C. A. J. Coady

Bio: C. A. J. Coady is an academic researcher from University of Melbourne. The author has contributed to research in topics: Terrorism & Just war theory. The author has an hindex of 14, co-authored 58 publications receiving 1349 citations. Previous affiliations of C. A. J. Coady include Charles Sturt University.

Testimony: A Philosophical Study

Abstract: I. The Problematic: The domain of testimony What is testimony? Objections and clarifications II. The Tradition: Testimony, observation, and the reductive approach Deciding for testimony The analogical approach Scottish fundamentalism III. The Solution: The status of testimony Language and mind IV: The Puzzles: Astonishing reports The disappearance of history Dretske's drinker V. The Applications: Collingwood and historical testimony Mathematical knowledge and reliable authority Psychology and the law Experts and the law

Morality and Political Violence

Abstract: Political violence in the form of wars, insurgencies, terrorism and violent rebellion constitutes a major human challenge. C. A. J. Coady brings a philosophical and ethical perspective as he places the problems of war and political violence in the frame of reflective ethics. In this book, Coady re-examines a range of urgent problems pertinent to political violence against the background of a contemporary approach to just war thinking. The problems examined include: the right to make war and conduct war, terrorism, revolution, humanitarianism, mercenary warriors, the ideal of peace and the right way to end war. Coady attempts to vindicate the contemporary relevance of the just war tradition to current problems without applying the tradition in a merely mechanical or uncritical fashion.

Terrorism, Morality, and Supreme Emergency

Abstract: In this chapter, I will be using ‘terrorism’ in the sense of organized use of violence to attack non-combatants (’innocents’ in a special sense) or their property for political purposes.1 Is terrorism wrong? Given this definition — which I want to term ‘tactical’ — and given just war theory, the answer is, as I have argued more fully elsewhere,2 clearly yes. Terrorism violates a central principle of the jus in bello, the principle of discrimination, which declares the immunity of non-combatants from direct attack. It is not just that there are good utilitarian arguments for this principle or that it has been agreed between nations. The prohibition lies at the heart of the reasoning that allows for legitimate war in extremis since you are entitled to wage war only against those who are doing a certain sort of harm (and then only if other conditions are fulfilled). As John Locke put it: ‘they [those among the enemy population innocent of waging the war] ought not to be charged as guilty of the violence and injustice that is committed in an unjust war any farther than they actually abet it.’3 Here Locke echoes what is common in the just war tradition.4

The Idea of Violence

Abstract: Violence is a central idea for political theory but there is very little agreement about how it should be understood. This paper examines some fashionable approaches to the concept and argues against ‘wide’ definitions, particularly those of the ‘structuralist’ variety of which that offered by the sociologist, Johan Galtung, is taken as typical. A critique is also given of ‘legitimist’ definitions which incorporate some strong notion of illegitimacy into the very meaning of violence. Structuralist definitions are much favoured by the political left whereas legitimist accounts are more common on the right but these connections, though psychologically understandable, are not logically tight. Both structuralist and legitimist analyses are criticised on conceptual and practical grounds and a defence of a more restricted definition is presented. The paper concludes with some remarks about the point of having a concept of violence of the type delineated.

Two Treatises of Government.

Abstract: All these premises having, as I think, been clearly made out, it is impossible that the rulers now on earth should make any benefit, or derive any the least shadow of authority from that, which is held to be the fountain of all power, Adam's private dominion and paternal jurisdiction; so that he that will not give just occasion to think that all government in the world is the product only of force and violence, and that men live together by no other rules but that of beasts, where the strongest carries it, and so lay a foundation for perpetual disorder and mischief, tumult, sedition and rebellion, (things that the followers of that hypothesis so loudly cry out against) must of necessity find out another rise of government, another original of political power, and another way of designing and knowing the persons that have it, than what Sir Robert Filmer hath taught us.

Rethinking Informed Consent in Bioethics

Abstract: 1 Consent: Nuremburg, Helsinki and beyond 2 Information and communication: the drift from agency 3 Informing and communicating: back to agency 4 How to rethink informed consent 5 Informational privacy and data protection 6 Genetic information and genetic exceptionalism 7 Trust, accountability and transparency Some conclusions and proposals

Expanding the Dimensions of Epistemic Cognition: Arguments From Philosophy and Psychology

Abstract: Psychological and educational researchers have developed a flourishing research program on epistemological dimensions of cognition (epistemic cognition). Contemporary philosophers investigate many epistemological topics that are highly relevant to this program but that have not featured in research on epistemic cognition. We argue that integrating these topics into psychological models of epistemic cognition is likely to improve the explanatory and predictive power of these models. We thus propose and explicate a philosophically grounded framework for epistemic cognition that includes five components: (a) epistemic aims and epistemic value; (b) the structure of knowledge and other epistemic achievements; (c) the sources and justification of knowledge and other epistemic achievements, and the related epistemic stances; (d) epistemic virtues and vices; and (e) reliable and unreliable processes for achieving epistemic aims. We further argue for a fine-grained, context-specific analysis of cognitions within t...

Patterns of neural activity associated with honest and dishonest moral decisions

Abstract: What makes people behave honestly when confronted with opportunities for dishonest gain? Research on the interplay between controlled and automatic processes in decision making suggests 2 hypotheses: According to the "Will" hypothesis, honesty results from the active resistance of temptation, comparable to the controlled cognitive processes that enable the delay of reward. According to the "Grace" hypothesis, honesty results from the absence of temptation, consistent with research emphasizing the determination of behavior by the presence or absence of automatic processes. To test these hypotheses, we examined neural activity in individuals confronted with opportunities for dishonest gain. Subjects undergoing functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) gained money by accurately predicting the outcomes of computerized coin-flips. In some trials, subjects recorded their predictions in advance. In other trials, subjects were rewarded based on self-reported accuracy, allowing them to gain money dishonestly by lying about the accuracy of their predictions. Many subjects behaved dishonestly, as indicated by improbable levels of "accuracy." Our findings support the Grace hypothesis. Individuals who behaved honestly exhibited no additional control-related activity (or other kind of activity) when choosing to behave honestly, as compared with a control condition in which there was no opportunity for dishonest gain. In contrast, individuals who behaved dishonestly exhibited increased activity in control-related regions of prefrontal cortex, both when choosing to behave dishonestly and on occasions when they refrained from dishonesty. Levels of activity in these regions correlated with the frequency of dishonesty in individuals.

Environmental Harm and the Political Economy of Consumption

Abstract: Introduction THIS ARTICLE ARGUES THAT ADEQUATE STUDY OF ENVIRONMENTAL HARM MUST proceed from sustained analysis of the basic institutions and structures of contemporary capitalism. The central question at the core of environmental degradation and destruction is the organization of human subsistence and the relationship of this to nature. The article thus demonstrates the centrality of capitalist political economy to the construction of the substantive problem (environmental harm) and to the limitations of existing regulatory regimes in relation to this problem. To illustrate the theoretical issues and complexities in this area, the specific focus will be on "consumption" relations. I will discuss the relationship between production and consumption, the developments underpinning the extension of "consumerism" in capitalist society (e.g., privatization and commodification), and the symbolic place of consumption and its association with the realization of surplus value by capital (e.g., production of meaning, identity, and desire). Each of these areas has implications for the conceptualization of environmental problems and for how to regulate or respond to environmental harm. Criminology and the Study of Environmental Harm By its very nature, the study of environmental harm raises issues pertaining to the proper domains of criminology as a field of inquiry. For example, from the point of view of conceptions of "harm" and the regulation of environmental activity, there is rarely a specific, or adequate, criminal justice response to the issues. There is enormous variation in how we conceptualize the problem and devise appropriate and effective measures to limit, reduce, or abolish certain types of environmental harm depending upon the philosophical framework within which analysis and intervention take place (see, for example, Halsey and White, 1998). The actual interplay between civil and criminal remedies also warrants close attention, as it represents attempts to deal with substantive issues through measures across a range of regulatory areas (Gunningham et al., 1995). Major issues relating to environmental harm include its definition in criminological terms and the nature of responses to such harm. The politics of definition are complicated by the politics of "denial," in which particular concrete manifestations of social injury and environmental damage are obfuscated, ignored, or redefined in ways that re-present them as being of little relevance to academic criminological study or state criminal justice intervention. Similar to the denial of human rights violations, environmental issues call forth a range of neutralization techniques on the part of nation-states and corporations that ultimately legitimate and justify certain types of environmentally unfriendly activities. For instance, "green washing" media campaigns misconstrue the nature of collective corporate business regarding the environment (Beder, 1997). The arguments of critics of particular kinds of biotechnological development are attacked and delegitimated (see Hager and Burton, 1999; Hannigan, 1995), as in t he case of those who question the nature of genetically modified food (Hindmarsh, 1996). For governments, denial of harm is usually associated with economic objectives and the appeal to forms of "sustainable development" that fundamentally involve further environmental degradation (see Harvey, 1996). At the heart of these processes of denial is a culture that takes for granted, but rarely sees as problematic, the proposition that continued expansion of material consumption is both possible and will not harm the biosphere in any fundamental way. Some aspects of denial are consciously and directly linked to instrumental purposes (as in firm's or industry campaigns to delegitimate environmental action surrounding events or developments that are manifestly harmful to local environments). …