference into the language of the public debate. This idea serves as an always fragile limit to tolerance. (shrink)

Just what is philosophy? Is there objective truth? Is self-knowledge possible? What is being? What is man's relation to nature? Is it possible for human reason to know God? If there is a God, why is there evil? What is happiness and how can we achieve it? If you've ever wondered about the answers to any of these questions, this is the book for you!...Every Catholic should own one book on philosophy. This is it." [taken from back cover].

Abelard's major ethical writings--Ethics, or Know Yourself, and Dialogue between a Philosopher, a Jew and a Christian, are presented here in a student edition including cross-references, explanatory notes, a full table of references, bibliography, and index.

This chapter deals with al-Kindī’s metaphysics, which in this context means theology and the idea that being is an emanation or creation from God. Depending on the Neoplatonists, especially Proclus, al-Kindī proves God’s existence by arguing for the need for a “true One”, whose absolute simplicity rules out a multiplicity of divine attributes.

Discusses the nature of philosophical rationality and modernity.