Browse
Recent Submissions
Item Open Access Virtue and moral obligation(Routledge, 2023-06-19) Bergès, Sandrine; Detlefsen, K.; Shapiro, L.Although Early Modern male philosophers arguably moved away from virtue ethics toward theories of obligation, it is less clearly true of women philosophers of that period. I argue that Early Modern women philosophers in France and England mixed elements from virtue ethics and theories of moral obligation in order to theorize their moral experience. I look at Christine de Pizan, Jacqueline Pascal, Catherine Trotter Cockburn, and Mary Wollstonecraft.Item Open Access Predictivism and model selection(Springer Science and Business Media B.V., 2023-02-21) Fatollahi, AlirezaThere has been a lively debate in the philosophy of science over predictivism: the thesis that successfully predicting a given body of data provides stronger evidence for a theory than merely accommodating the same body of data. I argue for a very strong version of the thesis using statistical results on the so-called “model selection” problem. This is the problem of finding the optimal model (family of hypotheses) given a body of data. The key idea that I will borrow from the statistical literature is that the level of support a hypothesis, H, receives from a body of data, D, is inversely related to the number of adjustable parameters of the model from which H was constructed. I will argue that when D is not essential to the design of H (i.e., when it is predicted), the model to which H belongs has fewer adjustable parameters than when D is essential to the design of H (when it is accommodated). This, I argue, provides us with an argument for a very strong version of predictivism.Item Open Access Newton’s example of the two globes(Springer, Cham, 2023-11-28) Solomon, MonicaAt the end of the Scholium Newton includes a long paragraph about two globes revolving around their center of gravity and held together by a tensed cord. It has been interpreted as a thought experiment (Sect. 6.2) meant to show how the properties of true circular motion defined as absolute motion can be determined in a three-dimensional empty universe. I start by showing that this reading of Newton’s example as a bona fide thought experiment is riddled with interpretation problems and that it is less straightforward than so far assumed (Sect. 6.3).Item Open Access Mereological destruction and relativized parthood: a reply to Costa and Calosi(Springer Science and Business Media B.V., 2021-07-24) Payton, Jonathan D.Metaphysicians of various stripes claim that a single object can have more than one exact location in space or time – e.g. endurantists claim that an object persists by being ‘all there’ at diferent moments in time. Antony Eagle has developed a formal theory of location which is prima facie consistent with multi-location, but Dami ano Costa and Claudio Calosi argue that the theory is unattractive to multi-location theorists on other grounds. I examine their charge that Eagle’s theory won’t allow an endurantist to account for certain cases of mereological change. I argue that the charge sticks, but not for the reasons Costa and Calosi think. Along the way, I explore an issue which is underexplored in their paper, namely, how an endurantist might modify Eagle’s theory to incorporate a parthood relation which obtains, not absolutely, but only relative to times.Item Open Access Akaike and the No Miracle Argument for scientific realism(Cambridge University Press, 2023-08-03) Fatollahi, Alireza; McCullagh, M.The “No Miracle Argument” for scientific realism contends that the only plausible explanation for the predictive success of scientific theories is their truthlikeness, but doesn’t specify what ‘truthlikeness’ means. I argue that if we understand ‘truthlikeness’ in terms of Kullback-Leibler (KL) divergence, the resulting realist thesis (RKL) is a plausible explanation for science’s success. Still, RKL probably falls short of the realist’s ideal. I argue, however, that the strongest version of realism that the argument can plausibly establish is RKL. The realist needs another argument for establishing a stronger realist thesis.Item Embargo The historiography of philosophy. by Michael Frede(Philosophy Documentation Center, 2023-03-01) Wolt, DanielItem Open Access Consciousness and categorical properties(Springer Science and Business Media B.V., 2021-01-04) Brown, Christopher DevlinRussellian physicalism is a view on the nature of consciousness which promises to satisfy the demands of both traditional physicalists and non-physicalists. It does so by identifying subjective experience with physically acceptable categorical proper ties underlying structural and dispositional properties described by science. Though promising, the view faces at least two serious challenges: (i) it has been argued that science deals in both categorical and non-categorical properties, which would under cut the motivation behind Russellian physicalism, and (ii) it has been argued that only nonphysicalist Russellian views—like panpsychism—are useful when it comes to explaining consciousness. I address these criticisms, arguing that there is no viable reason for maintaining that science deals in categorical properties of the sort which a Russellian physicalist is interested in, and that features of fully-physical categorical properties can be described which provide useful explanations for various essential features of subjective experience. These projects are connected: it turns out that when the explanatory relevance of Russellian physicalism is explained in detail, constraints are put the sort of categorical properties that Russellian physicalists can say are left out of science. Specifically, Russellian physicalists are forced to subscribe to the view that science leaves out any categorical properties whatsoever, as opposed to the view that some scientifcally scrutable properties are categorical, but not the ones which Russellian physicalists are interested in. I hope that by addressing these criticisms of Russellian physicalism, and drawing logical connections between the responses, fur ther appeal is added to a promising, but so far relatively unexplored, view.Item Embargo Philosophy and politics in Julian’s letter to Themistius(2023-02) Wolt, DanielJulian’s Letter to Themistius is one of our most valuable sources for understanding Julian’s political thought. More specifically, it is perhaps our most valuable source for investigating the extent to which Julian’s approach to governance was or was not influenced by his philosophical commitments. Here I focus on this question and argue that, understood in its proper intellectual context, the Letter provides us with good reason for thinking that Julian’s political philosophy (and the programme that he implemented as emperor) was profoundly influenced by the Platonist tradition. While Julian does distance himself both from the philosopher-king of the Republic and the lawgiver of the Laws, this should not be taken as a wholesale rejection of the possibility of an applied Platonist political philosophy. A standard Platonist doctrine by Julian’s time distinguished between not two but three levels of political reform: the divine ideal of the Republic, the second-best state of the Laws, and a third state, arising from reform. A careful reading of the Letter provides support for the idea that Julian aimed at the latterItem Open Access Domesticity and political participation: at home with the jacobin women(SAGE Publications Inc., 2022-03-22) Bergès, SandrineThe exclusion of women from political participation and the separation of private and public spheres seem anchored in human history to such an extent that we may think they are necessary. I offer an analysis of a philosophical moment in history, the early years of the French Revolution, where politics and domesticity were not incompatible. I show how this enabled women to participate in politics from within their homes, at the same time fulfilling their duties as wives and mothers. The republican home, on this interpretation, was a place of power and virtue, a merging of the public and the private sphere where political ideals and reforms could be born and nurtured. This conception of the home was derived in great part from a reading of Rousseau’s writings on motherhood. As the influence of French revolutionary women became more visible, they were severely repressed. The fact that they could not hold on to a position of power that derived naturally from the ideals they and others defended, I will suggest, was caused both by the fact that the framework used to allow women political power was insecure, and by the gradual replacement of republican ideals by liberal ones.Item Open Access Non-communicable disease policy implementation from 2014 to 2021: a repeated cross-sectional analysis of global policy data for 194 countries(Elsevier Ltd, 2023-04) Allen, L. N.; Wigley, Simon; Holmer, H.; Barlow, P.Background: Non-communicable diseases (NCDs) are the world's leading cause of death and disability. Global implementation of WHO-recommended NCD policies has been increasing with time, but in 2019 fewer than half of these policies had been implemented globally. In 2022, WHO released updated data on NCD policy implementation, on the basis of surveys conducted in 2021 during the COVID-19 pandemic. We sought to examine whether the trajectory of global policy implementation changed during this period. Methods: In this repeated cross-sectional analysis, we used data from the 2015, 2017, 2020, and 2022 WHO progress monitors to calculate NCD policy implementation scores for all 194 WHO member states. We used Welch's ANOVA and Games-Howell post-hoc pairwise testing to examine changes in mean implementation scores for 19 WHO-recommended NCD policies, with assessment at the global, geographical, geopolitical, and country-income levels. We collated sales data on tobacco, alcohol, and junk foods to examine the association between changes in sales and the predicted probability of implementation of policies targeting these products. We also calculated the Corporate Financial Influence Index (CFII) for each country, which was used to assess the association between corporate influence and policy implementation. We used logistic regression to assess the relationship between product sales and the probability of implementing related policies. The relationship between CFII and policy implementation was assessed with Pearson's correlation analysis and random-effects multivariate regression. Findings: Across the 194 countries, in the years preceding publication of each progress monitor, mean total policy implementation score (out of a potential 18·0) was 7·0 (SD 3·5) in 2014, 8·2 (3·5) in 2016, 8·6 (3·6) in 2019, and 8·6 (3·6) in 2021. Only the differences in mean implementation score between 2014 and the other three report years were deemed statistically significant (pairwise p<0·05). Thus the steady improvement in mean global NCD policy implementation stalled in 2021 at 47·8%. However, from 2019 to 2021, we identified shifts in individual policies: global mean implementation scores increased for policies on tobacco, clinical guidelines, salt, and child food marketing, and decreased for policies on alcohol, breastmilk substitute marketing, physical activity mass media campaigns, risk factor surveys, and national NCD plans and targets. Six of the seven policies with the lowest levels of implementation (global mean score <0·4 out of a potential 1·0) in both 2019 and 2021 were related to tobacco, alcohol, and unhealthy food. From 2020 onwards, we identified weak or no associations between sales of tobacco, alcohol, and junk foods and the predicted probability of implementing policies related to each commodity. Country-level CFII was significantly associated with total policy implementation score (Pearson's r –0·49, 95% CI –0·59 to –0·36), and this finding was supported in multivariate modelling for all policies combined and for all commercial policies except alcohol policies. Interpretation: NCD policy implementation has stagnated. Progress in the implementation of some policies is matched by decreased implementation of others, particularly those related to unhealthy commodities. To prevent NCDs and their consequences, and attain the Sustainable Development Goals, the rate of NCD policy adoption must be substantially and urgently increased before the next NCD progress monitor and UN high-level meeting on NCDs in 2024 Funding: NoneItem Open Access Kant’ın intihar üzerine görüşlerinin stoacı temelleri(Anadolu İlahiyat Akademisi, 2023-03-28) Vatansever, Saniyeİntiharın ahlaka uygun ve hatta kimi zaman ahlaken iyi olduğunu kabul eden Stoacı anlayışa zıt olarak Kant intiharın hiçbir durumda ahlaka uygun olamayacağını savunur. Bu çalışmada Kant’ın intihar üzerine görüşleri derlenerek, ilk bakışta birbirine zıt görünse de Kant’ın intihar konusundaki tutumunun Stoacı temelleri olduğu gösterilecektir. Kant’ın intihar ile ilgili görüşlerinin gerekçelerinin doğru bir şekilde anlaşılabilmesi için öncelikle onun ödev ahlakına dair genel bir açıklama yapılacak, böylece ahlak teorisinden doğan yaşama ödevinin temelleri ve bu ödevin intihar ile ilgili sonuçları ortaya konacaktır. Bilindiği gibi, Kant’a göre tek bir evrensel ve zorunlu ahlak yasası olduğu halde bu yasanın üç farklı formülasyonu mevcuttur. Kant insan doğasının özelliklerini aklın a priori buyruğu olan ahlak yasasının üç formülasyonunda bize adım adım açıklar. İlk formülasyonda insanın doğanın bir parçası olması yani onun bir doğa varlığı olduğu vurgulanır. İkinci formülasyonda insanın doğanın bir parçası olduğu denli akıl varlığı olduğu ve bu sebeple de aklını kullanarak hareket edebilme kapasitesi sebebiyle haysiyet ve saygıyı hak ettiği ortaya konur. Üçüncü ve son formülasyonda da insanın sadece aklın kurallarına uyan bir varlık olmayıp aynı zamanda kural koyucu bir yönü olduğu ve bu bakımdan da kendi koyduğu kurallara tâbi olması bakımından kendi kurduğu amaçlar krallığının hem üyesi hem de yöneticisi olduğu ortaya konur. Bu çalışma ile, Kant’ın ahlak yasasının üç formülasyonunun bize Stoa felsefesinde olduğu gibi, kendi doğamızın farklı yönlerini tanımamızı ve ona göre hareket etmemizi buyurduğu savunulacaktır. Böylece Kant’ın ahlak felsefesinin temelinde yatan Stoacı anlayışa dikkat çekilerek gerek Kant’ın ahlak anlayışına gerekse intihar ile ilgili görüşlerine dair özgün bir yorum ortaya konulacaktır.Item Open Access Energeia in the Magna Moralia(Brill, 2023-01) Wolt, DanielThere is no clear consensus among scholars about the authenticity of the Magna Moralia. Here I present a new case for thinking that the work was composed by a later Peripatetic, and is not, either directly or indirectly, the work of Aristotle. My argument rests on an analysis of the author’s usage of ἐνέργεια, which is a fruitful way to investigate the date of the work: the term was apparently coined by Aristotle but in later antiquity came to be used in ways inconsistent with Aristotle’s own usage. I argue that in several passages from the Magna Moralia the term is used in this distinctively late sense and that it is not plausible to think that this innovation could have occured in Aristotle’s own lifetime or shortly thereafter.Item Open Access Reviewing women’s philosophical works during the French revolution: the case of P.-L. Roederer(Taylor and Francis Group, 2023-07-04) Bergès, SandrineThis paper looks at selected reviews of women’s philosophical (and literary) works by Revolutionary author and politician Pierre-Louis Roederer. This study occasions the following remarks. Women’s works, when they raised political radical and sometimes feminist agendas were not only read and reviewed, but considered part of the general Revolutionary effort to relieve social and political inequalities. Secondly Roederer appears, from these reviews, as committed to convincing the French intellectual community that works by women ought to be taken as seriously as works by men, and to combat the prejudices which meant that they often were not. I will highlight in particular his reading of Mary Wollstonecraft’s Maria, or the Wrongs of Woman as both a fictionalized continuation of the philosophical programme of her Vindication of the Rights of Woman, and as a contribution to the philosophy of emotions–for which he compares it to Sophie de Grouchy’s Letters on Sympathy. I will also look at an unpublished draft in which he compares and contrasts Grouchy, Germaine de Staël, Emilie du Chatelet and Suzanne Necker’s writings on love. © 2023 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group.Item Open Access The effect of SARS-CoV-2 virus on resting-state functional connectivity during adolescence: Investigating brain correlates of psychotic-like experiences and SARS-CoV-2 related inflammation response(Elsevier B.V., 2023-12) Yilmaz Kafali, H.; Dasgin, Hacer; Sahin Cevik, Didenur; Sozan, S. S.; Oguz, Kader K.; Mutlu, M.; Ozkaya Parlakay, A.; Toulopoulou, TimotheaWe first aimed to investigate resting-state functional connectivity (rs-FC) differences between adolescents exposed to SARS-CoV-2 and healthy controls. Secondly, the moderator effect of PLEs on group differences in rs-FC was examined. Thirdly, brain correlates of inflammation response during acute SARS-CoV-2 infection were investigated. Eighty-two participants aged between 14 and 24 years (SARS-CoV-2 (n = 35), controls (n = 47)) were examined using rs-fMRI. Seed-based rs-FC analysis was performed. The positive subscale of Community Assessment of Psychotic Experiences-42 (CAPE-Pos) was used to measure PLEs. The SARS-CoV-2 group had a lesser rs-FC within sensorimotor network (SMN), central executive network (CEN) and language network (LN), but an increased rs-FC within visual network (VN) compared to controls. No significant differences were detected between the groups regarding CAPE-Pos-score. However, including CAPE-Pos as a covariate, we found increased rs-FC within CEN and SN in SARS-CoV-2 compared to controls. Among the SARS-CoV-2 group, neutrophil/lymphocyte and thrombocyte*neutrophil/lymphocyte ratio was correlated with decreased/increased FC within DMN and SN, and increased FC within CEN. Our results showed rs-FC alterations within the SMN, CEN, LN, and VN among adolescents exposed to SARS-CoV-2. Moreover, changes in rs-FC associated with PLEs existed in these adolescents despite the absence of clinical changes. Furthermore, inflammation response was correlated with alterations in FC within the triple network system.Item Open Access Gendered actions with a genderless robot: gender attribution to humanoid robots in action(Springer Science and Business Media B.V., 2023-01-20) Aşkın, Gaye; Saltık, İmge; Elver Boz, Tuğçe; Urgen, Burcu A.The present study aims to investigate how gender stereotypes affect people’s gender attribution to social robots. To this end, we examined whether a robot can be assigned a gender depending on a performed action. The study consists of 3 stages. In the first stage, we determined masculine and feminine actions by a survey conducted with 54 participants. In the second stage, we selected a gender-neutral robot by having 76 participants rate several robot stimuli in the masculine-feminine spectrum. In the third stage, we created short animation videos in which the gender-neutral robot determined in stage two performed the masculine and feminine actions determined in stage one. We then asked 102 participants to evaluate the robot in the videos in the masculine-feminine spectrum. We asked them to rate the videos according to their own view (self-view) and how they thought society would evaluate them (society-view). We also used the Socialization of Gender Norms Scale (SGNS) to identify individual differences in gender attribution to social robots. We found the main effect of action category (feminine vs. masculine) on both self-view reports and society-view reports suggesting that a neutral robot was reported to be feminine if it performed feminine actions and masculine if it performed masculine actions. However, society-view reports were more pronounced than the self-view reports: when the neutral robot performed masculine actions, it was found to be more masculine in the society-view reports than the self-view reports; and when it performs feminine actions, it was found to be more feminine in the society-view reports than the self-view reports. In addition, the SGNS predicted the society-view reports (for feminine actions) but not the self-view reports. In sum, our study suggests that people can attribute gender to social robots depending on the task they perform.Item Open Access What does it take to remember episodically?(Taylor and Francis, 2022-01-01) Keven, NazımItem Open Access Study protocol: Assessing the association between corporate financial influence and implementation of policies to tackle commercial determinants of non-communicable diseases: A cross-sectional analysis of 172 countries(BMJ Publishing Group, 2022-08-30) Allen, Luke Nelson; Wigley, Simon; Holmer, HampusIntroduction There are many case studies of corporations that have worked to undermine health policy implementation. It is unclear whether countries that are more exposed to corporate financial influence are systematically less likely to implement robust health policies that target firms' financial interests. We aim to assess the association between corporate financial influence and implementation of WHO-recommended policies to constrain sales, marketing and consumption of tobacco, alcohol and unhealthy foods. Methods and analysis We will perform a cross-sectional analysis of 172 WHO Member States using national datasets from 2015, 2017 and 2020. We will use random effects generalised least squares regression to test the association between implementation status of 12 WHO-recommended tobacco, alcohol and diet policies, and corporate financial influence, a metric that combines disclosure of campaign donations, public campaign finance, corporate campaign donations, legislature corrupt activities, disclosure by politicians and executive oversight. We will control for GDP per capita, population aged >65 years (%), urbanisation (%), level of democracy, continent, ethno-linguistic fractionalisation, legal origin, UN-defined 'Small Island Developing States' and Muslim population (%) (to capture alcohol policy differences). We will include year dummies to address the possibility of a spurious relationship between the outcome variable and the independent variables of interests. For example, there may be an upward global trend in policy implementation that coincides with an upward global trend in the regulation of lobbying and campaign finance. Ethics and dissemination As this study uses publicly available data, ethics approval is not required. The authors have no conflicts of interest to declare. Findings will be submitted to a peer-reviewed journal for publication in the academic literature. All data, code and syntax will be made publicly available on GitHub. © Author(s) (or their employer(s)) 2022. Re-use permitted under CC BY-NC. No commercial re-use. See rights and permissions. Published by BMJ.Item Open Access Pandemic preparedness and COVID-19: an exploratory analysis of infection and fatality rates, and contextual factors associated with preparedness in 177 countries, from Jan 1, 2020, to Sept 30, 2021(The Lancet Publishing Group, 2022-02-01) Bollyky, Thomas J; Hulland, Erin N; Barber, Ryan M; Collins, James K; Kiernan, Samantha; Moses, Mark; Pigott, David M; Reiner Jr, Robert C; Sorensen, Reed J D; Abbafati, Cristiana; Adolph, Christopher; Allorant, Adrien; Amlag, Joanne O; Aravkin, Aleksandr Y; Bang-Jensen, Bree; Carter, Austin; Castellano, Rachel; Castro, Emma; Chakrabarti, Suman; Combs, Emily; Dai, Xiaochen; Dangel, William James; Dapper, Carolyn; Deen, Amanda; Duncan, Bruce B; Earl, Lucas; Erickson, Megan; Ewald, Samuel B; Fedosseeva, Tatiana; Ferrari, Alize J; Flaxman, Abraham D; Fullman, Nancy; Gakidou, Emmanuela; Galal, Bayan; Gallagher, John; Giles, John R; Guo, Gaorui; He, Jiawei; Helak, Monika; Huntley, Bethany M; Idrisov, Bulat; Johanns, Casey; LeGrand, Kate E; Letourneau, Ian D; Lindstrom, Akiaja; Linebarger, Emily; Lotufo, Paulo A; Lozano, Rafael; Magistro, Beatrice; Malta, Deborah Carvalho; Månsson, Johan; Herrera, Ana M Mantilla; Marinho, Fatima; Mirkuzie, Alemnesh H; Mokdad, Ali H; Monasta, Lorenzo; Naik, Paulami; Nomura, Shuhei; O'Halloran, James Kevin; Odell, Christopher M; Olana, Latera Tesfaye; Ostroff, Samuel M; Pasovic, Maja; Azeredo Passos, Valeria Maria de; Penberthy, Louise; Reinke, Grace; Santomauro, Damian Francesco; Schmidt, Maria Inês; Sholokhov, Aleksei; Spurlock, Emma; Troeger, Christopher E; Varavikova, Elena; Vo, Anh T; Vos, Theo; Walcott, Rebecca; Walker, Ally; Wigley, Simon D; Wiysonge, Charles Shey; Worku, Nahom Alemseged; Wu, Yifan; Hanson, Sarah Wulf; Zheng, Peng; Hay, Simon I; Murray, Christopher J L; Dieleman, Joseph LItem Open Access Fair infinite lotteries, qualitative probability, and regularity(Cambridge University Press, 2022-02-11) DiBella, NicholasA number of philosophers have thought that fair lotteries over countably infinite sets of outcomes are conceptually incoherent by virtue of violating countable additivity. In this article, I show that a qualitative analogue of this argument generalizes to an argument against the conceptual coherence of a much wider class of fair infinite lotteries—including continuous uniform distributions. I argue that this result suggests that fair lotteries over countably infinite sets of outcomes are no more conceptually problematic than continuous uniform distributions. Along the way, I provide a novel argument for a weak qualitative, epistemic version of regularity.Item Open Access Non-paradigmatic punishments(John Wiley and Sons Inc, 2022-03-05) Brown Coverdale, Helen; Wringe, BillThis review article argues for a better acknowledgement by penal philosophers of the diversity of subjects, agents, and practices of punishment. Much current penal philosophy has an unhelpful hyper-focus on the criminal punishment of culpable adults, by states, often through imprisonment. This paradigmatic case is important, but other subjects, agents, and practices of punishment are not statistically insignificant side-issues, and a comprehensive account of punishment should address them. Our understanding of punishment as a whole can be enhanced by considering non-paradigmatic punishment, with implications for whether and when punishment is justified, how we should understand appropriate authority, and how we should understand and engage with abolitionist arguments. We explore non-paradigmatic penal practices (community punishments, suspended prison sentence, restorative justice, and alternative jurisprudence), non-paradigmatic punishing agents (International judicial bodies, schools, and religious communities; with practices such as boycotts, shaming and shunning) and non-paradigmatic subjects of punishment (collective agents, corporations and children). © 2022 The Authors. Philosophy Compass published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd.