Philosophy

Belief or 'Belief': Rush Rhees on Religious Belief Language

Todd R. Long — Mon, 14 May 2012 10:45:38 PDT

The recent book Rush Rhees on Religion and Philosophy contains a stimulating collection of writin~s by Rush Rhees on a variety of topics in the philosophy of religion. Comprising accounts of personal, religious and moral struggles, these essays provide a refreshing change from the often dry, overly technical approach to philosophy writing. Despite spanning more than thirty years, Rhees' s essays disclose a fairly consistent philosophy .of religion with a clear emphasis. Since he was Wittgenstein's student and long-time friend as well as a literary executor ofWittgenstein's writings, it is not surprising that Rhees's comments on the philosophy of religion reveal a distinctly Wittgensteinian approach, both in content and style. Moreover, Rhees's particular way of doing philosophy of religion seems, in retrospect, to have set the course that subsequent philosophy of religion of the Wittgensteinian type would take.

A Selective Defence of Tolstoy's What is Art?

Todd R. Long — Mon, 14 May 2012 10:45:32 PDT

Bell's Spaceships Problem and the Foundations of Special Relativity

Francisco Fernflores — Mon, 14 May 2012 10:45:29 PDT

Recent ‘dynamical’ approaches to relativity by Harvey Brown and his colleagues have used John Bell’s own solution to a problem in relativity which has in the past sometimes been called ‘Bell’s spaceships paradox’, in a central way. This paper examines solutions to this problem in greater detail and from a broader philosophical perspective than Brown et al. offer. It also analyses the well-known analogy between special relativity and classical thermodynamics. This analysis leads to the sceptical conclusion that Bell’s solution yields neither new philosophical insights concerning the foundations of relativity nor differential support for a specific view concerning the existence of space-time.

Language and Responsibility: The Possibilities and Problems of Poetic Thinking for Environmental Philosophy

Eleanor D. Helms — Fri, 27 Jan 2012 14:38:07 PST

There is a sense in which poetry can re-inscribe humans in their natural surroundings, but language—even poetic language—is also always problematic. In conversation with and in response to recent works by David Abram, I will delineate at least two ways in which poetic language separates and distinguishes humans from nature. I also argue for the importance of what is implicit or invisible (as opposed to tangible and sensuous). Language is a mode of human responsibility for the world, not just a sign or result of being part of it.

Moderate Reasons-Responsiveness, Moral Responsibility, and Manipulation

Todd R. Long — Thu, 29 Sep 2011 14:04:19 PDT

Is it True that ‘Evolution is a Theory, Not a Fact’?

Todd R. Long — Thu, 29 Sep 2011 14:04:16 PDT

Proper Function Justification and Epistemic Rationality

Todd R. Long — Thu, 29 Sep 2011 14:04:14 PDT

A proper de jure objection to the epistemic rationality of religious belief

Todd R. Long — Thu, 29 Sep 2011 14:04:12 PDT

I answer Alvin Plantinga’s challenge to provide a ‘proper’ de jure objection to religious belief. What I call the ‘sophisticates’ evidential objection’ (SEO) concludes that sophisticated Christians lack epistemic justification for believing central Christian propositions. The SEO utilizes a theory of epistemic justification in the spirit of the evidentialism of Richard Feldman and Earl Conee. I defend philosophical interest in the SEO (and its underlying evidentialism) against objections from Reformed epistemology, by addressing Plantinga’s criteria for a proper de jure objection, his anti-evidentialist arguments, and the relevance of ‘impulsional evidence’. I argue that no result from Plantinga-style Reformed epistemology precludes the reasons I offer in favour of giving the SEO its due philosophical attention.

Mentalist evidentialism vindicated (and a super-blooper epistemic design problem for proper function justification)

Todd R. Long — Thu, 29 Sep 2011 14:04:09 PDT

Michael Bergmann seeks to motivate his externalist, proper function theory of epistemic justification by providing three objections to the mentalism and mentalist evidentialism characteristic of nonexternalists such as Richard Feldman and Earl Conee. Bergmann argues that (i) mentalism is committed to the false thesis that justification depends on mental states; (ii) mentalism is committed to the false thesis that the epistemic fittingness of an epistemic input to a belief-forming process must be due to an essential feature of that input, and, relatedly, that mentalist evidentialism is committed to the false thesis that the epistemic fittingness of doxastic response B to evidence E is an essential property of B–E; and (iii) mentalist evidentialism is ‘‘unmotivated’’. I object to each argument. The argument for (i) begs the question. The argument for (ii) suffers from the fact that mentalist evidentialists are not committed to the consequences claimed for them; nevertheless, I show that there is, in the neighborhood, a substantive dispute concerning the nature of doxastic epistemic fittingness. That dispute involves what I call ‘‘Necessary Fittingness’’, the view that, necessarily, exactly one (at most) doxastic attitude (belief,or disbelief,or suspension of judgment) toward a proposition is epistemically fitting with respect to a person’s total evidence at any time. Reflection on my super-blooper epistemic design counterexamples to Bergmann’s proper function theory reveals both the plausibility of Necessary Fittingness and a good reason to deny (iii). Mentalist evidentialism is thus vindicated against the objections.

Review of Quantum Mechanics and Experience by David Albert

Francisco Flores et al. — Wed, 13 Jul 2011 11:07:31 PDT

Robot ethics: Mapping the issues for a mechanized world

Patrick Lin et al. — Wed, 06 Jul 2011 14:17:15 PDT

As with other emerging technologies, advanced robotics brings with it new ethical and policy challenges. This paper will describe the flourishing role of robots in society—from security to sex—and survey the numerous ethical and social issues, which we locate in three broad categories: safety & errors, law & ethics, and social impact. We discuss many of these issues in greater detail in our forthcoming edited volume on robot ethics from MIT Press.

Plato’s “Democratic Man” and the Implausibility of Preference Utilitarianism

Tal Scriven — Thu, 28 Apr 2011 09:48:45 PDT

Preference, Rational Choice and Arrow's Theorem

Tal Scriven — Thu, 28 Apr 2011 09:43:48 PDT

Communicating with Accelerated Observers in Minkowski Spacetime

Francisco Flores — Thu, 28 Apr 2011 09:43:40 PDT

Our goal here is to determine the spatial and temporal constraints on communication between two observers at least one of which moves with constant proper acceleration in two-dimensional Minkowski spacetime. We take as a simplified model of communication one observer bouncing a light signal off another observer. Our derivations use only elementary mathematics and spacetime diagrams, and hence are accessible to students taking their first course in special relativity. Furthermore, the qualitative features of our results can be easily explained to non-physics students in courses that discuss special relativity at a ‘conceptual’ level.

On the Interpretation of the Equation E = mc²: Response to Krajewski

Francisco Flores — Thu, 28 Apr 2011 09:43:34 PDT

Bell's Spaceships: A Useful Relativistic Paradox

Francisco J. Flores — Thu, 28 Apr 2011 09:43:32 PDT

Bell’s spaceship ‘paradox’ [1] in special relativity is a particularly good one to examine with students, because although it deals with accelerated motions, it can be dissolved with elementary space–time diagrams. Furthermore, it forces us to be very clear about the relativity of simultaneity, proper length, and the ‘reality’ of the Lorentz contraction.

Interpretations of Einstein's Equation E = mc²

Francisco Flores — Thu, 28 Apr 2011 09:43:29 PDT

Interpretations of Einstein’s equation differ primarily concerning whether E = mc² entails that mass and energy are the same property of physical systems, and hence whether there is any sense in which mass is ever “converted” into energy (or vice versa). In this paper, I examine six interpretations of Einstein’s equation and argue that all but one fail to satisfy a minimal set of conditions that all interpretations of physical theories ought to satisfy. I argue that we should prefer the interpretation of Einstein’s equation that holds that mass and energy are distinct properties of physical systems. This interpretation also carries along the view that while most cases of “conversion” are not genuine examples of mass being “converted” into energy (or vice versa), it is possible that the there are such “conversions” in the sense that a certain amount of mass “appears” and an equivalent of mass “disappears.” Finally, I suggest that the interpretation I defend is the only one that does not blur the distinction between what Einstein called “principle” and “constructive” theories. This is philosophically significant because it emphasizes that explanations of Einstein’s equation and the “conversion” of mass and energy must be top-down explanations.

Einstein's Theory of Theories and Types of Theoretical Explanation

Francisco Flores — Thu, 28 Apr 2011 09:43:26 PDT

In this paper I draw on Einstein's distinction between “principle” and “constructive” theories to isolate two levels of physical theory that can be found in both classical and (special) relativistic physics. I then argue that when we focus on theoretical explanations in physics, i.e. explanations of physical laws, the two leading views on explanation, Salmon's “bottom-up” view and Kitcher's “top-down” view, accurately describe theoretical explanations for a given level of theory. I arrive at this conclusion through an analysis of explanations of mass—energy equivalence in special relativity.

Einstein’s 1935 Derivation of E=mc²

Francisco Flores — Thu, 28 Apr 2011 09:43:23 PDT

Einstein’s 1935 derivation of mass—energy equivalence is philosophically important because it contains both a criticism of purported demonstrations that proceed by analogy and strong motivations for the definitions of the ‘new’ dynamical quantities (viz relativistic momentum, relativistic kinetic energy and relativistic energy). In this paper, I argue that Einstein’s criticism and insights are still relevant today by showing how his derivation goes beyond Friedman’s demonstration of this result in his Foundations of Spacetime ¹heories. Along the way, I isolate three distinct physical claims associated with Einstein’s famous equation that are sometimes not clearly distinguished in philosophical discussions of spacetime theory.

Book Review: Quantum Non-Locality and Relativity

Francisco Flores — Thu, 28 Apr 2011 09:43:19 PDT