Diversity Reading List

Abstract:

Abstract: Are doctors and nurses bound by just the same constraints as everyone else in regard to honesty? What, anyway, does honesty require? Telling no lies? Avoiding intentional deception by whatever means? From a utilitarian standpoint lying would seem to be on the same footing as other forms of intentional deception: yielding the same consequences. But utilitarianism fails to explain the wrongness of lying. Doctors and nurses, like everyone else, have a prima facie duty not to lie - but again like everyone else, they are not duty-bound to avoid intentional deception, lying apart; except where it would involve a breach of trust.

Abstract: What methods, what strategies, is it defensible for us to employ when campaigning on a contentious moral issue? What kinds of intolerance may we legitimately manifest towards the opposition in our endeavour to win converts and influence opinion? Could we be justified in refusing on principle even to engage with the opposition in public debate? And what of the legitimacy of 'playing' on people's emotions, or of not correcting misinformation put about by some of our supporters which helps our cause? Or, in making use of premises in argument that our opponents accept but we do not or, of appealing to arguments that we know to be invalid but by which the opposition may be taken in?

Abstract: Cognitive neuroscience can offer us new explanations of episodes human behavior that, unlike many explanations traditionally available, do not draw on questionable past theories arising from cultures and traditions that are in fact patriarchal. At the same time, feminists have had a number of reasons for regarding it suspiciously as, among other things, reductive and dehumanizing. In this paper, new work on borderline personality disorder provides an illustrative example of the first. It is also used in an extended argument against the second. Cognitive neuroscience is interested principally in explaining how creatures function well in their niches. It is replete with covert references to values and interests. The paper draws an important distinction between cases in which culture creates new conditions for old functions to be realized and those where it creates new functions.

Abstract: Abstract. Philosophers frequently invoke our ability to imagine, conceive or suppose various thing in order to explain how we achieve our cognitive goals when we make decisions about future actions, when we perform thought experiments, and when we engage in games of pretense. But what is the relationship between imaginings, conceivings, and supposings? And what exactly are the epistemic roles they play in the cognitive projects in which they are involved? This chapter provides answers to these questions by first bringing out a contrast between what we do when we imagine and what we do when we suppose, and then by showing how to fit conceivings into the emerging systematic picture of the ways we use different forms of hypothetical thinking to acquire knowledge.

Abstract: According to Conceptualism, philosophy is an independent discipline that can be pursued from the armchair because philosophy seeks truths that can be discovered purely on the basis of our understanding of expressions and the concepts they express. In his recent book, The Philosophy of Philosophy, Timothy Williamson argues that while philosophy can indeed be pursued from the armchair, we should reject any form of Conceptualism. In this paper, we show that Williamson's arguments against Conceptualism are not successful, and we sketch a way to understand understanding that shows that there is a clear sense in which we can indeed come to know the answers to (many) philosophical questions purely on the basis of understanding.

Abstract: It is often assumed that contemporary physics is more hospitable to divine action (and human freedom) than classical mechanics. The article criticizes this assumption on the grounds of both physics and theology. Most currently discussed models of divine action do not challenge the physicalist assumption that physics provides a true and complete description of nature's causal web. Thus they resemble physicalism-plus-God. Taking up suggestions from Herman Dooyeweerd and Henri Blocher, I propose an alternative framework for divine action in the world. It takes creation as the starting-point to understand the world and leads to a non-reductionist, multidimensional picture of reality

Summary: This article explores the idea that we can assuage our physicalist qualms by embracing "ontological physicalism", the claim that all that exists in space-time is physical, but, at the same time, accept "property dualism", a dualism about psychological and physical attributes, insisting that psychological concepts or properties form an irreducible, autonomous domain. The issue the author explores is whether or not a robust physicalist can, consistently and plausibly, swear off reductionism - that is, whether or not a substantial form of physicalism can be combined with the rejection of psycho-physical reduction. The author argues that a middle-of-the road position of the sort just described is not available. More specifically, he claim that a physicalist has only two genuine options, eliminativism and reductionism.

Abstract: This paper analyzes and evaluates quine's influential thesis that epistemology should become a chapter of empirical psychology. quine's main point, it is argued, is that normativity must be banished from epistemology and, more generally, philosophy. i claim that without a normative concept of justification, we lose the very concept of knowledge, and that belief ascription itself becomes impossible without a normative concept of rationality. further, the supervenience of concepts of epistemic appraisal shows that normative epistemology is indeed possible.

Content: Starts with a nice historical discussion of the emergence of the term 'terrorism' and some of the ways that it changed before and after the 9/11 attacks. Jaggar offers a specification of the concept and then her own conception, which can be practiced by governments and international bodies, and then discusses several kinds of conflict in which it may be deployed as a tactic. Here is her definition: "Terrorism is the use of extreme threats or violence designed to intimidate or subjugate governments, groups, or individuals. It is a tactic of coercion intended to promote further ends that in themselves may be good, bad or indifferent. Terrorism may be practiced by governments or international bodies or forces, sub-state groups or even individuals. Its threats or violence are aimed directly or immediately at the bodies or belongings of innocent civilians but these are typically terrorists’ secondary targets; the primary targets of terrorists are the governments, groups or individuals that they wish to intimidate" (2005: 209).