ExcerptIt can be argued that we are currently living in a time characterized by a widespread perception of “discontinuity,” of a rupture in historical continuity. This rupture appears to have been brought about by the alleged demise of the secular paradigm, underpinning the Enlightenment project of modernity, caused by the outbreak of religious fervor and spirituality at the dawn of the new millennium. The perceived rupture in the natural progression of secular modernity has led to the questioning of the assumed (...) link of modernity and secularity1 and to the critique of Enlightenment theories and postulates regarding the disenchantment of the…. (shrink)

ExcerptThere are a number of ways of considering the current crisis in Western universities and, in particular, their problems with ideas and practices about truth and truthfulness. One is to see it as a problem created by what is often termed “modernity,” which is to say the issues raised and the processes set in motion by the Enlightenment and the various reactions to it in the West. Going down this road invariably means invoking modern thinkers, ranging from Nietzsche to Weber (...) to Foucault, all of whom provide considerable insight into the way in which certain ideas in the West have…. (shrink)

Perception is our key to the world. It plays at least three different roles in our lives. It justifies beliefs and provides us with knowledge of our environment. It brings about conscious mental states. It converts informational input, such as light and sound waves, into representations of invariant features in our environment. Corresponding to these three roles, there are at least three fundamental questions that have motivated the study of perception. How does perception justify beliefs and yield knowledge of our (...) environment? How does perception bring about conscious mental states? How does a perceptual system accomplish the feat of converting varying informational input into mental representations of invariant features in our environment? -/- This book presents a unified account of the phenomenological and epistemological role of perception that is informed by empirical research. So it develops an account of perception that provides an answer to the first two questions, while being sensitive to scientific accounts that address the third question. The key idea is that perception is constituted by employing perceptual capacities - for example the capacity to discriminate instances of red from instances of blue. Perceptual content, consciousness, and evidence are each analyzed in terms of this basic property of perception. Employing perceptual capacities constitutes phenomenal character as well as perceptual content. The primacy of employing perceptual capacities in perception over their derivative employment in hallucination and illusion grounds the epistemic force of perceptual experience. In this way, the book provides a unified account of perceptual content, consciousness, and evidence. (shrink)

In Metaphysics of States of Affairs, Bo Meinertsen reviews and works out several underdeveloped points in the existing scholarly debate on states of affairs, and presents his own original account in detail. In this paper, we raise three problems for Meinertsen’s account and draw attention to an alternative view that, though not discussed in the book, is not beset by these problems.

The rapidly growing research on hybrid organizations in recent years suggests that these organizations may have particular abilities to facilitate institutional change. This article contributes to our understanding of change and, in particular, sustainable transformation in society by highlighting the importance of organizational forms. Looking more closely at the role of hybrid organizations in processes of path generation, we analyze the conditions under which hybrid organizations may enable path generation. A retrospective exploratory case study of the Swedish hybrid organization The (...) Natural Step confirms how hybrids can take part in- and may facilitate the early phases of path generation: assimilation and coalescence. The conclusion drawn is that hybrids have multivocal abilities that enable them to earn trust and authority to open up “neutral” spaces for orientation and connection between actors in separated sub-paths, and that this in turn may ease tensions and trigger dialogue and exchange, also between former opponents. Yet, as also seen in the case, this enabling position of the hybrid may be both fragile and temporary. (shrink)

Nietzsche and the Long Flight of the “Good European”. The question of “the good European,” as Nietzsche conceives it, refers to a complex process of cultural transformation that starts from the critical relationship toward the European Christian heritage. The three volumes discussed in this review single out three different aspects of this cultural process: a “new Enlightenment,” which refers to the gradual liberation from the European tradition “in search of good Europeans” (Crescenzi / Gentili / Venturelli 2017), the early twentieth-century (...) debate around “European identity” (Crescenzi / Gentili / Venturelli 2018), in which the good European takes on a precise role, and contemporary Europe and the current relevance of the good European (Brusotti / McNeal / Schubert / Siemens 2020). This review discusses and reflects critically on these three volumes, examining how they contribute to contemporary debates about Nietzsche and the question of a European culture. (shrink)

Drawing from extensions of existing ideas in the logic of ground, a novel account of the grounds of necessity is presented, the core of which states that necessary truths are necessary because they stand in specific grounding connections.

Cet article est une contribution à la lecture de Fûdo, le milieu humain, ouvrage du philosophe japonais Watsuji Testurô qui aborde le thème du rapport de l’être humain au monde. Cette réflexion veut en éclairer certaines thèses, les comparer aux catégories de la philosophie occidentale et déterminer si Fûdo peut se comprendre comme une pensée de la finitude.

The European policies acknowledge greenways and “Green Infrastructure” as strategically planned and delivered networks comprising the broadest range of green spaces and other environmental features. The Aniene River, linking the eastern suburbs of Rome to the City of Tivoli, has been envisaged in a multi-level approach as a Green-Blue Infrastructure able to hinder land use fragmentation and provide new continuity to remainders of open space. In turn, landscape is taken into account as a biodiversity reservoir, the scenery of outstanding cultural (...) heritage and the relevant backdrop of ordinary life. (shrink)

In an age of rapid advances inlife-prolonging treatment, patients and caregivers areincreasingly facing tensions in making end-of-lifedecisions. An examination of the history of healthcare in the United States reveals technological,economic, and medical factors that have contributed tothe problems of terminal care and consequently to themovement of assisted suicide. The movement has itsroots in at least two fundamental perceptions andexpectations. In the age of technological medicineenergized by the profit motive, dying comes at a highprice in suffering and in personal economic loss. (...) Thefailure to provide affordable resources for terminalcare is the result of the marketplace in health care. The medical profession has been painfully slow inresponding to the challenges of terminal care, mainlybecause of the pressures of the marketplace and lackof adequate training. This has occurred at a time ofrapid advances in life-sustaining treatment and ofexpanding public awareness of personal rights underthe law. Overly aggressive treatment in the finalstages of terminal illness has enhanced anxieties overa painfully prolonged and expensive dying. Thesefactors have promoted the movement to assistedsuicide. In the U.S. debate of the issues, ethiciststend to argue abstractly without examiningadequately the context of terminal care that is thehealth care system. It is a system in dire need of areform that will remove it from the marketplace. (shrink)

A short overview of the philosophical significance of perceptual contents.

I provide a case-by-case definition of essential truths based on the notions of metaphysical necessity and ontological dependence. Relying on suggestions in the literature, I adopt a definition of the latter notion in terms of the notion of ground. The resulting account is adequate in the sense that it is not subject to Kit Fine’s famous counterexamples to the purely modal account of essence. In addition, it provides us with a novel conception of truths pertaining to the essence of objects, (...) which might help to dispel doubts on the legitimacy of the notion of essence itself. (shrink)

In discussions of perception and its relation to knowledge, it is common to distinguish what one comes to believe on the basis of perception from the distinctively perceptual basis of one's belief. The distinction can be drawn in terms of propositional contents: there are the contents that a perceiver comes to believe on the basis of her perception, on the one hand; and there are the contents properly attributed to perception itself, on the other. Consider the content.

“Locke and Leibniz and the Debate over Species” An examination of Leibniz's reaction to Locke's theory of essences and species, exploring both his responses in the New Essays and his deeper views on species as developed in his other, more esoteric works. The central thesis is that the responses Leibniz offers in the New Essays are inadequate as a refutation of Locke. Not only does Leibniz misunderstand Locke's theory of nominal and real essences but in arguing against Lockealso relies on (...) his more considered views, requiring metaphysical assumptions that, if accepted, do not even allow Locke's original concerns about species and essences to arise. (shrink)

A common way of clarifying the notion of ground is by way of examples from logic: thus a conjunction is grounded in both of its conjuncts; a disjunction in each of its true disjuncts; a double negation in its negatum; and so on. Developing a semantics that accommodates these logical examples in full generality turned out to be a difficult task. In this paper, I develop a novel approach that substitutes fusion for a more discerning relation of combination between states (...) in the framework of truth-maker semantics. (shrink)

In the third chapter of his major work, the Controversy over the Existence of the World, Roman Ingarden discusses four varieties of dependence entities might exhibit. The aim of this essay is to explore these varieties and to put the claims Ingarden makes concerning them on a rigorous footing.

In part one I present a positive argument for the claim that philosophical argument can rationally overturn common sense. It is widely agreed that science can overturn common sense. But every scientific argument, I argue, relies on philosophical assumptions. If the scientific argument succeeds, then its philosophical assumptions must be more worthy of belief than the common sense proposition under attack. But this means there could be a philosophical argument against common sense, each of whose premises is just as worthy (...) of belief as the scientist’s philosophical assumptions. If so, then the purely philosophical argument will also succeed. In part two I consider three motivations, each of which comprises a distinct philosophical methodology, for the opposing view: the Moorean idea that common sense enjoys greater plausibility than philosophy; case judgments should trump general principles; reflective equilibrium and conservatism. I argue that all three motivations fail. (shrink)

Those who model doxastic states with a set of probability functions, rather than a single function, face a pressing challenge: can they provide a plausible decision theory compatible with their view? Adam Elga and others claim that they cannot, and that the set of functions model should be rejected for this reason. This paper aims to answer this challenge. The key insight is that the set of functions model can be seen as an instance of the supervaluationist approach to vagueness (...) more generally. We can then generate our decision theory by applying the general supervaluationist semantics to decision-theoretic claims. The result: if an action is permissible according to all functions in the set, it’s determinately permissible; if impermissible according to all, determinately impermissible; and – crucially – if permissible according to some, but not all, it’s indeterminate whether it’s permissible. This proposal handles with ease some difficult cases ) on which alternative decision theories falter. One reason this view has been overlooked in the literature thus far is that all parties to the debate presuppose that an acceptable decision theory must classify each action as either permissible or impermissible. But I will argue that this thought is misguided. Seeing the set of functions model as an instance of supervaluationism provides a compelling motivation for the claim that there can be indeterminacy in the rationality of some actions. (shrink)

This book breaks new ground in our understanding of how we perceive and represent the space around us - one of the central topics in cognitive psychology. It presents a new view of development and spatial cognition by reversing the usual focus on vision and examining the evidence on representation in the total absence of vision without specific brain damage. Findings from the author's work with congenitally totally blind and with sighted children, together with studies from a wide variety of (...) other areas, are set in the context of intersensory and spatial development. Touch and movement are considered as converging sources of reference information with and without vision. The findings have important implications for future work in many fields, particularly developmental pscychology; cognition, cognitive neuroscience and visual handicap, and make this new work essential reading for students and researchers in these fields. (shrink)

A powerful critique of nudge theory and the paternalist policies of behavioral economics, and an argument for a more inclusive form of rationality.

P. van Inwagen famously offered three precise versions of the so-called Consequence Argument for incompatibilism. The third of these essentially employs the notion of an agent’s having a choice with respect to a proposition. In this paper, I offer two intuitively attractive accounts of this notion in terms of the explanatory connective ‘because’ and explore the prospects of the third argument once they are in play. Under either account, the argument fails.

This paper defends a principle I call Equal Treatment, according to which the rationality of a belief is determined in precisely the same way as the rationality of any other state. For example, if wearing a raincoat is rational just in case doing so maximizes expected value, then believing some proposition P is rational just in case doing so maximizes expected value. This contrasts with the popular view that the rationality of belief is determined by evidential support. It also contrasts (...) with the common idea that in the case of belief, there are two different incommensurable senses of rationality, one of which is distinctively epistemic. I present considerations that favor Equal Treatment over these two alternatives, reply to objections, and criticize some arguments for Evidentialism. I also show how Equal Treatment opens the door to a distinctive kind of response to skepticism. (shrink)

Literary historians have been working productively in recent years to reclaim the texture of early-fifteenth-century English poetry in contexts of politics and religion. To the list of major authors we should add John Audelay, chaplain of Knockin , setting him equally beside his contemporaries Thomas Hoccleve, John Lydgate, and Margery Kempe. As a vernacular poet with a name, a provenance, and a rich body of work, Audelay warrants serious regard. His oeuvre displays an artistry that is different from, but as (...) innovative and revelatory of his times as, those of his celebrated contemporaries. (shrink)

This article examines the problems of forming the technological competence of various scientists. In the process of training future specialists in various industries, the authors propose methods and means for the formation of technological competence: the introduction of a special course into the educational process, which is aimed at developing the professionally important qualities of a specialist; application of gaming technology and project method in the classroom in special disciplines; passing by students of industrial practice; creating a portfolio.

Cet article présente la conception hégélienne de la vie naturelle comme limite : la nature est la limite de l’esprit, et le vivant est une limite en soi. Examiné surtout dans l’animal, « vivre » équivaut à tracer les limites du vivant, dont on voit ainsi la plasticité fondamentale. La finitude du vivant se traduit en une imagination purement sensible, qui se réalise dans la création d’un espace-temps singulier ; le sens qui dirige cette activité vise à reproduire une existence, (...) non une forme, ce qui en fait plus un terme qu’un but de la téléologie animale. Or, si la nature vivante est la limite de l’esprit, peut-elle « surprendre » celui-ci ? Si la « surprise » dit l’apparition de l’inouï depuis la création libre, elle ne le peut pas, car la plasticité naturelle ne produit que la contingence de l’existence et de l’entendement. Mais la contingence ne soumet pas pour autant la nature intégralement à l’idée : en ce sens, la nature reste pour Hegel l’ « énigme » qui tient l’esprit en éveil.The article presents Hegel’s conception of natural life as a limit : nature is the limit of spirit, and the living being is a limit as such. Examined above all in the animal, life is the tracing of the limits of the living being, whose fundamental plasticity becomes manifest. The living being’s finitude is conveyed in its purely sensible imagination, which realises itself in the creation of a singular space-time ; the sense directing this activity aims at reproducing an existence, not a form, and such a sense is rather the end than the aim of animal teleology. Now, if living nature is spirit’s limit, can it « surprise » the latter ? It cannot, if « surprise » means the apparition of an unprecedented possibility of a free creation, for natural plasticity can only produce the contingencies of existence and understanding. But neither does the contingency of nature subjugate it integrally to idea : in this sense, nature remains for Hegel the « enigma » that keeps spirit awake. (shrink)

Critical discussion of Andromache has almost invariably focused on the question of unity. As everyone who has ever read a critical account of the play knows, the action falls into three parts: the plot against Andromache by Hermione and her father, foiled by Peleus; Hermione's subsequent panicky flight with Orestes; and Neoptolemos' murder at Orestes' instigation. The play appears not to possess ‘unity of action’ in the strict Aristotelian sense: there is, for instance, no tight causal connection between the plot (...) against Andromache and Orestes' plot against Neoptolemos. Troubled by this, critics have made a variety of attempts to find unity of another sort: unity of ‘theme’. Each has asked, ‘What is Andromache about?’, taking the question in an absolute sense; and has assumed that one must search for a single answer. (shrink)

Many philosophers have shown sympathy to the thought that reality is fundamentally positive. Julio De Rizzo formulates this idea precisely by means of the notion of grounding, and examines how the resulting thesis fares with respect to three much discussed classes of negative truths, namely that of negative predications, that of negative causal reports, and that of negative existential truths. By shedding light on the issues advocates of the thesis have to deal with, this work shows the positivist account (...) to be a tenable position in metaphysics. (shrink)

In this paper I argue that causal relations between objects are represented in visual experience, and contrast my argument and its conclusion with Michotte's results from the 1960's.

What do we see? We are visually conscious of colors and shapes, but are we also visually conscious of complex properties such as being John Malkovich? In this book, Susanna Siegel develops a framework for understanding the contents of visual experience, and argues that these contents involve all sorts of complex properties. Siegel starts by analyzing the notion of the contents of experience, and by arguing that theorists of all stripes should accept that experiences have contents. She then introduces (...) a method for discovering the contents of experience: the method of phenomenal contrast. This method relies only minimally on introspection, and allows rigorous support for claims about experience. She then applies the method to make the case that we are conscious of many kinds of properties, of all sorts of causal properties, and of many other complex properties. She goes on to use the method to help analyze difficult questions about our consciousness of objects and their role in the contents of experience, and to reconceptualize the distinction between perception and sensation. Siegel's results are important for many areas of philosophy, including the philosophy of mind, epistemology, and the philosophy of science. They are also important for the psychology and cognitive neuroscience of vision. (shrink)

This paper proposes that the question “What should I believe?” is to be answered in the same way as the question “What should I do?,” a view I call Equal Treatment. After clarifying the relevant sense of “should,” I point out advantages that Equal Treatment has over both simple and subtle evidentialist alternatives, including versions that distinguish what one should believe from what one should get oneself to believe. I then discuss views on which there is a distinctively epistemic sense (...) of should. Next I reply to an objection which alleges that non-evidential considerations cannot serve as reasons for which one believes. I then situate Equal Treatment in a broader theoretical framework, discussing connections to rationality, justification, knowledge, and theoretical vs. practical reasoning. Finally, I show how Equal Treatment has important implications for a wide variety of issues, including the status of religious belief, philosophical skepticism, racial profiling and gender stereotyping, and certain issues in psychology, such as depressive realism and positive illusions. (shrink)

Includes a summary of my book *The Rationality of Perception* (Oxford, 2017) and replies to commentaries on it by Endre Begby, Harmen Ghijsen, and Katia Samoilova. These commentaries and my summary and replies will be published soon in Analysis Reviews. Begby focuses on my analysis of the epistemic features of the interface between individual minds and their cultural milieu (discussed in chapter 10 of *The Rationality of Perception*), Ghijsen focuses on the notion of inference and reliabilism (chapters 5 and 6), (...) and Samoilova focuses on the relationship between epistemic charge (chapter 3) and shifts in the amount of justification needed for knowledge. (shrink)

In this paper I discuss several proposals for how to find out which contents visual experiences have, and I defend the method I.

Behavioral paternalism raises deep concerns that do not arise in traditional welfare economics. These concerns stem from behavioral paternalism’s acceptance of the defining axioms of neoclassical rationality for normative purposes, despite having rejected them as positive descriptions of reality. We argue that behavioral paternalists have indeed accepted neoclassical rationality axioms as a welfare standard; that economists historically adopted these axioms not for their normative plausibility, but for their usefulness in formal and theoretical modeling; that broadly rational individuals might fail to (...) satisfy the axioms for various reasons, making them unpersuasive as normative criteria; and that even if their violation did constitute irrationality, that would not justify paternalists’ choosing among inconsistent preferences to define an individual’s “true” preferences. (shrink)

_ Source: _Volume 46, Issue 3, pp 369 - 389 The article’s aim is to measure the potential of Derrida’s work for a philosophy of technique. It shows why Derrida does not present a positive philosophy of technology but rather describes technique as a _quasi_-technique, _as if_ a technique. The article inquires into the potential of such a quasi-technique for a contemporary philosophy of technology: it is suggested that it can function as a salutary “deconstruction” of mainstream philosophy of technology (...) because it shows how to think technique _in_ the absence of essence and _as_ the absence of essence.The article begins with a survey of the machines that figure in Derrida’s texts. It then examines three propositions concerning technology in Derrida’s work:Derrida thinks technology as a metaphor of _writing_ and not the other way round.Derrida thinks technique as _prosthesis_, firstly of memory, then more generally of life.Derrida’s quasi-technique relies on his peculiar conception of the incorporal _materiality_ of technique. (shrink)

Some prominent evidentialists argue that practical considerations cannot be normative reasons for belief because they can’t be motivating reasons for belief. Existing pragmatist responses turn out to depend on the assumption that it’s possible to believe in the absence of evidence. The evidentialist may deny this, at which point the debate ends in an impasse. I propose a new strategy for the pragmatist. This involves conceding that belief in the absence of evidence is impossible. We then argue that evidence can (...) play a role in bringing about belief without being a motivating reason for belief, thereby leaving room for practical considerations to serve as motivating reasons. I present two ways in which this can happen. First, agents can use evidence as a mere means by which to believe, with practical considerations serving as motivating reasons for belief, just as we use tools (e.g. a brake pedal) as mere means by which to do something (e.g. slow down) which we are motivated to do for practical reasons. Second, evidence can make it possible for one to choose whether or not to believe – a choice one can then make for practical reasons. These arguments push the debate between the evidentialist and the pragmatist into new territory. It is no longer enough for an evidentialist to insist that belief is impossible without evidence. Even if this is right, the outcome of the debate remains unsettled. It will hang on the ability of the evidentialist to respond to the new pragmatist strategy presented here. (shrink)