“The wrongness of Albert's action causally explains why Jane judged that his action was wrong”. This type of causal moral explanation has been extensively discussed in the recent metaethical literature. This paper motivates the following claims about this type of moral explanation. First, a typical defence of this type of moral explanation suggested in the literature does not work because it predicts inaccurate modal information. Second, focusing on different aspects of the ways moral judgements are generated provides better chances for the defender of this type of moral explanation. Third, the strategy mentioned in the previous point leads us to the following alternative evaluative explanation: The property of being a harmful action explains a recognisable pattern of moral judgements observed in the relevant empirical studies. One crucial implication the paper alludes to is a localist approach to the debates concerning moral realism: We should consider each moral property's ontological genuineness separately, referring to specific empirical findings that are particularly relevant to the target moral property in question. Such a localist approach can provide solid resources for realists to respond to various anti-realist challenges, such as an influential evolutionary debunking argument.
{"title":"Moral explanation of moral judgements","authors":"Ryo Chonabayashi","doi":"10.1111/theo.12503","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1111/theo.12503","url":null,"abstract":"“The wrongness of Albert's action causally explains why Jane judged that his action was wrong”. This type of causal moral explanation has been extensively discussed in the recent metaethical literature. This paper motivates the following claims about this type of moral explanation. First, a typical defence of this type of moral explanation suggested in the literature does not work because it predicts inaccurate modal information. Second, focusing on different aspects of the ways moral judgements are generated provides better chances for the defender of this type of moral explanation. Third, the strategy mentioned in the previous point leads us to the following alternative evaluative explanation: The property of being a harmful action explains a recognisable pattern of moral judgements observed in the relevant empirical studies. One crucial implication the paper alludes to is a localist approach to the debates concerning moral realism: We should consider each moral property's ontological genuineness separately, referring to specific empirical findings that are particularly relevant to the target moral property in question. Such a localist approach can provide solid resources for realists to respond to various anti-realist challenges, such as an influential evolutionary debunking argument.","PeriodicalId":44638,"journal":{"name":"THEORIA","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.5,"publicationDate":"2023-11-23","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"138542845","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Recent work in metaphysics has focused on the nature of artefacts, most accounts of which assume that artefacts depend on the intentions of their individual makers. Artefacts are thus importantly different from institutional kinds, which involve collective intentions. However, recent work in social ontology has yielded renewed focus on the social dimensions of various kinds, including artefacts. As a result, some philosophers have suggested that artefacts have a distinctly social dimension that goes beyond their makers' individual intentions but which stops short of the collective intentionality of institutional kinds. I aim to combine these insights into an account of artefacts that involves disjunctive conditions of mind-dependence: Artefacts can either depend on the singular intentions of their makers or they can depend on the collective acceptance of particular social groups. Whether the first or second disjunct is satisfied depends on the artefact's context of creation. I'll argue that this applies not to artefact kinds but to individual artefacts. I then consider two objections to my view based on Robinson Crusoe cases and show how my account allows us to fit artefacts into a taxonomy of social kinds.
{"title":"On the social nature of artefacts","authors":"Tim Juvshik","doi":"10.1111/theo.12506","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1111/theo.12506","url":null,"abstract":"Recent work in metaphysics has focused on the nature of artefacts, most accounts of which assume that artefacts depend on the intentions of their individual makers. Artefacts are thus importantly different from institutional kinds, which involve collective intentions. However, recent work in social ontology has yielded renewed focus on the social dimensions of various kinds, including artefacts. As a result, some philosophers have suggested that artefacts have a distinctly social dimension that goes beyond their makers' individual intentions but which stops short of the collective intentionality of institutional kinds. I aim to combine these insights into an account of artefacts that involves disjunctive conditions of mind-dependence: Artefacts can <i>either</i> depend on the singular intentions of their makers <i>or</i> they can depend on the collective acceptance of particular social groups. Whether the first or second disjunct is satisfied depends on the artefact's context of creation. I'll argue that this applies not to <i>artefact kinds</i> but to <i>individual artefacts</i>. I then consider two objections to my view based on Robinson Crusoe cases and show how my account allows us to fit artefacts into a taxonomy of social kinds.","PeriodicalId":44638,"journal":{"name":"THEORIA","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.5,"publicationDate":"2023-11-20","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"138524055","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
There is a research programme in linguistics that is founded on describing language as an emergent phenomenon. This paper clarifies how the core concept of emergence is deployed in this emergentist programme. We show that if one adopts the weak understandings of the concept of language emergence, the emergentist programme is not fundamentally different from the other non-emergentist research programmes in linguistics. On the other hand, if one adopts the stronger understandings of emergence then the programme would have a unique character, but at the cost of some corollaries (philosophical, but not only) which the emergentist linguists would seemingly want to avoid. We show that if the emergentists accept those corollaries, the resulting hypothetical emergentist programme would be totally different from the emergentist programme in its present shape. We conclude that the emergentist programme, as it stands, should be either abandoned or reshaped in both theory and methodology.
{"title":"A philosophical analysis of the emergence of language","authors":"Hamed Tabatabaei Ghomi, Antonio Benítez-Burraco","doi":"10.1111/theo.12507","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1111/theo.12507","url":null,"abstract":"There is a research programme in linguistics that is founded on describing language as an emergent phenomenon. This paper clarifies how the core concept of emergence is deployed in this emergentist programme. We show that if one adopts the weak understandings of the concept of language emergence, the emergentist programme is not fundamentally different from the other non-emergentist research programmes in linguistics. On the other hand, if one adopts the stronger understandings of emergence then the programme would have a unique character, but at the cost of some corollaries (philosophical, but not only) which the emergentist linguists would seemingly want to avoid. We show that if the emergentists accept those corollaries, the resulting hypothetical emergentist programme would be totally different from the emergentist programme in its present shape. We conclude that the emergentist programme, as it stands, should be either abandoned or reshaped in both theory and methodology.","PeriodicalId":44638,"journal":{"name":"THEORIA","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.5,"publicationDate":"2023-11-20","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"138524056","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
In an earlier paper in Theoria, I discussed an argument based on the idea of “soul-switching” that attempted to undermine the immaterialist account of human beings. The present paper deals with a parity argument against that argument in which the idea of “body-switching” plays a pivotal role. I call these two arguments, that have been reported by Razi (d. 1210), respectively “the soul-switching argument” and “the body-switching argument”. After some introductory remarks, section 2 of the paper describes the structure of the latter argument. Section 3 considers some philosophical discussions in the ancient, modern, and contemporary eras in which the idea of body-switching (or some similar conception) plays a major role. In the following section 4, some criticisms of the argument are discussed and a general response that is meant to cover a broad range of objections is considered. This paper shows that the body-switching argument reported by Razi is a methodological antecedent of several contemporary arguments in defence of substance dualism.
{"title":"On a body-switching argument in defence of the immateriality of human nature","authors":"Pirooz Fatoorchi","doi":"10.1111/theo.12505","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1111/theo.12505","url":null,"abstract":"In an earlier paper in <i>Theoria</i>, I discussed an argument based on the idea of “soul-switching” that attempted to undermine the immaterialist account of human beings. The present paper deals with a parity argument against that argument in which the idea of “body-switching” plays a pivotal role. I call these two arguments, that have been reported by Razi (d. 1210), respectively “the soul-switching argument” and “the body-switching argument”. After some introductory remarks, section 2 of the paper describes the structure of the latter argument. Section 3 considers some philosophical discussions in the ancient, modern, and contemporary eras in which the idea of body-switching (or some similar conception) plays a major role. In the following section 4, some criticisms of the argument are discussed and a general response that is meant to cover a broad range of objections is considered. This paper shows that the body-switching argument reported by Razi is a methodological antecedent of several contemporary arguments in defence of substance dualism.","PeriodicalId":44638,"journal":{"name":"THEORIA","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.5,"publicationDate":"2023-11-14","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"138524051","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
To assess the intelligence of machines, Alan Turing proposed a test of imitation known as the imitation game, famously known as the Turing test. To assess whether artificial intelligent (AI) systems could be moral or not, Colin Allen et al. developed a test of imitation in the context of morality, a test known as the Moral Turing Test (MTT), which I will, in this paper, call the moral imitation game. There are arguments against developing any type of MTT or moral imitation game. Rather than developing a moral imitation game, this paper proposes a criterion of imitation for AI systems in the moral scenario. To develop a criterion of imitation, I explore the notion of moral attribution in detail. Within the case of moral attribution, I introduce the subject-ascriber distinction. The notion of moral attribution and the subject-ascriber distinction is employed to address the following questions: (a) how is the assessment in MTT arranged?, (b) what is the role of the interrogator in the MTT?, and (c) what information is to be concealed from the interrogator? The first question deals with the aspect of assessment, the second question deals with the reordering of the role of the interrogator and the third one deals with the concealment aspect of the imitation game. After that, a criterion of imitation for AI systems is put forward. Using the subject-ascriber distinction in moral attribution and David Lewis' Mad Pain and Martian Pain cases, it is argued that the notion of sentience is insignificant for the ascriber for moral attributions.
{"title":"On the criteria of the imitation for the artificial intelligent systems in the moral imitation game","authors":"Jolly Thomas","doi":"10.1111/theo.12502","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1111/theo.12502","url":null,"abstract":"To assess the intelligence of machines, Alan Turing proposed a test of imitation known as the imitation game, famously known as the Turing test. To assess whether artificial intelligent (AI) systems could be moral or not, Colin Allen et al. developed a test of imitation in the context of morality, a test known as the Moral Turing Test (MTT), which I will, in this paper, call the moral imitation game. There are arguments against developing any type of MTT or moral imitation game. Rather than developing a moral imitation game, this paper proposes a criterion of imitation for AI systems in the moral scenario. To develop a criterion of imitation, I explore the notion of moral attribution in detail. Within the case of moral attribution, I introduce the subject-ascriber distinction. The notion of moral attribution and the subject-ascriber distinction is employed to address the following questions: (a) how is the assessment in MTT arranged?, (b) what is the role of the interrogator in the MTT?, and (c) what information is to be concealed from the interrogator? The first question deals with the aspect of assessment, the second question deals with the reordering of the role of the interrogator and the third one deals with the concealment aspect of the imitation game. After that, a criterion of imitation for AI systems is put forward. Using the subject-ascriber distinction in moral attribution and David Lewis' Mad Pain and Martian Pain cases, it is argued that the notion of sentience is insignificant for the ascriber for moral attributions.","PeriodicalId":44638,"journal":{"name":"THEORIA","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.5,"publicationDate":"2023-11-14","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"138542822","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Abstract This paper explores the role of phenomenology in the understanding of the cognitive processes of coupling/decoupling, defending the Wittgensteinian idea that phenomenology can play a crucial role as a description of immediate (social) experience. We argue that epistemic feelings can provide a phenomenological description of the development of a subject's everyday experience, tracking the transition from the processes of coupling/decoupling and recoupling with the world. In particular, the feeling of familiarity, whose key features can be considered the core of epistemic feelings, signals a novelty in the flow of experience that makes sense and is worthy of remarking on or even articulating. By describing the primary features and sources of the feeling of familiarity, we highlight a conceptual tension related to its sources, which could be based on processing both fluency and discrepancy. We proposed a solution to the conceptual tension by introducing two levels of the feeling of familiarity: epistemic and experiential.
{"title":"Two levels in the feeling of familiarity","authors":"Sonia Maria Lisco, Francesca Ervas","doi":"10.1111/theo.12496","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1111/theo.12496","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract This paper explores the role of phenomenology in the understanding of the cognitive processes of coupling/decoupling, defending the Wittgensteinian idea that phenomenology can play a crucial role as a description of immediate (social) experience. We argue that epistemic feelings can provide a phenomenological description of the development of a subject's everyday experience, tracking the transition from the processes of coupling/decoupling and recoupling with the world. In particular, the feeling of familiarity, whose key features can be considered the core of epistemic feelings, signals a novelty in the flow of experience that makes sense and is worthy of remarking on or even articulating. By describing the primary features and sources of the feeling of familiarity, we highlight a conceptual tension related to its sources, which could be based on processing both fluency and discrepancy. We proposed a solution to the conceptual tension by introducing two levels of the feeling of familiarity: epistemic and experiential.","PeriodicalId":44638,"journal":{"name":"THEORIA","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-11-13","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"136347058","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Abstract The internet is a major part of our lives today. This applies to politics as well, and accordingly, the question of whether it is possible to realize democracy on the internet has arisen. Using the arguments of Hannah Arendt, the paper aims to determine what online democracy should look like. It is argued that the internet's decentralized structure is advantageous because it facilitates the implementation of the Arendtian system of political councils. Due to the character of online political platforms – mainly social media – these political councils should ideally revolve around shared issues that simultaneously create the common world on the internet. At the same time, clear rules need to be laid down for the functioning of these online political councils. Based on Arendt's arguments, it is claimed in the paper that these rules include the principles of mutual promises and covenants on the issues themselves. It is also argued that because Arendt emphasizes the role of appearing in the public sphere, the process of authentication – that is, verifying that there is a concrete person with a physical body behind each online account that wants to actively participate in a particular online political council – is required.
{"title":"Online democracy: Applying Hannah Arendt's model of democracy to the internet","authors":"Sylvie Bláhová","doi":"10.1111/theo.12501","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1111/theo.12501","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract The internet is a major part of our lives today. This applies to politics as well, and accordingly, the question of whether it is possible to realize democracy on the internet has arisen. Using the arguments of Hannah Arendt, the paper aims to determine what online democracy should look like. It is argued that the internet's decentralized structure is advantageous because it facilitates the implementation of the Arendtian system of political councils. Due to the character of online political platforms – mainly social media – these political councils should ideally revolve around shared issues that simultaneously create the common world on the internet. At the same time, clear rules need to be laid down for the functioning of these online political councils. Based on Arendt's arguments, it is claimed in the paper that these rules include the principles of mutual promises and covenants on the issues themselves. It is also argued that because Arendt emphasizes the role of appearing in the public sphere, the process of authentication – that is, verifying that there is a concrete person with a physical body behind each online account that wants to actively participate in a particular online political council – is required.","PeriodicalId":44638,"journal":{"name":"THEORIA","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-11-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135186761","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Abstract The field of numerical cognition provides a fairly clear picture of the processes through which we learn basic arithmetical facts. This scientific picture, however, is rarely taken as providing a response to a much‐debated philosophical question, namely, the question of how we obtain number knowledge, since numbers are usually thought to be abstract entities located outside of space and time. In this paper, I take the scientific evidence on how we learn arithmetic as providing a response to the philosophical question of how we obtain number knowledge. I reject the view that numbers are abstract entities located outside of space and time and, alternatively, derive from the scientific evidence a novel account of the nature of numbers. In this account, numbers are reifications of the counting procedure and arithmetic statements are seen as describing the functioning of counting and calculation techniques.
{"title":"An empirically informed account of numbers as reifications","authors":"César Frederico dos Santos","doi":"10.1111/theo.12493","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1111/theo.12493","url":null,"abstract":"Abstract The field of numerical cognition provides a fairly clear picture of the processes through which we learn basic arithmetical facts. This scientific picture, however, is rarely taken as providing a response to a much‐debated philosophical question, namely, the question of how we obtain number knowledge, since numbers are usually thought to be abstract entities located outside of space and time. In this paper, I take the scientific evidence on how we learn arithmetic as providing a response to the philosophical question of how we obtain number knowledge. I reject the view that numbers are abstract entities located outside of space and time and, alternatively, derive from the scientific evidence a novel account of the nature of numbers. In this account, numbers are reifications of the counting procedure and arithmetic statements are seen as describing the functioning of counting and calculation techniques.","PeriodicalId":44638,"journal":{"name":"THEORIA","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-11-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135973765","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
According to a well-established view of desire satisfaction, a desire that p is satisfied iff p obtains. Call this the 'standard view'. The standard view is purely semantic, which means the satisfaction condition of desires is placed in the truth of the embedded proposition that indicates the content of the desire. This paper aims to defend the standard view against two frequently discussed problems: the problem of underspecification and desires conditional on their own persistence. The former holds that the standard view cannot capture the specific ways of desire satisfaction. The latter holds that the standard view does not provide sufficient conditions for the satisfaction of desires conditional on their own persistence. To address the first problem, I will disambiguate different interpretations of desire ascriptions using de re/de dicto distinction. My argument to address the second problem rests on the disambiguation of different senses of satisfaction: semantic and agent.
{"title":"Desire satisfaction and its discontents","authors":"Hadis Farokhi Kakesh","doi":"10.1387/theoria.24081","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1387/theoria.24081","url":null,"abstract":"According to a well-established view of desire satisfaction, a desire that p is satisfied iff p obtains. Call this the 'standard view'. The standard view is purely semantic, which means the satisfaction condition of desires is placed in the truth of the embedded proposition that indicates the content of the desire. This paper aims to defend the standard view against two frequently discussed problems: the problem of underspecification and desires conditional on their own persistence. The former holds that the standard view cannot capture the specific ways of desire satisfaction. The latter holds that the standard view does not provide sufficient conditions for the satisfaction of desires conditional on their own persistence. To address the first problem, I will disambiguate different interpretations of desire ascriptions using de re/de dicto distinction. My argument to address the second problem rests on the disambiguation of different senses of satisfaction: semantic and agent.","PeriodicalId":44638,"journal":{"name":"THEORIA","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-10-26","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135013622","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
The paper spells out the thesis that the crucial, substantial move of presentism should be to temporalize modality. The present is not simply actual, and the future not simply possible, but the present is becoming actual, and the present’s becoming actual is future’s becoming possible (and past’s becoming necessary). I will argue that by so temporalizing modality, as modes of becoming rather than of being, the presentists can make room for the future (and the past), can answer the triviality-objection raised against them, and can provide a specific account of presentist change.
{"title":"Present’s actualizing and future’s becoming possible","authors":"Cord Friebe","doi":"10.1387/theoria.23489","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1387/theoria.23489","url":null,"abstract":"The paper spells out the thesis that the crucial, substantial move of presentism should be to temporalize modality. The present is not simply actual, and the future not simply possible, but the present is becoming actual, and the present’s becoming actual is future’s becoming possible (and past’s becoming necessary). I will argue that by so temporalizing modality, as modes of becoming rather than of being, the presentists can make room for the future (and the past), can answer the triviality-objection raised against them, and can provide a specific account of presentist change.","PeriodicalId":44638,"journal":{"name":"THEORIA","volume":null,"pages":null},"PeriodicalIF":0.0,"publicationDate":"2023-10-26","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"135013620","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
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