Showing papers in "Australasian Journal of Philosophy in 2018"
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors propose a framework for marking the perception-cognition boundary, which can accommodate two apparent counterexamples: hallucination and demonstrative thought, which are prima facie perceptual yet stimulus independent.
Abstract: Philosophy, scientific psychology, and common sense all distinguish perception from cognition. While there is little agreement about how the perception–cognition boundary ought to be drawn, one prominent idea is that perceptual states are dependent on a stimulus, or are stimulus-dependent, in a way that cognitive states are not. This paper seeks to develop this idea in a way that can accommodate two apparent counterexamples: hallucinations, which are prima facie perceptual yet stimulus-independent; and demonstrative thoughts, which are prima facie cognitive yet stimulus-dependent. The payoff is not only a specific proposal for marking the perception–cognition boundary, but also a deeper understanding of the natures of hallucination and demonstrative thought.
41 citations
TL;DR: The issue-based theory of topics as mentioned in this paper is a natural entry in the atom-based tradition that meets the constraints of adequacy and complements the subject-predicate approach.
Abstract: Our topic is the theory of topics (that is, the theory of subject matter). My goal is to clarify and evaluate three competing traditions: what I call the way-based approach, the atom-based approach, and the subject-predicate approach. I develop (defeasible) criteria for adequacy using robust linguistic intuitions that feature prominently in the literature. Then I evaluate the extent to which various existing theories satisfy these constraints. I conclude that recent theories due to Parry, Perry, Lewis, and Yablo do not meet the constraints in total. I then introduce the issue-based theory—a novel and natural entry in the atom-based tradition that meets our constraints. In a coda, I categorize a recent theory from Fine as atom-based, and contrast it to the issue-based theory, concluding that they are evenly matched, relative to our main criteria of adequacy. I offer tentative reasons to nevertheless favour the issue-based theory.
38 citations
TL;DR: Despite the now considerable literature on intellectual virtue, there remains relatively little philosophical discussion of intellectual vice as mentioned in this paper, and what discussion there is has been shaped by a powerful powerful powerful force.
Abstract: Despite the now considerable literature on intellectual virtue, there remains relatively little philosophical discussion of intellectual vice. What discussion there is has been shaped by a powerful...
28 citations
TL;DR: The authors argue that the specious present does not explain temporal experiences and that temporal experiences do not tell us anything special about the nature of consciousness and its temporal properties per se, and that the different aspects of temporal experiences arise from different mechanisms operating separately.
Abstract: Most philosophers believe that we have experiences as of temporally extended phenomena like change, motion, and succession. Almost all theories of time consciousness explain these temporal experiences by subscribing to the doctrine of the specious present, the idea that the contents of our experiences embrace temporally extended intervals of time and are presented as temporally structured. Against these theories, I argue that the doctrine is false and present a theory that does not require the notion of a specious present. Furthermore, I argue that the different aspects of temporal experiences arise from different mechanisms operating separately. If the theory is true, then temporal experiences do not tell us anything special about the nature of consciousness and its temporal properties per se.
25 citations
TL;DR: This paper identifies alternative ways that selective attention might play a role in cognitive effects on perception and emerges a plausible and well-evidenced mental schema that describes attention-mediated cognitive penetration.
Abstract: One sceptical rejoinder to those who claim that sensory perception is cognitively penetrable is to appeal to the involvement of spatial attention While the sceptic is correct that some putative cases are accurately deflected in this way, the rejoinder oversimplifies the possible roles that attention might play in relevant contexts This paper identifies alternative ways that selective attention might play a role in cognitive effects on perception What emerges is a plausible and well-evidenced mental schema that describes attention-mediated cognitive penetration
24 citations
TL;DR: The authors explored whether dialetheism, armed with the tools of paraconsistent logics, has the resources to respond to the objections leveled against the divine attributes of omniscience and omnipotence.
Abstract: The divine attributes of omniscience and omnipotence have faced objections to their very consistency. Such objections rely on reasoning parallel to semantic paradoxes such as the Liar or to set-theoretic paradoxes like Russell's paradox. With the advent of paraconsistent logics, dialetheism—the view that some contradictions are true—became a major player in the search for a solution to such paradoxes. This paper explores whether dialetheism, armed with the tools of paraconsistent logics, has the resources to respond to the objections levelled against the divine attributes.
22 citations
TL;DR: Evaluative aesthetic discourse communicates that the speaker has had first-hand experience of what is talked about as mentioned in this paper, and if a book bewitching, it will be assumed that you have read the book.
Abstract: Evaluative aesthetic discourse communicates that the speaker has had first-hand experience of what is talked about. If you call a book bewitching, it will be assumed that you have read the ...
20 citations
TL;DR: In this article, the authors argue that there is no experiential phenomenology associated with the ownership of experiences, and there is nothing that it is like to be an owner of experiences.
Abstract: The Abhidharma Buddhist revisionary metaphysics aims to provide an intellectually and morally preferred picture of the world that lacks a self. The first part of the paper claims that the Abhidharma ‘no-self’ view can be plausibly interpreted as a no-ownership view, according to which there is no locus or subject of experience and thus no owner of mental or bodily awarenesses. On this interpretation of the no-self view, the Abhidharma Buddhist metaphysicians are committed to denying the ownership of experiences, and thereby apparently obliged to explain our purported experience of ownership. My experiences seemingly come with the sense that I am the one who is undergoing this experience. But is there a really an experience of ownership—namely, an experience of being a subject that underlies our sense of ownership? I argue that there is nothing that it is like to be an owner of experiences, in the sense that there is no experiential phenomenology associated with the ownership of experience. The sec...
19 citations
TL;DR: In this article, the authors introduce the category of non-deceptive manipulation that causes false beliefs, and analyze how it narrows the traditional scope of deception and draws moral implications, and how it can be used to identify false beliefs.
Abstract: This paper introduces the category of ‘non-deceptive manipulation that causes false beliefs’, analyzes how it narrows the traditional scope of ‘deception’, and draws moral implications.
18 citations
TL;DR: The authors distinguish between two kinds of biological connections between parents and children: the genetic link and the gestational link, and argue that the second can better justify a right to rear a child.
Abstract: Common-sense morality and legislations around the world ascribe normative relevance to biological connections between parents and children. Procreators who meet a modest standard of parental competence are believed to have a right to rear the children whom they brought into the world. I explore various attempts to justify this belief, and find most of these attempts lacking. I distinguish between two kinds of biological connection between parents and children: the genetic link and the gestational link. I argue that the second can better justify a right to rear.
17 citations
TL;DR: The authors discusses Wittgenstein's conception of logic, early and late, and some of the types of logical systems that he constructed, and argues that the common view that Wittdenstein had stopped engaging in logic as a philosophical discipline by the time of writing Philosophical Investigations is mistaken.
Abstract: This essay discusses Wittgenstein's conception of logic, early and late, and some of the types of logical system that he constructed. The essay shows that the common view according to which Wittgenstein had stopped engaging in logic as a philosophical discipline by the time of writing Philosophical Investigations is mistaken. It is argued that, on the contrary, logic continued to figure at the very heart of later Wittgenstein's philosophy; and that Wittgenstein's mature philosophy of logic contains many interesting thoughts that have gone widely unnoticed.
TL;DR: In this article, a new view of logical pluralism is presented, which takes into account how the logical connectives shift, depending on the context in which they occur, using the Question Under-Discussion Framework.
Abstract: This paper presents a new view of logical pluralism. This pluralism takes into account how the logical connectives shift, depending on the context in which they occur. Using the Question-Under-Discussion Framework as formulated by Craige Roberts, I identify the contextual factor that is responsible for this shift. I then provide an account of the meanings of the logical connectives which can accommodate this factor. Finally, I suggest that this new pluralism has a certain Carnapian flavour. Questions about the meanings of the connectives or the best logic outside of a specified context are not legitimate questions.
TL;DR: In this article, a defence of the moral beauty view is presented, arguing via an inference to the best explanation, which is based on empirical evidence and is supported by thought experiments.
Abstract: Although formative of modern value theory, the moral beauty view—which states that moral virtue is beautiful and moral vice is ugly—is now mostly neglected by (analytic) philosophers. The two contemporary defences of the view mostly capitalize on its intuitive attractiveness, but to little avail: such considerations hardly convince sceptics of what is nowadays a rather unpopular view. Historically, the view was supported by thought experiments; and although these greatly increase its plausibility, they also raise empirical questions, which they leave unanswered. Here, I offer a novel defence of the moral beauty view, capitalizing on empirical evidence and arguing via an inference to the best explanation.
TL;DR: In this article, the authors argue that received accounts of the concept of human dignity face more difficulties than has been appreciated, when explaining the connection between human dignity and the duty of respect that dignity is supposed to generate.
Abstract: This article argues that received accounts of the concept of human dignity face more difficulties than has been appreciated, when explaining the connection between human dignity and the duty of respect that dignity is supposed to generate. It also argues that a novel, relational, account has the adequate structure to explain such connection.
TL;DR: It is argued that Andrea Woody's functional analysis of explanation is a better fit with logical practice and accounts better for the explanatory role of logical theories.
Abstract: Anti-exceptionalists about logic maintain that it is continuous with the empirical sciences. Taking anti-exceptionalism for granted, we argue that traditional approaches to explanation are inadequate in the case of logic. We argue that Andrea Woody's functional analysis of explanation is a better fit with logical practice and accounts better for the explanatory role of logical theories.
TL;DR: In this article, the authors defend a non-reductive realist view of the sensible qualities, which they call secondary quality Russellian Monism, and show how the secondary qualities (especially the so-called ''secondary qualities'' relate to physical reality.
Abstract: This paper defends a non-reductive realist view of the sensible qualities—roughly, the view that the sensible qualities are (i) really instantiated by the external objects of perception, and (ii) not reducible to response-independent physical properties or response-dependent relational properties. I begin by clarifying and motivating the non-reductive realist view. I then consider some familiar difficulties for the view. Addressing these difficulties leads to the development and defence of a general theory, inspired by Russellian Monist theories of consciousness, of how the sensible qualities (especially the so-called ‘secondary qualities’) relate to physical reality. I conclude by showing how this theory, which I call ‘Secondary Quality Russellian Monism’, resolves the most significant difficulties for the non-reductive realist view of the sensible qualities.
TL;DR: The authors argue that the very fact that there is disagreement among experts on a given issue provides a positive reason for non-experts to trust that the experts really are justified in their attitudes towards consensus theories.
Abstract: It is often suggested that disagreement among scientific experts is a reason not to trust those experts, even about matters on which they are in agreement. In direct opposition to this view, I argue here that the very fact that there is disagreement among experts on a given issue provides a positive reason for non-experts to trust that the experts really are justified in their attitudes towards consensus theories. I show how this line of thought can be spelled out in three distinct frameworks for non-deductive reasoning: namely, Bayesian Confirmation Theory, Inference to the Best Explanation, and Inferential Robustness Analysis.
TL;DR: In this article, the authors present a new, prudential, companions-in-guilt argument and argue for its superiority over the epistemic alternative, arguing that moral discourse is irredeemably in error because it is committed to the existence of properties that do not exist.
Abstract: The moral error theorist claims that moral discourse is irredeemably in error because it is committed to the existence of properties that do not exist. A common response has been to postulate ‘companions in guilt’—forms of discourse that seem safe from error despite sharing the putatively problematic features of moral discourse. The most developed instance of this pairs moral discourse with epistemic discourse. In this paper, I present a new, prudential, companions-in-guilt argument and argue for its superiority over the epistemic alternative.
TL;DR: It is argued that if the physicalist adopts the powerful qualities ontology of properties then a new and powerful version of the phenomenal concept strategy can be developed, which answers the new challenge to physicalism.
Abstract: Defenders of the phenomenal concept strategy have to explain how both physical and phenomenal concepts provide a substantive grasp on the nature of their referents, whilst referring to the very same experience. This is the ‘new challenge’ to physicalism. In this paper, I argue that if the physicalist adopts the powerful qualities ontology of properties then a new and powerful version of the phenomenal concept strategy can be developed, which answers the new challenge.
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TL;DR: In this paper, the authors disambiguated the question of what is John Cage's 4′33″ into three sub-questions concerning, respectively, the work's ontological nature, the art form to which it belongs, and the genre it is in.
Abstract: What is John Cage's 4′33″? This paper disambiguates this question into three sub-questions concerning, respectively, the work's ontological nature, the art form to which it belongs, and the genre it is in. We shall see that the work's performances consist of silence (rather than containing environmental sounds), that it is a work of performance art (rather than music), and that it belongs to the genre of conceptual art. Seeing the work in these ways helps us to understand it better, and promises to assuage somewhat the puzzlement and irritation of those who are at first resistant to its charms.
TL;DR: The tracking assumption as discussed by the authors assumes that an attitude-ascription which states that s Φ's that P is true iff s has an attitude, of Φ-ing, which is an entertaining of the content P (with entertain used in a stipulated sense).
Abstract: This paper is about the relevance of attitude-ascriptions to debates about singular thought. It examines a methodology (common to early acquaintance theorists [Kaplan 1968] and recent critics of acquaintance [Hawthorne and Manley 2012], which assumes that the behaviour of ascriptions can be used to draw conclusions about singular thought. Although many theorists (e.g. [Recanati 2012]) reject this methodology, the literature lacks a detailed examination of its implications and the challenges faced by proponents and critics. I isolate an assumption of the methodology, which I call the tracking assumption: that an attitude-ascription which states that s Φ's that P is true iff s has an attitude, of Φ-ing, which is an entertaining of the content P (with entertain used in a stipulated sense). I argue that the tracking assumption must be rejected, not because it has deflationary consequences, but because it leads to unstable commitments. I also show that there are independent reasons to reject it, becaus...
TL;DR: In this paper, the authors examine three "anti-object" metaphysical views: nihilism, generalism and anti-quantificationalism (quantification over objects does not perspicuously represent the world).
Abstract: I examine three ‘anti-object’ metaphysical views: nihilism (there are no objects at all), generalism (reality is ultimately qualitative), and anti-quantificationalism (quantification over objects does not perspicuously represent the world). After setting aside nihilism, I argue that generalists should be anti-quantificationalists. Along the way, I attempt to articulate what a ‘metaphysically perspicuous’ language might even be.
TL;DR: In this article, the authors defend sensitivity by showing that inductive knowledge is sensitive, and that sensitivity therefore cannot be necessary for knowledge, whereas Sosa, Pritchard, and Vogel have all argued that there are cases in which one knows something inductively but does not believe it sensitively.
Abstract: Sosa, Pritchard, and Vogel have all argued that there are cases in which one knows something inductively but does not believe it sensitively, and that sensitivity therefore cannot be necessary for knowledge. I defend sensitivity by showing that inductive knowledge is sensitive.
TL;DR: In this article, it was shown that if the mental is taken to supervene non-reductively on the physical, there cannot exist empirical evidence for its causal efficacy.
Abstract: It has become a popular view among non-reductive physicalists that it is possible to devise empirical tests generating evidence for the causal efficacy of the mental, whereby the exclusion worries that have haunted the position of non-reductive physicalism for decades can be dissolved once and for all. This paper aims to show that these evidentialist hopes are vain. I argue that, if the mental is taken to supervene non-reductively on the physical, there cannot exist empirical evidence for its causal efficacy. While causal structures without non-reductive supervenience relations can be conclusively identified in ideal discovery circumstances, it is impossible, in principle, to generate evidence that would favour models with mental causation over models without. Ascribing causal efficacy to the mental, for the non-reductive physicalist, is a modelling choice that must be made on the basis of metaphysical background theories or pragmatic maxims guiding the selection among empirically indistinguishabl...
TL;DR: A recent strand of argument in both Aristotelian and contemporary literature on hylomorphism has concluded that no genuine unity can be composed of a plurality as discussed by the authors, but this conclusion falls away as improperly formulated in light of Aristotle's metaontology.
Abstract: How should we understand the relationship, for Aristotle, between matter, form, and hylomorphic composite? Are matter and form distinct from each other, so that each hylomorphic unity harbours a plurality within it, or would such a plurality undermine the unity of the composite? A recent strand of argument in both Aristotelian and contemporary literature on hylomorphism has concluded that no genuine unity can be composed of a plurality. I will argue that the objection motivating this conclusion falls away as improperly formulated in light of Aristotle's metaontology—in particular, his thesis that unity (and therefore also plurality) is indeterminate. The genuine objection threatening hylomorphic unity is one that Aristotle himself formulates as a central concern in his Metaphysics: no substance can be composed of substances. He answers this genuine objection in his appeal to the actuality/potentiality distinction, and in Metaphysics VIII.6 he reminds us why no more basic problem of hylomorphic uni...
TL;DR: A novel approach to these core issues of sensory capacities is recommended, one that draws heavily on game-theoretic treatments of signalling in nature and helps to understand why biologists attribute sensory powers to such a diverse range of organisms.
Abstract: A central goal of the philosophy of perception is to uncover the nature of sensory capacities. Ideally, we would like an account that specifies what conditions need to be met in order for an organism to count as having the capacity to sense or perceive its environment. And, on the assumption that sensory states are the kinds of things that can be accurate or inaccurate, a further goal of the philosophy of perception is to identify the accuracy conditions for sensory states. In this paper I recommend a novel approach to these core issues, one that draws heavily on game-theoretic treatments of signalling in nature. A benefit of the approach is that it helps us to understand why biologists attribute sensory powers to such a diverse range of organisms, including plants, fungi, and algae.
TL;DR: The authors discusses a challenge for comparativists about belief, who hold that numerical degree of belief (in particular, subjective probability) is a useful fiction, unlike comparative belief, which they regard as real.
Abstract: This paper discusses a challenge for comparativists about belief, who hold that numerical degree of belief (in particular, subjective probability) is a useful fiction, unlike comparative belief, which they regard as real. The challenge is to make sense of claims like ‘I am twice as confident in A as in B’ in terms of comparative belief only. After showing that at least some comparativists can meet this challenge, I discuss implications for Zynda's [2000] and Stefansson's [2017] defences of comparativism.
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TL;DR: In this paper, the authors argue that there are no sums, and that Universalism is false in the sense that it requires a constraint on what it takes for something to ground, or metaphysically explain, another.
Abstract: As I will use the term, an object is a mereological sum of some things just in case those things compose it simply in virtue of existing. In the first half of this paper, I argue that there are no sums. The key premise for this conclusion relies on a constraint on what, in certain cases, it takes for something to ground, or metaphysically explain, something else. In the second half, I argue that in light of my argument against sums, Universalism, which is perhaps the most widely accepted answer to the Special Composition Question, is false.
TL;DR: This article argued that one should use stochastic dominance in comparing lotteries, even when dealing with incomplete orderings that allow for non-comparable outcomes, and argued that the dominance of the winner should be used in comparing lotsteries.
Abstract: This paper addresses the problem of opaque sweetening and argues that one should use stochastic dominance in comparing lotteries even when dealing with incomplete orderings that allow for non-comparable outcomes.
TL;DR: In the alternative view, it is said that "one's culture is superior to others, more deserving of respect, or at the 'centre' of things" as mentioned in this paper.
Abstract: Ethnocentrism, it is said, involves believing certain things to be true: that one's culture is superior to others, more deserving of respect, or at the ‘centre’ of things. On the alternative view d...