In this paper, I criticize Structured Propositionalism, the most widely held theory of the nature of propositions according to which they are structured entities with constituents. I argue that the proponents of Structured Propositionalism have paid insufficient attention to the metaphysical presuppositions of the view – most egregiously, to the notion of propositional constituency. This is somewhat ironic, since the friends of structured propositions tend to argue as if the appeal to constituency gives their view a dialectical advantage. I criticize four different approaches to providing a metaphysics of propositional constituency: set-theoretic, mereological, hylomorphic, and structure-making. Finally, I consider the option of taking constituency in a deflationary, metaphysically ‘lightweight’ sense. I argue that, though invoking constituency in a lightweight sense may be useful for avoiding the ontological problems that plague the ‘heavyweight’ conception, it no longer proffers a dialectical advantage to Structured Propositionalism.

Risk-weighted expected utility theory (REU theory for short) permits preferences which violate the Sure-Thing Principle (STP for short). But preferences that violate the STP can lead to bad decisions in sequential choice problems. In particular, they can lead decision-makers to adopt a strategy that is dominated – i.e. a strategy such that some available alternative leads to a better outcome in every possible state of the world.

Slippery slope arguments are commonly thought to be fallacious. But is there a single fallacy which they all commit? A study of applied logic texts reveals competing diagnoses of the supposed error, and several recent authors take slippery slope arguments seriously. Clearly, there is room for comment. I shall give evidence of divergence on the question of what sort of argument constitutes a slippery slope, distinguish four different types of argument which have all been deemed to be slippery slopes, and contend that two of these types need involve no logical error.

We find in textbook accounts three quite differently oriented treatments of slippery slope: conceptual — relating to vagueness and the ancient sorites paradox; precedential — relating to the need to treat similar cases consistently; and causal — relating to the avoidance of actions which will, or would be likely to, set off a series of undersirable events.

Kant defined ‘sensation’ (Empfindung) as ‘the effect of an object on the representative capacity, so far as we are affected by it.’ This is, to put it mildly, not one among his more elegant, clear or helpful sayings. And it is merely an instance of a more general malaise. Kant did not say as much about sensation as he should have, and his account-or lack of it-can be seen at the root of many of the difficulties that have plagued his readers.

In a well-known series of articles, Norman Daniels has drawn a contrast between wide reflective equilibrium and a more traditional method of theory acceptance in ethics that would be employed by a sophisticated moral intuitionist. The more traditional method is geared towards achieving a narrow equilibrium, or ‘an ordered pair of (a) a set of considered moral judgments acceptable to a given person P at a given time, and (b) a set of moral principles that economically systematizes (a).’ Although we might achieve narrow reflective equilibrium by deducing particular moral judgments from self-evident moral principles, the more plausible approach is to start from our particular moral judgments. Here we begin by screening our intial moral judgments to eliminate those in which we have little confidence and those made under circumstances conducive to error. We then search for general moral principles that best account for the remaining ‘considered’ moral judgments.

We talk of the differences between the old Camus and the new Camus. Often such talk is equivalent to talk of the differences between Camus’ old self and Camus’ new self, between Camus’ diachronous selves. In other contexts, contexts which I shall ignore, the old and the new Camus is something we can read, provide literary criticism of, ponder over. In these contexts it is to the literary works of the old and new Camus that we are referring. The same kind of ambiguity attaches to the expressions ‘the early Beethoven’ and ‘the later Beethoven’.

Automated Influence is the use of Artificial Intelligence (AI) to collect, integrate, and analyse people’s data in order to deliver targeted interventions that shape their behaviour. We consider three central objections against Automated Influence, focusing on privacy, exploitation, and manipulation, showing in each case how a structural version of that objection has more purchase than its interactional counterpart. By rejecting the interactional focus of “AI Ethics” in favour of a more structural, political philosophy of AI, we show that the real problem with Automated Influence is the crisis of legitimacy that it precipitates.

We have some justified beliefs about modal matters. A modal epistemology should explain what’s involved in our having that justification. Given that we’re realists about modality, how should we expect that explanation to go? In the first part of this essay, I suggest an answer to this question based on an analogy with games. Then, I outline a modal epistemology that fits with that answer. According to a theory-based epistemology of modality, you justifiably believe that p if (a) you justifiably believe a theory that says that p and (b) you believe p on the basis of that theory.

Philosophers of science now broadly agree that doing good science involves making non-epistemic value judgments. I call attention to two very different normative standards which can be used to evaluate such judgments: standards grounded in ethics and standards grounded in political philosophy. Though this distinction has not previously been highlighted, I show that the values in science literature contain arguments of each type. I conclude by explaining why this distinction is important. Seeking to determine whether some value-laden determination meets substantive ethical standards is a very different endeavor from seeking to determine if it is politically legitimate.

This article examines the complaint that arbitrary algorithmic decisions wrong those whom they affect. It makes three contributions. First, it provides an analysis of what arbitrariness means in this context. Second, it argues that arbitrariness is not of moral concern except when special circumstances apply. However, when the same algorithm or different algorithms based on the same data are used in multiple contexts, a person may be arbitrarily excluded from a broad range of opportunities. The third contribution is to explain why this systemic exclusion is of moral concern and to offer a solution to address it.

Classical Electrodynamics is a classical theory treating Systems comprising an electromagnetic field and electrically charged matter. In a recent book Mathias Frisch argues that this theory is inconsistent within its intended domain of application and that a number of interesting methodological morals follow from this conclusion (2005,33-5; all citations of Frisch refer to this work).

Most of us accept that we have special obligations to our family members: to, e.g., our parents, our siblings, and our grandparents. But it is extremely difficult to offer a plausible grounding for such obligations, given the apparent fact that (at least most) familial relationships are not voluntarily entered. I did not choose to be my mother's daughter or my brother's sister, so why suppose that such facts about me are morally significant? Why suppose that I owe more to my mother or to my brother than natural duty requires that I do for all and any persons? Special obligations appear more problematic the less the relationships that supposedly generate them are akin to the relationship between promiser and promisee, a voluntarily assumed relationship. Thus, for example, special obligations to friends might appear less problematic than do those to family members, because it seems that we voluntarily choose our friends, and, thus, voluntarily choose to bear more for them than natural duty requires.

Virtually everyone agrees that there is a strong moral presumption against the use of coercion. There is, however, considerably less agreement about the nature of coercion. For example, each of the following claims has been the subject of considerable controversy: 1. coercion is an essentially normative concept whose ‘conditions of application contain an ineliminable reference to moral rightness or wrongness’; 2. it is possible to coerce someone by means of an especially enticing offer as well as by means of a threat; 3. coercion sometimes consists in nothing more than the direct application of physical force; and 4. exploitation is a form of coercion. In this essay I shall propose and defend an explication of the concept of coercion which will entail the falsity of each of these claims. Such an analysis, although it will naturally start from and be guided by our intuitions about the subject, will not be bound rigidly by them. My primary objective will be to provide a reasonably precise and systematic way of describing a category of human behavior only the paradigm examples of which are clearly circumscribed by ordinary usage.

The ‘death of evidence’ issue in Canada raises the spectre of politicized science, and thus the question of what role social values may have in science and how this meshes with objectivity and evidence. I first criticize philosophical accounts that have to separate different steps of research to restrict the influence of social and other non-epistemic values. A prominent account that social values may play a role even in the context of theory acceptance is the argument from inductive risk. It maintains that the more severe the social consequences of erroneously accepting a theory would be, the more evidence is needed before the theory may be accepted. However, an implication of this position is that increasing evidence makes the impact of social values converge to zero; and I argue for a stronger role for social values. On this position, social values (together with epistemic values and other empirical considerations) may determine a theory's conditions of adequacy, which among other things can include considerations about what makes a scientific account unbiased and complete. I illustrate this based on recent theories of human evolution and the social behaviour of non-human primates, where some of the social values implicated are feminist values. While many philosophical accounts (both arguments from inductive risk and from underdetermination) conceptualize the relevance of social values in terms of making inferences from evidence, I argue for the need for a broader philosophical framework, which is also motivated by issues pertaining to scientific explanation.

Muddles can be instructive. The clarifying confusion to be examined in this paper is Isaiah Berlin's intelligent vacillation on the issue of whether or not the extent of a person's freedom depends on his desires. Is the amount of freedom an agent possesses determined solely by his objective circumstances or is it also partly a function of his subjective tastes and preferences? In clarifying this question I shall suggest that Berlin has trouble answering it because he almost perceives that interpersonal cardinal measurement of freedom, if possible at all, is possible only on a subjective basis. Yet as Berlin eloquently reminds us measuring freedom according to a subjective metric generates paradox. Whether commonsense ideas of freedom are consistent and reasonable is not purely an academic issue, for we do often make political judgments to the effect that one or another policy, or a movement to one or another form of society, can be expected to reduce or enlarge human freedom. If freedom is not measurable these judgments are merely hortatory.

Let's say that two individuals are epistemic counterparts iff they happen to be in precisely the same (non-factive) mental states. If one has a veridical experience, her counterparts will undergo a subjectively indistinguishable conscious experience. If she remembers something, her counterparts will seem to recall the same event or fact. If she knows something to be true, her counterparts will believe it to be true. Counterparts always find the same things intuitive. Any difference between those who know a great deal about the external world and their systematically deceived counterparts is a difference the deceived counterparts could never appreciate.

A theory is developed explaining how beliefs, and derivatively intentions and perhaps the other propositional attitudes, find their objects. Beliefs about particular objects are divided into two kinds. Attributive beliefs find their objects purely through the mediation of contained descriptive content, while referential beliefs connect directly with their objects via a causal connection. This distinction is explicated in terms of complementing semantic and epistemic differences, and details of the causal connection are explored.

Locke's main semantic thesis is that words stand for, or signify, ideas. He says this over and over again, though the phraseology he employs varies. In Book III chapter 2 alone we find the following statements of the thesis: (1) ‘ … Words … come to be made use of by Men, as the Signs of their Ideas’ [III.2.1; 405:10-11); (2) The use then of Words, is to be sensible Marks of Ideas; and the Ideas they stand for, are their proper and immediate Signification’ [III.2.1; 405:15-17]; (3) ‘Words in their primary or immediate Signification, stand for nothing, but the Ideas in the Mind of him that uses them’ [III.2.2; 405:21-2]; (4) That then which Words are the Marks of, are the Ideas of the Speaker’ [III.2.2; 405:27-8]; (5) ‘ …

It is often said that singular causal statements express a relationship between one event and another or between a fact and an event. This is a very strong view, which has the following simple corollary: singular causal statements whose cause-term purports to refer to an event (or a fact) and whose effect-term purports to refer to an event express a relationship between an event (or a fact) and an event.

Thus, both Davidson and Kim would claim that the singular causal Statement

(1) Socrates’ drinking hemlock at dusk caused his death expresses a relationship between two events, referred to, respectively, by the expressions “Socrates’ drinking hemlock at dusk” and “his death.” For Kim, but not for Davidson, an event is analyzable as a thing's having a property at or during a time. The event of Socrates’ drinking hemlock at dusk consists of Socrates’ at a certain time having the property of drinking hemlock at dusk. I shall not here try to choose between their respective theories of events but will only note that both theorists would say that (1) expresses a relationship between events however the latter are to be construed.

Anyone who has ever lived with roommates understands the Hobbesian state of nature implicitly. People sharing accommodations quickly discover that buying groceries, doing the dishes, sweeping the floor, and a thousand other household tasks, are all prisoner's dilemmas waiting to happen. For instance, if food is purchased communally, it gives everyone an incentive to overconsume (because the majority of the cost of anything anyone eats is borne by the others). Individuals also have an incentive to buy expensive items that the others are unlikely to want. As a result, everyone's food bill will be higher than it would be if everyone did their own shopping. Things are not much better when it comes to other aspects of household organization. Cleaning is a common sticking point. Once there are a certain number of people living in a house, cleanliness becomes a quasi-public good. If everyone ‘pitched in’ to clean up, then everyone would be happier. But there is a free-rider incentive—before cleaning, it's best to wait around a bit to see if someone else will do it. As a result, the dishes will stack up in the sink, the carpet will get grungy, and so on.