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The Impossibility of Free Will and Ultimate Responsibility
Get PDFThis paper concerns itself with the metaphysics of free will. To posit, as some philosophers do, that free will and determinism are incompatible is to provide a necessary condition for free will. Yet what should a sufficient condition look like? In other words, how might indeterminists provide a positive account of free will? In section 2 of this paper, I provide a few definitions and discuss an influential argument against compatibilism, namely the view that free will and determinism are compatible. This will help to identify some important criteria for theories of free will. Section 3 shows how abandoning determinism and adopting indeterminism is also problematic, and that we thus need to fill in the definition of free will. Section 4 presents the first part of Robert Kane’s definition of free will, which goes along the lines of “we make choices based on our beliefs, priorities, etc.” and section 5 offers Kane’s account of Self-Forming Actions to explain how our beliefs and priorities are our own. The core of my objection will take place in section 6, where I show how the concept of a Self-Forming Action cannot make free will compatible with indeterminism in that the idea of a Self-Forming Action is incoherent
GIS Analysis of Factors Influencing Particulate Pollution in Keene, New Hampshire
Get PDFThis study aims to identify the characteristics of air inversions and Particulate Matter 2.5 (PM2.5) in the city of Keene, New Hampshire. PM2.5 is a type of particulate pollutant with a diameter of less than 2.5 microns that exists naturally, and can be created through industrial processed and the combustion of biomass. The combustion of wood as a home heating fuel is considered the main source of PM2.5 in Keene. Meteorological factors were investigated by searching through quality assured meteorological record provided by the New Hampshire Department of Environmental Services. Wintertime temperature inversions are of particular concern as they trap pollutants near the ground, creating high concentrations of PM2.5. This is particularly true for Keene, which is in a glacial valley. This study concluded that air inversions and high PM2.5 event are most likely to occur on cold, clear, windless nights during the winter. The temperature must drop at least 11 degrees Fahrenheit, with a dew point close to the ambient temperature. The other objective of the study was to create a model that would predict the areas that will experience high PM2.5 concentrations as the result of demographic and topographical factors. The model was built using Digital Elevation Models, and building footprints provided by the University of New Hampshire Database. Housing density was calculated using the building footprints layer, and combined with areas that have less than three degrees of slope. This was compared to mobile monitoring data collected during the timeframe of the study.Faculty Sponsor: Dr. Chris Brehm
The Photophysical Properties of CdTe/ZnS Core/Shell Quantum Dots
Get PDFThe distinctive fluorescent properties of semiconductor nanocrystal quantum dots (QDs) make them advantageous for use in optoelectronic and biological applications. We report on experiments done to characterize the optical properties and the general photostability of CdTe QDs with varying ZnS shell thicknesses. Steady-state and time-resolved absorption and fluorescence spectroscopy measurements indicate that increasing the ZnS shell thickness results in longer absorption and emission wavelengths, increased quantum yield, and improved photostability.Faculty Sponsor: Dr. James J. Butler and Dr. David Corde
Artificial Intelligence, Zygotes, and Free Will
Get PDFIn this paper, I assume that strong AI is possible and I question whether AI robots would have free will. The ultimate goal of this paper is to use our intuitions regarding AI and free will to motivate incompatibilism. I argue that AI cannot act freely because the nature of an AI robot’s design keeps it from being able to have the kind of control required for free will. The strategy of this paper is to first define the control condition of free will. Then I discuss Mele’s Zygote Argument and compare it to AI. Then I briefly discuss advancements in AI technology and briefly describe how AI would work. Next, I show how an AI machine cannot satisfy the requirements for free will. Following this, I use these intuitions to motivate incompatibilism—the concept that free will is not compatible with determinism. Finally, I respond to a series of objections. It is my hope that, using this AI thought experiment, we can come to a similar conclusion that Mele came to: AI is not relevantly different from humans, AI would not have free will, so neither would humans (if humans turn out to be determined in the appropriate way)
Trans Phenomenology: A Merleau-Pontian Reclamation of the Trans Narrative
Get PDFTransgender identities have historically been faced with erasure by the cisgender community, particularly through being forced to use cisgender terminology to define their own non-conforming experiences. This systemic cisgender inscription upon transgender identity is seen clearly through Bernice Hausman’s medicalizing reading of transgender narratives, leading her to falsely conclude that transgender individuals perpetuate the cisgender binary. I argue that Hausman’s analysis denies trans individuals the right to speak for themselves, thus denying them the agency of creating their own narratives. In the wake of this particular form of gender violence, the transgender community must create their own method of narrative construction and analysis. By rereading gender into Maurice Merleau-Ponty’s discussion of sexuality, I create a trans phenomenology as a way to read and analyze trans narratives. Focusing on Merleau-Ponty’s description of sexuality as reciprocally reflecting existence through his case study of the “silent, heartbroken girl,” I argue that through narrative, we see that gender, too, reciprocally reflects existence. Applying this framework to rereadings of trans narratives, I not only show how gender is truly lived, but offer a uniquely positive account of transgender identity by focusing on individuals’ own descriptions of themselves, thereby reclaiming the trans narrative on trans terms
Sellars and Quine on Abstracta in Scientific Ontology
Get PDFWilfrid Sellars and Willard Van Quine long disagreed over the nature of ontological commitment in scientific inquiry. Particularly, they disagreed over whether abstract entities such as numbers, sets, or classes should be admitted into scientific ontology. In Quine’s view, positing such platonic entities is necessary in order for scientific inquiry to progress and for scientific knowledge to increase. Sellars, on the other hand, sees such a view as a form of platonic realism and eschews it in favor of a more austere nominalism about the ontological status of abstracta. I summarize the reasons for each philosopher’s view, drawing on a dialogue between them regarding the ontological status of abstracta. I argue that Quine’s justifications for his pragmatically-based realism do little to evade Sellars’ charge that such a view commits one to an empirically unjustifiable platonistic ontology. In Sellars’ view, an adequate philosophy of science requires an adequate philosophy of mind, and this implies that we cannot locate unobservable platonic abstracta on an ontological continuum with the unobservable theoretical entities posited in scientific theories (e.g., neutrinos or positrons). Those who are committed to the ideals of scientific realism and methodological naturalism must grapple with the question Sellars posed to Quine: “if sets are basic objects, how does the mind get in touch with them?
Deflationary Nominalism’s Commitment to Meinongianism
Get PDFDeflationary nominalism is a novel view in the philosophy of mathematics on which there are mathematical statements, such as ‘There are prime numbers’ that are literally true despite the nonexistence of any mathematical objects. In this paper, I outline the deflationary nominalism of Azzouni, the most prominent contemporary defender of deflationary nominalism. I then object that it is committed to some form of Meinongianism. Because I believe that any view’s commitment to Meinongianism constitutes a strong reason in favor of rejecting that view, I suggest that deflationary nominalism should be rejected. Finally, I conclude that realism about mathematical objects must be accepted if we are to understand true mathematical statements as being literally true
Epistemic Warrant for Ethical Beliefs in Relation to Living Freely and Patriarchal Systems of Oppression
Get PDFRegarding the epistemic warrant1 for ethical beliefs, I will make three arguments. First, that warrant for an ethical belief can only be transferred interpersonally if the adopter fully understands the justifications for that belief or takes the reasoning of the testifier as a proxy for their own. Second, that if most or all of one’s ethical beliefs are based on other’s testimony, that person will be living freely only if those beliefs were adopted with proper warrant. Third, that systems of oppression are unethical in part because the oppressed are expected to take on ethical beliefs from authority figures without valid warrant, rendering the oppressed unfree. I will specifically use patriarchal systems of oppression to illustrate this final point
Generating Road Network Graph with Vision-Based Unmanned Vehicle
Get PDFWith the advancement of technology and its cheapness, robotic vehicles have gained a large number of applications. The spread of their use is growing also because they are getting smaller, lighter and easier to build. In this paper we present a simple and effective way to map a road network with the help of a driverless vehicle. Our approach consists of only three parts: vision-segmentation, angle variation and travelled distance. A video camera attached to a Lego® NXT Mindstorm vehicle guides it by image segmentation using Matlab® Image processing toolbox, along a road network, in which is represented by black tape over a white floor. The algorithm makes the vehicle travel all over the road memorizing main coordinates to identify all crossroads by keeping track of the travelled distance and the current angle. The crossroads and road’s end are the nodes of the graph. After several simulations have been performed, the modelling proved to be successful in that small scale approach. Consequently, there are good chances that driverless cars and UAVs also make use of the strategies to map route networks accordingly. The algorithm presented in this paper is useful when there is no localization signal such as GPS, for example, navigation on water, tunnels, inside buildings, among others.Faculty Sponsor: Francisco de Assis Zampiroll