Epistemology.
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The skilful origins of human normative cognition
Fellow: Jonathan Birch abstract & keywords
Abstract: I briefly present and motivate a ‘skill hypothesis’ regarding the evolution of human normative cognition. On this hypothesis, the capacity to internally represent action-guiding norms evolved as a solution to the distinctive problems of standardizing, learning and teaching complex motor skills and craft skills, especially skills related to toolmaking. We have an evolved cognitive architecture for internalizing norms of technique, which was then co-opted for a rich array of social functions. There was a gradual expansion of the normative domain, with ritual playing an important role in bridging the gap between concrete, enacted norms and general, abstract norms, such as kinship norms. I conclude by stating nine predictions arising from the skill hypothesis. Keywords: normative cognition, skill, cognitive control, norms, evolution |
Toolmaking and the evolution of normative cognition
Fellow: Jonathan Birch abstract & keywords
Abstract: We are all guided by thousands of norms, but how did our capacity for normative cognition evolve? I propose there is a deep but neglected link between normative cognition and practical skill. In modern humans, complex motor skills and craft skills, such as toolmaking, are guided by internally represented norms of correct performance. Moreover, it is plausible that core components of human normative cognition evolved as a solution to the distinctive problems of transmitting complex motor skills and craft skills, especially skills related to toolmaking, through social learning. If this is correct, the expansion of the normative domain beyond technique to encompass more abstract norms of fairness, reciprocity, ritual and kinship involved the elaboration of a basic platform for the guidance of skilled action by technical norms. This article motivates and defends this “skill hypothesis” for the origin of normative cognition and sets out various ways in which it could be empirically tested. Keywords: normative cognition, skill, cognitive control, norms, evolution |
The greatest epistemological externalisation: reflecting on the puzzling direction we are heading to through algorithmic automatisation
Fellow: Simona Chiodo abstract & keywords
Abstract: The aim of the article is reflecting on a fundamental epistemological issue which characterises our present technological progress: where are we heading to, as humankind, while we are progressively externalising our most crucial decision processes towards algorithms, from which decisive data, coming from human experience and mind (including the very experience of human abilities), are left out? By reflecting on some cases, I shall try to argue that the most puzzling issue which engineers and philosophers should be aware that they have to jointly challenge may be that what we are actually doing through algorithmic automatisation is developing a novel human condition, according to which: (1) we are progressively thinking that algorithmic abstraction is always better than mental abstraction, because, at least in the Western culture, we come from a history of a progressive restriction of the best use of our minds to the realm of rationality, first, then to the realm of computation, second, and then to the realm of algorithmic automatisation, third, which finally exceeds our minds and (2) in doing so, we are progressively externalising not only human contents, but also human abilities, i.e., we are progressively atrophying ourselves, by becoming creatures who are progressively delegating the core of their very essence, which has always included the epistemological ability, together with the ethical courage, of making complex decisions on both our lives and the others’ lives. Keywords: Epistemological externalisation, Algorithm, Future of humankind |
Come pensa un europeo. Epistemologia di un agire comune
Fellow: Simona Chiodo overview
Overview: Quando crediamo che i diritti umani siano universali stiamo spremendo il succo della specificità del pensiero europeo: è il pensiero europeo ad avere inventato sia l’idea che qualsiasi essere umano possa condividere la sua essenza identitaria con la totalità degli altri esseri umani sia l’idea che, allora, possiamo definire diritti convertibili in leggi universali. Nel primo caso stiamo astraendo e nel secondo caso stiamo idealizzando, cioè stiamo usando gli strumenti essenziali attraverso i quali un europeo pensa da millenni. L’obiettivo del libro è mettere a fuoco le specificità degli strumenti più distintivi del modo europeo di pensare, insieme con le loro potenzialità straordinarie: l’analisi, l’astrazione e l’idealizzazione – in sintesi, l’invenzione della metafisica, e il salto che facciamo dai particolari all’universale in qualsiasi articolazione della nostra cultura, dalla religione alla filosofia e dalla scienza all’arte e al diritto. Mettere a fuoco come pensiamo ci aiuta a capire di più sia come parliamo sia come agiamo e, in ultimo, che cosa il pensiero europeo può ancora dare di essenziale, a partire dall’idea secondo la quale fare esercizi di astrazione significa fare esercizi di democrazia, se è vero che in entrambi i casi alleniamo la capacità di riconoscere che cosa è uguale in che cosa è diverso. |
Intellectually Humble, but Prejudiced People. A Paradox of Intellectual Virtue
Fellow: Matteo Colombo authors & abstract
Authors: Matteo Colombo, Kevin Strangmann, Lieke Houkes, Zhasmina Kostadinova, Mark J. Brandt Abstract: Intellectual humility has attracted attention in both philosophy and psychology. Philosophers have clarified the nature of intellectual humility as an epistemic virtue; and psychologists have developed scales for measuring people’s intellectual humility. Much less attention has been paid to the potential effects of intellectual humility on people’s negative attitudes and to its relationship with prejudice-based epistemic vices. Here we fill these gaps by focusing on the relationship between intellectual humility and prejudice. To clarify this relationship, we conducted four empirical studies. The results of these studies show three things. First, people are systematically prejudiced towards members of groups perceived as dissimilar. Second, intellectual humility weakens the association between perceived dissimilarity and prejudice. Third, more intellectual humility is associated with more prejudice overall. We show that this apparently paradoxical pattern of results is consistent with the idea that it is both psychologically and rationally plausible that one person is at the same time intellectually humble, epistemically virtuous and strongly prejudiced. |
Two neurocomputational building blocks of social norm compliance
Fellow: Matteo Colombo abstract
Abstract: Current explanatory frameworks for social norms pay little attention to why and how brains might carry out computational functions that generate norm compliance behavior. This paper expands on existing literature by laying out the beginnings of a neurocomputational framework for social norms and social cognition, which can be the basis for advancing our understanding of the nature and mechanisms of social norms. Two neurocomputational building blocks are identified that might constitute the core of the mechanism of norm compliance. They consist of Bayesian and reinforcement learning systems. It is sketched why and how the concerted activity of these systems can generate norm compliance by minimization of three specific kinds of prediction-errors. |
Plain alethic pluralism: the human face of truth
Fellow: Massimo Dell'Utri ABSTRACT
Abstract: Within the secular and still ongoing discussion about truth, what is by now known as alethic pluralism has proved to be one of the most interesting proposals advanced in the field. Indeed, from the last decade of the last century onwards, the field of theories about truth has been enriched with the idea that truth is not only one but also many—many alethically potent properties that differently characterise different domains of discourse. Moreover, thirty or so years of discussions have also shown that alethic pluralism itself is many rather than one—a family of views with different metaphysical commitments. As it may happen in all good families, though, some members are neglected or overshadowed. This is the case with the view called “simple alethic pluralism”, and this paper seeks to remedy this. Accordingly, a new kind of simple alethic pluralism (termed “Plain Alethic Pluralism”) is advanced. It highlights the features of the meaning of the word “true”, in particular its focal meaning, while reaffirming the dependence of truth on the world. In drawing attention to the way speakers use the truth-predicate, making it acquire the meaning it has, it intends to qualify as a conception of truth with a human face. |
Why Post-Truth Cannot Be Our Epistemological Compass
Fellow: Massimo Dell'Utri ABSTRACT
Abstract: This paper tackles some of the arguments Steve Fuller – arguably the best advocate of post-truth currently on the scene – put forward to show that, correctly understood, post-truth is the best conceptual tool to get a clear picture not only of what is happening in our societies today, but also of what has happened throughout the secular history of Western culture. The implicit assumption is that post-truth represents a reliable ‘epistemological compass’ – that is, a notion (or a set of notions) for proper orientation in both cultural and physical environments. The aim of the paper is to show that Fuller’s arguments do not work, because an epistemological compass can only be centered on a plausible notion of objectivity, and – it will be contended – this is exactly what Fuller lacks. Accordingly, it will be stressed how the upshot of his theses is the opposite of what he presumes it to be and, moreover, that his theses prove lethal to his own position. |
Hilary Putnam’s Philosophical Naturalism
Fellow: Massimo Dell'Utri ABSTRACT
Abstract: Hilary Putnam’s Philosophical Naturalism: Making Philosophy Matter for Life emphasizes both the nature of Hilary Putnam’s link to the Neopositivist tradition and his progressive critical departure from it. Massimo Dell’Utri argues that one of the main senses of this departure resides in implicitly revealing that there is no opposition between philosophy concerned with hard technical questions and philosophy concerned with "how to live." It is this innovative combination that made Putnam offer what is widely regarded as the most sensible interpretation of philosophical naturalism ever articulated. From the latter comes a multilevel image of reality, the realization of which required a lifelong reflection not only on science and its importance, but also on mathematics, knowledge, mind, truth, religion, morality, and more. This variegated reflection provides insight into how, despite shifts in opinion, Putnam’s thought reveals strong continuities and a systematic backbone issues of central philosophical importance. |
In Defense of Normativism about the Aim of Belief
Fellow: Pascal Engel abstract & keywords
Abstract: I answer the objections which have been addressed to the normative account of the norm for belief – a belief is correct if and only if it is true . These objections are that the norm fails to motivate, or motivates too much, that it is trivial and that it is unfathomable and does not provide any regulation or actual guidance for our belief. But specifying what the correctness conditions of a mental state are is one thing, and giving an account of its regulation is another thing. If we respect this distinction, it becomes possible to envisage a separate account of the regulation of belief by a norm of truth, through the psychological feature of the transparency of belief, and to hold that the norm for belief is actually dependent upon the norm of knowledge. Keywords: Belief, normativity, correctness, truth, knowledge |
The Norm of Truth: a Dialogue
Fellow: Pascal Engel abstract
Abstract: Pilates' question might have been different from the fampur "What is truth?". Perhaps he was actually interested in asking Jesus what the value of truth was, and whether truth is the norm of belief. In a surprising anticipation of contemporary debates Pilate and his Epicurean interlocutor discuss these issues, some 50 years after J.C., and ask whether truth, justification or knowledhe is the main norm of belief. They discuss the form that the norm has to take in order to guide our beliefs, and the nature of the normativity which is involved in our epistemic attitudes. They conclude their satisfaction, that the true norm of belief is knowledge. |
Experience and Justification: Revisiting McDowell’s Empiricism
Fellow: Daniel Kalpokas abstract
Abstract: In this paper I try to defend McDowell’s empiricism from a certain objection made by Davidson, Stroud and Glüer. The objection states that experiences cannot be reasons because they are—as McDowell conceives them—inert. I argue that, even though there is something correct in the objection (only an accepted content can be a reason), that is not sufficient for rejecting the epistemological character that McDowell attributes to experiences. My strategy consists basically in showing that experiences involve a constitutive attitude of acceptance of their contents. |
Experience and Justification: Revisiting McDowell’s Empiricism
Fellow: Daniel Kalpokas abstract
Abstract: In this paper I try to defend McDowell’s empiricism from a certain objection made by Davidson, Stroud and Glüer. The objection states that experiences cannot be reasons because they are—as McDowell conceives them—inert. I argue that, even though there is something correct in the objection (only an accepted content can be a reason), that is not sufficient for rejecting the epistemological character that McDowell attributes to experiences. My strategy consists basically in showing that experiences involve a constitutive attitude of acceptance of their contents. |
Conceptual Confusions and causal Dynamics
Fellow: Patrizio Lo Presti abstract & keywords
Abstract: This paper argues that rules and norms are conceptually distinct: what is norm is not thereby rule, and vice versa. Versions of conflating the two are discussed and an argument for distinction given. Two objections to the argument are responded to. It is accepted that rules and norms are often intimately related. They are so causally, not conceptually: what norms we live by can make a difference to what rules we accept and what rules we accept can make a difference to what norms we live by. This is a social, dynamic and continuous causal process of development of the social practices of community. Keywords: norms, rules, social practice, causal dynamics, know-how |
Understanding undermining defeat
Fellow: Giacomo Melis abstract & keywords
Abstract: Taking the inspiration from some points made by Scott Sturgeon and Albert Casullo, I articulate a view according to which an important difference between undermining and overriding defeaters is that the former require the subject to engage in some higher-order epistemic thinking, while the latter don’t. With the help of some examples, I argue that underminers push the cognizer to reflect on the way she formed a belief by challenging the epistemic worthiness of either the source of justification or the specific justificatory process. By contrast, overriders needn’t pose any such challenge. I also consider some problems for the proposed view, and I put forward some possible solutions. Finally, I provide some details on how undermining defeat works in different cases. Keywords: epistemology; defeaters; undermining; overriding; justificatory process; higher-order. |
The Intertwinement of Propositional and Doxastic Justification
Fellow: Giacomo Melis abstract & keywords
Abstract: One important distinction in the debate over the nature of epistemic justification is the one between propositional and doxastic justification. Roughly, while doxastic justification is a property of beliefs, propositional justification is a property of propositions. On a rather common view, which accounts for doxastic justification in terms of propositional justification plus the so-called ‘basing relation’, propositional justification is seen as the prior notion, and doxastic justification is explained in terms of it. According to the opposing view, the direction of explanation needs to be reversed, and doxastic justification should be seen as primary. I distinguish between two notions of priority, and I argue that they give different verdicts with respect to the issue of which notion of justification comes first. The lesson may be taken to be that propositional and doxastic justification are in a relation of intertwinement. Keywords: propositional justification, doxastic justification, conceptual priority, theoretical priority |
How Many Normative Notions of Rationality? A Critical Study of Wedgwood’s The Value of Rationality
Fellow: Giacomo Melis overview
Overview: The main goal of Wedgwood’s book, expected to be the first instalment of a trilogy, is to defend the claim that the concept of rationality is normative. Among other things, on Wedgwood’s understanding, this is supposed to entail that ‘we always ought to be as we are rationally required to be’. Since Wedgwood argues that a mentalist variety of internalism is true of rationality, in his picture the demands of rationality may be characterized as the demand that the agent be broadly coherent – that one’s way of thinking fit with the mental states and events present in one’s mind at the relevant times. Yet, internal coherence can’t prevent one from being led astray on occasion, as the possibility of acquiring misleading evidence and the predicament of victims of sceptical scenarios illustrate. If so, as Wedgwood acknowledges, ‘we may well doubt whether it must always be true that there is something good simply in being coherent’ (38, emphasis original). Addressing this concern – that is, explaining what is good about coherence and why we should always avoid being incoherent – takes up the main part of the book (Chs. 4–9). Wedgwood’s answer begins with five careful chapters of stage-setting and preliminary considerations. These chapters develop many philosophical insights and arguments that any philosopher would find worth engaging with independently of the goal that they serve in the book, and include the following broad topics. Chapter 4 offers a discussion of why it is a mistake to think that the most fundamental normative notion is that of reasons; Chapter 5 discusses the distinction between different senses of ‘ought’ and isolates the sense that is taken to be linked to rationality; Chapter 6 proposes that the most fundamental normative concepts are evaluative ones and that the concept of rationality is one of them; Chapter 7 defends mentalist internalism about rationality, and Chapter 8 critiques attempts to explain why rationality matters within frameworks that accept Wedgwood’s commitments to internalism and decisiveness of the requirements of rationality. The specific answer to the question of why rationality matters – why we should always avoid being incoherent – arrives in Chapter 9, and it is rich in technical details. |
Incorrect Emotions in Ancient, Austrian & Contemporary Philosophy
Fellow: Kevin Mulligan abstract
Abstract: After a presentation of the Ancient conceptions of órexis, a few questions regarding the nature of “non-intellectual correctness” are raised, whilst the answers offered by Brentano and his heirs are assessed, as well as those proposed within contemporary philosophy of values and contemporary philosophy of mind. It is proposed that the Brentanian conception of values be understood in terms of orthonomy: x is valuable if a positive emotion or desire for x is correct (and one can have knowledge of that emotion or desire). Yet, some texts by Brentano also describe correctness in relational terms (a relation between a mental act and a deontic form), thereby pointing towards contemporary buck-passing and fitting-attitude theories. Brentano thus often leans towards a non-relational conception of correctness, but also sometimes endorses a relational account. |
Normativity of Predictions: A New Research Perspective
Fellow: Michał Piekarski abstract & keywords
Abstract: One of the most interesting philosophical aspects of predictive processing (PP) is the normativity of predictive mechanisms and its function as a guide of action. In my opinion this framework provides us with good tools to describe and explain the phenomenon of normativity. It is possible to justify the thesis that explanations in the PP approach are normative in nature. They are like that because predictive mechanisms themselves are normative. By normative function of prediction I understand a feature of prediction which is constitutive (Bickhard, 2003) for action control as well as for the structure and content of the world model that is internal to a given cognitive system. They are normative in the sense of possibly being wrong (Bickhard, 2015a,b, 2016). Normative are also some properties of the environment. Both those factors are crucial for content and truth-value of representations. With no normativity, there is no error and it is hard to explain the possibility of misrepresentations. It means that predictions are also normative for action because they can be true (more probably in the Bayesian manner) or false (less probably in the Bayesian manner). Keywords: predictive processing, normativity, active inference, uncertainty, mechanism, environment, content, casuality |
Contraddizione, pensabilità, impossibilità
Fellow: Venanzio Raspa abstract
Abstract: Il tema di cui intendo occuparmi è la pensabilità di ciò che è impossibile o contraddittorio. Nella storia del pensiero vanta invece una lunga tradizione la tesi opposta, secondo cui oggetti o concetti contraddittori non sono pensabili. Nelle pagine che seguono, tratteggerò i punti di vista di vari autori, seguendo un percorso che, sebbene non sia strettamente cronologico, si snoda secondo una sua cronologia interna 2. L’idea portante è che, per poter pensare la contraddizione, bisogna riconsiderare la relazione fra pensabilità e rappresentabilità. Al riguardo andrà precisato il senso in cui intendere il termine “rappresentazione”, dalla cui polisemanticità derivano le maggiori difficoltà interpretative. Per entrare in argomento, partiamo dalle figure impossibili. |
In-contraddizione. Il principio di contraddizione alle origini della nuova logica
Fellow: Venanzio Raspa overview
OVERVIEW: Indice Premessa Avvertenza Il problema 1. Per cominciare, alcuni esempi dal linguaggio ordinario, – 2. Perché uno studio sul principio di contraddizione – 3. Ipotesi di ricerca. I. Incontraddizione Il principio di contraddizione nella tradizione. Fonti, problemi, spiegazioni e implicazioni 1. La duplice via di Aristotele 1. La proposizione nel De interpretatione – 2. Le forme di opposizione fra proposizioni – 3. La portata esistenziale delle proposizioni e la negazione – 4. I principi di contraddizione e del terzo escluso come assiomi negli Analitici secondi – 5. Il principio di contraddizione come principio primo nella Metafisica, i: la formulazione ‘ontologica’ classica – 6. Il principio di contraddizione come principio primo nella Metafisica, ii: la formulazione ‘psicologica’. 2. La non-contraddittorietà come principio primo, legge del pensiero e condizione di pensabilità in Kant 1. La logica come scienza delle leggi naturali e formali del pensiero – 2. Non-contraddittorietà = possibilità = pensabilità – 3. Il principio di contraddizione nella Critica della ragion pura – 4. Critica del principio di contraddizione kantiano. 3. Priorità, formalità ed estensione del principio di contraddizione. Discussioni nell'ambito della tradizione logica ottocentesca 1. Primi passi verso un dibattito sul principio di contraddizione quale legge del pensiero – 2. William Hamilton – 3. John Stuart Mill – 4. Herbert Spencer – 5. Un dubbio e la posizione di Gerardus Heymans – 6. Il principio di contraddizione aristotelico e quello kantiano secondo Christoph Sigwart – 7. Critica delle interpretazioni psicologistiche del principio di contraddizione (Bolzano, Husserl, e i giovani Russell e Lukasiewicz) – 8. La logica formale non può prescindere dal riferimento al reale: la critica di Adolf Friedrich Trendelenburg – 9. Un'altra voce: Rudolf Hermann Lotze. 4. Dimostrabilità del principio di contraddizione? La natura del soggetto della proposizione 1. Sulla necessità di una giustificazione del principio di contraddizione – 2. La dimostrazione per via di confutazione di Aristotele – 3. La ‘dimostrazione diretta’ di Friedrich Ueberweg... – 4. ... e quella di Alexander Pfänder – 5. Le critiche del giovane Lukasiewicz contro la presunta priorità del principio di contraddizione – 6. La ‘dimostrazione’ di Lukasiewicz – 7. Il principio di contraddizione e la logica simbolica secondo Lukasiewicz – 8. Note conclusive sulla logica formale tradizionale. II. In-contraddizione Oggetti esistenti e oggetti non-esistenti 1. L'universo di Bolzano e l'in sé 1. Sulle “somme leggi del pensiero” – 2. L'anti-Kant: sulla logica e la forma logica – 3. L'in sé – 4. Le rappresentazioni senza oggetto. 2. Dalle rappresentazioni senza oggetto agli oggetti non-esistenti 1. La mediazione storica di Robert Zimmermann: breve storia redazionale della Philosophische Propaedeutik – 2. La Philosophische Propaedeutik e la Wissenschaftslehre a confronto, i: la concezione della logica e l'in sé – 3. La Philosophische Propaedeutik e la Wissenschaftslehre a confronto, ii: le rappresentazioni senza oggetto – 4. Rappresentazione, contenuto e oggetto in Kazimierz Twardowski – 5. Il capovolgimento delle rappresentazioni senza oggetto in Twardowski: rappresentazioni i cui oggetti non esistono. 3. Oggetti impossibili 1. La Gegenstandstheorie di Alexius Meinong: eine daseinsfreie Wissenschaft – 2. Oggetti impossibili e teoria dell'Außersein nella Gegenstandstheorie – 3. Russell versus Meinong: descrizioni ed esistenza. III. In contraddizione Verso logiche non-aristoteliche 1. Principio di contraddizione e sillogismo 1. An. post. A 11. 77a10-21: le interpretazioni di Jan Lukasiewicz e di Isaac Husik – 2. La finzione di Lukasiewicz e l'idea della logica non-aristotelica. 2. Mondi possibili con oggetti impossibili. La logica immaginaria di N.A. Vasil'ev 1. Cenni introduttivi – 2. Giudizi universali e giudizi particolari in Sigwart – 3. Sui giudizi particolari, il triangolo delle opposizioni e la legge del quarto escluso – 4. I contributi di Meinong e Husik e l'idea della “logica immaginaria (non-aristotelica)” – 5. Negazione e legge di contraddizione nella logica immaginaria – 6. Giudizi e sillogismi nella logica immaginaria - 7. Breve confronto con Lukasiewicz. 3. Individui, continuo e vaghezza in Peirce 1. Peirce, Vasil'év e la logica non-aristotelica – 2. Individui, contraddizione e terzo escluso – 3. Alcuni aspetti del continuo in Peirce – 4. I casi al bordo: Peirce versus Frege – 5. Vaghezza: oggetti indeterminati e predicati vaghi. Per continuare Bibliografia Indice dei nomi Indice analitico. |
Expressive Explication and the Optative Model
Fellow: Neil Roughley overview
Overview: Chapter 4 develops the idea of an expressive explication of the attitudes, which grounds in the claim that there is an essential structural analogy between mental states and linguistic utterances. The strengths of the conception are first demonstrated by showing how it explains the phenomenon of Moore-paradoxical sentences for beliefs. Applied to wants, it reveals them as essentially optative attitudes, that is, as mental states articulated by utterances of the form “Let it be the case that p”. The optative analysis is then confronted with two competing proposals stemming from the field of moral psychology. According to the first, axiological theory, “desires” entertain the same relation to the good as beliefs do to truth. The main argument for the view, Anscombe’s hermeneutic vertigo argument, is shown to conflate the putative incoherence of a non-axiological concept of wanting with the incomprehensibility of an agent’s reasons for wanting. According to the second proposal, the pure entailment view, which revives the main premise of the Logical Connection Argument, talk of “desires” is, in at least certain important cases, simply a way of characterising an action as intentional, a characterisation that makes no substantial contribution to its explanation. I distinguish three reasons for this view and show why none of them justify the claim that wants* are mere ascriptions. In an appendix to the chapter, the optative analysis is related to the metaphor of “direction of fit”. I argue against reductive attempts to rid us of the metaphor, claiming instead that it marks an irreducibly normative feature of attitudinising. At the close, the chapter returns to the suggestion at the end of Chap. 2, that there may be creatures that play host to motivational states without being believers. This possibility turns out to be entailed by the conception of wanting* as the setting of subjective standards, which, unlike the objective standard required by belief, don’t require the capacities for full Davidsonian triangulation. |
Traditions and True Successors
Fellow: David-Hillel Ruben abstract & keywords
Abstract: How can different parties to a dispute in aesthetics, history, politics or religion, either individuals or groups, each claim, apparently with at least some justification, that it, but not its rival(s), is the true or authentic successor or later representative for some earlier group or individual, or that it, but not its rival(s), stands in the same authentic tradition as the earlier one? Such social disputes seem essentially endless and interminable. Is this so? Can the disputes receive a rational resolution? I try and illustrate these disputes with numerous specific examples. I focus on the two concepts of tradition and true succession for my analysis. The idea of qualitative similarity of beliefs and practices can illuminate social disputes over true succession or membership of a tradition. (Causal connexion has a necessary role to play.) Other analyses frequently identify the vagueness or ambiguity in the concepts of the specific traditions as the source of dispute. On the contrary, I argue that the vagueness inherent in the question of how similar beliefs and practices need to be is what explains these apparently endless disputes that social groups have with one another over these questions. Keywords: Traditions, True Succession, Social Disputes |
Anaphoric deflationism, primitivism, and the truth-property
Fellow: Pietro Salis abstract & keywords
Abstract: Anaphoric deflationism is a prosententialist account of the use of “true.” Prosentences are, for sentences, the equivalent of what pronouns are for nouns: as pronouns refer to previously introduced nouns, so prosentences like “that’s true” inherit their content from previously introduced sentences. This kind of deflationism concerning the use of “true” (especially in Brandom’s version) is an explanation in terms of anaphora; the prosentence depends anaphorically on the sentence providing its content. A relevant implication of this theory is that “true” is not understood as a predicate and that truth is not a property. Primitivism, defended by Frege, Moore, and Davidson, is associated with two ideas: (1) that truth is a primitive and central trait of our conceptual system and (2) that truth, as such, cannot be defined. This second claim can be called “negative primitivism,” and it especially points out the facts about the “indefinability” of truth generally advocated by primitivists. In what follows, a connection is established between the deflationist’s rejection of the predicate and of the property and facts (and primitivist ideas) about the indefinability of truth. This connection establishes a common framework to lend further explanatory power to both options. According to the resulting view, this indefinability can explain the appeal and soundness of a deflationist dismissal of predicates and properties dealing with truth. Keywords: Brandom, Deflationism, Davidson, Indefinability of truth, Prosententialism, Truth |
Implicit norms
Fellow: Pietro Salis abstract & keywords
Abstract: Robert Brandom has developed an account of conceptual content as instituted by social practices. Such practices are understood as being implicitly normative. Brandom proposed the idea of implicit norms in order to meet some requirements imposed by Wittgenstein’s remarks on rule-following: escaping the regress of rules on the one hand, and avoiding mere regular behavior on the other. Anandi Hattiangadi has criticized this account as failing to meet such requirements. In what follows, I try to show how the correct understanding of sanctions and the expressivist reading of the issue can meet these challenges. Keywords: Brandom, Heath, Hattiangadi, Dispositionalism, Expressivism, Implicit norms, Norms, Normativity |
Collective Intentionality, Inferentialism and the Capacity for Claim-Making
Fellow: Glenda Satne abstract & keywords
Abstract: Some of our linguistic practices are special in that they involve claims about how things stand in the world. These judgments are thought to be true or false with respect to what they are about. The nature of these practices of claim-making has been studied by philosophers and psychologists alike. Furthermore, important strands in evolutionary studies have relied on both psychological and philosophical theories for addressing the question of how these practices evolved in the hominins lineage, claiming that engagement in such linguistic practices is humans’ exclusive heritage. This paper aims to show that (some of) the conceptual tools provided by collective intentionality and inferentialist theorists can productively complement each other in pursuing this theoretical endeavor, namely the elucidation of human practices of claim-making. In particular, I argue that (i) Brandom’s inferentialist account of basic linguistic practices in interpretational terms is problematic and that these problems can be addressed via appeal to the collective intentionality theorist’s toolbox, and (ii) Inferentialists resource to linguistic norms in understanding meaning and claim-making can offer crucial tools for understanding the emergence of human specific cognitive capacities of objective judgement, tools that are needed to complement the accounts offered by collective intentionality theorists. The main aim of the paper is to provide an account of the evolution and development of human-specific abilities of claim-making which combines resources from both approaches in order to understand the nature and crucial role of shared activities in their emergence. Keywords: Collective intentionality, Inferentialism, Claim-making practices |
Explorative Experiments: A Paradigm Shift to Deal with Severe Uncertainty in Autonomous Robotics
Fellow: Viola Schiaffonati abstract
Abstract: This paper presents a case of severe uncertainty in the development of autonomous and intelligent systems in Artificial Intelligence and autonomous robotics. After discussing how uncertainty emerges from the complexity of the systems and their interaction with unknown environments, the paper describes the novel framework of explorative experiments. This framework presents a suitable context in which many of the issues relative to uncertainty, both at the epistemological level and at the ethical one, in this field should be reframed. The case of autonomous robot systems for search and rescue is used to make the discussion more concrete. |
Accuracy and epistemic conservatism
Fellow: Florian Steinberger abstract
Abstract: Epistemic utility theory (EUT) is generally coupled with veritism. Veritism is the view that truth is the sole fundamental epistemic value. Veritism, when paired with EUT, entails a methodological commitment: norms of epistemic rationality are justified only if they can be derived from considerations of accuracy alone. According to EUT, then, believing truly has epistemic value, while believing falsely has epistemic disvalue. This raises the question as to how the rational believer should balance the prospect of true belief against the risk of error. A strong intuitive case can be made for a kind of epistemic conservatism – that we should disvalue error more than we value true belief. I argue that none of the ways in which advocates of veritist EUT have sought to motivate conservatism can be squared with their methodological commitments. Short of any such justification, they must therefore either abandon their most central methodological principle or else adopt a permissive line with respect to epistemic risk. |
Is Aristotelian Concept of Phronesis Empirically Adequate?
Fellow: Natasza Szutta abstract & keywords
Abstract: Contemporary virtue ethics, after gaining a strong position in ethics during the last decades of the twentieth century, has become an object of radical criticism. Situationists, such as John Doris, Gilbert Harman and Maria Merritt, inspired by the results of the research in social and cognitive psychology, questioned empirical adequacy of moral psychology on which virtue ethics was based. In their view, not dispositions and character, but situational factors decisively determine human behavior and thinking. At first this criticism of virtue ethics was focused on questioning the existence of ethical virtues, which would explain stable, consistent and morally integrated actions; then, the critics moved on to questioning the ideal of practical wisdom (phronesis) understood as an acquired constant disposition to deliberately search the best ways to respond to given moral reasons, choosing what is right as well as to find best means to realize the goal of good life. Situationists, notice that majority of our cognitive and motivational processes are automatic and unconscious. They are often incongruent with declared moral values to such extend that the model of practical wisdom seems to situationists to be problematic. In my presentation I will try to respond to the situationistic objections. I will analyze a number of experiments, to which they refer, and ask to what extend these experiments allow them for so radical conclusions. I will also present contemporary dual – process theories of cognition and show how they fit with the Aristotelian idea of practical wisdom. Although virtue ethics is normative, there is no easy passage from the analysis of facts (situationists) to the formulation of norms (virtue ethicists), we must admit that formulating norms cannot contradict our knowledge about facts. And for this reason the situational criticism cannot be easily ignored. Keywords: phronesis, virtue, virtue ethics, situationism, Aristotle. |
Normative Concepts: A Connectedness Model
Fellows: François Schroeter, Laura Schroeter overview
Overview: Although foundational issues about meaning and concepts rarely take center stage in contemporary metaethics, metaethical debates are shaped by background assumptions about the nature of concepts. The issue of when there is direct logical agreement or disagreement among our normative thoughts, for instance, is at bottom a matter of concept identity. And the issue of whether our normative thoughts all pick out a single property depends in part on what is required for competence with the same concept and how concepts in general acquire their semantic values. This paper sketches a new relational account of normative concepts that challenges widely held assumptions in metaethics. We start by articulating the central role played by concepts in keeping track of particular topics in thought and talk. Sameness of concept normally gives rise to the appearance of guaranteed sameness of topic, and this psychological appearance must be reliable if concepts are to play their characteristic role. We then introduce and criticize the standard broadly Fregean approach to concepts that has often been common ground in metaethical debates. The bulk of the paper articulates our alternative connectedness model of concepts and shows how this model is particularly well suited to normative concepts. The connectedness model builds social and historical facts into the foundations of concept identity. This aspect of the model, we suggest, reshapes normative epistemology and provides new resources for a vindication of realism in ethics |
Normative realism: co-reference without convergence?
Fellows: François Schroeter, Laura Schroeter overview
Overview: A core claim of normative realists is that normative predicates pick out properties. Traditional normative realists also hold the semantic view that central normative terms are context-invariant: the predicate ‘is morally right’, for instance, picks out the very same property when used at different times, by different speakers, or in different social contexts. Our focus in this paper will be on a pair of metasemantic theses that many theorists see as central to vindicating traditional normative realism. The first thesis is that the reference of normative predicates is not epistemically constrained: just which property is picked out by ‘is morally right’ is not settled by the verdicts the speaker would endorse at the end of ideal rational reflection. The second thesis is that co-reference does not require convergence in speakers’ ideal normative judgments: competent speakers’ use of a moral predicate picks out the same property, even if speakers would arrive at divergent verdicts about which things are morally right at the end of ideal rational reflection. |
Normalità o processi di normalizzazione? Le analisi husserliane sulla dimensione orto-estetica e il carattere dinamico dell’esperienza percettiva
Fellow: Michela Summa abstract & keywords
Abstract: Questo articolo si concentra sull’approccio husserliano al tema della normalità. Muovendo dalla considerazione delle diverse dimensioni alle quali questo concetto si riferisce, si propone un approccio "stratificato" alla normalità, basato sull’analisi dell’esperienza sensibile e di quella che Husserl chiama orto-estesia. La considerazione dei criteri dell’ottimalità e della concordanza, che Husserl introduce per la definizione della normalità individuale e intersoggettiva, ci consentirà di portare in luce la duplice connotazione, descrittiva e normativa, della normalità. Sulla base della considerazione congiunta dei criteri menzionati in relazione all’esperienza individuale e intersoggettiva si propone un’interpretazione della normalità basata sulle dinamiche dei processi di normalizzazione. Keywords: Normalità, orto-estesia, concordanza, optimum, percezione, normatività. |
Are Fictional Emotions Genuine and Rational? Phenomenological Reflections on a Controversial Question
Fellow: Michela Summa abstract & keywords
Abstract: The aim of this paper is to discuss the status of so-called ‘fictional emotions’ and their relation to emotions in the face of what is real. Particularly, I consider whether we can take fictional emotions as genuine and rational. I begin with a discussion of a paradoxical characterization of fictional emotions, which introduces questions concerning their genuineness and rationality, and show how these questions are strictly tied to the problem of the existence of fictional objects, or of our disbelief in their existence. I then clarify in what sense emotions can arise independently of our belief in real existence and in what sense we can say that fictional objects ‘exist’ although they do not exist as real. Subsequently, I briefly address the normative implications of fictional experience. And finally, I consider how a phenomenological account of fictional emotions presupposes a discussion of the different modalities of our participation in imaginary and fictional context, and how these different modalities are correlated to different forms of self-consciousness. Keywords: imagination, fiction, fictional emotions, reality, irreality |
Husserl’s Conception of Cognition as an Action: An Inquiry into Its Prehistory
Fellow: Genki Uemura abstract & keywords
Abstract: The present chapter investigates a development in Husserl’s thought concerning cognition. In some of his later writings after the 1920s, Husserl holds that cognition is an action. This claim is available for him only if a previous idea expressed in his Logische Untersuchungen (1900/1901), according to which no act is action, has been abandoned. In addition, there must be a further reason for Husserl’s classification of cognition as action. We attempt to account for this move solely on the basis of Husserl’s discussions of cognition and action before the 1920s. The proposed account consists of two steps. First, drawing mainly on Husserl’s related manuscripts in 1909–1914, we give an outline of Husserl’s phenomenology of action in general. Second, examining some of Husserl’s discussions in the same period, we show that Husserl is already phenomenologically justified at that time to regard his analysis of cognition as dealing with a certain sort of action. Keywords: Creative Process, Phenomenological Analysis, Practical Philosophy, Intentional Correlate, Congruence Model |