{"title":"An equivocation in the simple argument for downward causation","authors":"Matthew Rellihan","doi":"10.1002/tht3.502","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1002/tht3.502","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":44963,"journal":{"name":"Thought-A Journal of Philosophy","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.7,"publicationDate":"2021-09-22","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"49445252","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Correspondence Samia Hesni, Department of Philosophy, Boston University, 745 Commonwealth Avenue #516, Boston, MA 02215, USA. Email: shesni@bu.edu Abstract Generic sentences are sometimes characterized as normative or descriptive. Descriptive generics make generalized claims about things: dogs bark, birds fly, doughnuts have holes. Normative generics do something more complicated; they seem to communicate how things should be: boys don't cry, children are seen and not heard, friends don't let friends drive drunk. The latter set of sentences express something like the speaker's endorsement that the predicated terms match up with the kind terms. Sarah-Jane Leslie posits a semantic view of normative generics on which the subject term is polysemous between a normative and a descriptive reading. I argue that this cannot be right, and show how a Gricean implicature view can accommodate everyday normative generics in a way that Leslie's polysemous view cannot. An upshot of my argument is skepticism about drawing semantic conclusions from dual character concepts.
Samia Hesni，波士顿大学哲学系，745 Commonwealth Avenue #516, Boston, MA 02215, USA。摘要一般句有时被描述为规范性的或描述性的。描述性泛型对事物做出一般化的描述:狗会叫，鸟会飞，甜甜圈有洞。规范泛型做一些更复杂的事情;他们似乎传达了事情应该是怎样的:男孩不要哭，孩子被看到而不被听到，朋友不要让朋友酒后驾车。后一组句子表达了说话者对谓词项与类项匹配的认可。萨拉-简·莱斯利提出了规范性泛型的语义观，认为主词在规范性阅读和描述性阅读之间是多义的。我认为这不可能是正确的，并展示了格里安的含意观如何能够适应日常的规范性泛型，而莱斯利的多义观却不能。我的论点的一个结果是对从双重特征概念中得出语义结论的怀疑。
{"title":"Normative generics: Against semantic polysemy","authors":"Samia Hesni","doi":"10.1002/tht3.499","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1002/tht3.499","url":null,"abstract":"Correspondence Samia Hesni, Department of Philosophy, Boston University, 745 Commonwealth Avenue #516, Boston, MA 02215, USA. Email: shesni@bu.edu Abstract Generic sentences are sometimes characterized as normative or descriptive. Descriptive generics make generalized claims about things: dogs bark, birds fly, doughnuts have holes. Normative generics do something more complicated; they seem to communicate how things should be: boys don't cry, children are seen and not heard, friends don't let friends drive drunk. The latter set of sentences express something like the speaker's endorsement that the predicated terms match up with the kind terms. Sarah-Jane Leslie posits a semantic view of normative generics on which the subject term is polysemous between a normative and a descriptive reading. I argue that this cannot be right, and show how a Gricean implicature view can accommodate everyday normative generics in a way that Leslie's polysemous view cannot. An upshot of my argument is skepticism about drawing semantic conclusions from dual character concepts.","PeriodicalId":44963,"journal":{"name":"Thought-A Journal of Philosophy","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.7,"publicationDate":"2021-06-28","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1002/tht3.499","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"45870589","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
A traditional problem with the performative hypothesis is that it cannot assign proper truth-conditions to a declarative sentence. This paper shows that the problem is solved by adopting a multidimensional semantics on which sentences have more than just truth-conditions. This is good news for those who want to at least partially revive the hypothesis. The solution also brings into focus a lesson about what issues to consider when drawing the semantics/pragmatics boundary.
{"title":"Reviving the performative hypothesis?","authors":"Peter Elswyk","doi":"10.1002/tht3.501","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1002/tht3.501","url":null,"abstract":"A traditional problem with the performative hypothesis is that it cannot assign proper truth-conditions to a declarative sentence. This paper shows that the problem is solved by adopting a multidimensional semantics on which sentences have more than just truth-conditions. This is good news for those who want to at least partially revive the hypothesis. The solution also brings into focus a lesson about what issues to consider when drawing the semantics/pragmatics boundary.","PeriodicalId":44963,"journal":{"name":"Thought-A Journal of Philosophy","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.7,"publicationDate":"2021-06-21","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1002/tht3.501","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"46775199","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Seeing and attending wholes and parts: A reply to Prettyman","authors":"Bradley Richards","doi":"10.1002/tht3.500","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1002/tht3.500","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":44963,"journal":{"name":"Thought-A Journal of Philosophy","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.7,"publicationDate":"2021-06-17","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1002/tht3.500","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"47377422","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
By mimicking the standard definition for a formal language, we define what it is for a natural language to be compact. We set out a valid English argument none of whose finite subarguments is valid. We consider one by one objections to the argument's logical validity and then dismiss them. The conclusion is that English — and any other language with the capacity to express the argument — is not compact. This rules out a large class of logics as the correct foundational one, for example any sound and complete logic, and in particular first-order logic. The correct foundational logic is not compact.
{"title":"Is English consequence compact?","authors":"A. Paseau, O. Griffiths","doi":"10.1002/THT3.492","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1002/THT3.492","url":null,"abstract":"By mimicking the standard definition for a formal language, we define what it is for a natural language to be compact. We set out a valid English argument none of whose finite subarguments is valid. We consider one by one objections to the argument's logical validity and then dismiss them. The conclusion is that English — and any other language with the capacity to express the argument — is not compact. This rules out a large class of logics as the correct foundational one, for example any sound and complete logic, and in particular first-order logic. The correct foundational logic is not compact.","PeriodicalId":44963,"journal":{"name":"Thought-A Journal of Philosophy","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.7,"publicationDate":"2021-06-02","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1002/THT3.492","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42286775","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
The conventional wisdom in ethics is that pure moral laws are at least metaphysically necessary. By contrast, Moral Contingentism holds that pure moral laws are metaphysically contingent, and at most normatively necessary. This paper raises a normative objection to Moral Contingentism: it is worse equipped than Moral Necessitarianism to account for the normative standing or authority of the pure moral laws to govern the lives of the agents to whom they apply. Since morality is widely taken to have such a standing, failing to account for it would be a significant problem. The objection also shows that the debate about the modal status of moral principles isn't a debate solely within modal metaphysics, but has implications for topics in moral philosophy.
{"title":"Against Moral Contingentism","authors":"Pekka Väyrynen","doi":"10.1002/THT3.494","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1002/THT3.494","url":null,"abstract":"The conventional wisdom in ethics is that pure moral laws are at least metaphysically necessary. By contrast, Moral Contingentism holds that pure moral laws are metaphysically contingent, and at most normatively necessary. This paper raises a normative objection to Moral Contingentism: it is worse equipped than Moral Necessitarianism to account for the normative standing or authority of the pure moral laws to govern the lives of the agents to whom they apply. Since morality is widely taken to have such a standing, failing to account for it would be a significant problem. The objection also shows that the debate about the modal status of moral principles isn't a debate solely within modal metaphysics, but has implications for topics in moral philosophy.","PeriodicalId":44963,"journal":{"name":"Thought-A Journal of Philosophy","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.7,"publicationDate":"2021-05-13","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1002/THT3.494","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"42760096","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
This paper targets a nearly universal assumption in the philosophical literature: that prepunishment is unproblematic for consequentialists. Prepunishment threats do not deter, as deterrence is traditionally conceived. In fact, a pure prepunishment legal system would tend to increase the criminal disposition of the grudgingly compliant. This is a serious problem since, from many perspectives, but especially from a consequentialist one, a primary purpose of punishment is deterrence. I analyze the decision theory behind preand postpunishments, which helps clarify both what deterrence is and how it operates in consequentialist justifications of punishment. I end by sketching a road map for the future of prepunishment as artificial intelligence and other technological advances generate increasing possibilities for its use. If the police could know that a person will commit a crime tomorrow, then could they reasonably decide to “prepunish” the predicted offender today? This was the question first asked by Christopher New [1992], who argued that such a practice, if made feasible, would be morally permissible. The intuition against prepunishment, New claimed, results from “attaching improper moral significance to an insignificant temporal fact” [37]. Subsequently, many philosophers have disagreed with New on nonconsequentialist grounds. Consequentialists think that the practice of punishing should aim to produce good consequences. One of the primary ways the threat of punishment produces good consequences is by deterring crime. And the most obvious way that the threat of punishment deters crime is by making people fear that they would be punished in response to their criminal act. Virtually everyone assumes that prepunishment is unproblematic, or dramatically less problematic, for consequentialists. For those who think that prepunishment is problematic, this is viewed as a reason to doubt consequentialism. Underlying the belief that prepunishment is unproblematic for consequentialists is the assumption that the deterrent value of prepunishment is similar to the deterrent value of postpunishment. This starts with New (1992, 38): “In preas much as in postpunishment the penalty imposed may deter potential offenders, as also the actual offender, from committing other offences in the future.” In his influential reply, Smilansky (1994, 50) agrees with New at least to that extent. He writes, “We need not concern ourselves here with [consequentialist objections]. I allow prepunishment may be useful. . . . The crucial question is whether someone who believes in nonconsequentialist constraints of justice has the resources to reject [prepunishment].” Subsequent discussions of prepunishment have emphasized its supposed deterrent value. Statman (1997, 129) writes, “Utilitarian benefits that can be gained by punishing after crime (‘postpunishment’) can also be gained by prepunishment, e.g., deterring other potential criminals. . . . It is a puzzle mainly for retribut
{"title":"The consequentialist problem with prepunishment","authors":"Preston Greene","doi":"10.1002/THT3.493","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1002/THT3.493","url":null,"abstract":"This paper targets a nearly universal assumption in the philosophical literature: that prepunishment is unproblematic for consequentialists. Prepunishment threats do not deter, as deterrence is traditionally conceived. In fact, a pure prepunishment legal system would tend to increase the criminal disposition of the grudgingly compliant. This is a serious problem since, from many perspectives, but especially from a consequentialist one, a primary purpose of punishment is deterrence. I analyze the decision theory behind preand postpunishments, which helps clarify both what deterrence is and how it operates in consequentialist justifications of punishment. I end by sketching a road map for the future of prepunishment as artificial intelligence and other technological advances generate increasing possibilities for its use. If the police could know that a person will commit a crime tomorrow, then could they reasonably decide to “prepunish” the predicted offender today? This was the question first asked by Christopher New [1992], who argued that such a practice, if made feasible, would be morally permissible. The intuition against prepunishment, New claimed, results from “attaching improper moral significance to an insignificant temporal fact” [37]. Subsequently, many philosophers have disagreed with New on nonconsequentialist grounds. Consequentialists think that the practice of punishing should aim to produce good consequences. One of the primary ways the threat of punishment produces good consequences is by deterring crime. And the most obvious way that the threat of punishment deters crime is by making people fear that they would be punished in response to their criminal act. Virtually everyone assumes that prepunishment is unproblematic, or dramatically less problematic, for consequentialists. For those who think that prepunishment is problematic, this is viewed as a reason to doubt consequentialism. Underlying the belief that prepunishment is unproblematic for consequentialists is the assumption that the deterrent value of prepunishment is similar to the deterrent value of postpunishment. This starts with New (1992, 38): “In preas much as in postpunishment the penalty imposed may deter potential offenders, as also the actual offender, from committing other offences in the future.” In his influential reply, Smilansky (1994, 50) agrees with New at least to that extent. He writes, “We need not concern ourselves here with [consequentialist objections]. I allow prepunishment may be useful. . . . The crucial question is whether someone who believes in nonconsequentialist constraints of justice has the resources to reject [prepunishment].” Subsequent discussions of prepunishment have emphasized its supposed deterrent value. Statman (1997, 129) writes, “Utilitarian benefits that can be gained by punishing after crime (‘postpunishment’) can also be gained by prepunishment, e.g., deterring other potential criminals. . . . It is a puzzle mainly for retribut","PeriodicalId":44963,"journal":{"name":"Thought-A Journal of Philosophy","volume":" ","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":0.7,"publicationDate":"2021-05-11","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1002/THT3.493","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"48170385","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"RegionCategory":"哲学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
The past few years have seen several novel information-theoretic measures of causal emergence developed within the scientific community. In this paper I will introduce one such measure, called ‘ effective information ’ , and describe how it is used to argue for causal emergence. In brief, the idea is that certain kinds of complex system are structured such that an intervention characterised at the macro-level will be more informative than one characterised at the micro-level, and that this constitutes a form of causal emergence. Having introduced this proposal, I will then assess the extent to which it is genuinely ‘ causal ’ and/or ‘ emergent ’ , and argue that it supports only an epistemic form of causal emergence that is not as exciting as it first seems.
{"title":"Causal emergence from effective information: Neither causal nor emergent?","authors":"Joe E. Dewhurst","doi":"10.1002/THT3.489","DOIUrl":"https://doi.org/10.1002/THT3.489","url":null,"abstract":"The past few years have seen several novel information-theoretic measures of causal emergence developed within the scientific community. In this paper I will introduce one such measure, called ‘ effective information ’ , and describe how it is used to argue for causal emergence. In brief, the idea is that certain kinds of complex system are structured such that an intervention characterised at the macro-level will be more informative than one characterised at the micro-level, and that this constitutes a form of causal emergence. Having introduced this proposal, I will then assess the extent to which it is genuinely ‘ causal ’ and/or ‘ emergent ’ , and argue that it supports only an epistemic form of causal emergence that is not as exciting as it first seems.","PeriodicalId":44963,"journal":{"name":"Thought-A Journal of Philosophy","volume":"10 1","pages":"158-168"},"PeriodicalIF":0.7,"publicationDate":"2021-05-05","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://sci-hub-pdf.com/10.1002/THT3.489","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"48037882","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":2,"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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