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The Justification of Antagonistic Response to Wrongdoing
Full text linkThere is a strong Western tradition of opposing angry, hostile, or antagonistic reactions to wrongdoing. In the twentieth century, leaders like Mahatma Gandhi and Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. counseled responding to wrongdoing with forgiveness and love rather than anger, hate, or vindictiveness.This ideal has taken on an exalted status in Western culture. Gandhi and King are widely regarded as moral saints. And yet sometimes antagonism seems deeply appropriate. Consider a very serious wrong: suppose, for instance, that a driver viciously and deliberately runs down my small child on the sidewalk. I ought to be resentful and angry at someone who does such a thing. It is troubling if I am not.In light of such worries, some philosophers have defended antagonistic response to wrongdoing. In the dissertation I explore these defenses.Chapter 1 identifies my target. These responses, which I call antagonistic, involve taking the wrongdoer's suffering to be intrinsically, non-instrumentally valuable. Chapters 2 and 3 explore attempts to establish that such response is required by important interpersonal attachments. In chapter 2, I discuss P. F. Strawson's well-known defense of antagonistic resentment in "Freedom and Resentment;" in chapter 3, I discuss attempts to tie antagonistic response to attachment to the victim of wrongdoing. In both cases, I argue, there are non-antagonistic alternative reactions--centrally, a form of moral sadness or disappointment--that can serve the same interpersonal roles. Antagonistic response is not, in fact, required by these important interpersonal attachments.Chapters 4 and 5 discuss restorative and nullification defenses of response to wrongdoing. Restoration involves restoring some valuable state of affairs that has been destroyed by wrongdoing; annulment involves retroactively altering the wrongdoing itself in some way. Retroactively altering the past may sound farfetched; I argue that we can make sense of it, and appeal to such annulment to defend some specific ways of responding to wrongdoing. In the end, though, these responses do not involve the antagonism that is condemned by King and Gandhi. I conclude with a qualified endorsement of the King-Gandhi ideal: none of the attempts to justify antagonistic response that I consider succeed
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The Ethics of Self-Fulfilling Belief
Full text linkThis dissertation examines how we ought to reason about propositions whose truth is determined by whether we believe them. In it, I defend the thesis that in cases of self-fulfilling belief we ought to believe whatever would be best, if true. Though believing whatever would be best if true appears to be a form of wishful thinking, and so unwarranted, this dissertation develops an account according to which, when a belief is self-fulfilling, optimistic reasons which show what we believe to be good can also be genuine epistemic reasons for believing it to be true
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What are practical reasons? Explaining the counting in favor of relation
Full text linkIt is commonly claimed, in normative ethics, that a reason for action is a consideration that counts in favor of performing an action. There is, however, considerable debate about whether and how this counting in favor of relation is to be explained. That is, there is considerable debate about in virtue of what a consideration counts in favor of performing an action. In this dissertation, I defend the idea that a consideration counts in favor of performing an action in virtue of picking out something about that action that would have value. Chapter 1 examines a prominent strategy for defending this explanation of the counting in favor of relation. This strategy attempts to understand the relation by looking at the role that reasons for action play in distinguishing intentional actions from non-intentional actions. I argue that this distinction is not helpful for understanding the counting in favor of relation, and I suggest that an investigation into this relation should focus instead on a different distinction--that between actions that agents perform because they regard those actions as "called for" by something about them and actions that agents are merely moved to perform. Chapters 2-4 then examine accounts of the counting in favor of relation that attempt to capture this distinction without appealing to value. They appeal instead to non-normative desires and formal principles of reasoning. I argue that each of these accounts fails to capture the distinction. Furthermore, the ways in which each account fails to capture this distinction make clearer what the distinction is and why, in order to capture it, we need to appeal to value. In the final chapter, I discuss what the arguments presented in Chapters 2-4 show about what taking a consideration to "call for" an action amounts to. I also explain why we need the idea that a reason counts in favor of an action in virtue of picking out something about that action that would have value in order to account for this sense in which, when an action acts for a reason, she takes that reason to call for her action
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On Loving Some People More than Others
Full text linkAugustine makes the following argument:(1) The degree to which we love something should be proportional to the value it has.(2) Every person has equal value.(3) Therefore, we should love all people equally.It seems there is something wrong with the argument since its conclusion conflicts with the intuition that, for example, we should love our own children more than a new friend. Premise (1) seems like the source of the problem, though it is not obvious what is wrong with it. Indeed, it seems there is some connection between appropriate love and value. Thus, even if premise (1) is false, it is worthwhile trying to say what is wrong with it, since that effort promises to illuminate the connection between appropriate love and value. The first aim of the dissertation, then, is to identify the central problem with premise (1), which I take to be an unstated assumption that underlies it: that love for a person should be a response to the value possessed by that person as such. I argue that love need not be a response only to that value; rather it may also be a response to the value of certain qualities of the beloved, or of a relationship to him, neither of which necessarily constitutes his value as a person. Thus, I argue that Augustine's view of love's connection to value is too narrow. The second aim of the dissertation is to give an account of why we should love some people more than others. I begin with a basic principle of practical reason: when faced with a forced, mutually exclusive choice between two goods, we should choose the more valuable over the less. I then argue that preferential love for those relationally close to us is (in part) a tendency of will to choose a more valuable relationship over a less valuable one. Thus, in the end, I claim that we should love those close to us more than those more distant from us since such love is (in part) a tendency to choose in just the way that practical reason dictates
Going Beyond Counting First Authors in Author Co-citation Analysis
Full text linkThe present study examines one of the fundamental aspects of author co-citation analysis (ACA) - the way co-citation
counts are defined. Co-citation counting provides the data on which all subsequent statistical analyses and mappings
are based, and we compare ACA results based on two different types of co-citation counting - the traditional type that
only counts the first one among a cited work's authors on the one hand and a non-traditional type that takes into
account the first 5 authors of a cited work on the other hand. Results indicate that the picture produced through this non-traditional author co-citation counting contains more coherent author groups and is therefore considerably clearer. However, this picture represents fewer specialties in the research field being studied than that produced through the traditional first-author co-citation counting when the same number of top-ranked authors is selected and analyzed. Reasons for these effects are discussed
Freedom, resentment, and the metaphysics of morals/ Pamela Hieronymi.
No full textIncludes bibliographical references and index."Description An innovative reassessment of philosopher P. F. Strawson's influential "Freedom and Resentment" P. F. Strawson's 1962 paper "Freedom and Resentment" is one of the most influential in modern moral philosophy, prompting responses across multiple disciplines, from psychology to sociology. In Freedom, Resentment, and the Metaphysics of Morals , Pamela Hieronymi closely reexamines Strawson's paper and concludes that his argument has been underestimated and misunderstood. Line by line, Hieronymi carefully untangles the complex strands of Strawson's ideas. After elucidating his conception of moral responsibility and his division between "reactive" and "objective" responses to the actions and attitudes of others, Hieronymi turns to his central argument. Strawson argues that, because determinism is an entirely general thesis, true of everyone at all times, its truth does not undermine moral responsibility. Hieronymi finds the two common interpretations of this argument, "the simple Humean interpretation" and "the broadly Wittgensteinian interpretation," both deficient. Drawing on Strawson's wider work in logic, philosophy of language, and metaphysics, Hieronymi concludes that his argument rests on an implicit, and previously overlooked, metaphysics of morals, one grounded in Strawson's "social naturalism." In the final chapter, she defends this naturalistic picture against objections. Rigorous, concise, and insightful, Freedom, Resentment, and the Metaphysics of Morals sheds new light on Strawson's thinking and has profound implications for future work on free will, moral responsibility, and metaethics. Biography Pamela Hieronymi is professor of philosophy at the University of California, Los Angeles. Endorsements "Hieronymi is an expert guide to the twists and turns of Strawson's 'Freedom and Resentment,' arguably the single most influential paper on free will and moral responsibility. The book is an important contribution to our understanding of Strawson, and will become an essential reference for philosophers." -Sarah Buss, coeditor of Contours of Agency "This is an exciting and groundbreaking book that has the potential to reshape our understanding of the nature of morality and our practices of holding one another responsible." - Angela M. Smith, coeditor of The Nature of Moral Responsibility Reviews - no copy text Author Photo Credit Line - no copy text Jacket Art Credit Line NONE YET. DESIGN STILL IN PROGRESS. Bookstore Categories Philosophy Special Copy Type - no copy text Other Copy & Jacket Circ - no copy text"--Cover -- Contents -- Preface -- Primer on Free Will and Moral Responsibility -- Introduction -- 1. Strawson's Strategy -- Strawson's Picture of Responsibility -- The Central, and Seemingly Facile, Argument -- 2. The Resource and the Role of Statistics -- 3. The Further, Implicit Point -- The Generalization Strategy -- Making Explicit the Further Point -- Objections -- 4. Addressing the Crucial Objection -- Unearthing Strawson's Naturalism -- Social Naturalism and the Central Argument -- 5. The Remaining Objections -- Intermediate Principles and Cases -- A Pessimistic Metaphysics of Morals?Against Social Naturalism -- A Defense of Social Naturalism -- An Opening for the Generalization Strategy? -- Error, Inconsistency, and Crises -- Conclusion -- Reprint of P. F. Strawson's "Freedom and Resentment -- Acknowledgments -- Bibliography -- Index1 online resource (xx, 145 pages
Variations on the Author
Full text link“Variations on the Author” discusses two of Eduardo Coutinho’s recent films (Um Dia na Vida, from 2010, and Últimas Conversas, posthumously released in 2015) and their contribution to the general question of documentary authorship. The director’s filmography is characterized by a consistent yet self-effacing form of authorial self-inscription: Coutinho often features as an interviewer that rather than express opinions propels discourses; an interviewer that is good at listening. This mode of self-inscription characterizes him as an author who is not expressive but who is nonetheless markedly present on the screen. In Um Dia na Vida, however, Coutinho is completely absent form the image, while Últimas Conversas, on the contrary, includes a confessional prologue that moves the director from the margins to the center of his films. This article examines the ways in which these works stand out in the filmography of a director who offers new insights into the notion of cinematic authorship
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Joint Action, Speech, and Asymmetric Relations
Full text linkEveryday life is full of situations in which we act not only as individuals, but also with others, as parts of informal groups or structured collectives. For example, a group of friends spend a day hiking a trail together, a guardian offers a hand to stabilize a young child’s tentative first steps, or an academic department draws up policies that facilitate student instruction. Philosophers call this category of action “joint action,” and agree that it is an important and distinctive way in which we exercise our agency. However, there has been a tendency in the philosophical literature to explain the phenomenon by analyzing highly structured and cooperative cases of joint action like two or more agents painting a house together or moving a heavy piece of furniture together. On these analyses, two or more agents are engaged in joint, rather than individual action when they jointly and intentionally pursue goals that they have in common, all while abiding by principles of rationality which demand that they act in ways that are both conducive to achieving the shared goal and responsive to the actions of their co-participants. In this dissertation, I argue that these standard analyses of joint action do not provide us with a comprehensive understanding of the phenomenon, because they ignore important cases of joint action that do not fit into the highly structured and cooperative paradigm. To address this gap in the literature and bring us closer to a comprehensive understanding of joint action, my dissertation uses case studies of the speech act of telling and early childhood development to show that joint action also occurs in situations which involve little to no cooperation or strongly shared goals. Instead, as we see when we investigate these atypical cases, joint action is consistent with competition and antagonism, and does not require participants to have the sophisticated theory of mind needed to track and adjust to the goals and actions of their co-participants in a way that coheres with principles of rationality
Appropriate Similarity Measures for Author Cocitation Analysis
Full text linkWe provide a number of new insights into the methodological discussion about author cocitation analysis. We first argue that the use of the Pearson correlation for measuring the similarity between authors’ cocitation profiles is not very satisfactory. We then discuss what kind of similarity measures may be used as an alternative to the Pearson correlation. We consider three similarity measures in particular. One is the well-known cosine. The other two similarity measures have not been used before in the bibliometric literature. Finally, we show by means of an example that our findings have a high practical relevance.information science;Pearson correlation;cosine;similarity measure;author cocitation analysis
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