1,721,208 research outputs found
Animals: A History
Full text link© 2019, The author(s). The attached document (embargoed until 11/02/2021) is an author produced version of a paper published in BRITISH JOURNAL FOR THE HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY uploaded in accordance with the publisher’s self- archiving policy. The final published version (version of record) is available online at the link. Some minor differences between this version and the final published version may remain. We suggest you refer to the final published version should you wish to cite from it
Kidnapping an ugly child: is Willliam James a pragmaticist?
No full textSince the term ‘pragmatism’ was first coined, there have been debates about who is or is not a ‘real’ pragmatist, and what that might mean. The division most often drawn in contemporary pragmatist scholarship is between William James and Charles Peirce. Peirce is said to present a version of pragmatism which is scientific, logical and objective about truth, whereas James presents a version which is nominalistic, subjectivistic and leads to relativism. The first person to set out this division was in fact Peirce himself, when he distinguished his own ‘pragmaticism’ from the broad pragmatism of James and others. Peirce sets out six criteria which defines ‘pragmaticism’: the pragmatic maxim; a number of ‘preliminary propositions’; prope-positivism; metaphysical inquiry; critical common-sensism; and scholastic realism. This paper sets out to argue that in fact James meets each of these criteria, and should be seen as a ‘pragmaticist’ by Peirce’s own lights.© 2019, BSHP. The attached document (embargoed until 04/03/2019) is an author produced version of a paper published in BRITISH JOURNAL FOR THE HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY uploaded in accordance with the publisher’s self- archiving policy. The final published version (version of record) is available online at the link below. Some minor differences between this version and the final published version may remain. We suggest you refer to the final published version should you wish to cite from it
The long-term modelling of space debris clouds in high Earth orbits
No full textThe GEO regime represents a growing debris environment that poses a significant long-term collision hazard to future launched spacecraft. To date, relatively little work has been done in modelling space debris in GEO, although this is a trend that is just beginning to be reversed as more and more emphasis is placed on GEO debris modelling. Space debris models can have very long run times and, depending on the input parameters, can take several days to generate a prediction of the future debris environment, even on the fastest of machines. The orbital propagator is one of the most time-consuming components in any debris model and thus, in an effort to reduce run-times, many debris models utilise various techniques to attempt to improve on the speeds of their orbital propagators. All of these techniques involve some forfeit in the accuracy of the results produced and most depend on assumptions which are only really valid in the LEO regime. To date, little work has been done in the development of a fast method of propagating debris clouds in the GEO regime. This PhD attempts to address this problem by developing an accurate and novel Fast Cloud Propagator (FCP) for use in high-Earth orbits, including GEO and the GEO regime. The FCP has undergone rigorous testing and has proved itself capable of accurately modelling the debris clouds produced by a number of breakup events, as modelled by a number of leading breakup models, over various time periods (up to the maximum design threshold of 100 years), in a variety of test orbits. A comprehensive risk analysis exercise has shown that the FCP results are accurate enough to be used in future collision risk analyses and hence in future debris environment prediction studies. The speed increases attained by the FCP depend on the size of the debris cloud, where the efficiency of the FCP increases as the number of fragments in the cloud increases. If a large number of Monte Carlo simulations are required, as is desirable in debris environment prediction studies, then the FCP has demonstrated speed increases which can be thousands of times faster than conventional methods of space debris propagation.</p
Replication Data for: What Type of Democracy Do Chileans Want?
No full textReplication materials for "What Type of Democracy Do Chileans Want?” by Shane P. Singh and Neil S. Williams. See "readme.rtf" for instructions
A spectroscopic investigation of titania-supported rhodium and ruthenium organometallics
No full textThe role of temperaments in philosophical inquiry: a pragmatic approach
No full textIn his Pragmatism lectures, William James famously argued that personal temperaments had an important role to play in philosophical inquiry. Our temperamental natures help determine which philosophical theories we find satisfying and their influence explains persistent disagreement in the history of philosophy. Crucially, James was not just making a descriptive claim about the formation of our philosophical preferences. James was also making a radical normative claim: that temperaments could play a legitimate epistemic role in our philosophical inquiries. This paper aims to evaluate and defend this more radical claim. This temperamental metaphilosophy has been roundly criticised both in James’ own time and in our own. This paper identifies three key problems for James’ view: (1) that allowing temperaments to play a role in our inquiry would dissolve that inquiry by replacing philosophical disagreements with psychological differences; (2) that introducing temperamental differences into our inquiries would allow entirely arbitrary elements to influence the outcome of those inquiries; and (3) that a view in which our temperamental natures could have an epistemic role would assume an implausible metaphysical picture. Through clarifying the exact nature of temperaments, and what would count as a satisfactory philosophical theory on a pragmatist account, this paper argues that there is an available interpretation of James’ metaphilosophical claims which can provide satisfactory responses to these problems. In addition, this interpretation has the benefit of connecting James’ position with a wider pragmatist tradition in which affective states ground philosophical inquiry
Prophets, plumbers, and philosophers: a pragmatic argument for public philosophy
No full textWhat is the value of public philosophy? “Philosopher-first” accounts suggest that the ideas that academic philosophers produce can, when disseminated, be useful to the wider public. However, such accounts assume that there is a gap between the interests and activities of professional philosophers and those of the wider public, which must be overcome by translating philosophy into more accessible terms. This article offers an alternative account—the “public-first” account. On this account, philosophy is a necessary part of everyday life. Each of us relies upon a background of conceptual resources that shape our interpretations, expectations, and behaviours in the world. Professional philosophers might be useful in analysing, maintaining, and fixing our conceptual infrastructure. However, there is no gap between philosophy and everyday life, which must be overcome. Whilst most defences of public philosophy argue that it is beneficial to the public, on the “public-first” account, public philosophy is also vital for the discipline of philosophy itself. If philosophers want to adequately evaluate their philosophical theories, they must appeal to a much wider and more diverse range of human experience than that of professional philosophers themselves. As such, public philosophy is necessary for properly conducted philosophical inquiry
The no interest argument and the rights of nature
No full textAwarding rights to rivers, forests, and other environmental entities (EEs) is a new and increasingly popular approach to environmental protection. The distinctive feature of such rights of nature (RoN) legislation is that direct duties are owed to the EEs.This paper presents a novel rebuttal of the strongest argument against RoN: the no interest argument. The crux of this argument is that because EEs are not sentient, they cannot possess the kinds of interests necessary to ground direct duties. Therefore, they cannot be legitimate rights-bearers. After considering and rejecting standard responses to this argument, the paper challenges its fundamental assumption: that rights-correlative duties must be grounded in the interests of the rights-bearer. The paper then presents the RoN critic with a dilemma. The critic must either accept that EEs are legitimate rights-bearers or delegitimise many well-established rights-bearers along with EEs. Either way,the no interest argument loses its force
Radical Empiricism, British Idealism, and the Reality of Relations
No full textThis chapter focuses on the relationship between James and Bradley, and their metaphysical disputes around the reality of relations and the nature of immediate experience. The respect that Bradley accorded to radical empiricism was clearly in part due to the similarity he saw between it and his own monistic idealism. James also appreciated this similarity. In fact, both the public and private correspondence between the two is haunted by a palpable frustration – a frustration which comes from the lurking sense that it is only one or two confusions or misinterpretations which block the two thinkers from heartfelt agreement. According to James, both the classical empiricists and the idealists make the same mistake: they assume that the manifold of feeling is discontinuous. The final feature of James’s radical empiricism to note is that experience is neutral between subject and object:The instant field of the present is at all times what I call the ‘pure experience’
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