2024-03-29T04:49:34Zhttps://research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk/oai/requestoai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/148142019-04-01T09:23:07Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
The theory of rational decision and the foundations of ethics
Sowden, Lanning Patrick
Mayo, Bernard
University of St Andrews
The primary concern of this thesis is to investigate what light (if any) the theory of rational decision can throw on certain problems in first-order ethics. In particular, it examines whether given a correct theory of decision we can determine which of the two major rivals in the field of contemporary ethics, utilitarianism and contractarianism, is the more adequate moral theory. I begin by outlining what I call orthodox decision theory and note from this theory together with a minimal characterization of what it is to make a moral judgement we can deduce utilitarianism. The apparent conflict between utilitarianism and our moral intuitions is then examined. I criticize a common response made by utilitarians to this conflict, namely, their recourse to the distinction between rule and act utilitarianism. But I then ask the question of whether this conflict really matters? I conclude that in a sense it does not. I then turn from a consideration of the implications of utilitarianism to its foundations, particularly, its foundations in orthodox decision theory. I attempt to establish that orthodox theory has empirical content and that it has been falsified. I also consider the theory from the normative standpoint and construct a prima facie case against it. I now consider the dispute between the contractarian and the utilitarian and note that it is essentially decision theoretic in character. From a consideration of what was found to be mistaken about orthodox theory I now argue for a defence of the selection rule for rational choice presupposed by contractarianism and thereby offer a (partial) defence of a contractarian theory of justice.
2018-07-02T14:53:52Z
2018-07-02T14:53:52Z
2018-07-02T14:53:52Z
1983-07
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/14814
en
vi,270p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/275162024-02-15T14:36:58Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
From evidence to underdetermination : essays in the way of scepticism
Savino, Paolo
Ebert, Philip A.
Brown, Jessica (Jessica Anne)
Greenough, Patrick
Sorensen, Roy
University of St Andrews. Department of Philosophy
Scepticism
Underdetermination
Evidence
Justification
Evidentialism
Mentalism
Closure
Infallibilism
Luminosity
Mooreanism
Scepticism about justification is the view that justification is impossible. Underdetermination scepticism is scepticism that turns on the idea that our beliefs are underdetermined by the evidence relative to certain sceptical hypotheses. This thesis provides an elucidation and a defence of underdetermination scepticism on an evidentialist framework for justification and a mentalist conception of evidence. The thesis consists of five chapters and a conclusion. Chapter 1 introduces the Underdetermination Argument for scepticism and explains the core concepts of the thesis. Chapter 2 explores the relationship between closure and underdetermination scepticism. Chapter 3 responds to the Infallibility Objection, the idea that the Underdetermination Argument is a bad argument because the inference from sameness of evidence to underdetermination presupposes infallibilism. Chapter 4 responds to the charge that the Underdetermination Argument relies on excessive demands on the cognitive accessibility of evidence. Chapter 5 responds to attempts to resist scepticism on the ground that it is a Moorean fact that our beliefs are justified. The conclusion reviews and generalizes the results of the previous chapters. The upshot is that a significant set of objections against underdetermination scepticism fails. At the end of the day, we might have to take the possibility of living with scepticism seriously – or at least more seriously than we thought.
2023-05-05T08:50:01Z
2023-05-05T08:50:01Z
2023-05-05T08:50:01Z
2023-06-12
Thesis
https://hdl.handle.net/10023/27516
https://doi.org/10.17630/sta/420
en
185
The University of St Andrews
The University of Stirling
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/135452023-04-18T23:39:44Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30com_10023_879com_10023_878col_10023_118col_10023_880
Quatenus and Spinoza's monism
Douglas, Alexander
University of St Andrews. Philosophy
Spinoza
Quatenus
Pierre Bayle
Monism
Restriction
B Philosophy (General)
T-NDAS
BDC
I examine Spinoza’s use of the term quatenus. It is, I argue, an operator working in the context of a broader logical theory and blocking certain inferences that, according to critics such as Pierre Bayle, lead Spinoza’s metaphysical system into absurdities. I reconstruct this crucial theory from some treatises on logic to which Spinoza had access. I then show how a later logical theory—that of the Port-Royal Logic—does not permit Bayle’s troublesome inferences to be blocked by the use of terms like quatenus. Most likely Bayle was thinking in terms of the later theory, Spinoza in terms of the earlier.
2018-05-25T15:30:05Z
2018-05-25T15:30:05Z
2018-05-25T15:30:05Z
2018-04
Journal article
Douglas , A 2018 , ' Quatenus and Spinoza's monism ' , Journal of the History of Philosophy , vol. 56 , no. 2 , pp. 261-280 . https://doi.org/10.1353/hph.2018.0023
0022-5053
PURE: 251028374
PURE UUID: 26b75486-97af-4f5e-8f92-403579528b9c
Scopus: 85045692661
ORCID: /0000-0001-9486-8991/work/69029488
WOS: 000430366900004
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/13545
https://doi.org/10.1353/hph.2018.0023
https://www.dropbox.com/s/31vwip9epu9rtkn/Spinoza%20Quatenus.docx?dl=0
eng
Journal of the History of Philosophy
Copyright © 2018 Journal of the History of Philosophy, Inc. his work is made available online in accordance with the publisher’s policies. This is the final published version of the work, which was originally published at: https://doi.org/10.1353/hph.2018.0023
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/146752019-04-01T09:23:16Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
The individual and the absolute: a re-examination of some points in British Idealist philosophy
Islam, Aminul
Smith, R. N. W.
2018-06-28T07:55:56Z
2018-06-28T07:55:56Z
2018-06-28T07:55:56Z
1973-10
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/14675
en
v, 261 p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/146802019-04-01T09:23:18Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
Realism: a critical analysis of some arguments by Michael Dummett
Menzies, Peter Charles
Read, Stephen
CHAPTER ONE This thesis is a critical analysis of arguments which Michael Dummett has developed against realism. Dummett characterizes realism as the thesis that the meaning of sentences should be analyzed in terms of the notions oftruth and falsity which obey the classical principle of bivalence. Before examining Dummett's arguments against realism, I consider the two models Dummett proposes for analyzing the content of assertions and examine his thesis that the realist notion of truth is induced for some sentences by their use as constituents in compound sentences.
CHAPTER TWO I begin the examination of Dummett's arguments against realism by noting that Dummett allows in his recent work that a Tarskian truth-theory, couched in terms of a non-classical notion of truth, may act within a theory of meaning as the theory of reference yielding an inductive specification of truth- conditions. I then present Dummett's distinction between modest and full- blooded theories of meaning and suggest that the difference between them lies in the fact that the latter type possesses, while the former type lacks, a theory of sense, which Dummett conceives of as a series of correlations between practical abilities and T-sentences. I then consider the manifestation form of the argument against realism and argue that it fails on several counts. I then consider the acquisition form of the argument and point out the disputable assumptions about language-acquisition on which it is based. In the concluding section I question whether a theory of meaning which makes due allowance for idealization in the study of semantic competence should require a theory of sense of the kind Dummett suggests and question why the theory of reference should be responsive to the particular practical abilities which Dumniett emphasizes.
CHAPTER THREE In this chapter I complete the discussion of Dummett's arguments against realism and argue that Dummett has no satisfactory line of defence against my principal reaction to the manifestation form of the argument against realism. I then present Dummett's distinction between demonstrations and canonic al proofs his general distinction between between direct and indirect verifications. Then consider Dummett's attempts to characterize mathematical truth in terms of canonical proof and general truth in terms of direct verification. I conclude by outlining a problem which confronts a verificationist theory meaning of the kind Dummett espouses and show that there is a flaw in his argument that a verificationist theory of meaning leads to a rejection of classical logic.
CHAPTER FOUR I begin this chapter by examining Dummett's claim that reductionism is neither necessary nor sufficient for anti-realism. I argue that there is a sense in which reductionism is necessary and claim that there is a way of uniformly characterizing anti-realist positions on a number of subjects in terms of the thesis that a sentence is true in virtue of the evidence existing for it. I then consider Dummett's claim that a realist interpretation of counterfactuals involves asserting the unrestricted validity of the law of conditional excluded middle. I conclude by arguing that the anti-realist cannot acknowledge the defeasibility of evidence for empirically undecidable sentences and at the same time meet a legitimate demand that he explain in terms which do not beg any questions his conception of truth for such sentences.
2018-06-28T08:37:27Z
2018-06-28T08:37:27Z
2018-06-28T08:37:27Z
1981-07
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/14680
en
vi, 148 p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/148092019-04-01T09:23:19Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
A philosophical commentary on Schiller's 'Letters on the aesthetic education of man'
Murray, Patrick Timothy
This work provides a detailed philosophical exposition of Schiller's Letters on the Aesthetic Education of Man. (1795). In the introduction, the author's aims and methodology are briefly stated. There then follows a survey of those books in English with chapters on the treatise. The introduction concludes with an outline of Kant's critical system, and a summary of his theories of aesthetic judgement, art and beauty. The main body of the work consists of an exegesis of Schiller's text. Its 27 Letters are divided, for convenience, into three parts. In part one (Letters 1 - 9) we follow Schiller as he describes the afflictions of civilization and their cure. From a critique of Contemporary society, he argues for a political revolution resting upon the psycho-ethical reform of the individual. Such reform involves feeling becoming harmonized with reason, through the educative power of beauty and art. In part two (Letters 10 - 17) we follow Schiller as he considers the essential nature of man and beauty. He constructs an a priori model of our fundamental human nature, and asserts the need for, a corresponding model of ideal beauty, if man's dual nature is to be fully realized in a harmoniously integrated manner. In part three (Letters 18 - 27), we follow Schiller as he describes the psychological development of the individual and species from a sensuous to a rational condition, through the mediation of the aesthetic. The exposition is accompanied by assessment and criticism; attention is given to Schiller's changing methodology; and Schiller's ideas and theoretical perspectives are related, where derivative, to those of Kant and Fichte. The conclusion commences with a recapitulation of the main arguments in each Letter. This is followed by an evaluation of the Aesthetic Letters, identifying those specific theories of contemporary relevance, and with the potential for further theoretical development.
2018-07-02T13:45:41Z
2018-07-02T13:45:41Z
2018-07-02T13:45:41Z
1990-07
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/14809
en
318 p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/290332024-02-15T03:00:29Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
The time we experience : understanding the phenomenologies of temporal passage and presentness
Chen, Keyu
Prosser, Simon
This dissertation explores what is involved in the alleged phenomenologies of the passage of time and the present, two phenomenological data that are normally cited to support the A-theory of time. It argues that the phenomenology corresponding to the purported passage phenomenology is that of dynamic changes in things’ states, and the phenomenology corresponding to the purported presentness phenomenology is that of (only) some things and events occurring simpliciter. It claims that these illusory phenomenologies are products of the feature of our perceptual experience of having a confined temporal horizon, which includes three aspects – limited access, involuntariness, and directionality. It also argues that the illusory phenomenologies of dynamic change and things and events occurring simpliciter, despite being at odds with the B-ontology, do not lend support to the A-theory of time. Furthermore, it provides insight into why our perceptual experience has a confined temporal horizon and how the intuitive beliefs that we experience temporal passage and presentness arise from the illusory phenomenologies.
2024-01-19T14:46:57Z
2024-01-19T14:46:57Z
2024-01-19T14:46:57Z
2024-06-10
Thesis
https://hdl.handle.net/10023/29033
https://doi.org/10.17630/sta/702
en
80
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/102512019-04-01T09:23:19Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
Liberal trusteeship : preparatory work for an epistemic defence of non-egalitarian liberalism
Dagkas-Tsoukalas, Vladimiros
Cruft, Rowan
Sachs, Benjamin Alan
Epistemic theory of legitimacy
Democracy
Non-egalitarianism
Liberalism
Legitimacy
Epistemic democracy
Liberal trusteeship
Trusteeship
This thesis examines some epistemic defences of democracy put forward by David Estlund, Michael Fuerstein, Cheryl Misak, and Fabienne Peter, as well as a critique of democracy raised by Jason Brennan. It then develops an epistemic defence of a moderately non-egalitarian system, which it proposes to call liberal trusteeship. According to the proposed theory, the power to draft laws ought to be separated from the power to enact those drafts into law. The former power ought to be vested in trustees, who are essentially specialists that have inquired extensively into a given matter, and the latter power ought to be vested in a democratically elected parliament. Subsequently, this thesis argues that parliament should nevertheless have the prerogative to ultimately override trustees on ethics and pass its own legislation regulating moral matters; that the criteria for selecting trustees should be determined by jury courts; and that parliament and jury courts should be given some powers to influence the composition of trustee committees, so that the political process can guard against the risk that trustees might be biased or corrupt.
The above proposal is grounded on three principal claims. Firstly, this thesis argues that moral authority and legitimacy ought to be reserved for the political system that strikes the best balance between competence and equality. Secondly, it argues that liberal trusteeship is more likely than democracy to determine correctly what ought to be done in light of the progress of open and vigorous inquiry into a given matter. Thirdly, and as a result, it argues that liberal trusteeship is likely to exercise power sufficiently more competently than democracy, such that its moderate deviation from political equality will be justified. In the light of this, the thesis concludes that liberal trusteeship would strike a better balance between competence and equality than democracy.
2017-02-08T15:40:24Z
2017-02-08T15:40:24Z
2017-02-08T15:40:24Z
2017-06-22
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/10251
en
Brennan, Jason. “The Right to a Competent Electorate”. In: The Philosophical Quarterly vol. 61 (2011), pp. 700–724.
Estlund, David M. Democratic Authority. A Philosophical Framework. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2008.
Misak, Cheryl. Truth, Politics, Morality. Pragmatism and Deliberation. London: Routledge, 2000.
viii, 201 p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/108302018-09-28T11:19:53Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
Title redacted
Paris, Panagiotis S.
Gaut, Berys Nigel
Broadie, Sarah
Alexander S. Onassis Public Benefit Foundation
2017-05-24T08:54:32Z
2017-05-24T08:54:32Z
2017-05-24T08:54:32Z
2017-06-22
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/10830
en
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
2022-02-03
Thesis restricted in accordance with University regulations. Print and electronic copy restricted until 3rd February 2022
Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International
v, 275 p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/195372021-07-23T11:03:48Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
Fiction and its objects
Watkins, Ashley Everett
Gaut, Berys Nigel
University of St Andrews. Sheana and Pierre Rollin Scholarship
Fiction
Imagination
Fictive utterance
Social practices
Fictional objects
Fictional reference
This thesis develops a metaphysics of fictional objects that is embedded in a theory of fictional practice and maximally preserves the meanings of our fictional utterances. I begin by asking two questions: How can it be true of a fictional object such as Dune's Paul Atreides that he was born on the planet Caladan to the Lady Jessica (an intrafictional claim), that he was created on Earth by Frank Herbert (an extrafictional claim), and that he does not exist (a nonexistence claim)? If one or more of these is not true, then what is the nature of our assent to these three types of propositions about fictional objects? I argue that fiction's social nature and its basis in imaginative acts provides us with a dualist account of fictional objects: 'Paul Atreides' in the intrafictional and nonexistence claims refers to merely possible people while 'Paul Atreides' in extrafictional claims refers to an actual abstract artifact. I defend imagination's central role in fiction and argue that it's a norm of imagination that it models possibilities. I then define fiction as a social practice necessarily consisting in 1) acts of social imagining, 2) agreement maintained by implicit principles, 3) an aesthetic function or aim, and 4) the creation of abstract artifacts through which it achieves that aim. The result is that intrafictional claims are not assertions about the actual world, but expressions of imaginings that have as their intentional objects possible objects and states of affairs. Extrafictional claims are assertions about the actual abstract artifacts created by fictional practice that bear a picking out relation to the possibilia of fictive imaginings. Finally, nonexistence claims are assertions about the possibilia of our fictive imaginings - assertions that they are not actual. I defend the compatibility of these artifactualist and possibilist accounts and show how their union under the umbrella of a full theory of fiction both explains their intuitive appeal and solves the major issues they encounter individually.
2020-02-26T12:41:27Z
2020-02-26T12:41:27Z
2020-02-26T12:41:27Z
2020-06-22
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/19537
https://doi.org/10.17630/10023-19537
en
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International
221 p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/6882019-04-01T09:23:19Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
Inferences in context : contextualism, inferentialism and the concept of universal quantification
Tabet, Chiara
Wright, Crispin
Universal quantification
Context-sensitivity
Inference
This Thesis addresses issues that lie at the intersection of two broad philosophical projects: inferentialism and contextualism.
It discusses and defends an account of the logical concepts based on the following two ideas: 1) that the logical concepts are constituted by our canonical inferential usages of them; 2) that to grasp, or possess, a logical concept is to undertake an inferential commitment to the canonical consequences of the concept when deploying it in a linguistic practice.
The account focuses on the concept of universal quantification, with respect to which it also defends the view that linguistic context contributes to an interpretation of instances of the concept by determining the scope of our commitments to the canonical consequences of the quantifier.
The model that I offer for the concept of universal quantification relies on, and develops, three main ideas: 1) our understanding of the concept’s inferential role is one according to which the concept expresses full inferential generality; 2) what I refer to as the ‘domain model’ (the view that the universal quantifier always ranges over a domain of quantification, and that the specification of such a domain contributes to determine the proposition expressed by sentences in which the quantifier figures) is subject to a series of crucial difficulties, and should be abandoned; 3) we should regard the undertaking of an inferential commitment to the canonical consequences of the universal quantifier as a stable and objective presupposition of a universally quantified sentence expressing a determinate proposition in context.
In the last chapter of the Thesis I sketch a proposal about how contextual quantifier restrictions should be understood, and articulate the main challenges that a commitment-theoretic story about the context-sensitivity of the universal quantifier faces.
2009-05-15T13:01:44Z
2009-05-15T13:01:44Z
2009-05-15T13:01:44Z
2008-11-27
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/688
en
286
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/278122023-07-28T14:33:57Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
Self-identification, group-membership, and the race-gender analogy
Kopec, Kim Laura
Ball, Derek Nelson
Self-identification is often quickly dismissed as a possible criterion for group-membership. I explore what self-identification might be and how it might figure into group-membership. I set out desiderata for an account of group-membership that considers the analogy between race and gender to have some merit as well as the broad theoretical framework underlying discussions around the nature of race and gender. I argue a constructivist framework of some kind is most appropriate as it has the potential of being maximally inclusive as well as ameliorative. I criticize Haslanger’s ameliorative account, which focuses on social positioning as a membership criterion, based on its lack of recognition of the interactive nature of social groups and its normativity. Haslanger’s account lacks the inclusion of individual “choice” on one’s individual identity. I explore Jenkins’ inclusion problem and argue that her solution of multiple and equally weighted target concepts has some shortcomings as she fails to consider that these concepts might conflict when they are practically applied, and hence cannot be equally weighted. I distinguish between self- identification and self-declaration. I argue that the former has more relevance pertaining to actual group-membership rather than perceived membership. I argue that, especially in the case of race, it cannot be the sole criterion due to arbitrariness objections and the interactivity of social concepts. I further lay out why it cannot be one of many equally weighted criteria: The risk is self-identification will be outweighed by other criteria, which would result in it not figuring into group-membership after all. This risks entrenching historical injustices, and is similar in structure to my objection against Jenkins.
Hence, I put forward that self-identification might come into play when other criteria don’t give a clear indication. This is also where the race-gender analogy might fall apart as the restrictive criteria might differ. However, examining this stipulation is outside the scope of this project. This dissertation aims to contribute to a clearer understanding of race and gender concepts as they have practical policy implications.
2023-06-27T13:15:39Z
2023-06-27T13:15:39Z
2023-06-27T13:15:39Z
2022-11-30
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/27812
https://doi.org/10.17630/sta/515
en
82
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/27032019-04-01T09:23:20Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
Poincaré's philosophy of mathematics
Folina, Janet
Clark, Peter
The primary concern of this thesis is to investigate
the explicit philosophy of mathematics in the work of
Henri Poincare. In particular, I argue that there is
a well-founded doctrine which grounds both Poincare's
negative thesis, which is based on constructivist
sentiments, and his positive thesis, via which he retains
a classical conception of the mathematical continuum.
The doctrine which does so is one which is founded on
the Kantian theory of synthetic a priori intuition.
I begin, therefore, by outlining Kant's theory of the
synthetic a priori, especially as it applies to mathematics.
Then, in the main body of the thesis, I explain how the
various central aspects of Poincare's philosophy of
mathematics - e.g. his theory of induction; his theory
of the continuum; his views on impredicativiti his
theory of meaning - must, in general, be seen as an
adaptation of Kant's position. My conclusion is that
not only is there a well-founded philosophical core to
Poincare's philosophy, but also that such a core provides
a viable alternative in contemporary debates in
the philosophy of mathematics. That is, Poincare's
theory, which is secured by his doctrine of a priori
intuitions, and which describes a position in between
the two extremes of an "anti-realist" strict constructivism
and a "realist" axiomatic set theory, may indeed be
true.
2012-06-08T14:12:15Z
2012-06-08T14:12:15Z
2012-06-08T14:12:15Z
1986
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/2703
en
248
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/90322019-11-05T15:04:37Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
Full-bloodedness, modesty and minimalist truth
Billinge, Daniel
Johnston, Colin
University of Stirling
University of St Andrews. Discretionary Fund
May Wong Smith Trust
Michael Dummett
Donald Davidson
John McDowell
Meaning-theories
Minimalist truth
Full-bloodedness
Modesty
Philosophy of language
Reductionism
This thesis discusses the central ideas that surround Michael Dummett’s claim that there is an incompatibility between a truth-conditional conception of meaning and a minimalist conception of truth. These ideas are brought into relation to the work of John McDowell and Donald Davidson, as all three philosophers can be better understood by locating them within Dummett’s dialectic regarding the incompatibility. Dummett’s argument crucially depends upon the assumption that a meaning-theory should be full-blooded in nature, against McDowell’s insistence that a meaning-theory can only ever be modest. The main contention of this thesis is that neither Dummett nor McDowell is successful in establishing their strong contentions regarding the form that a meaning-theory should take. McDowell only wants to provide trivial answers to questions about the constitutive nature of the meanings and competency of particular items in a language. Dummett, on the other hand, wants to provide a reductive account of the central concepts that concern the philosophy of language. What this thesis will argue is that once both of these claims have been rejected, the position Dummett and McDowell jointly dictate is in fact the position that we should read Davidson as occupying, who lies in a conceptual space between the extremes of maximal full-bloodedness and modesty. This is an understanding of Davidson that is contrary to how McDowell reads him, who has been an influential commentator of Davidson. How Davidson should actually be interpreted is achieved by understanding how he has the resources to avoid Dummett’s claim of an incompatibility between a truth-conditional conception of meaning and a minimalist conception of truth.
2016-06-22T10:14:29Z
2016-06-22T10:14:29Z
2016-06-22T10:14:29Z
2016-06-23
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/9032
en
x, 168 p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
The University of Stirling
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/218262021-10-25T09:27:18Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
Necessity and modal systems: an essay on modal terms
Esterline, Albert Crawford
The purpose of this paper is to determine if our ordinary-language notions of modal terms furnish a basis for the development of modal logics, and if so, how and to what extent. I shall begin by distinguishing the "use" of a modal term and the "ground" for it. Briefly, the logical relations between statements are due to the uses of their terms, and the grounds for a statement are the reasons we would produce to justify its assertation. In Chapter One I shall distinguish five uses of modal terms, and in Chapter Two I shall enumerate a number of grounds for sentences containing modal terms. In the next two chapters I shall employ the results of Chapter One and Chapter Two in connection with the two most important problems facing modal logic: Iterated modalities and statements in which a quantifier binds a variable which is within the scope of a modal term.
2021-04-08T08:57:03Z
2021-04-08T08:57:03Z
2021-04-08T08:57:03Z
1971
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/21826
en
197 p
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/41962019-07-01T10:19:19Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
Space and its dis-contents : new directions for intrinsicality, substance and dimensionality
Walker-Dale, Heather
Hawley, Katherine (Katherine Jane)
Metaphysics
Dimension
Substance
Intrinsic properties
This dissertation examines key areas in ontology through the intersection of metaphysics and physics. I argue that modern physics gives us good cause to look for new metaphysical models in place of the classical conceptions of ‘object’ and ‘space’. Part I addresses the object in itself, wherein I argue that physics, along with various philosophical concerns, encourages us to re-evaluate the intrinsic/ extrinsic distinction in favour of new classifications. In particular, I use conclusions of relativity theory and the acquisition of mass via the Higgs field as indications of the inadequacy of intrinsicality, concluding that the distinction is more trouble than it is worth.
Part II examines the intersection of objects and space, wherein I criticise substantivalism and promote singular fundamental ontologies like relationalism and supersubstantivalism. I examine phenomena like spatial expansion and field theory as well as separability issues more generally to emphasise the lack of rationale for a substance dualism of ‘object material’ and ‘space material’. I also challenge the coherence of substantivalism’s ‘occupation relation’ and the ease of interpreting mathematical models into physical terms. I conclude that, again, the classical notion of ‘object’ and its substantival framework are misplaced and should be put aside in favour of developing monistic ontologies.
Part III looks at space in itself and the properties commonly attributed to it. I explore issues of separability using key experiments, and what makes spaces ‘physically real’, before an extended examination of dimensions and dimensionality, highlighting the confusion physicists express toward such a ubiquitous concept in modern physical theories. I also explore how we use dimensions and reasons for adopting realist or instrumentalist approaches toward them, arguing that much more work should be focused on this area. I conclude with ways in which physics motivates new metaphysical models and suggest improvements for future methodological partnerships.
2013-11-13T14:21:55Z
2013-11-13T14:21:55Z
2013-11-13T14:21:55Z
2013-11-30
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/4196
en
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/
Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported
207
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/32012019-04-01T09:23:20Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
The ideal role of women in Plato's and Aristotle's societies
Jawin, Alixandra
Broadie, Sarah
This dissertation analyzes Plato’s and Aristotle’s
conception of women’s proper role in the state. The first chapter
demonstrates that due to Plato’s belief that the soul is sexless it is
impossible to determine one’s role in society by one’s sex. Plato’s
claim in the Republic that women who are qualified by nature will
become guardians is therefore consistent with his larger view that
one’s role in society should only be based on one’s nature. Since the
only distinction between male and female Guardians is that women
give birth to children and are physically weaker than men, there is no
justification for barring women from the Guardian class. The second
chapter turns to the Symposium and Plato’s thoughts on intellectual as
well as physical pregnancy, and specifically that according to Plato the
process of giving birth does not affect a woman’s soul or capacity to
reason. In the third chapter I demonstrate that even outside the ideal
city of the Republic, Plato does not revise his position on women’s
capacities. The Laws is more concerned with practicality than the
Republic and Plato is therefore forced to make concessions which limit
women’s opportunity to govern, but such concessions are minor. This
chapter also emphasizes Plato’s belief that good laws make good
people and describes how this realization enables him to recognize
that the poor condition of the women in Classical Athens is due to
Athenian social institutions and not to women’s inferior nature. Finally,
the fourth chapter turns to Aristotle and seeks to prove that his
position on women’s role in the state is far more nuanced than
appreciated.
2012-10-19T13:17:15Z
2012-10-19T13:17:15Z
2012-10-19T13:17:15Z
2012-06-19
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/3201
en
150
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/156772019-01-18T12:45:50Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
Title redacted
Randall, Leonard Avery
Timmermann, Jens
2018-07-24T11:02:30Z
2018-07-24T11:02:30Z
2018-07-24T11:02:30Z
2016
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/15677
en
2021-10-13
Thesis restricted in accordance with University regulations. Print and electronic copy restricted until 13th October 2021
192 p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/129212019-04-01T09:23:21Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
Knowledge, lies and vagueness : a minimalist treatment
Greenough, Patrick
Wright, Crispin
Minimalism concerning truth is the view that that all there is to be said concerning truth is exhausted by a set of basic platitudes. In the first part of this thesis, I apply this methodology to the concept of knowledge. In so doing, I develop a model of inexact knowledge grounded in what I call minimal margin for error principles. From these basic principles, I derive the controversial result that epistemological internalism and internalism with respect to self-knowledge are untenable doctrines. In the second part of this thesis, I develop a minimal theory of vagueness in which a rigorous but neutral definition of vagueness is shown to be possible. Three dimensions of vagueness are distinguished and a proof is given showing how two of these dimensions are equivalent facets of the same phenomenon. From the axioms of this minimal theory one can also show that there must be higher-order vagueness, contrary to what some have argued. In the final part of this thesis, I return to issues concerning the credentials of truth-minimalism. Is truth-minimalism compatible with the possibility of truth-value gaps? Is it right to say that truth-minimalism is crippled by the liar paradox? With respect to the former question, I develop a novel three-valued logical system which is both proof-theoretically and truth-theoretic ally well-motivated and compatible with at least one form of minimalism. With respect to the second question, a new solution to the liar paradox is developed based on the claim that while the liar sentence is meaningful, it is improper to even suppose that this sentence has a truth-status. On that basis, one can block the paradox by restricting the Rule of Assumptions in Gentzen-style presentations of the sentential sequent calculus. The first lesson of the liar paradox is that not all assumptions are for free. The second lesson of the liar is that, contrary to what has been alleged by many, minimalism concerning truth is far better placed than its rival theories to solve the paradox.
2018-03-12T16:15:56Z
2018-03-12T16:15:56Z
2018-03-12T16:15:56Z
2002
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/12921
en
viii, 171 p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/155552019-04-01T09:23:21Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
Taking meaning out of context : essays on the foundations of natural language semantics
Cameron, Matthew Dunbar
Ball, Derek Nelson
Dever, Josh
Royal Institute of Philosophy
Rafferty Scholarship
David Lewis articulated minimal constraints on a formal theory of natural language
semantics that have been widely adopted by subsequent theorists: compositionality
and sentence truth in a given context. In the process, Lewis distinguished between the
compositional semantic value of an expression and its propositional content relative
to a context. This dissertation consists of a series of essays in which I address several
questions that arise from this distinction, including how we should understand semantic
values, how we should understand propositional content, and how we should understand
the relation between them.
Related to this, I explore and address a number of interesting and unresolved
methodological issues that arise in relation to context-sensitivity, and provide an
account of the role of speaker intentions in a formal theory of natural language
semantics. Additionally, I provide a detailed analysis of the role of context in a theory
of natural language semantics and its connection to various aspects of language use and
communication. I also motivate coherence with syntactic structure (in the tradition of
generative grammar) as an additional constraint on a formal theory of natural language
semantics and assess its import for how we theorize about tense and modality and
issues related to the syntax-semantics interface, including covert structure and logical
form.
In broad strokes, this dissertation addresses issues concerning the aims, scope and
criteria of a theory of natural language semantics. I approach these issues from the
perspective of generative grammar, a theoretical framework that aims to characterize
our understanding of natural language independent of its use. These essays help to
clarify what should be expected of a formal theory of natural language semantics and
its contribution to theories of speech acts and communication.
2018-07-18T16:48:48Z
2018-07-18T16:48:48Z
2018-07-18T16:48:48Z
2018
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/15555
en
xiii, 173 p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/133502019-04-01T09:23:22Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
The role of well-being in ethics
Rodogno, Raffaele
Skorupski, John
In this thesis I assess the role of well-being in ethics. In order to do so I reply to a threefold charge against the importance of well-being in ethics. In What We Owe to Each Other Scanlon argues (1) that the concept of well-being plays very little role in the thinking of an agent; (2) that no unified theory of well-being can be found; (3) that welfarism is false. In Part I, I argue that the concept of well-being does play an explanatorily and justificatorily important role in the thinking of a rational agent. I arrive at this conclusion by distinguishing levels of thinking activity as well as by considering the implicit rather than explicit role well-being plays in our deliberation. I conclude this part of the thesis by illustrating the relation between the idea of well-being, its parts and its sources. In Part II, I put forward a unified theory of well-being and I do so by taking on board with a slight modification Scanlon's own buck-passing account of value. I argue that something is a part of a person's good if, and only if, there is reason for this person to desire it. I claim that this account does not fall prey to the 'scope problem'. I also discuss a number of different though connected issues such as the defence of the claim that well-being is itself a normative notion and issues concerning the various parts of well-being. In Part III, I begin to sketch the normative role of well-being both first-personally and impartially. With Scanlon, I agree that welfarism is false. Yet, I argue in favour of a moderate form of welfarism, a view that takes a positive function of each individual's well-being to afford the ultimate criterion of practical reason.
2018-05-16T12:54:13Z
2018-05-16T12:54:13Z
2018-05-16T12:54:13Z
2003
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/13350
en
227 p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/273642023-04-08T02:01:06Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
Affective experience as a source of knowledge
Jost, Lara Apolline
Snedegar, Justin
AD Links Foundation
Fondation Znedek et Michaela Bakala
Emotion
Epistemology
Affective experience
Feminist philosophy
Medical ethics
Epistemic injustice
Knowledge
Microaggressions
Endometriosis
Testimony
In analytic philosophy, appropriate sources of knowledge do not include affective experience. In this thesis, I oppose this commonly accepted view and argue in favour of valuing the contribution of affective experience to knowledge. My argument unfolds in two parts. In the first part of the thesis, I propose a positive argument favouring the inclusion of affective experience in our sources of knowledge. My main contribution is the Reflective Model, a novel account of affective experience as a source which responds to the common objections towards the epistemic value of affective experience. This new model is built on the idea that affective experience is a reason- tracking ability, which incorporates a reflective element through internal and social calibration. I illustrate this phenomenon by discussing how members from marginalised groups identify microaggressions through their emotions. In the second part of the thesis, I offer a negative argument: given the negative ethical and practical consequences of excluding affective experience, we should include it in our sources of knowledge. I conceptualise a new form of epistemic injustice, source based epistemic injustice, which highlights unfairness towards knowers who utilise unapproved sources of knowledge like affective experience. In addition, I discuss two applied cases where testimony based on affective experience is unfairly downgraded: testimony about lesser-known illnesses and testimony about everyday racism. I argue that the first case leads to the epistemic exploitation of patients, whilst the second gives rise to dialectical white scepticism, a pernicious form of white scepticism which has not been previously theorised. Altogether, I argue that legitimising affective experience as a source of knowledge would enable us to incorporate a greater number of epistemic contributions in our epistemological system, thus reducing instances of injustice and silencing experienced by members of marginalised groups.
2023-04-07T12:38:29Z
2023-04-07T12:38:29Z
2023-04-07T12:38:29Z
2023-06-12
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/27364
https://doi.org/10.17630/sta/387
en
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International
181
The University of St Andrews
University of Stirling
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/25562019-07-01T10:10:45Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
On subsistence and human rights
Tomalty, Jesse
Ashford, Elizabeth
Global justice
Human rights
Global poverty
Subsistence
Rights
The central question I address is whether the inclusion of a right to subsistence among human rights can be justified. The human right to subsistence is conventionally interpreted as a fundamental right to a basic living standard characterized as having access to the material means for subsistence. It is widely thought to entail duties of protection against deprivation and duties of assistance in acquiring access to the material means for subsistence (Shue 1996, Nickel, 2004, Griffin 2008). The inclusion of a right to subsistence among human rights interpreted in this way has been met with considerable resistance, particularly on the part of those who argue that fundamental rights cannot entail positive duties (Cranston 1983, Narveson 2004, O’Neill 1996, 2000, 2005).
My purpose in this dissertation is to consider whether a plausible interpretation of the human right to subsistence can succeed in overcoming the most forceful and persistent objections to it. My main thesis is that a minimal interpretation of the human right to subsistence according to which it is a right not to be deprived of access to the means for subsistence provides the strongest interpretation of this right. Although the idea that the human right to subsistence correlates with negative duties is not new, discussion of these duties has been overshadowed in the literature by debate over the positive duties conventionally thought to be entailed by it. I show that the human right to subsistence interpreted as a right not to be deprived of access to the means for subsistence makes an important contribution to reasoning about the normative implications of global poverty.
2012-04-16T11:02:05Z
2012-04-16T11:02:05Z
2012-04-16T11:02:05Z
2012-06
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/2556
en
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/
Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported
180
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/86302019-04-01T09:23:22Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
Saying nothing : in defence of syntactic and semantic underdetermination
Bowker, Mark
Greenough, Patrick
Dever, Josh
Egan, Andy
Cappelen, Herman
Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC)
Underdetermination
Communication
Context
According to the Encoding Model, speakers communicate by encoding the propositions they want to communicate into sentences, in accordance with the conventions of a language L. By uttering a sentence that encodes p, the speaker says that p. Communication is successful only if the audience identifies the proposition that the speaker intends to communicate, which is achieved by decoding the uttered sentence in accordance with the conventions of L.
A consequence of the Encoding Model has been the proliferation of underdetermination arguments, each of which concludes against some linguistic theory T, on the grounds that, were T true, audiences would be unable to know what was said by utterances of some particular linguistic form, and therefore unable to know what speakers intended to communicate by these utterance. The result, if we accept the conclusion of these arguments, is radical restriction of the domain of viable linguistic theory.
This Thesis defends an alternative model according to which there need be nothing encoded in an uttered sentence – nothing that is said by its utterance – for the audience to retrieve. Rather, there are indefinitely many ways to interpret uttered sentences – indefinitely many routes to the propositions that speaker intend to communicate – which proceed through different interpretations of what is said.
2016-04-18T15:37:58Z
2016-04-18T15:37:58Z
2016-04-18T15:37:58Z
2016-06-23
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/8630
en
156 p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/192442021-04-19T16:31:30Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
Generics, modality, and morality
Thakral, Ravi
Ball, Derek Nelson
University of St Andrews. St Leonard's College
St Andrews and Stirling Graduate Programme in Philosophy (SASP)
Generics
Semantics
Metasemantics
Context-sensitivity
Modality in natural language
Defeasible reasoning
Moral principles
Moral reasoning
Moral particularism
Deontic modality
The issues in this dissertation reside at the intersections of, and relationships between,
topics concerning the meaning of generic generalizations, natural language modality,
the nature and role of moral principles, and the place of supererogation in the overall
structure of the normative domain. In ’Generics and Weak Necessity’, I argue
that generics—exception-granting generalizations such as ’Birds fly’ and ’Tigers are
striped’—involve a covert weak necessity modal at logical form. I argue that this improves
our understanding of the variability and diversity of generics. This chapter
also argues that we can account for variability concerning normative generics within
a modal approach to generics. In ’The Genericity of Moral Principles’, I provide evidence
for the view that moral principles are generic generalizations, and, on the basis
of this claim, argue that moral principles do not provide adequate support for reasoning
about the moral statuses of particular cases. In ’Supererogation and the Structure
of the Normative Domain’, I investigate the diversity of the central normative modal
notions and argue that we should distinguish between two senses of supererogation
based different ways deontic modals are sensitive to background information.
2020-01-07T16:23:32Z
2020-01-07T16:23:32Z
2020-01-07T16:23:32Z
2019-12-04
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/19244
https://doi.org/10.17630/10023-19244
en
xi, 184 p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/148162019-04-01T09:23:26Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
The ethological roots of morality
Butler, Emma Francis
2018-07-02T15:29:57Z
2018-07-02T15:29:57Z
2018-07-02T15:29:57Z
1978-07
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/14816
en
300 p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/2162019-04-01T09:23:26Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
Global distributive justice
Hanisch, Christoph
Mulgan, Tim
Global Justice
Moral Obligation
This dissertation is concerned with the moral-philosophical dimensions of global poverty and inequality. The first chapter argues in favour of justice-based – contrasted with beneficence-based – obligations asking the wealthy to actively do something about severe poverty abroad. The distinguishing property of justice-based obligations is that they derive their high level of moral stringency from the fact that they ask the obligation-bearer to rectify for past and/or present violations of negative obligations, such as the obligation not to harm anybody (regardless of geographical distance). Partly in following and partly in reinterpreting Thomas Pogge the first chapter concludes that the current economic and political order harms the global poor by making it difficult or impossible for them to satisfy their basic needs. To the extent that better-off states (citizens and their democratically accountable governments) uphold such an unjust global order and contribute to the poor’s enduring dire straits they have obligations of justice to secure the basic needs of the poor. This is why the approach introduced and defended in this essay is called “basic needs cosmopolitanism”.
The second chapter examines the idea of “basic needs” more detailed. Basic needs cosmopolitanism employs a specific notion of basic needs that is derived from Martha Nussbaum’s list of ten central human functional capabilities. These capabilities are of universal appeal, i.e. they are concerned with activities and states of being that are indispensable features of every human life. After discussing Nussbaum’s justification for the universal applicability of her list and after examining in more detail the list itself the argument distinguishes between basic needs for the material (financial, resource-related, etc.) and basic needs for the non-material (political, social, etc.) prerequisites for possessing these central capabilities. Both groups of basic needs have to be satisfied by a sufficient quality and quantity in order for a society to count as being able to meet its citizens basic needs and as being able to secure all its citizens’ central capabilities. The crucial idea is that if Nussbaum’s central capabilities are presented as having universal appeal, the related basic needs are of global applicability as well. The standard of material and non-material prerequisites is applied to a) the question of whether and to what extent the global order harms the poor and b) the question of what and how much material transfers from the wealthy to the poor are required on grounds of justice.
Since this dissertation’s topic is global distributive justice the primary focus of this argument lies on the material pre-requisites that have to be available in order to secure central capabilities for all. This does not imply that the non-material basic needs for living in a society ruled by just and stable political and social institutions are less important. A complete version of basic needs cosmopolitanism will have to dedicate equal consideration to obligations of justice related to the global order’s responsibility for poor countries’ lack of the non-material prerequisites. The notion of “potential functionings”, introduced in concluding this essay, is supposed to underline the importance of securing central capabilities for all members of poor societies and expresses again basic needs cosmopolitanism’s commitment to identifying universal minimal standards of social and economic global justice.
2007-03-06T14:20:03Z
2007-03-06T14:20:03Z
2007-03-06T14:20:03Z
2007-06-22
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/216
en
94
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/147202019-04-01T09:23:30Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
Joseph Glanvill and the seventeenth century reaction against enthusiasm
Waller, Marian Joan
Carnie, R. H.
Doig, R. P.
2018-06-28T14:55:24Z
2018-06-28T14:55:24Z
2018-06-28T14:55:24Z
1968-01
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/14720
en
328 p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/147532019-04-01T09:23:33Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
Second-order logic is logic
Friend, Michèle Indira
Clark, Peter
Read, Stephen
Shapiro, Stewart
"Second-order logic" is the name given to a formal system. Some claim that the formal system is a logical system. Others claim that it is a mathematical system. In the thesis, I examine these claims in the light of some philosophical criteria which first motivated Frege in his logicist project. The criteria are that a logic should be universal, it should reflect our intuitive notion of logical validity, and it should be analytic. The analysis is interesting in two respects. One is conceptual: it gives us a purchase on where and how to draw a distinction between logic and other sciences. The other interest is historical: showing that second-order logic is a logical system according to the philosophical criteria mentioned above goes some way towards vindicating Frege's logicist project in a contemporary context.
2018-06-29T13:14:00Z
2018-06-29T13:14:00Z
2018-06-29T13:14:00Z
1997-06
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/14753
en
Michèle Indira
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/218342021-10-25T13:22:55Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
Semantic theory and sentential understanding : a discussion of tacit knowledge and compositionality
Miller, Alexander, 1965-
This essay is an attempt to look critically at some issues arising from the idea that competent speakers of a natural language can tacitly know an extensionally correct theory of meaning for their language. In the first chapter I outline the idea that sentential understanding is to be construed as an ability, and argue that a speaker's tacitly knowing a theorem of a semantic theory should be construed as his possessing an intention to uphold the regularity prescribed by that theorem. I then go on to deal with objections that have been raised against the idea that speakers can have such tacit knowledge by Baker and Hacker, Appiah, and McDowell. In the second chapter I ask whether a similar story can be given concerning tacit knowledge of the axioms of a semantic theory, and come to the conclusion that it cannot: using modifications of arguments by Evans, Wright, and Stich, I show that speakers cannot be ascribed intentional states corresponding to semantic axioms. I then go back to argue that the ascription of such intentional states corresponding to theorems does not violate a plausible constraint on the ascription of such states. In the third chapter I look at the prospects for the use of the notion of tacit knowledge in the justification of the compositionality constraint. Beginning with Evans, I eventually come to the conclusion that tacit knowledge of a semantic theory is a sort of causal explanatory structure, to be found in the abilities which constitute language mastery : this finds expression in Davies' version of the mirror constraint. Inter alia , I sketch responses to difficulties that have been pointed out concerning this account by Wright, Davies, and Sainsbury, but conclude that there are still at least some difficulties looming which stem from the later Wittgenstein's attack on the objectivity of meaning.
2021-04-08T08:57:06Z
2021-04-08T08:57:06Z
2021-04-08T08:57:06Z
1989
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/21834
en
96p
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/55442019-07-01T10:09:42Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
The sensorimotor theory of perceptual experience
Silverman, David
Wheeler, Michael
Perception
Consciousness
Embodied cognition
Sensorimotor theory
Vision
Enactivism
The sensorimotor theory is an influential, non-mainstream account of perception and perceptual consciousness intended to improve in various ways on orthodox theories. It is often taken to be a variety of enactivism, and in common with enactivist cognitive science more generally, it de-emphasises the theoretical role played by internal representation and other purely neural processes, giving theoretical pride of place instead to interactive engagements between the brain, non-neural body and outside environment.
In addition to offering a distinctive account of the processing that underlies perceptual consciousness, the sensorimotor theory aims to offer a new and improved account the logical and phenomenological character of perceptual experience, and the relation between physical and phenomenal states. Since its inception in a 2001 paper by O’Regan and Noë, the theory has prompted a good deal of increasingly prominent theoretical and practical work in
cognitive science, as well as a large body of secondary literature in philosophy of cognitive science and philosophy of perception. In spite of its influential character, many of the theory’s most basic tenets are incompletely or ambiguously defined, and it has attracted a number of prominent objections.
This thesis aims to clarify the conceptual foundations of the sensorimotor theory, including the key theoretical concepts of sensorimotor contingency, sensorimotor mastery, and presence-as-access, and defends a particular understanding of the respective theoretical roles of internal representation and behavioural capacities. In so doing, the thesis aims to highlight the sensorimotor theory’s virtues and defend it from some leading criticisms, with particular attention to a response by Clark which claims that perception and perceptual experience plausibly depend on the activation of representations which are not intimately involved in bodily engagements between the agent and environment. A final part of the thesis offers a sensorimotor account of the experience of temporally extended events, and shows how with reference to this we can better understand object experience.
2014-10-15T14:22:32Z
2014-10-15T14:22:32Z
2014-10-15T14:22:32Z
2014-12-01
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/5544
en
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International
206
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
University of Stirling
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/9242019-07-01T10:09:48Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
Real impossible worlds : the bounds of possibility
Kiourti, Ira Georgia
Hawley, Katherine (Katherine Jane)
Priest, Graham
Read, Stephen
Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC)
University of St Andrews
Impossible worlds
Lewisian realism about possible worlds
Extending Lewisian realism into impossible worlds
Lewisian modal realism
Reductive theories of modality
David Lewis
Plenitude
Arbitrariness
Circularity
Recombination
Impossible worlds & the reduction of the modal
Ersatz impossibilia out of Lewis-worlds
Lewis-friendly ersatz worlds
Concrete impossible worlds
Actual truth versus truth simpliciter
Negation at concrete impossible worlds
Negation commutation
Concrete impossibilia & contradiction
Reasoning about Lewisian realism with impossibilia
Modality as world similarity
Relative Modality
Relative impossibilia
Logical similarity between worlds
"The logical laws of w"
Representing impossibilities about the plurality
Concrete impossibilism
Truth-at-w & literal truth
Lewisian Genuine Realism (GR) about possible worlds is often deemed unable to accommodate impossible worlds and reap the benefits that these bestow to rival theories. This thesis explores two alternative extensions of GR into the terrain of impossible worlds.
It is divided in six chapters. Chapter I outlines Lewis’ theory, the motivations for
impossible worlds, and the central problem that such worlds present for GR: How can GR
even understand the notion of an impossible world, given Lewis’ reductive theoretical
framework? Since the desideratum is to incorporate impossible worlds into GR without
compromising Lewis’ reductive analysis of modality, Chapter II defends that analysis
against (old and new) objections. The rest of the thesis is devoted to incorporating
impossible worlds into GR. Chapter III explores GR-friendly impossible worlds in the
form of set-theoretic constructions out of genuine possibilia. Then, Chapters IV-VI
venture into concrete impossible worlds. Chapter IV addresses Lewis’ objection against
such worlds, to the effect that contradictions true at impossible worlds amount to true contradictions tout court. I argue that even if so, the relevant contradictions are only ever about the non-actual, and that Lewis’ argument relies on a premise that cannot be nonquestion-
beggingly upheld in the face of genuine impossible worlds in any case. Chapter
V proposes that Lewis’ reductive analysis can be preserved, even in the face of genuine
impossibilia, if we differentiate the impossible from the possible by means of accessibility relations, understood non-modally in terms of similarity. Finally, Chapter VI counters objections to the effect that there are certain impossibilities, formulated in Lewis’ theoretical language, which genuine impossibilia should, but cannot, represent. I conclude that Genuine Realism is still very much in the running when the discussion turns to impossible worlds.
2010-06-21T14:31:17Z
2010-06-21T14:31:17Z
2010-06-21T14:31:17Z
2010-06-25
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/924
en
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/
Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported
213
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
Arché Philosophical Research Centre for Logic, Language, Metaphysics and Epistemology
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/26902019-04-01T09:23:34Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
Equality, priority, and aggregation
Hirose, Iwao
Broome, John
Skorupski, John
In this dissertation, I discuss two distributive principles in moral philosophy:
Derek Parfit's Prioritarianism and Egalitarianism. I attempt to defend
a version of Egalitarianism, which I call Weighted Egalitarianism. Although
Parfit claims that Egalitarianism is subject to what he calls the Levelling
Down Objection, I show (a) that my proposed Weighted Egalitarianism is
not subject to the Objection, and (b) that it gives priority to the worse
off people. The real difference between the two principles lies in how the
weight of each person's well-being is determined. Prioritarianism assumes
that there is a moral scale of the goodness of well-being, independently of
distributions of people's well-being. I raise two objections to this claim:
firstly, it is hard to believe that the choice of the level of well-being affects
our distributive judgement; secondly, it is hard to believe that there is such
a moral scale independently of distributions of people's well-being. On the
other hand, Weighted Egalitarianism claims that the weight is given by the
rank order position of the person in the ranking by well-being level. This
means that, in Weighted Egalitarianism, the goodness of a distribution is
an increasing, linear function of people's well-being. Weighted Egalitarianism
is not affected by the choice of the level of people's well-being. Nor
does it require require the moral scale of the goodness of well-being independently
of distributions of people's well-being. Leximin, which might be
a version of Prioritarianism, avoids my objections. But it is hard to support
Leximin, because it rules out the trade off between the better off and the
worse off. I conclude that Weighted Egalitarianism is more acceptable than
Prioritarianism.
2012-06-08T11:19:40Z
2012-06-08T11:19:40Z
2012-06-08T11:19:40Z
2004
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/2690
en
170
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/294462024-03-08T10:57:38Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
Moral inquiry : we're all in this together
Küspert, Nick
Snedegar, Justin
Brown, Jessica (Jessica Anne)
Philosophical Quarterly
Moral epistemology
Social epistemology
Moral testimony
Testimony
Moral experts
Moral understanding
Moral knowledge
Identity
Blame
Moral inquiry is often thought of as an individualistic enterprise. This is in large part because morality not only seems to require doing the right thing, but being in touch with moral reality in the right way: to act well, it is necessary to ground our actions on an insight into moral reasons—reasons we can only understand when we inquire for ourselves. In this dissertation, I defend a picture
of moral inquiry according to which such inquiry is fundamentally social: we are not alone when it comes to making moral decisions. In particular, I argue that the conception of moral inquiry as an individualistic enterprise wrongly delegitimises a central resource of moral inquiry, moral testimony. To this end, I first argue that moral agreement is of crucial justificatory value in moral inquiry. I then go on to address some worries connected to moral testimony, arguing that reliance on moral testimony is not intrinsically wrong and indeed oftentimes permissible if not required of us. I complement this with a discussion of moral
expertise, arguing that the search for moral experts has often been too focused on theoretical knowledge. However, practical experience is a much more reliable way of identifying those we can rely on with respect to a particular moral issue.
Lastly, I discuss one consequence this more social picture of moral inquiry has, namely that blame can not only be allocated to a wrongdoing agent, but also to those who guided the agent to that act. This concludes my contribution to
the defence of a more social picture of moral inquiry. Overall, however, my aim is not to do away with the importance of being rightly connected to moral reality—it is just that the best connection to moral reality available is often not
through ourselves, but through others.
2024-03-06T14:56:17Z
2024-03-06T14:56:17Z
2024-03-06T14:56:17Z
2024-06-10
Thesis
https://hdl.handle.net/10023/29446
https://doi.org/10.17630/sta/811
en
https://doi.org/10.1080/09672559.2023.2263708
Küspert, N. (2023). Conciliating to avoid moral scepticism. International Journal of Philosophical Studies, 31(3), 279-300. https://doi.org/10.1080/09672559.2023.2263708
143
The University of St Andrews
The St Andrews and Stirling Graduate programme in Philosophy (SASP)
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/132172020-03-03T12:23:40Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
Aesthetic antirealism
Cooke, Brandon L.
Gaut, Berys Nigel
Broadie, Sarah
A puzzle is generated by two intuitions about artworks: 1. There is no prima facie reason to take artworks to be mind-independent objects; 2. Aesthetic judgments are objective. These intuitions seem to be in tension, for if artworks or their aesthetic properties are mind-dependent, how can aesthetic judgments be objective? The common solution to the puzzle lies in rejecting or revising one of the two intuitions. Typically, realists reject 1, and many antirealists reject 2. I develop an antirealist aesthetic theory that accommodates both intuitions, focusing on critical disagreement between epistemically optimal judges, realist difficulties with supervenience and response-dependence, the role of imagination in the experience of artworks, and the metaphorical quality of aesthetic discourse. The hallmark of realism, namely the mind-independence of aesthetic qualities, is an untenable commitment that yields an impoverished view of artworks. A cognitivist anti-realism is available which preserves the objectivity of aesthetic discourse and yields a richer conception of artworks and our interaction with them.
2018-04-25T13:26:53Z
2018-04-25T13:26:53Z
2018-04-25T13:26:53Z
2003-06
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/13217
en
viii, 194 p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/275672023-05-12T21:22:31Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
Time, self-consciousness, and categorial unity
Satija, Atul
Haddock, Adrian
Driver, Julia
Kant
Self-consciousness
Time
Wittgenstein
Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus
These essays are an attempt to elucidate the notion of a category, which, broadly speaking, is a concept that accounts for the manner in which the constituents of experience are combined or held together. The relation of such concepts to the unity of self-consciousness and the unity of time is explicated in order to consider the possibility of synthetic a priori knowledge.
2023-05-11T10:08:54Z
2023-05-11T10:08:54Z
2023-05-11T10:08:54Z
2023-06-12
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/27567
https://doi.org/10.17630/sta/438
en
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International
62
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/58922019-04-01T09:23:35Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
On rights and demands : how theorists of rights can benefit from taking demands seriously
Ho, Kin Ting
Cruft, Rowan
Theory of rights
Theory of human rights
Moral philosophy
Political philosophy
Demand theory of rights
This thesis explores the normative significance of making a rights-backed, authorized demand as a right holder. Rights, I argue, enable their holders to make a special kind of demand which comes with a special force. It is, in other words, one of rights’ functions that they are demands-enabling. I single out what sort of demands I am interested in exploring. I also look at how these special demands are normatively significant. I call them rights-backed, authorized demands. They are normatively significant, first, because of the interesting role they play in other agents’ practical-reasoning, and , second, because the very making of these demands, as a matter of rights, is empowering in an abstract way. I go on to contrast my view with other ‘demand theories’ in existence and conclude that my view is substantively different. In particular, existing demand theories of rights all fail to sufficiently highlight the importance of actual demands, and instead focus on the ‘status’ of ‘being in a position’ to make demands. I argue that this focus is a fundamental mistake. I also consider how my view can contribute to some related literature on rights. First, I argue that my view highlights a new function which rights have: it has interesting implications on the shape of the long-standing debate between the will and interest theory of rights. Second, I argue that my view provides us with a new way to counter one of the most discussed criticisms of the existence of welfare human rights, which is the argument that rights must correlate with some specific duties as a necessary existence condition, and that human welfare rights fail on this mark. I conclude that if human rights indeed have a demand-related function as I argue, it weakens the intuitive appeal of this criticism.
2014-12-08T15:15:31Z
2014-12-08T15:15:31Z
2014-12-08T15:15:31Z
2014-12-01
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/5892
en
255
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
University of Stirling
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/291332024-02-03T03:01:19Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
Reality Engineering and social kinds
Calosi, Duccio
Cotnoir, A. J.
Greenough, Patrick
Ball, Derek Nelson
Conceptual Engineering is a new and interesting trend in Philosophy. However, it is not free from problems. The most relevant issue is that, at least following a Cappelen-like account, we are forced to commit to the controversial metaphysical view that the world has a linguistic structure. Under such view, a modification in the semantics of a term implies a modification in nature of the thing which is referred by that word. I propose to explore the implications of the reversal of such principle, thereby committing to the idea that a modification in the nature of things implies a modification of the semantics of the terms that refer to them, and not the other way around. Following this new principle, I am interested in developing an alternative account to Conceptual Engineering, which I call (following Greenough) Reality Engineering.
In this dissertation, I will focus on the analysis of two major points about Reality Engineering, trying to define what it is about and how to perform it. I will argue that Reality Engineering has kinds as its scope and I will restrict the focus of the present enquiry to social kinds only. I will proceed by providing a taxonomy of the most popular views about the metaphysics of social kinds, since in order to modify something properly, first we have to be clear on what that something is. Out of this taxonomy, I will generate two general theories on social kinds. The first one is what we can call a Top-down view, and it says that a social kind is generated via the acceptance of constitutive rules by some group of authorities and the successful application of those rules in ordinary practice. The second one is what we can call a Bottom-up view, according to which social kinds are nothing but the reification of social external norms, where social external norms are to be intended as the set of attitudes/behaviours/treatments/practices that people who are not members of the kind have towards the members of such kind (trivially, if the kind in question, like money, does not include people as its members, then everyone is external to such kind). After presenting these two views, I will explore the possibility of engineering kinds within them, focusing on some case studies and examples. I will highlight various ways in which social kinds can be defective and propose solutions for all kinds of defectiveness.
In conclusion, I will briefly discuss how typical worries concerning Conceptual Engineering projects translate to my framework, focusing on the problems of Feasibility and Control.
2024-02-01T16:43:22Z
2024-02-01T16:43:22Z
2024-02-01T16:43:22Z
2022-06-13
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/29133
https://doi.org/10.17630/sta/724
en
147
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/167432019-04-01T09:23:36Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
Refugee law and states' obligations
Walker, Jessica
Hope, Simon
Cruft, Rowan
Refugee
Hardship
Law and morality
Refugee law
Legal definition vs moral definition
Morally arbitrary distinctions
States' obligations
Perfect and imperfect duties
Asylum seekers vs refugees seeking resettlement
Category, location, level
The current legal definition of the term ‘refugee’ fails to recognise the centrality of refugees’ hardship and in doing so draws morally arbitrary distinctions between different types of refugees. I use Wiggins’ 1987 paper to give us reason to think that hardship ought to be central to morality. From here I make hardship the core of a modified legal definition of the term ‘refugee’. Then I explore moral obligations that states have to refugees in virtue of their hardship. First, I ask whom states are obligated to and show that the only morally relevant distinguishing feature between refugees is the ‘level’ of hardship they experience. Second, I ask what kinds of moral and legal obligations states have to refugees. I argue that states’ moral obligations to ‘give refuge’ are perfect duties and that states’ legal obligations differ for different types of refugees.
2018-12-20T15:26:09Z
2018-12-20T15:26:09Z
2018-12-20T15:26:09Z
2016-06-23
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/16743
en
UNHCR. 1951. “Text of the 1951 Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees”, CSR, United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) The UN Refugee Agency, Date Accessed: 24. 03.15 http://www.unhcr.org/3b66c2aa10.html
UNHCR. 1967. “Text of the 1967 Protocol Relating to the Status of Refugees”, United nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) The UN Refugee Agency, Date Accessed: 24. 03.15 http://www.unhcr.org/3b66c2aa10.html
Wiggins, David. 1987. Needs, Values, Truth, Clarendon Press, Oxford, pp1-33
Singer, Peter. 1972. “Famine and Affluence”, Philosophy and Public Affairs, Vol.1, No.3, pp 229-243
Anderson, E. 1999. “What is the Point of Equality”, Ethics, Vol. 109, No. 2, January, pp 287-337.
119 p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
University of Stirling
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/147542019-04-01T09:23:40Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
Belief and action
Pehrson, Claud W. P.
Squires, Roger
The role of "believes" is identified by finding a unique and unparaphraseable use of the term that is integral to the structure of important forms of language. This role can only be roughly indicated here. Roughly, "believes" identifies someone's reasons for doing or thinking something or what he counts as success in certain activities, without committing the speaker to accepting them; and so it allows the possibility of mistake. Standard objections to dispositional accounts are reviewed and found unconvincing. The central difficulty is found to be that dispositional accounts give no satisfactory explanation of the fact what it is (part of) an explanation of action to cite the agent's beliefs. It is argued that causal accounts have the same deficiency, that the role or point of "believes" in language is not satisfactorily explained. It is concluded that neglect of this central question vitlates even the real strengths of these accounts. The relation between different questions about belief is explored, and analogous questions about other cases, especially artefacts, are considered. Explanations of actions are discussed to bring out the role of "believes." This appears in explaining the relation between the "point or purpose" of an action and the actions of which it consists at a lower level of description. "Believes" identifies what governs this relation while allowing the possibility of mistake. Ryle's claims about thinking are considered, and an interpretation of the notion of an adverbial verb is suggested. The central difficulty concerns the cases of the thinking of le Penseur or of Eucild. Although it seems important that we should be able to say what the constituents of thinking are here, we cannot do so, since the relevant vocabulary is not adapted to giving the constituents of anything. These activities have their own "objects" as well as their own criteria of success. Activities, "objects", and criteria of success are bound up together, and do not connect in any simple way with the vocabulary that we try to connect them with in asking what their constituents are. This far from unique. Music provides another relevant example. The last chapters examine various contexts in which "believes" is important. Topics considered are reasons, evaluations, assertions, belief and the will, internationality, and speech-act accounts. In each case particular doctrines are critically examined.
2018-06-29T13:41:38Z
2018-06-29T13:41:38Z
2018-06-29T13:41:38Z
1976
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/14754
en
275 p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/130832019-04-01T09:23:41Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
Proper names and possible worlds
Girle, Roderic Allen
Hunter, Geoffrey
In this essay a theory of proper names is developed and
applied to the construction of quantified modal logics and to a
discussion of problems concerning identity across possible worlds.
The theory is then used to aid discussion of essentialism, empty
singular terms, quantification into epistemic contexts, and Frege’ s
problem with identity .
In the first chapter, after a preliminary discussion of
Russell’s and Frege’s theories of names, a theory is developed. It
is argued that in the giving of a name a relation is established
between the name and what is named. That relation is the sense of
the name. It is also argued that names can be given to imaginary,
fictional, and other such non-existent things.
The second chapter is devoted to a discussion of Quine’s
programme for eliminating singular terms. It is there argued that
the programme cannot be justified.
The third chapter centres around the construction of
logical systems to deal with identity across possible worlds. It is
assumed that once a name is given and its sense thereby established
the name is a rigid designator. Quantificational systems are constructed
without modal operators yet in terms of which cross world identity
can be discussed. Modal operators are then introduced to facilitate
a discussion of essentialism and identity. At each point the formal
systems are constructed in accordance with clearly stated assumptions
about constant singular terms, the domains of quantification, and the
interpretation of modal operators
2018-04-06T09:18:36Z
2018-04-06T09:18:36Z
2018-04-06T09:18:36Z
1975
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/13083
en
v, 228 p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/33602019-04-01T09:23:41Zcom_10023_274com_10023_39com_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_275col_10023_119
On the contrary: disagreement, context, and relative truth
Huvenes, Torfinn Thomesen
Cappelen, Herman
Schaffer, Jonathan
2013-02-18T14:47:39Z
2013-02-18T14:47:39Z
2013-02-18T14:47:39Z
2012-11-30
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/3360
en
186
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
Universitet i Oslo. Filosofisk Institutt
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/178182021-03-03T16:51:36Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
An investigation into Moritz Schlick's foundationalist epistemology
Healey, Daniel James
Sullivan, Peter M.
Johnston, Colin
Schlick
Carnap
Neurath
Wittgenstein
Epistemology
Verificationism
Vienna Circle
Logical positivism
Logical empiricism
Epistemic foundationalism
Foundationalist epistemology
Affirmations
Konstatierungen
Protocol sentences
Moritz Schlick is an influential figure in the history of philosophy, but his place in the narrative is often confined to having been the man who brought great thinkers together, rather than having been a great thinker himself. In this thesis I argue that Schlick’s ideas deserve greater philosophical recognition, and to this end I focus on his work on the foundations of scientific enquiry. I trace Schlick’s thought from Allgemeine Erkenntnislehre through the prism of Wittgenstein’s Tractatus Logico Philosophicus and into his later work on the form and content of statements. I then look at the Vienna Circle’s so-called “protocol sentences debate” and explain why Schlick felt the need to introduce his controversial account of Konstatierungen, his objective being to find epistemically-guaranteed foundations for our scientific beliefs. The problem with Schlick’s account appears to be that any statement that is epistemically secure cannot be connected appropriately to our network of scientific beliefs, which itself is never immune to revision. I argue that Schlick may have been attempting to bridge this gap with the middle-Wittgensteinian notion of the criteria for the acceptance of a statement as separate from its truth conditions, but I argue that this approach leaves the link between Konstatierungen and science underexplained. Finally, I consider some of the advances made in philosophy since Schlick’s death – Donald Davidson’s arguments against the need for individually-infallible judgements to form the foundations of knowledge, and David Chalmers’ scrutability framework which helps us explicate the connection needed between foundational statements and the system of science. I conclude that there is a viable position within the scrutability framework – “weak phenomenal structuralism” – that allows us to retain Schlick’s emphasis on the role of experience in science and implies that science, as a whole, is well-founded, but individually-guaranteed Konstatierungen must stand wholly outside this system.
2019-06-05T11:54:21Z
2019-06-05T11:54:21Z
2019-06-05T11:54:21Z
2019-06-24
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/17818
https://doi.org/10.17630/10023-17818
en
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International
xxvi, 217 p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
The University of Stirling
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/274402023-04-22T02:01:24Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
Working for each other : an account of the need for work in society
Thomas, Deryn Mair
Douglas, Alexander
Work
Labour
Leisure
Basic needs
Social contribution
Reciprocity
This dissertation evaluates a need for work. In doing so, it addresses a neglected topic – by systematically exploring the concept of work and its relation to basic needs – and situates that contribution in the context of existing philosophical literature on work and adjacent research in the humanities and social sciences. Second, it offers up new conceptual tools – by arguing for the usefulness of a needs-centred perspective on work – which can aide in our deliberations about how to construct a more human(e) future of work. The project defends an account of a need for work which is grounded in the basic, non-contingent needs we hold, not as individuals, but as a society. It begins by defining work and need, and clarifying the meaning of the question, “Do we need work?” in light of these definitions. It then draws a distinction between the different levels of social life at which we can be understood to hold needs: as individuals, as a community, and as a society. I argue that it is possible, at each of these levels, to ask and answer a different question about work’s relationship to our basic, non-contingent needs. Subsequently, I find that work is important, but not necessary for our ability to meet such needs as individuals and members of a community, since we can do so through non-work activities. It is, however, necessary at the level of society. As a society, we have a need for a shared system of reciprocity to govern how we recognise and communicate about contribution. Work allows us to meet this need by functioning as a signalling mechanism for value. In fulfilling this function, it cannot be straightforwardly replaced by non-work activities, since activities like leisure are not connected to contribution in the same way.
2023-04-20T10:31:09Z
2023-04-20T10:31:09Z
2023-04-20T10:31:09Z
2023-06-12
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/27440
https://doi.org/10.17630/sta/412
en
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International
195
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/293092024-02-23T03:01:51Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
John Stuart Mill as existentialist : does Mill see the role of government as propagating a Sartrean, existentially authentic moral character?
Rountree, George Hugh
Ashford, Elizabeth
Etinson, Adam
Mill
Sartre
Politics
Authenticity
Existentialism
Freedom
Government
Rationality
Moral
Ethics
The purpose of this thesis is to explore whether or not the goal of John Stuart Mill’s political philosophy could be described as existentialist. To do this, I will demonstrate that Mill’s philosophy was centred around the cultivation of an ideal individual moral character in the populace, and then I shall show that this moral character is a form of existential authenticity. It will first draw upon the interpretation by Jones of Mill’s philosophy that states that his political project was centred around an ideal of the individual’s life consisting in Victorian moral norms and the perfection of individual rationality. I will devote the first half of this essay to presenting, developing and defending Jones’ interpretation according to this moral character thesis. The second half of the paper will then examine whether or not this moral character could be described as an existentially authentic one. I will use Sartre’s account of authenticity as a framework against which to compare Mill’s moral character. I will then show that this account of authenticity is near identical to Mill’s moral character, despite the two authors working from different ontological frameworks of human action. I will demonstrate this not only by pointing out how the characteristics of each author’s ideal characters are the same, but also by noting that they respond to the same societal problems of alienation and custom and resolving them through the cultivation of free-thinking individuals who respect the freedom of others. Finally, I shall conclude that while Mill does have as the basis for his political project a distinctly existentialist notion of authentic existence, one could not describe him as an existentialist philosopher in the same manner as writers such as Sartre due to the presence in Mill’s philosophy of an abstract, objective normative ethics that existentialism inherently rejects.
2024-02-21T12:27:50Z
2024-02-21T12:27:50Z
2024-02-21T12:27:50Z
2022-06-13
Thesis
https://hdl.handle.net/10023/29309
https://doi.org/10.17630/sta/786
en
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International
117
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/147782019-04-01T09:23:45Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
The structures and significance of mimesis in Adorno's "Aesthetic Theory"
Hooker, Richard
Crowther, Paul
British Academy
This thesis starts from the point of departure of asking why Aesthetic Theory is difficult to read. In answering this question it is argued that the difficulty of the work is a function of the unusual claims Adorno makes about the relation between art and philosophy, and that the presentation of these arguments exemplifies these claims. This complimentary relation between form and content has implications for the way Adorno can be understood as engaging the idea of mimesis. Aesthetic Theory should be understood as a theory of mimesis in modern art and as a mimetic work itself. Given this idea, the question of the readability of the work emerges as inseparable from the explicit claims Adorno makes for mimesis. If the work ultimately cannot be understood because Adorno does not define his concepts, or it is unexplainable for any other reason, then mimesis will be shown to be untenable. The issue of the readability of Aesthetic Theory is explored in the Introduction through a discussion of issues arising from the recent history of Adorno's reception. Particular attention is paid to the differences between critics who have emphasised the significance of the particular claims Adorno makes against those who emphasise his method. Chapter I rejects this distinction while it argues that the character of Adorno's writing is uneven, that is to say, Aesthetic Theory cannot usefully be read in a uniform way.
Chapter I considers different aspects of this lack of uniformity and argues that the identity of Aesthetic Theory as 'philosophy' is often tenuous as it moves in and out of other modes of argument. Chapters 2 and 3 look at different aspects of the identity of Aesthetic Theory as philosophy. Chapter 2 explains the strategic significance of the work as a continuation of a tradition of philosophy from Hegel onwards. This tradition, it is argued, has explicitly understood the problem of philosophy as recognising itself as experience while it attempts to describe experience. Chapter 3 extends this theme into a consideration of philosophical form. If philosophy is understood as a mode of experience then its form as well as its content is significant. Through a consideration of Heidegger and Derrida, Chapter 3 examines the uniqueness of the philosophical form of Aesthetic Theory. Having made this distinction. Chapter 4 reads Aesthetic Theory as philosophical form, describing aspects of it as mimetic. Chapters 5 and 6 then give detailed readings of parts of Aesthetic Theory which are particularly relevant for an understanding of Adorno's theory of the mimetic potential of modern art. The concluding chapter argues that the internal consistency of Aesthetic Theory in its practice and definition of the crisis of mimesis in modernism has significant implications for the practice of art history and criticism of twentieth-century art.
2018-07-02T09:40:50Z
2018-07-02T09:40:50Z
2018-07-02T09:40:50Z
1997-07
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/14778
en
viii, 331 p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/91202023-04-18T10:11:13Zcom_10023_30com_10023_117com_10023_879com_10023_878col_10023_861col_10023_118col_10023_880
Reply to Blackson
Weatherson, Brian James
University of St Andrews. School of Philosophical, Anthropological and Film Studies
University of St Andrews. Philosophy
B Philosophy (General)
Thomas Blackson argues that interest-relative epistemologies cannot explain the irrationality of certain choices when the agent has three possible options. I argue that his examples only refute a subclass of interest-relative theories. In particular, they are good objections to theories that say that what an agent knows depends on the stakes involved in the gambles that she faces. But they are not good objections to theories that say that what an agent knows depends on the odds involved in the gambles that she faces. Indeed, the latter class of theories does a better job than interest-invariant epistemologies of explaining the phenomena he describes.
2016-07-12T15:30:03Z
2016-07-12T15:30:03Z
2016-07-12T15:30:03Z
2016
Journal article
Weatherson , B J 2016 , ' Reply to Blackson ' , Journal of Philosophical Research , vol. 41 , pp. 73-75 . https://doi.org/10.5840/jpr201663072
2153-7984
PURE: 244241593
PURE UUID: 01713948-2af8-4a88-8f72-ae5d219c605a
Scopus: 85049138247
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/9120
https://doi.org/10.5840/jpr201663072
eng
Journal of Philosophical Research
Copyright 2016 Philosophy Documentation Center. This work is made available online in accordance with the publisher’s policies. This is the author created, accepted version manuscript following peer review and may differ slightly from the final published version. The final published version of this work is available at https://dx.doi.org/10.5840/jpr201663072
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/126012019-04-01T09:23:45Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
Essays on the nature and roles of knowledge
Hughes, Nicholas
McGrath, Matthew
Gjelsvik, Olav
Cappelen, Herman
Brown, Jessica (Jessica Anne)
This dissertation is comprised of five independent essays on the theme of the nature and roles
of knowledge. The essays are intended to be free-standing pieces of work and should be read
as such. Contents: 1. An Existential Argument For Pragmatic Encroachment --
2. Environmental Luck Gettier Cases And The Metaphysical Roles Of Knowledge --
3. Might The Simulation Heuristic Influence Knowledge Attributions? --
4. Excuses And Epistemic Norms --
5. From Moore's Paradox To The Knowledge Norm Of Belief And Beyond
2018-01-24T17:09:40Z
2018-01-24T17:09:40Z
2018-01-24T17:09:40Z
2015-06-25
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/12601
en
168 p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
Universitetet i Oslo. Institutt for filosofi, ide- og kunsthistorie og klassiske språk
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/219842022-03-08T16:28:13Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
Spatial thought and active experience
Lindsay, Christopher J.
In the following thesis I attempt to argue that some form of activity is necessary if a subject is to be able to partake in spatial thought and undergo conceptual, spatial experience. I approach this issue by considering a thought experiment of Galen Strawson, concerning the passive creatures that he calls the 'Weather Watchers', and by attempting to demonstrate that such passive creatures could not meet certain requirements necessary for conceptual spatial awareness. I argue against the idea that such passive beings could possess spatial concepts by employing certain transcendental arguments that connect the possession of particular concepts to the having of certain sorts of experience. More specifically, I claim that in order to view oneself as located in space and to make sense of the causal relations holding between oneself and other spatial items, one must possess the concept of a material object. I argue that the possession of this concept is only available to those subjects able to actively interact in certain ways with other objects. Next, I argue that the ability to grasp the distinction between veridical and non-veridical experience is essential if one is to grasp that one's perceptual experience represents something other than one's own states, and that a passive subject will have no means by which it might achieve such a grasp. Parallels are drawn between this approach and that of P. F. Strawson and Gareth Evans. Finally, I attempt to demonstrate that the spatial content of sensation alone is inadequate for full conceptual, spatial awareness. This section draws upon Brian O'Shaughnessy's work on the body image.
2021-04-08T08:59:47Z
2021-04-08T08:59:47Z
2021-04-08T08:59:47Z
2000
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/21984
en
268p
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/291522024-02-06T03:01:25Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
A defence of the truth norm of belief
Wei, Xintong
Ebert, Philip A.
Wright, Crispin
John Templeton Foundation
Aristotelian Society (Great Britain)
Royal Institute of Philosophy
For belief, the standard of correctness is truth. Truth is said to be the norm of belief. This thesis aims to address some recent challenges relating to various aspects of the truth norm of belief on a reason-based normative framework. On a reason-based normative framework, normativity is a matter of (normative) reasons. Reasons are facts that count in favour of a response, grounded in value-based, desire-based, constitutive, or practice-based facts. Reasons are the sort of things that we can respond to and they have weights in making a claim on us when we stand in a relation to them. Three anti-normativist challenges arise in recent discussion. First, the grounding challenge concerns whether the reason to believe truly (correctly) and to refrain from believing falsely (incorrectly) can be properly grounded. Second, the guidance challenge concerns whether the reason to believe truly and to refrain from believing falsely is something we can respond to in our belief-formation. Third, the weighting challenge concerns whether the reason to believe truly and to refrain from believing falsely has any weight in making a claim on us regarding what we ought to/may believe. In this thesis, I offer novel responses to all three challenges. I develop and defend a practice-based, variantist account of the truth norm, according to which, the truth norm of belief is grounded in a justified social practice, guides our belief-formation on a reason- responsive model of epistemic guidance, and makes varying claims on us regarding what we
ought to/may believe depending on the circumstances.
2024-02-05T10:47:45Z
2024-02-05T10:47:45Z
2024-02-05T10:47:45Z
2022-06-13
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/29152
https://doi.org/10.17630/sta/730
58450
en
https://doi.org/10.5840/logos-episteme201910438
Wei, X. (2019). The Permissible Norm of Truth and “Ought Implies Can”. Logos & Episteme, 10(4), 433-440. https://doi.org/10.5840/logos-episteme201910438
191
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/133022023-04-25T23:53:03Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30com_10023_879com_10023_878col_10023_118col_10023_880
Corporate agency and possible futures
Mulgan, Tim
University of St Andrews. Philosophy
University of St Andrews. St Andrews Centre for Exoplanet Science
Collective agency
Corporate agency
Corporate responsibility
Future people
Climate change
Broken world
Virtual reality
Artificial intelligence
B Philosophy (General)
HD Industries. Land use. Labor
T Technology (General)
T-NDAS
SDG 13 - Climate Action
SDG 15 - Life on Land
We need an account of corporate agency that is temporally robust – one that will help future people to cope with challenges posed by corporate groups in a range of credible futures. In particular, we need to bequeath moral resources that enable future people to avoid futures dominated by corporate groups that have no regard for human beings. This paper asks how future philosophers living in broken or digital futures might re-imagine contemporary debates about corporate agency. It argues that the only temporally robust account is moralised extreme collectivism, where full moral personhood is accorded (only) to those corporate groups that are reliably disposed to respond appropriately to moral reasons.
2018-05-04T15:30:10Z
2018-05-04T15:30:10Z
2018-05-04T15:30:10Z
2018-05-03
Journal article
Mulgan , T 2018 , ' Corporate agency and possible futures ' , Journal of Business Ethics , vol. First Online . https://doi.org/10.1007/s10551-018-3887-1
0167-4544
PURE: 252933797
PURE UUID: 8aa20d25-7b50-454d-8812-0a9af879367a
Scopus: 85046495277
WOS: 000458212600002
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/13302
https://doi.org/10.1007/s10551-018-3887-1
eng
Journal of Business Ethics
© The Author(s) 2018. Open Access. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made.
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/13482019-07-01T10:17:51Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
Aristotle on ethical ascription : a philosophical exercise in the interpretation of the role and significance of the hekousios/akousios distinction in Aristotle's Ethics
Echeñique, Javier
Broadie, Sarah
Beca Presidente de la República
Moral responsibility
Voluntary
Aristotle
In his ethical treatises Aristotle offers a rich account of those conditions that render people’s behaviour involuntary, and defines voluntariness on the basis of the absence of these conditions. This dissertation has two aims. One is to offer an account of the significance of the notions of involuntariness and voluntariness for Aristotle’s ethical project that satisfactorily explains why he deems it necessary to discuss these notions in his Ethics. My own account of the significance of these notions for Aristotle’s Ethics emerges from my arguments against the two most influential views concerning this significance: I argue that Aristotle’s concern with voluntariness in his Ethics is not (primarily) shaped by a concern with accountability, i.e. with those conditions under which fully mature and healthy rational agents are held accountable or answerable for their actions; nor is it (primarily) shaped by a concern with the conditioning of pain-responsive agents for the sake of socially useful ends that are not, intrinsically, their own. Rather, his concern is with reason-responsive agents (which are not morally accountable agents, nor merely pain-responsive agents) and the conditions for attributing ethically significant behaviour to them. This is what I call ‘ethical ascription’. The second aim of this dissertation is to provide a comprehensive account of those conditions that defeat the ascription of ethically significant pieces of behaviour to reason-responsive agents, and to show the distinctiveness of Aristotle’s views on the nature of these conditions. The conclusions I arrive at in this respect are shaped by the notion of ethical ascription that I develop as a way of reaching the first aim.
2010-11-17T14:30:48Z
2010-11-17T14:30:48Z
2010-11-17T14:30:48Z
2010-09-22
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/1348
en
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/
Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported
220
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/129192019-04-01T09:23:46Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
A vindication of logical necessity against scepticism
Philie, Patrice
Wright, Crispin
Some philosophers dispute the claim that there is a notion of logical necessity involved in the concept of logical consequence. They are sceptical about logical necessity. They argue that a proper characterisation of logical consequence - of what follows from what - need not and should not appeal to the notion of necessity at all. Quine is the most prominent philosopher holding such a view. In this doctoral dissertation, I argue that scepticism about logical necessity is not successful. Quine's scepticism takes three forms. Firstly, he is often interpreted as undermining, in his classic paper 'Two Dogmas of Empiricism', the very intelligibility of notions such as meaning, necessity, and analyticity. If the notion of necessity is meaningless, it is clear that ascriptions of logical necessity are also meaningless. In the thesis, I defend Quine's criticism of these notions by situating it in its historical context and emphasising that the real target in those writings is not the intelligibility of these notions as such, but only their Platonistic interpretation. I agree with Quine that a good theory about meaning, necessity, or analyticity must avoid such an ontological commitment. Secondly, Quine advocates, in the same paper, a holistic picture of knowledge and claims that in this picture, ascriptions of logical necessity are superfluous. I then show that holism a la Quine is committed to admit the necessity of statements of logical consequence. Thirdly, there is Quine's substitutional account of logical consequence (as exposed in his (1970)). He contends that this theory makes no use of logical necessity, thus showing its superfluousness. I show that any plausible account of logical consequence needs to appeal to logical necessity, thus undercutting Quine's claim - and, more generally, undercutting scepticism about logical necessity.
2018-03-12T15:32:01Z
2018-03-12T15:32:01Z
2018-03-12T15:32:01Z
2002
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/12919
en
223 p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/109492019-04-01T09:23:47Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
The source of modal truth
Cameron, Ross P.
This thesis concerns the source of modal truth. I aim to answer the question: what is
it in virtue of which there are truths concerning what must have been the case as a
matter of necessity, or could have been the case but isn't.
I begin by looking at a dilemma put forward by Simon Blackburn which attempts to
show that any realist answer to this question must fail, and I conclude that either horn
of his dilemma can be resisted. I then move on to clarify the nature of the
propositions whose truth I am aiming to find the source of.
I distinguish necessity de re from necessity de dicto, and argue for a counterpart
theoretic treatment of necessity de re. As a result, I argue that there is no special
problem concerning the source of de re modal facts. The problem is simply to
account for what it is in virtue of which there are qualitative ways the world could
have been, and qualitative ways it couldn't have been.
I look at two ways to answer this question: by appealing to truthmakers in the actual
world, or by appealing to non-actual ontology. I develop a theory of truthmakers, but
argue that it is unlikely that there are truthmakers for modal truths among the
ontology of the actual. I look at the main possibilist ontology, David Lewis' modal
realism, but argue that warrant for that ontology is unobtainable, and that we
shouldn't admit non-actual possibilia into our ontology.
I end by sketching a quasi-conventionalist approach to modality which denies that
there are modal facts, but nevertheless allows that we can speak truly when we use
modal language.
2017-06-08T12:11:44Z
2017-06-08T12:11:44Z
2017-06-08T12:11:44Z
2006
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/10949
en
viii,185 p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/9492019-04-01T09:23:47Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
What if? : an enquiry into the semantics of natural language conditionals
Hjálmarsson, Guðmundur Andri
Read, Stephen
Conditionals
Semantics
Natural language conditionals
Indicative conditionals
Subjunctive conditionals
Modus ponens
Ramsey test
Information networks
Modal and amodal conditionals
Generative grammar
Compositional semantics
Syntax of English conditionals
This thesis is essentially a portfolio of four disjoint yet thematically related articles that deal with some semantic aspect or another of natural language conditionals.
The thesis opens with a brief introductory chapter that offers a short yet opinionated historical overview and a theoretical background of several important semantic issues of conditionals.
The second chapter then deals with the issue of truth values and conditions
of indicative conditionals. So-called Gibbard Phenomenon cases have been used to
argue that indicative conditionals construed in terms of the Ramsey Test cannot have truth values. Since that conclusion is somewhat incredible, several alternative
options are explored. Finally, a contextualised revision of the Ramsey Test is offered which successfully avoids the threats of the Gibbard Phenomenon.
The third chapter deals with the question of where to draw the so-called indicative/
subjunctive line. Natural language conditionals are commonly believed to be
of two semantically distinct types: indicative and subjunctive. Although this distinction is central to many semantic analyses of natural conditionals, there seems to be no consensus on the details of its nature. While trying to uncover the grounds for the distinction, we will argue our way through several plausible proposals found in the literature. Upon discovering that none of these proposals seem entirely suited, we will reconsider our position and make several helpful observations into the nature of conditional sentences. And finally, in light of our observations, we shall propose and argue for plausible grounds for the indicative/subjunctive distinction.distinction.
The fourth chapter offers semantics for modal and amodal natural language conditionals based on the distinction proposed in the previous chapter. First, the nature of modal and amodal suppositions will be explored. Armed with an analysis
of modal and amodal suppositions, the corresponding conditionals will be examined
further. Consequently, the syntax of conditionals in English will be uncovered
for the purpose of providing input for our semantics. And finally, compositional
semantics in generative grammar will be offered for modal and amodal conditionals.
The fifth and final chapter defends Modus Ponens from alleged counterexamples. In particular, the chapter offers a solution to McGee’s infamous counterexamples. First, several solutions offered to the counterexamples hitherto are all argued to
be inadequate. After a couple of observations on the counterexamples’ nature, a solution is offered and demonstrated. the solution suggests that the semantics of
embedded natural language conditionals is more sophisticated than their surface
syntax indicates. The heart of the solution is a translation function from the surface
form of natural language conditionals to their logical form.
Finally, the thesis ends with a conclusion that briefly summarises the main conclusions drawn in its preceding chapters.
2010-06-30T13:59:44Z
2010-06-30T13:59:44Z
2010-06-30T13:59:44Z
2010-06-25
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/949
en
261
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/74452019-04-01T09:23:47Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
Common human reason in Kant : a study in Kant’s moral psychology and philosophical method
Sticker, Martin
Timmermann, Jens
Kant
Ethics
Methodology
Moral-psychology
Common human reason
Self-deception
In my thesis I explain why the common, pre-theoretical understanding of morality is an important part of Kant’s ethics, and I critically evaluate what the strengths and weaknesses are of doing ethics with the common perspective as a point of reference.
In chapter 1, I discuss the significance of common rational capacities for the deduction in Groundwork III as well as for the Fact of Reason. Attention to the fundamental role of common rational capacities in the Second Critique reveals that Kant intends to provide further warrant for the Fact than its introspective self-evidence.
In chapter 2, I discuss what it means for a rational agent to be endowed with common rational capacities. The agent has everything she needs to reason on her own about what she ought to do and act from rational judgements. Furthermore, I critically evaluate Kant’s claim that his ethics spells out fundamental, pre-theoretical convictions.
In chapter 3, I discuss Kant’s conception of rationalizing (“Vernünfteln”). I analyse rationalizing as a process of self-deception in which an agent tries to justify or excuse violations of the moral law. This can lead to loss of the reliable use of common rational capacities. I discuss what help critical practical philosophy and moral education can afford against rationalizing.
In chapter 4, I argue that Kant saw dialogical engagement with ordinary agents as an important way of obtaining data concerning the correct starting point of practical philosophy. Kant demands that whatever we get from dialog and observation has to be isolated from its contingent elements. I conclude that the main problem for Kant’s method is how we can, on the one hand, exclude non-rational content, and, on the other hand, be open to what other agents actually have to say about morality.
2015-09-11T15:12:25Z
2015-09-11T15:12:25Z
2015-09-11T15:12:25Z
2015-11-30
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/7445
en
Print and electronic copy restricted until 14th August 2020
Thesis restricted in accordance with University regulations
267
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/30702016-11-08T16:03:35Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
A defence of the Kaplanian theory of sentence truth
Sweeney, Paula
Wright, Crispin
When David Kaplan put forward his theory of sentence truth
incorporating demonstratives, initially proposed in ‘Dthat’ (1978) and later developed
in ‘Demonstratives’ (1989a) and ‘Afterthoughts’ (1989b), it was, to his mind, simply
a matter of book-keeping, a job that had been pushed aside as a complication when a
truth conditional semantics had been proposed. The challenges considered in this
thesis are challenges to the effect that Kaplan’s theory of sentence truth is, for one
reason or another, inadequate. My overarching aim is to defend Kaplan’s theory of
sentence truth against these challenges.
In chapter one I am concerned only with setting out some preliminary considerations.
In chapter two I defend Kaplan’s theory of sentence truth against a general challenge,
motivated by linguistic data from ‘contextualists’ and ‘relativists’. I argue that the
methods and data employed by proponents of contextualism and relativism are
lacking and as such should not be taken to have seriously challenged Kaplan’s theory
of sentence truth.
In chapter three I defend Kaplan’s theory of sentence truth against challenges to the
effect that his theory is not suited to delivering on its initial purpose—to provide a
semantics for indexical and demonstrative terms. I then develop a form of semantic
pluralism that I take to be entirely compatible with the Kaplanian model.
In chapters four I demonstrate the efficiency of this Kaplanian model when it comes
to defending Kaplan’s theory against the challenge of providing suitable semantics to
accommodate discourse involving future contingents.
And finally, in chapter five I consider contextualist accounts of discourse concerning
vague predicates.
2012-09-11T11:03:35Z
2012-09-11T11:03:35Z
2012-09-11T11:03:35Z
2010-06
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/3070
en
Electronic copy restricted until 22nd June 2015
Thesis restricted in accordance with University regulations
177
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/132242019-04-01T09:23:48Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
Contemporary ethical naturalism : a comparative metaethical evaluation of expressivism and Cornell realism
Sonderholm, Jorn
Haldane, John
This thesis contains a critical discussion of two metaethical theories: expressivism, as developed in the works of Simon Blackburn, and Cornell realism, as presented by Richard Boyd and David Brink. In the introduction, a distinction is made between external and internal accommodation projects for moral discourse and it is argued that the external accommodation project should be guided by acceptance of methodological naturalism. Expressivism and Cornell realism are then subjected to an extended comparative evaluation, and an answer is sought to the question of which of the two should be favoured. The main conclusion of the thesis is that Cornell realism is rationally preferable to expressivism. This conclusion is arrived at by looking at how well the two theories, respectively, explain various deeply embedded features of moral discourse. Explaining such features is what the internal accommodation project for moral discourse consists in. The assertoric surface-form of moral discourse and the supervenience of moral predicates on natural predicates receive special attention in the study. It is argued that expressivism and Cornell realism do equally well on the issue of moral supervenience. But whereas expressivism is still vulnerable to a particular argument from the philosophy of language (the Frege-Geach point), Cornell realism can fend off the criticism that most persistently has been directed at it from this area of philosophy. In a comparative evaluation involving the selected issues, Cornell realism therefore fares better than expressivism.
2018-04-25T15:45:22Z
2018-04-25T15:45:22Z
2018-04-25T15:45:22Z
2005
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/13224
en
211 p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/129202019-04-01T09:23:48Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
Quine and Boolos on second-order logic : an examination of the debate
Morris, Sean
Cook, Roy T.
The aim of this thesis is to examine the debate between Quine and Boolos over the logical status of higher-order logic-with Quine taking the position that higher-logic is more properly understood as set theory and Boolos arguing in opposition that higher-order logic is of a genuinely logical character. My purpose here then will be to stay as neutral as possible over the question of whether or not higher-order logic counts as logic and to instead focus on the exposition of the debate itself as exemplified in the work of Quine and Boolos. Chapter I will be a detailed consideration of Quine's conception of logic and its place within the wider context of his philosophy. Only once this backdrop is in place will I then examine his views on higher-order logic. In Chapter II, I turn to Boolos's response to Quine-his attempt to examine the extent to which we may want to count higher-order logic as logic and the extent to which we may want to count it as set theory. With each point Boolos raises, I attempt to give what I think would have been Quine's reply. Finally, in Chapter III, I consider Boolos's attempt to show that monadic second-order logic (MSOL) should be understood as pure logic as it does not commit us to the existence of classes, as we may take the standard interpretation of MSOL to do. I discuss here some of the major reactions to Boolos's plural interpretation (Resnik, Parsons, and Linnebo), and conclude with more speculative remarks on what Quine's own response might have been. Throughout this thesis, my primary method has been one of close textual analysis.
2018-03-12T16:00:10Z
2018-03-12T16:00:10Z
2018-03-12T16:00:10Z
2005
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/12920
en
119 p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/160592024-02-15T04:37:41Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30com_10023_879com_10023_878col_10023_118col_10023_880
The semantic error problem for epistemic contextualism
Greenough, Patrick Michael
Kindermann, Dirk
Jenkins-Ichikawa, Jonathan
University of St Andrews. Philosophy
B Philosophy (General)
2018-09-24T11:42:12Z
2018-09-24T11:42:12Z
2018-09-24T11:42:12Z
2017-03-22
Book item
Greenough , P M & Kindermann , D 2017 , The semantic error problem for epistemic contextualism . in J Jenkins-Ichikawa (ed.) , The Routledge Handbook of Epistemic Contextualism . Routledge Handbooks in Philosophy , Routledge Taylor & Francis Group , London .
9781138818392
ORCID: /0000-0002-5337-8993/work/64697672
https://hdl.handle.net/10023/16059
https://www.routledge.com/9781138818392
eng
The Routledge Handbook of Epistemic Contextualism
Routledge Handbooks in Philosophy
Routledge Taylor & Francis Group
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/29402019-04-01T09:23:49Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
The role of the imagination in Hume's science of man
Bernard, Christopher
Bryant, Christopher
In recent years there has been an explosion of writing on
David Hume. His scepticism, his writings on morality, politics,
and religion, have all received substantial attention. What I
attempt to do in this thesis is to suggest that his
revolutionary contributions in all these fields can be better
understood if we consider his attempt to found the sciences on
the imagination.
What little work there is on the imagination in Hume's
writings is almost all concerned with Book I of the Treatise.
As regards Book I, I suggest that Hume's overarching problem is
to argue that belief is dependent on the imagination, whilst
still keeping a contrast with the whims of the 'fancy'. He
wants to disabuse us of the idea that we believe on account of
reason; but he wants to distinguish the claims of science from
the claims of poets.
But I also examine why he thinks his explanation of the
production of passions support his conclusions about belief.
And I argue that his former account guides conclusions found in
other genres. So for example, I examine certain essays and
letters about politics, and his explanation of religious events
in the History of England.
Why do men falsely believe that they are distinguished from
the animals through possessing reason? On the one hand Hume
tries to explain the origin of the sciences; on the other hand,
he tries to show how men have come to have a false conception
of themselves. A central aim of the thesis is to bring out
these themes through showing the use Hume makes of principles
of the imagination. I pay special attention to Hume's attempt
to argue that Christianity plays a major role in the sustaining
of the false view.
2012-07-09T08:24:23Z
2012-07-09T08:24:23Z
2012-07-09T08:24:23Z
1990
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/2940
en
339 p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/36752019-07-01T10:11:21Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
Defining art culturally : modern theories of art - a synthesis
Fokt, Simon
Gaut, Berys Nigel
Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC)
Definition of art
Aesthetics
Numerous theories have attempted to overcome the anti-essentialist scepticism about the possibility of defining art. While significant advances have been made in this field, it seems that most modern definitions fail to successfully address the issue of the ever-changing nature of art raised by Morris Weitz, and rarely even attempt to provide an account which would be valid in more than just the modern Western context. This thesis looks at the most successful definitions currently defended, determines their strengths and weaknesses, and offers a new, cultural definition which can preserve the good elements of other theories, solve or avoid their problems, and have a scope wide enough to account for art of different times and cultures. The resulting theory is a synthetic one in that it preserves the essential institutionalism of Dickie's institutional views, is inspired by the historical and functional determination of artistic phenomena present in Levinson's historicism and Beardsley's functionalism, and presents the reasons for something becoming art in a disjunctive form of Gaut's cluster account. Its strengths lie in the ability to account for the changing art-status of objects in various cultures and at various times, providing an explanation of not only what is or was art, but also how and why the concept 'art' changes historically and differs between cultures, and successfully balancing between the over-generalisations of ahistorical and universalist views, and the uninformativeness of relativism. More broadly, the cultural theory stresses the importance of treating art as a historical phenomenon embedded in particular social and cultural settings, and encourages cooperation with other disciplines such as anthropology and history of art.
2013-06-12T15:15:44Z
2013-06-12T15:15:44Z
2013-06-12T15:15:44Z
2013-06-27
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/3675
en
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/
Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported
226
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/148212019-04-01T09:23:53Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
An application of certain thomistic metaphysical and epistemological theories to the contemporary clash between naturalistic and non-naturalistic ethics
Tulloch, Doreen Mary
Belgium (Government)
University of St Andrews
2018-07-03T08:19:42Z
2018-07-03T08:19:42Z
2018-07-03T08:19:42Z
1953-08
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/14821
en
vii, 258 p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/293562024-03-15T11:19:35Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
The epistemology of inquiry : individuals, groups & institutions
Ross, Lewis Dylan
Brown, Jessica (Jessica Anne)
McGrath, Matthew
Weatherson, Brian
Mulgan, Tim
Carnegie Trust for the Universities of Scotland
Inquiring—roughly, the attempt to answer a question—is one of the most common intellectual undertakings. This thesis is comprised of a set of four essays that investigate the epistemology of inquiry. The first essay looks at one key epistemic state with which we end inquiry, viz understanding; the second essay examines collective inquiry; the third essay considers the normative role of curiosity in motivating inquiry; and the fourth essay discusses inquiry in the legal system. These essays will advance our understanding of what motivates inquiry, the mental states involved in inquiring, the sorts of norms that govern inquiry, and what continuities and discontinuities there are between how individuals and various types of collective inquire into different types of question.
2024-02-27T12:26:31Z
2024-02-27T12:26:31Z
2024-02-27T12:26:31Z
2020-12-02
Thesis
https://hdl.handle.net/10023/29356
https://doi.org/10.17630/sta/790
en
128
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/98902019-04-01T09:23:53Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
Perspectives on what to believe : the information-sensitivity of the doxastic 'should' and its implications for normative epistemology
Becker, Sebastian Josef Albrecht
Brown, Jessica (Jessica Anne)
McGrath, Matthew
Egan, Andy
St Andrews and Stirling Graduate Programme in Philosophy (SASP)
Epistemic norms
Contextualist semantics for the doxastic should
Higher-order evidence
Epistemic advice
Semantics for the deontic should
This thesis explores the extent to which the doxastic ‘should’ is information-sensitive and the implications of this for a number of debates in normative epistemology. The doxastic ‘should’ is a special case of the deontic modal ‘should’ and occurs in sentences such as ‘You shouldn’t believe everything you read online’. In the recent semantics literature, it has been suggested that the deontic ‘should’ is information-sensitive, meaning that sentences of the form ‘S should do A’ are relativized to information-states. After a short introductory chapter, I survey the relevant semantics literature in chapter 2 and provide a simplified contextualist semantics for the doxastic ‘should’, according to which the truth-conditions of sentences containing the doxastic ‘should’ vary with the information-state provided by their context of utterance.
In chapters 3 to 6, I discuss the different kinds of information-states the doxastic ‘should’ can be relativized to and how the respective relativization matters for normative epistemology. Chapter 3 argues that the doxastic ‘should’ has a subjective and an objective sense and that this distinction solves the apparent conflict between subjective epistemic norms and the truth norm for belief. Chapter 4 addresses the question of how one should react to misleading higher-order evidence. I propose that two seemingly opposing views on this issue, Steadfastness and Concilliationism, are both correct. In a sense of ‘should’ that is relativized to one’s first-order evidence, one should remain steadfast in the face of misleading higher-order evidence, but in another sense, which is relativized to one’s higher-order evidence, one shouldn’t. In chapters 5 and 6, I argue that when we advise others on what they should believe, we talk about what they should believe in light of their and our joint evidence. Chapter 7 concludes this thesis with a defence of contextualist semantics for the doxastic ‘should’ against truth-relativist challenges.
2016-11-28T15:24:35Z
2016-11-28T15:24:35Z
2016-11-28T15:24:35Z
2016-12-01
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/9890
en
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International
vi, 221 p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/268972023-08-18T21:07:02Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
Towards a non-uniform epistemology of modality
Baron, Moritz Viktor Jakob
Roca Royes, Sonia
Ebert, Philip A.
Horizon 2020 (Programme)
Epistemology
Modality
Epistemology of modality
While most theories of a modal epistemology implicitly assume, or sometimes explicitly state, a uniform picture of the epistemology of modality, in this thesis I challenge this basic assumption. I argue that there is not one single epistemology of modality for all ‘domains of discourse’. That is, there is no one single way of coming to know modal propositions with such different content as those of mathematics, logic, physics, or the empirical world. I am not attempting to show that all epistemologies of modality should be non-uniform, but instead I am arguing that three influential modal epistemologies each fail to paint a uniform picture of our epistemic access of the modal realm on their own, but taken together form a coherent non-uniform epistemology of modality.
The counterfactual theory fails to provide an adequate answer to how we attain modal knowledge of necessary mathematical and empirical propositions. These necessary truths, I argue, do not possess the relevant independence from each other to be analysable in terms of counterfactuals. I argue that Williamson is forced to accept a non-uniform epistemology of modality as a result with respect to our knowledge of constitutive truths. Next, I outline Vetter’s possibility-based epistemology of modality and pose three challenges: the access problem, the problem of scope and the generalization problem. The resulting picture is a firmly non-uniform epistemology of modality on at least the level of an epistemology of circumstantial modality and, similar to the counterfactual-based account, the level of essential truths. In the last chapter of this thesis, I discuss Bob Hale’s essentialist modal epistemology. I take on board the essentialist epistemology of necessity, and focus instead on knowledge of possibility on this account. I argue that, on its own, it fails to paint a psychologically plausible picture of how we come to know obvious modal possibility knowledge but instead may plausibly be complemented by other epistemologies of modality.
2023-02-03T16:33:58Z
2023-02-03T16:33:58Z
2023-02-03T16:33:58Z
2022-11-30
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/26897
https://doi.org/10.17630/sta/255
675415
en
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International
156
The University of St Andrews
The University of Stirling
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/168182023-04-18T23:55:03Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30com_10023_879com_10023_878col_10023_118col_10023_880
Is Weak Supplementation analytic?
Cotnoir, Aaron
The Leverhulme Trust
University of St Andrews. Philosophy
Mereology
Identity
Parthood
Supplementation
Analyticity
Extensionality
B Philosophy (General)
T-NDAS
Mereological principles are often controversial; perhaps the most stark contrast is between those who claim that Weak Supplementation is analytic—constitutive of our notion of proper parthood—and those who argue that the principle is simply false, and subject to many counterexamples. The aim of this paper is to diagnose the source of this dispute. I’ll suggest that the dispute has arisen by participants failing to be sensitive to two different conceptions of proper parthood: the outstripping conception and the non-identity conception. I’ll argue that the outstripping conception (together with a specific set of definitions for other mereological notions), can deliver the analyticity of Weak Supplementation on at least one sense of ‘analyticity’. I’ll also suggest that the non-identity conception cannot do so independently of considerations to do with mereological extensionality.
2019-01-09T15:30:05Z
2019-01-09T15:30:05Z
2019-01-09T15:30:05Z
2021-08
Journal article
Cotnoir , A 2021 , ' Is Weak Supplementation analytic? ' , Synthese , vol. 198 , no. 18 , pp. 4229-4245 . https://doi.org/10.1007/s11229-018-02066-9
0039-7857
PURE: 256901621
PURE UUID: 6ba5a88d-1984-40af-9cf9-b1bd70def39d
WOS: 000687995100002
Scopus: 85059187379
ORCID: /0000-0003-4528-7570/work/65702597
WOS: 000687995100002
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/16818
https://doi.org/10.1007/s11229-018-02066-9
RF-2017-046\10
eng
Synthese
© The Author(s) 2018. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made.
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/188492021-04-13T11:12:21Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
Taking moral indeterminacy seriously : in defence of compatibility between moral realism and indeterminacy
Kim, Jiwon
Scharp, Kevin
Snedegar, Justin
Moral realism
Indeterminacy
Vagueness
Epistemicism
Indexical
Creeping minimalism
Moral indeterminacy appears to be incompatible with moral realism at first glance because moral realists believe that there are objective moral facts in the world, which seem determinate. Given the commitment to objective moral facts, moral realists would want to argue that there can be a considerable amount of convergence on moral matters. However, moral disagreement is too prevalent for realists to be optimistic that there will be convergence sometime in the future. Some moral disagreements seem to remain irresolvable or even faultless. Since it is reasonable to think that moral disagreements arise because there is indeterminacy, moral realists would want to explain indeterminacy without any inconsistency or incompatibility.
I argue that moral realism is compatible with every kind of indeterminacy: metaphysical indeterminacy, semantic indeterminacy, and epistemic indeterminacy. What I contribute to indeterminacy and moral realism debate is that, in contrast with how some philosophers argue that all moral indeterminacy can be reduced to metaphysical indeterminacy or epistemicism, I argue that every kind of indeterminacy has its own place. I show that each kind of indeterminacy is helpful for moral realists to explain different types of moral disagreement: faultless moral disagreement can be explained through semantic indeterminacy; irresolvable moral disagreement can be explained through metaphysical indeterminacy; resolvable disagreement can be explained through epistemicism.
The upshot of my research is that moral realists can still uphold their tenets on moral objectivity and truth while embracing indeterminacy, the cause of disagreement, at the same time. If the strength of a metaethical theory is measured by how much explanation it can provide, my dissertation shows that moral realism wins over anti-realism in this regard.
2019-11-05T13:55:45Z
2019-11-05T13:55:45Z
2019-11-05T13:55:45Z
2019-12-04
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/18849
https://doi.org/10.17630/10023-18849
en
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International
[7], 107 p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/1632019-04-01T09:23:53Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
The metaphysics of agency
Schlosser, Markus E.
Broadie, Sarah
Philosophy of action
Philosophy of mind
Free will
Reasons and causes
Mainstream philosophy of action and mind construes intentional behaviour in terms of causal processes that lead from agent-involving mental states to action. Actions are construed as events, which are actions in virtue of being caused by the right mental antecedents in the right way. Opponents of this standard event-causal approach have criticised the view on various grounds; they argue that it does not account for free will and moral responsibility, that it does not account for action done in the light of reasons, or, even, that it cannot capture the very phenomenon of agency. The thesis defends the standard event-causal approach against challenges of that kind.
In the first chapter I consider theories that stipulate an irreducible metaphysical relation between the agent (or the self) and the action. I argue that such theories do not add anything to our understanding of human agency, and that we have, therefore, no reason to share the metaphysically problematic assumptions on which those alternative models are based. In the second chapter I argue for the claim that reason-explanations of actions are causal explanations, and I argue against non-causal alternatives. My main point is that the causal approach is to be preferred, because it provides an integrated account of agency by providing an account of the relation between the causes of movements and reasons for actions. In the third chapter I defend non-reductive physicalism as the most plausible version of the standard event-causal theory. In the fourth and last chapter I argue against the charge that the standard approach cannot account for the agent’s role in the performance of action. Further, I propose the following stance with respect to the problem of free will: we do not have free will, but we have the related ability to govern ourselves—and the best account of self-determination presupposes causation, but not causal determinism.
2007-02-12T12:31:06Z
2007-02-12T12:31:06Z
2007-02-12T12:31:06Z
2007
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/163
en
229
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/270032023-04-29T21:23:46Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
Demystifying normativity : morality, error theory, and the authority of norms
Gerritsen, Eline
Streumer, Bart
Hurtig, Kent
Snedegar, Justin
Evers, H. W. A. (Hendrik WIllem Adriaan)
Prins Bernhard Cultuurfonds
Hendrik Muller Fund
University of Groningen
Normativity
Norms
Morality
Error theory
Metaethics
We are subject to many different norms telling us how to act, from moral norms to etiquette rules and the law. While some norms may simply be ignored, we live under the impression that others matter for what we ought to do. How can we make sense of this normative authority some norms have? Does it fit into our naturalist worldview? Many philosophers claim it does not. Normativity is conceived to be distinct from ordinary natural properties, making it mysterious. The mystery fuels a radical yet prominent scepticism about the existence of normative properties: if they are too strange to actually exist, there is nothing we ought to do. Some take this to mean, moreover, that nothing is morally right or wrong. We must critically examine the ideas behind these theories, which put both morality and normativity in general on the line.
The aim of this thesis is to unravel the mystery of normativity. It uncovers and objects to the influential non-natural conception of it, arguing that we can capture normativity with natural properties. In particular, it explores how the authority of norms can be explained by the commitments of the people subject to them. In connection to this, it challenges the conceptual claim behind the view that all moral judgements are mistaken. Finally, it reveals that treating morality as a mere fiction has revolutionary practical implications. This emphasises the importance of the overall conclusion: we need not conceive of either moral or normative properties as too mysterious to exist.
2023-02-17T11:16:58Z
2023-02-17T11:16:58Z
2023-02-17T11:16:58Z
2023-06-12
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/27003
https://doi.org/10.17630/sta/290
en
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International
221
The University of St Andrews
University of Stirling & University of Groningen
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/269102023-04-30T16:52:28Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
From immersion to understanding : an essay on virtual art and aesthetic cognitivism
Troesken, Colin
Gaut, Berys Nigel
Jones, Lisa
Aesthetics
Virtual media
Video games
Art and cognition
This dissertation argues against a cognitive devaluation of virtual art. By cognitive devaluation, I am referring to the charge that an art-kind is less artistically valuable than other art-kinds due to it lacking cognitive merits. I argue against this devaluation with three related arguments. The first argument says that virtual artworks can communicate perspectives which are conducive to understanding. I develop this argument by appealing to the standard features of virtual art, as well as to influential thoughts about the cognitive value of other art-kinds, especially literature. The second argument says that the cognitive value of a virtual artwork can sometimes count towards the artistic value of that artwork when appreciating that cognitive value requires appreciating the artistic success found within that artwork. The final argument shows that virtual art is not cognitively pernicious in any relevant sense, as is sometimes thought. If successful, these arguments jointly show that there is no good reason to devalue virtual art relative to other art-kinds on cognitivist grounds.
2023-02-06T11:23:31Z
2023-02-06T11:23:31Z
2023-02-06T11:23:31Z
2023-06-12
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/26910
https://doi.org/10.17630/sta/265
en
98
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/289342024-01-04T03:02:20Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
Indeterminacy and the law of the excluded middle
Engler, Jann Paul
Restall, Greg
Wright, Crispin
Philosophy of mathematics
Philosophy of set theory
Intuitionism
Law of the excluded middle
Infinity
Indefinite extensibility
Indeterminacy
Michael Dummett
Continuum hypothesis
Solomon Feferman
This thesis is an investigation into indeterminacy in the foundations of mathematics and its possible consequences for the applicability of the law of the excluded middle (LEM). It characterises different ways in which the natural numbers as well as the sets may be understood to be indeterminate, and asks in what sense this would cease to support applicability of LEM to reasoning with them. The first part of the thesis reviews the indeterminacy phenomena on which the argument is based and argues for a distinction between two notions of indeterminacy: a) indeterminacy as applied to domains and b) indefiniteness as applied to concepts. It then addresses possible attempts to secure determinacy in both cases. The second part of the thesis discusses the advantages that an argument from indeterminacy has over traditional intuitionistic arguments against LEM, and it provides the framework in which conditions for the applicability of LEM can be explicated in the setting of indeterminacy. The final part of the thesis then applies these findings to concrete cases of indeterminacy. With respect to indeterminacy of domains, I note some problems for establishing a rejection of LEM based on the indeterminacy of the height of the set theoretic hierarchy. I show that a coherent argument can be made for the rejection of LEM based on the indeterminacy of its width, and assess its philosophical commitments. A final chapter addresses the notion of indefiniteness of our concepts of set and number and asks how this might affect the applicability of LEM.
2023-12-22T09:57:07Z
2023-12-22T09:57:07Z
2023-12-22T09:57:07Z
2024-06-10
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/28934
https://doi.org/10.17630/sta/684
en
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International
264
The University of St Andrews
Arché Philosophical Research Centre for Logic, Language, Metaphysics and Epistemology, University of Stirling
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/65512019-07-01T10:12:23Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
The agential fork : the hidden consequences of agency for plenitude in David Lewis' thesis of genuine modal realism
Cole, Marc William
Ball, Derek Nelson
Hawley, Katherine (Katherine Jane)
David Lewis
Modality
Possible worlds
Protagoras
Plato
Tuche/techne antithesis
Metaphysics
Agency/free will
In this dissertation, I argue that David Lewis' abductive argument for Genuine Modal Realism (GMR) has the unwelcome, and hidden, implication of being unable to
accommodate agent causation theories of free will. This is because of his formulation of plenitude, which basically says that every way that a world or a part of a world could be is the way that some world, or part of some world is. This formulation tacitly assumes
that chance and nomological principles are sufficient to account for everything that happens at worlds. However, agent causation theories argue that free will is neither reducible to chance nor determined by physics. My argument recasts a fork argument made by Andrew Beedle. I proceed by arguing that chance-based principles evince an ontologically distinct kind of modality than agent causation principles. However,
plenitude only accounts for the physics/chance-based kind of modality. There is no similar principle of plenitude that can be given for agential modality that does not
collapse into the chance-based principle. But even if such a principle could be found, it would violate the doctrine in GMR that claims worlds are causally isolated. If no agential plenitude principle can be found and there is agential modality, then plenitude fails. If there is no agency at our world, and Lewis’ original formulation of plenitude is correct, then GMR implies no agency at any
world. This is the fork: If there is agency and GMR holds, then either plenitude fails, or isolation fails. But if there is no agency, and GMR holds, then there is no agency at any possible world. The latter prong is too strong a claim for an abductive argument like GMR. The
former proves that GMR cannot accommodate agent-causation theories. GMR loses its neutrality either way, to its detriment.
2015-04-23T13:40:18Z
2015-04-23T13:40:18Z
2015-04-23T13:40:18Z
2015-06-25
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/6551
en
'On the plurality of worlds', by David Lewis (1986)
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/
Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0 International
126
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
University of Stirling
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/122522021-08-20T02:02:27Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
Frege's case for the logicality of his basic laws
Yates, Alexander
Milne, Peter
Sullivan, Peter M.
Royal Institute of Philosophy
Frege
Logic
Epistemic analyticity
Philosophy of logic
History of analytic philosophy
Basic laws
Grundgesetze
Frege wanted to show that arithmetical truths are logical by proving them from purely logical basic laws. But how do we know that these basic laws are logical? Frege uses generality and undeniability to make a prima facie case for logicality—if a truth is general and undeniable, then it’s likely logical. I argue that Frege could, did, and had to make a deeper case for why we’re right in recognizing his basic laws as logical. Implicit in his work is a view of logical laws as epistemically analytic—his arguments for his basic laws serve to elicit a reflective awareness of the fact that understanding them is sufficient for recognizing them to be true. This view both fits with Frege’s comments concerning the connection between logic, truth, and normativity, and serves to explain why and in what sense he took logic to be general and conceptually undeniable.
In my view, semantics must play a distinctive role in any rational reconstruction of Frege’s case for logicality—the aforementioned “reflective awareness” must be an explicit appreciation of how the truth of formulas expressing Frege’s laws follows quickly from his stipulations governing terms which figure in those formulas. Opposing this view is the elucidatory interpretation of Thomas Ricketts, Warren Goldfarb, and Joan Weiner, which holds that Frege’s arguments for his basic laws can’t be taken at face value, and must serve the merely elucidatory purpose of easing us into the language. Another reading is the correctness interpretation of Richard Heck and Jason Stanley, which holds that Frege’s primary purpose in his arguments is justifying the claim that Frege’s axioms, qua formulas, are true. I argue against both of these interpretations, and in doing so clarify the role and limits of semantics in Frege’s enterprise.
2017-12-05T12:04:06Z
2017-12-05T12:04:06Z
2017-12-05T12:04:06Z
2017-06-22
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/12252
en
118 p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
University of Stirling
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/155342019-04-01T09:23:57Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
Exploratio intentionis
Crawford, J. M. B.
2018-07-18T12:50:15Z
2018-07-18T12:50:15Z
2018-07-18T12:50:15Z
1986
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/15534
en
627 p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/72862023-04-18T09:54:28Zcom_10023_274com_10023_39com_10023_117com_10023_30com_10023_879com_10023_878col_10023_276col_10023_118col_10023_880
Indexicality, transparency, and mental files
Ball, Derek Nelson
University of St Andrews. Philosophy
University of St Andrews. Arché Philosophical Research Centre for Logic, Language, Metaphysics and Epistemology
B Philosophy (General)
Francois Recanati’s Mental Files (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012) presents a picture of the mind on which mental representations are indexical and transparent. I dispute this picture: there is no clear case for regarding mental representations as indexical, and there are counterexamples to transparency.
2015-08-19T23:10:45Z
2015-08-19T23:10:45Z
2015-08-19T23:10:45Z
2014
Journal article
Ball , D N 2014 , ' Indexicality, transparency, and mental files ' , Inquiry - An Interdisciplinary Journal of Philosophy . https://doi.org/10.1080/0020174X.2014.883752
0020-174X
PURE: 155241458
PURE UUID: d6192059-8e0b-4f99-89ee-655f7b9fcffc
Scopus: 84929610004
ORCID: /0000-0002-7229-3282/work/66398271
WOS: 000354531600001
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/7286
https://doi.org/10.1080/0020174X.2014.883752
eng
Inquiry - An Interdisciplinary Journal of Philosophy
© 2014. Taylor & Francis. This is an Accepted Manuscript of an article published in Inquiry: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Philosophy on 20 February 2014, available online: http://www.tandfonline.com/10.1080/0020174X.2014.883752
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/273102023-04-01T02:02:24Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
The achievement of perceptual presence : to perceive by having access to the world
Gong, Qianrong
Wheeler, Michael
This dissertation provides an enactive approach to perception. It argues that perceptual presence is
achieved by perceivers. They do this by having access to the world through the navigation of
sensorimotor contingencies based on their understanding. In developing this view, the dissertation
defends a version of the enactive account of perception that is originally proposed by Alva Noë and
explores how this account challenges and competes with other accounts of perception, including
sense-datum theory, naïve realism, etc. It also argues that Noë’s enactive account is insightful as he
acutely captures certain features of perceptual phenomena and so makes plausible challenges
towards representationalism about perception. However, he fails to provide a clear and detailed
thesis concerning the way we perceive, especially how sensorimotor understanding can help with
the grasp of the two-dimensionality of presence, i.e., the fact that we perceive how things look and
how they really are at the same time. In order to make the enactive approach a better account, the
dissertation provides an improved explanation of the duality of presence. I argue that things are
always practically remote for us. Such remoteness is the root of the duality as we have to cope with
the remoteness by having access to objects through navigating sensorimotor contingencies. Because
presence is achieved in such a way, it has the two-dimensionality feature. The final chapters provide
an extended explication of the means to the achievement of access by drawing out the way that
sensorimotor understanding is procured through perceivers’ acquiring a sort of practical conceptual
knowledge of their perceptual situations. The dissertation thus ends with the argument that concepts
are necessary skills for perceivers to achieve sustaining access to the world.
2023-03-31T10:10:25Z
2023-03-31T10:10:25Z
2023-03-31T10:10:25Z
2022-11-30
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/27310
https://doi.org/10.17630/sta/381
en
154
The University of St Andrews
The St Andrews and Stirling Graduate programme in Philosophy (SASP)
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/255212022-07-26T09:18:54Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
Multi-descriptional physicalism, level(s) of being, and the mind-body problem
Ioannou, Savvas
Ball, Derek Nelson
Cotnoir, A. J.
The main idea of this thesis is multi-descriptional physicalism. According to it, only physical entities are elements of our ontology, and there are different ways to describe them. Higher-level vocabularies (e.g., mental, neurological, biological) truly describe reality. Sentences about higher-level entities are made true by physical entities. Every chapter will develop multi-descriptional physicalism or defend it from objections. In chapter 1, I will propose a new conceptual reductive account that conceptually reduces higher-level entities to physical entities. This conceptual reductive account combines resources from Heil’s truthmaker theory and either a priori physicalism or a posteriori physicalism. In chapter 2, I apply this conceptual reductive account to various debates. Physicalism, the multiple-realisability argument, the prototype theory of concepts, and truthmaker explanations will be discussed. In chapter 3, I will argue that a major aim of metaphysics should be to discover which entities are fundamental and explain why they suffice for the existence of derivative entities. In chapter 4, I will propose a new way to explain why sentences apparently about composite objects are true even though there are no composite objects. It combines resources from Cameron’s truthmaker theory and van Inwagen’s paraphrase strategy. In chapter 5, I will argue that the intuition that the mind and the body are very different does not show that the mind is distinct from the body. This intuition can be explained away by mentioning our dispositions to give non-physical explanations when we are ignorant of physical facts. In chapter 6, I will examine two arguments for the existence of a metaphysically independent level, and I will argue that only a modified version of one of them succeeds. I will argue that methodological principles support the view that there is a metaphysically independent level.
2022-06-13T13:56:09Z
2022-06-13T13:56:09Z
2022-06-13T13:56:09Z
2022-06-13
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/25521
https://doi.org/10.17630/sta/182
en
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International
225 p.
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/148072020-02-20T15:06:43Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
The nature and value of art
Kieran, Matthew Laurence
Gaut, Berys Nigel
This thesis examines the nature and value of art. It is primarily concerned to advance an argument which makes sense of the significance we ordinarily afford art, rather than rendering it merely aesthetic and thus cognitively trivial. Contrary to philosophical orthodoxy, it is argued that 'art' does not have two distinct senses. Rather, we should understand art as an inherently evaluative, evolving cultural practice. Thus, I argue, 'art' is essentially a cluster concept. I consider an account of art according to which it is in the pleasure art affords, that its value lies. However, though we derive pleasure even from apparently unpleasant artworks, the mark of art's value lies elsewhere. That is, the pleasure we derive from art is the result of an artwork's being of value in some other way. Through critically assessing the standard accounts of art's value, I argue that art's pleasures are primarily cognitive. Furthermore, I argue, the cognitive value of art arises primarily from the engagement of our imagination and interpretation of artworks. That is, we enjoy the imaginative activity of engaging with artworks and the promotion of particular imaginative understandings. Furthermore, as imaginative understanding is of fundamental importance in grasping the nature of our world and others, art may have a distinctive significance. That is, art may afford insights into and thus promote our imaginative understandings of our world and others. Thus, through the promotion of imaginative understanding, art may cultivate our moral understanding. Therefore, art is of profound significance and import.
2018-07-02T13:20:52Z
2018-07-02T13:20:52Z
2018-07-02T13:20:52Z
1995-07
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/14807
en
v, 207 p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/173742021-02-26T17:49:45Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
Kantian constructivism : a restatement
Schaab, Janis David
Timmermann, Jens
Aristotelian Society (Great Britain)
University of St. Andrews. Centre for Ethics, Philosophy and Public Affairs
Erasmus+ (Program)
University of St Andrews. Department of Philosophy
Russell Trust
Santander UK. Santander Universities
Ethics
Kant
Philosophy
Metaethics
Practical reason
This thesis provides a restatement of Kantian constructivism, with the aim of avoiding some of the objections and clearing up some of the ambiguities that have haunted previous versions of the view. I restate Kantian constructivism as the view that morality’s normativity has its source in the form of second-personal reasoning, a mode of practical reasoning in which we engage when we address demands person-to-person.
By advancing a position about the source of moral normativity, Kantian constructivism addresses a metaethical question, albeit one that is distinct from the questions that many traditional metaethical positions, such as moral realism, focus on. Kantian constructivism has an advantage over competing views of the source of moral normativity when it comes to answering the so-called Normative Question, which I interpret as the question of why we are rationally required to do what we take to be our moral obligation. Kantian constructivism can answer this question because, unlike its competitors, it does not conceive of practical reason as a receptive faculty that is determined by external inputs. Instead, it regards the very form of second-personal reasoning as grounding the fact that morality is normative, thus explaining morality’s rational authority.
Although second-personal reasoning is fundamentally distinct from the merely first-personal mode of reasoning that we must engage in insofar as we are agents, all those agents whom we would ordinarily consider bound by moral obligations seem to engage in it. Indeed, although it involves irreducibly second-personal notions, such as accountability and the authority to address legitimate demands, second-personal reasoning is not to be mistaken for a social practice. Instead, it can be applied to purely self-regarding contexts, such as that of committing oneself to a personal project and thereby holding oneself accountable for pursuing it, as well as to interactions with others.
2019-03-26T12:42:28Z
2019-03-26T12:42:28Z
2019-03-26T12:42:28Z
2019-06-24
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/17374
https://doi.org/10.17630/10023-17374
en
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
2024-03-21
Thesis restricted in accordance with University regulations. Electronic copy restricted until 21st March 2024
Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International
x, 191 p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
University of Stirling
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/93152019-04-01T09:24:02Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
Understanding Bernard Williams's criticism of Aristotelian naturalism
Addison, Michael
Hope, Simon
In Ethics and the Limits of Philosophy (henceforth ELP) Williams claims that holding a naturalistic
Aristotelian ethical theory is no longer an option for us—we cannot believe what Aristotle believed
about human beings. It is the purpose of this thesis to understand what Williams means by this claim
and to evaluate whether or not it constitutes a pressing argument against Aristotelian naturalism.
The modern Aristotelian (represented here by Martha Nussbaum, Philippa Foot and Rosalind
Hursthouse) seems to be untouched by the claim as presented—they do not have to hold Aristotle’s
view of human nature. The Aristotelian approaches human nature, not from an “outside” perspective,
like the scientist, but from an “inside” perspective—from the point of view of an ethically engaged
agent. The method does not seek to use a theory-independent notion of human nature to vindicate the
Aristotelian claim that the properly functioning human being is virtuous. Rather, the Aristotelian is
engaged in a project of using the notions of virtue that we already possess, to paint a picture of the
kind of lives that we can all identify with, and endorse as properly functioning.
However, there is a reading of Williams’s claim, which I draw from his replies to Nussbaum
(in Mind, World and Ethics) and his essay “St Just’s Illusion”, according to which he accuses the
Aristotelian, who attempts to reach human nature from the “inside”, of forgetting, that part of that
reflection from the inside, will constitute a consciousness of oneself as an evolved creature.
Understanding that human beings are evolved creatures, a “bricolage of powers and instincts”, should
temper one’s reflection on the idea that any one life could constitute proper human functioning, as it
must make us aware of the many lives that it is possible for a human being to lead.
2016-08-16T15:16:37Z
2016-08-16T15:16:37Z
2016-08-16T15:16:37Z
2016-06
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/9315
en
[6], 106 p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
University of Stirling
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/265842023-01-19T10:31:33Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
Moral decision-making : essays from philosophy and economics
Schönegger, Philipp
Pummer, Theron
Costa-Gomes, Miguel
Forethought Foundation for Global Priorities Research
Center for Effective Altruism (CEA)
Giving What We Can (GWWC)
Judgement and decision-making
Experimental philosophy
Experimental economics
Behavioural economics
Social and personality psychology
Charitable giving
Dark triad
Reflective equilibrium
Incentivisation
This thesis investigates moral decision-making from the two disciplinary angles of philosophy and economics. Moral decision-making includes moral judgements (e.g., judgements as to the moral (im-)permissibility of actions) and moral behaviour (e.g., charitable giving). The topic choice throughout this thesis was primarily motivated by global priorities research, ranging from population ethics to effective charitable giving. The first three chapter primarily focus on experimental philosophy. In them, I (a) investigate the relationship between the dark triad personality traits, psychopathy, Machiavellianism, and narcissism and anti-natalist views, finding that those high on dark triad traits are significantly more likely to endorse anti-natalist views. I also find that this relationship is mediated by depression. Then, I (b) study reflective equilibrium behaviour in the context of population ethics, finding that in accordance with theory, concrete case judgements play a revisionary role with respect to endorsements of general moral principles. Further, I (c) argue that research in psychology and experimental philosophy has not adequately dealt with the issue of incentivisation. I then go on to conduct an empirical showcase of the Bayesian Truth Serum in this context, demonstrating impacts on response behaviour. The last three chapters focus on experimental economics. I (d) analyse charitable giving behaviour under normative uncertainty and show that randomly allocated expert advice is undervalued by donors, though can impact donation behaviour and reduce uncertainty. Then, I (e) investigate the effect of morally demanding charitable solicitations on donor behaviour, finding that while moral arguments raise donations, increases of moral demandingness do not. Lastly, I (f) analyse the predictors of donating to probabilistic and ambiguous charities as opposed to more reliable ones, failing to find an impact of risk and ambiguity uncertainty. Overall, I hope that the work presented in this thesis is able to advance global priorities research into these topics.
2022-12-13T12:09:58Z
2022-12-13T12:09:58Z
2022-12-13T12:09:58Z
2023-06-12
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/26584
https://doi.org/10.17630/sta/238
en
2027-11-25
Thesis restricted in accordance with University regulations. Restricted until 25th November 2027
232 p.
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/273842023-04-23T16:00:19Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
Identifying oneself as an element of the objective order : Nagel's question and Evans' response
McGrath, Jack Dylan
Haddock, Adrian
Metaphysics
Analytic philosophy
German idealism
Frege leaves us with a task: to elucidate the fundamental character of the way in which we know which spatio-temporal particular is in question when we use the first person by formulating a semantic account of the first person. This investigation takes up this task, approaching it through the following question, Nagel’s question: is it possible for one to identify oneself as an element of the objective order? After thinking through the insights of Elizabeth Anscombe’s 'The First Person' and examining the collapse of Gareth Evans’ response to the question, the investigation draws on Sebastian Rödl’s 'Intentional Transaction' to answer Nagel’s question in the positive by formulating a semantic account of the first person and, as such, resolves its central task.
2023-04-11T11:36:23Z
2023-04-11T11:36:23Z
2023-04-11T11:36:23Z
2023-06-12
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/27384
https://doi.org/10.17630/sta/396
en
104
The University of St Andrews
The University of Stirling
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/35952019-04-01T09:24:02Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
Emotional responses to interactive fictions
Hagger, Andrzej
Gaut, Berys Nigel
We commonly feel a variety of emotional responses to works of fiction. In this thesis I propose to examine what we understand by the terms fictional and narrative, and to describe what sorts of narrator might be required within a narrative work.
Of particular interest are interactive works of art, both narrative and non-narrative, and I provide a definition of what features a work should possess if it should properly be considered interactive. I discuss the notions of interactive narratives and examine how interactivity affects any possible narrator.
I examine the paradox of fiction - how it is that we can feel emotions towards characters
we know not to exist, and suggest how the paradox can be dissolved. I further discuss
how it can be rational to feel these emotional responses and note particular responses that it does not seem possible to feel rationally when engaging with non-interactive narratives.
I then examine what effect the introduction of interactivity to both non-narrative and
narrative works has, and argue that it reduces the control the artist has to direct our emotions, but increases the range of emotions which we can feel. Finally I suggest that some of the emotional responses that would be irrational to feel when engaging with non-interactive narrative works can be rational when we are engaged with their interactive counterparts, but that at least one emotional response cannot genuinely be felt rationally even in interactive cases.
2013-06-03T15:42:39Z
2013-06-03T15:42:39Z
2013-06-03T15:42:39Z
2012
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/3595
en
iv, 130
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/147582019-04-01T09:24:09Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
The Kantian defence of freedom : with special reference to eighteenth-century determinism
Lewis, Walter L.
2018-06-29T15:19:45Z
2018-06-29T15:19:45Z
2018-06-29T15:19:45Z
1954-08
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/14758
en
337 p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/37152019-07-01T10:13:20Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
The pattern in the weave : an account of Wittgenstein's remarks on meaning-as-use and of their relation to social psychology
McKinlay, Andrew
Potter, Johnathan
Squires, Roger
The thesis begins with a criticism of the 'theory of meaning' approach to the philosophy of language. It then goes on to establish an account of language understanding in terms of Wittgenstein's comments on rule-following and meaning as use. This characterization is extended to aspects of the philosophy of social science. Inferences are then drawn, on the basis of this extension, as to the overall framework within which empirical
social studies should be located. A critical assessment is offered of a specific social scientific theory which is, in some ways, typical of empirical social research.
This criticism is followed by a formulation of an alternative approach to empirical questions in the social sciences. The alternative approach is depicted as more sympathetic to the general perspective on social scientific theories outlined earlier.
2013-06-18T11:02:24Z
2013-06-18T11:02:24Z
2013-06-18T11:02:24Z
1989
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/3715
en
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/
Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported
337
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/34652019-04-01T09:24:11Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
Epistemic theories of democracy, constitutionalism and the procedural legitimacy of fundamental rights
Allard-Tremblay, Yann
Cruft, Rowan
Mulgan, Tim
Fonds Québécois de Recherche sur la Société et la Culture
St Andrews and Stirling Graduate Programme in Philosophy (SASP)
Epistemic democracy
Constitutionalism
Legitimacy
Rights
The overall aim of this thesis is to assess the legitimacy of constitutional laws and bills of rights within the framework of procedural epistemic democracy. The thesis is divided into three sections. In the first section, I discuss the relevance of an epistemic argument for democracy under the circumstances of politics: I provide an account of reasonable disagreement and explain how usual approaches to the authority of decision-making procedures fail to take it seriously. In the second part of the thesis, I provide an account of the epistemic features of democracy and of the requirements of democratic legitimacy. I develop a revised pragmatist argument for democracy which relies on three presumptive aims of decision-making: justice, sustainability and concord. In the third and last section, I first argue for the desirability of constitutionalism. I then explain why constitutionalism, as it is usually understood, is incompatible with my procedural epistemic account of democratic legitimacy. In the last chapter, I offer a two-pronged solution to the apparent incompatibility of constitutionalism and epistemic democracy. I first argue for the appropriateness of political constitutionalism, as opposed to legal constitutionalism, in understanding the relationship between rights and democracy. I then provide an account of rights protection and judicial review compatible with epistemic democratic legitimacy. Finally, I use the notion of pragmatic encroachment to explain how constitutional laws can achieve normative supremacy through the increased epistemic credentials of the procedure.
2013-04-04T10:44:56Z
2013-04-04T10:44:56Z
2013-04-04T10:44:56Z
2012-11-30
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/3465
en
2022-11-12
Thesis restricted in accordance with University regulations. Electronic copy of sections 6.1.3, 7.1.4, 7.1.5 and 7.1.6 restricted until 12th November 2022
viii, 172
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
The University of Stirling
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/32122019-04-01T09:24:12Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
Poincaré against foundationalists old and new
Sands, Michael Thomas Jr.
Clark, Peter
The early 20th century witnessed concerted research in foundationalism
in mathematics. Those pursuing a basis for mathematics included Hilbert, Russell,
Zermelo, Frege, and Dedekind. They found a vocal opponent in Poincaré, whose
attacks were numerous, vituperative, and often indiscriminate. One of the objections
was the petitio argument that claimed a circularity in foundationalist arguments. Any
derivation of mathematical axioms from a supposedly simpler system would employ
induction, one of the very axioms purportedly derived.
Historically, these attacks became somewhat moot as both Frege and Hilbert had
their programs devastated-Frege's by Russell's paradox and Hilbert's by Godel's
incompleteness result. However, the publication of Frege's Conception of Numbers
as Objects by Crispin Wright began the neo-logicist program of reviving
Frege's project while avoiding Russell's paradox. The neo-logicist holds that Frege's
theorem-the derivation of mathematical axioms from Hume's Principle(HP) and
second-order logic-combined with the transparency of logic and the analyticity of
HP guarantees knowledge of numbers. Moreover, the neo-logicist conception of language
and reality as inextricably intertwined guarantees the objective existence of
numbers. In this context, whether or not a revived version of the petitio objection
can be made against the revived logicist project.
The current project investigates Poincaré's philosophy of arithmetic-his psychologism,
conception of intuition, and understanding of induction, and then evaluates
the effectiveness of his petitio objection against three foundationalist groups: Hilbert's
early and late programs, the logicists, and the neo-logicists.
2012-10-23T13:06:26Z
2012-10-23T13:06:26Z
2012-10-23T13:06:26Z
2011-11-30
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/3212
en
140
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/113532019-04-01T09:24:13Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
Being : a dialetheic interpretation of the late Heidegger
Casati, Filippo
Cotnoir, A. J.
Wheeler, Michael
In my thesis, I present a novel interpretation of the so-called second
Heidegger. In the first chapter I discuss the paradox of being, according to
which talking and thinking about being leads to a contradiction. I also show
that the late Heidegger endorses dialetheism, accepting the contradiction of
being as a true one. In the second chapter, I present a comparison between
Heidegger and Meinong. First of all, I discuss some similarities between
Heidegger’s account of intentionality and Meinong’s account of intentionality,
and Heidegger’s ontology and Meinong’s ontology. Secondly, I interpret
Heidegger’s being as a special case in Meinong’s ‘Theory of Objects’. In the
third chapter, after showing that, according to Heidegger, being is identical to
nothingness, I present a paraconsistent mereological system that makes
formal sense of Heidegger’s metaphysics. In this mereological system, the
totality is taken to be the mereological sum of everything that is and the
complement of the totality is interpreted as nothingness, namely what we
obtain removing all things from the totality. Since, according to Heidegger,
nothingness is being, the complement of totality is taken to be being as well.
Finally, in the fourth and last chapter, I discuss Heidegger’s theory of
grounding. I show that the early Heidegger endorses a particularly strong form
of foundationalism. Moreover, I present two paraconsistent versions of
foundationalism (called para-foundationalism 1.0 and para-foundationalism
2.0) that can accommodate the inconsistent views endorsed by the second
Heidegger.
2017-08-02T13:11:02Z
2017-08-02T13:11:02Z
2017-08-02T13:11:02Z
2017
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/11353
en
156 p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/32282019-04-01T09:24:13Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
Down to earth philosophy: an anti-exceptionalist essay on thought experiments and philosophical methodology
Sgaravatti, Daniele
Brown, Jessica (Jessica Anne)
In the first part of the dissertation, chapters 1 to 3, I criticize several views which tend to set philosophy apart from other cognitive achievements. I argue against the popular views that 1) Intuitions, as a sui generis mental state, are involved crucially in philosophical
methodology 2) Philosophy requires engagement in conceptual analysis, understood as the activity of considering thought experiments with the aim to throw light on the nature of our concepts, and 3) Much philosophical knowledge is a priori. I do not claim to have a proof that nothing in the vicinity of these views is correct; such a proof might well be impossible to give. However, I consider several versions, usually prominent ones, of each of the views, and I show those versions to be defective. Quite often, moreover, different versions of the same
worry apply to different versions of the same theory. In the fourth chapter I discuss the epistemology of the judgements involved in philosophical thought experiments, arguing that their justification depends on their being the product of a competence in applying the concepts involved, a competence which goes beyond the possession of the concepts. I then offer, drawing from empirical psychology, a sketch of
the form this cognitive competence could take. The overall picture squares well with the conclusions of the first part. In the last chapter I consider a challenge to the use of thought experiments in contemporary analytic philosophy coming from the ‘experimental philosophy’ movement. I argue that there is no way of individuating the class of hypothetical judgements under discussion which makes the challenge both interesting and sound. Moreover, I argue
that there are reasons to think that philosophers possess some sort of expertise which sets them apart from non-philosophers in relevant ways.
2012-10-25T14:11:46Z
2012-10-25T14:11:46Z
2012-10-25T14:11:46Z
2012-11-30
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/3228
en
158
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/269612024-03-12T11:27:50Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
Running out of time : the temporal case against the kalam
Bray, Nathan
Prosser, Simon
Johnston, Colin
Kalam cosmological argument
Philosophy of religion
Philosophy of time
B-theory of time
A-theory of time
Time travel
In this dissertation, I argue that if the kalam cosmological argument works, then it must work on either the A-theory of time or the B-theory of time. I offer several arguments for thinking that the kalam does not work on either the A-theory of time or the B-theory of time. The two main versions of the A-theory, presentism and the growing block theory, are considered. Even though I argue that the growing block theorist has the greatest chance of making the kalam work, I nonetheless argue that their attempts fail for various reasons. In the end, the kalam is left unsupported by any major theory of time and is therefore vitiated.
2023-02-13T12:17:58Z
2023-02-13T12:17:58Z
2023-02-13T12:17:58Z
2023-06-12
Thesis
https://hdl.handle.net/10023/26961
https://doi.org/10.17630/sta/276
en
171
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/103852019-04-01T09:24:16Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
Acta and omissions
Donald, Alexander Paul
Bryant, Christopher
University of St Andrews
Carnegie Trust for the Universities of Scotland
Humanitarian Trust
West Fife Edcational Trust
Sir Richard Stapley Educational Trust
Gilchrist Trust
Newby Trust
Heinz and Anna Kroch Foundation
I identify and examine the grounds on which we describe an
agent's non-doing as an omission to do X, and a cause of Y. I
distinguish between the formal and material aspects of an omission.
This is useful in setting aside obvious differences between actions
and omissions, which some writers take to be significant, in
particular the view that an omission can be identified with whatever
action an agent performs or movement he makes when he omits to X. In
fact, he need not make a bodily movement, perform some other action in
order to prevent himself from doing X, or decide not to perform X. It
is by no means certain that any omission is timeable, and most are
certainly not. I note difficulties for any account of intention that
is meant to embrace intentional omissions as well as actions. I do
not offer a single, all-embracing account of omissions, because I
think it is impossible to provide one.
I acknowledge the importance of the role of expectation in
identifying omissions, particularly as causes, but argue that there
are sorts of omissions which are not identified by the presence of
defeated expectation. I take the view that some omissions are in an
important way indistinguishable from actions and may therefore be
regarded as causes. Also that some non-doings which are not omissions
may be regarded as causes. I criticise the ability of traditional
analyses of causality to comprehend the possibility of omissive
causation and expound alternative accounts of what constitutes a cause in order to do justice to that possibility. I find useful Collingwood's account of what it is to speak of causality in terms
appropriate to a practical natural science; that is, in the language
of means and ends.
2017-03-01T15:28:27Z
2017-03-01T15:28:27Z
2017-03-01T15:28:27Z
1989
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/10385
en
vii, 300 p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/70602019-04-01T09:24:19Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
Causation and responsibility : four aspects of their relation
Tarnovanu, Horia
Cruft, Rowan
Schaffer, Jonathan
Brown, Jessica (Jessica Anne)
Causation
Responsibility
Causal realism
Causal contextualism
Causal selection
Group agency
Moral contextualism
Moral scepticism
Overdetermination
Fictionalism
Consequentialism
The concept of causation is essential to ascribing moral and legal responsibility since the only way an
agent can make a difference in the world is through her acts causing things to happen. Yet the extent
and manner in which the complex features of causation bear on responsibility ascriptions remain
unclear. I present an analysis of four aspects of causation which yields new insights into different
properties of responsibility and offers increased plausibility to certain moral views.
Chapter I examines the realist assumption that causation is an objective and mind-independent
relation between space-time located relata – a postulate meant to provide moral assessment with a
naturalistic basis and make moral properties continuous with a scientific view of the world. I argue that
such a realist stance is problematic, and by extension so are the views seeking to tie responsibility
attributions to an objective relation.
Chapter II combines the context sensitivity of causal claims with the plausible idea that
responsibility ascriptions rest on the assessment of causal sequences relating agents and consequences.
I argue that taking context sensitivity seriously compels us to face a choice between moral contrastivism
and a mild version of scepticism, viz. responsibility is not impossible, but ultimately difficult to identify
with confidence. I show why the latter view is preferable.
Chapter III explores the concern that group agents would causally (and morally) overdetermine
the effects already caused by their constituent individuals. I argue that non-reductive views of agency
and responsibility lack a coherent causal story about how group agents impact the world as relatively
independent entities. I explain the practical importance of higher-order entities and suggest a fictionalist
stance towards group agency talk.
Chapter IV analyses the puzzle of effect selection – if causes have infinitely many effects, but
only one or a few are mentioned in causal claims, what determines their selection from the complete set
of consequents? I argue that the criteria governing the difference between effects and by-products lack
clarity and stability. I use the concerns about appropriate effect selection to formulate an epistemic
argument against consequentialism.
2015-07-28T14:51:57Z
2015-07-28T14:51:57Z
2015-07-28T14:51:57Z
2015-06-25
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/7060
en
ii, 180 p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/8922019-07-01T10:17:51Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
The structure of logical consequence : proof-theoretic conceptions
Hjortland, Ole T.
Read, Stephen
Wright, Crispin
Shapiro, Stewart
ORS
Proof-theory
Logical constants
Harmony
Substructural logic
The model-theoretic analysis of the concept of logical consequence has come under heavy criticism in the last couple of decades. The present work looks at an alternative approach to logical consequence where the notion of inference takes center stage. Formally, the model-theoretic framework is exchanged for a proof-theoretic framework. It is argued that contrary to the traditional view, proof-theoretic semantics is not revisionary, and should rather be seen as a formal semantics that can supplement model-theory. Specifically, there are formal resources to provide a proof-theoretic semantics for both intuitionistic and classical logic.
We develop a new perspective on proof-theoretic harmony for logical constants which incorporates elements from the substructural era of proof-theory. We show that there is a semantic lacuna in the traditional accounts of harmony. A new theory of how inference rules determine the semantic content of logical constants is developed. The theory weds proof-theoretic and model-theoretic semantics by showing how proof-theoretic rules can induce truth-conditional clauses in Boolean and many-valued settings. It is argued that such a new approach to how rules determine meaning will ultimately assist our understanding of the apriori nature of logic.
2010-06-03T11:09:45Z
2010-06-03T11:09:45Z
2010-06-03T11:09:45Z
2010-06-25
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/892
en
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/
Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported
257
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/233562021-06-15T13:32:27Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
Rejuvenating democracy : age, knowledge, and the right to vote
Hinze, Jakob
Etinson, Adam
Brown, Jessica (Jessica Anne)
Philosophical Quarterly
Society of Applied Philosophy
University of St Andrews. St Leonard's College
Voting rights
Epistemic democracy
Epistocracy
Children
At the core of democracy is a simple idea: one person, one vote. However, all democracies disenfranchise citizens below a certain age. What justifies this practice? The answer seems obvious: voting isn’t a children’s game. When citizens head to the ballots, a lot is at stake: who runs the government and what policies are implemented significantly affects the lives of many citizens. According to a widely held view, voting requires a certain competence that children lack. If we take this idea a little further, we may conclude that adult citizens ought to demonstrate a certain level of competence before receiving the right to vote, too. However, most contemporary political philosophers reject this “epistocratic” line of thought. Either for epistemic, moral, or pragmatic reasons, they endorse enfranchising every adult. This raises the central question of this dissertation: can we justify giving the right to vote to all and only citizens above a certain age? I argue that we cannot. To establish this claim, I assess three different voting schemes: Standard Democracy, which gives exactly one vote to all and only citizens above a certain age; Epistocratic Democracy, which gives more voting power to “politically knowledgeable” citizens; and Ageless Democracy, which gives all citizens, regardless of age, the right to cast exactly one vote in democratic procedures. First, I defend Standard Democracy against Epistocratic Democracy. This amounts to an argument that all citizens above a certain age should have equal voting rights. I then evaluate potential justifications for conceding these rights only to citizens above a certain age, and reject them. This amounts to a case for Ageless Democracy. Abandoning the voting age is both a theoretically consistent implication of rejecting Epistocratic Democracy and a practically desirable approach to reinvigorating democratic procedures.
2021-06-14T15:57:57Z
2021-06-14T15:57:57Z
2021-06-14T15:57:57Z
2021-06-28
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/23356
https://doi.org/10.17630/sta/74
en
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/
Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International
xvi, 192 p.
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/111442023-04-18T23:37:12Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30com_10023_879com_10023_878col_10023_118col_10023_880
Biosocial selfhood : overcoming the ‘body-social problem’ within the individuation of the human self
Higgins, Joe
University of St Andrews. University of St Andrews
Selfhood
Cognitive science
Embodiment
Ensocialment
Body-social problem
Enactivism
B Philosophy. Psychology. Religion
RC0321 Neuroscience. Biological psychiatry. Neuropsychiatry
T-NDAS
In a recent paper, Kyselo (2014) argues that an enactive approach to selfhood can overcome ‘the body-social problem’: “the question for philosophy of cognitive science about how bodily and social aspects figure in the individuation of the human individual self” (Kyselo, 2014, p. 4; see also Kyselo and Di Paolo (2013)). Kyselo’s claim is that we should conceive of the human self as a socially enacted phenomenon that is bodily mediated. Whilst there is much to be praised about this claim, I will demonstrate in this paper that such a conception of self ultimately leads to a strained interpretation of how bodily and social processes are related. To this end, I will begin the paper by elucidating the body-social problem as it appears in modern cognitive science and then expounding Kyselo’s solution, which relies on a novel interpretation of Jonas’s (1966/2001) concept of needful freedom. In response to this solution, I will highlight two problems which Kyselo’s account cannot overcome in its current state. I will argue that a more satisfactory solution to the body-social problem involves a re-conception of the human body as irrevocably socially constituted and the human social world as irrevocably bodily constituted. On this view, even the most minimal sense of selfhood cannot privilege either bodily or social processes; instead, the two are ontologically entwined such that humans are biosocial selves.
2017-07-04T14:30:09Z
2017-07-04T14:30:09Z
2017-07-04T14:30:09Z
2018-07
Journal article
Higgins , J 2018 , ' Biosocial selfhood : overcoming the ‘body-social problem’ within the individuation of the human self ' , Phenomenology and the Cognitive Sciences , vol. 17 , no. 3 , pp. 433-454 . https://doi.org/10.1007/s11097-017-9514-2
1568-7759
PURE: 250088588
PURE UUID: c0ebeb53-a72d-4405-bcdc-4107079afd5b
Scopus: 85020683997
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/11144
https://doi.org/10.1007/s11097-017-9514-2
eng
Phenomenology and the Cognitive Sciences
© The Author(s) 2017. This article is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license, and indicate if changes were made.
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/9942019-04-01T09:24:20Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
Aristotle's eudaimonia and two conceptions of happiness
Grech, George J.
Broadie, Sarah
Are you happy? This question is asked of people by friends, parents and psychiatrists alike. What
happiness consists of for each person seems, at first glance, to be entirely subjective in that is it up
to each individual person to define what the happy-making ingredients of her life are.
This dissertation centrally involves an interpretation of Aristotle’s eudaimonia, often
translated as ‘happiness’. Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics is an inquiry into the chief good for human
beings, and according to Aristotle everyone agrees that this chief good is ‘happiness’, however there
is major disagreement about what ‘happiness’ consists of.
What follows critically interprets Aristotle’s eudaimonia through a close reading of his
arguments. Once Aristotle’s eudaimonia is explicated, it is used to question the supposedly
subjective conception of happiness that the happiness literature argues is pervasive. Finally,
Aristotle’s eudaimonia is defended as a theory of well-being against a charge of perfectionism. It is
argued that Aristotle’s eudaimonia commits its adherents to maximising virtuous activity at all
times, that is, to perfect themselves. It is this interpretation of Aristotle that seeks to undermine
eudaimonia as a plausible theory of well-being, and I end this dissertation by providing a response to
the objection from perfectionism.
This project attempts, fundamentally, to show that Aristotle’s eudaimonia is not simply an
intellectual curiosity: studying eudaimonia can help change the way we live our lives, and for the
better.
2010-09-17T11:45:52Z
2010-09-17T11:45:52Z
2010-09-17T11:45:52Z
2010
Thesis
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/994
en
92
University of St Andrews
The University of St Andrews
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/93892023-04-18T10:02:40Zcom_10023_30com_10023_117com_10023_879com_10023_878col_10023_861col_10023_118col_10023_880
Schellenberg on the epistemic force of experience
McGrath, Matthew
University of St Andrews. School of Philosophical, Anthropological and Film Studies
University of St Andrews. Philosophy
Evidence
Perceptual Justification
Perception
Content of Experience
B Philosophy (General)
According to Schellenberg, our perceptual experiences have the epistemic force they do because they are exercises of certain sorts of capacity, namely capacities to discriminate particulars—objects, property-instances and events—in a sensory mode. She calls her account the ‘‘capacity view.’’ In this paper, I will raise three concerns about Schellenberg’s capacity view. The first is whether we might do better to leave capacities out of our epistemology and take content properties as the fundamental epistemically relevant features of experiences. I argue we would. The second is whether Schellenberg’s appeal to factive and phenomenal evidence accommodates the intuitive verdicts about the bad case that she claims it does. I argue it does not. The third is whether Schellenberg’s account of factive evidence is adequate to capture nuances concerning the justification for singular but non demonstrative perceptual beliefs, such as the belief that’s NN, where NN is a proper name. I argue it is not. If I am right, these points suggest a mental-state-first account of perceptual justification, rather than a capacity-first account, and one which treats the good and bad cases alike in respect of justification and complicates the relation between perceptual content and what one is justified in believing.
2016-08-28T23:34:32Z
2016-08-28T23:34:32Z
2016-08-28T23:34:32Z
2016-04
Journal article
McGrath , M 2016 , ' Schellenberg on the epistemic force of experience ' , Philosophical Studies , vol. 173 , no. 4 , pp. 897-905 . https://doi.org/10.1007/s11098-015-0529-7
0031-8116
PURE: 215729582
PURE UUID: 0f4a4871-15b3-4ad4-ba1f-6855249626cc
Scopus: 84961129201
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/9389
https://doi.org/10.1007/s11098-015-0529-7
eng
Philosophical Studies
© Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht 2015. This work is made available online in accordance with the publisher’s policies. This is the author created, accepted version manuscript following peer review and may differ slightly from the final published version. The final published version of this work is available at https://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s11098-015-0529-7
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/158062023-04-18T10:12:46Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30com_10023_879com_10023_878col_10023_118col_10023_880
Comments on Brian Epstein's The Ant Trap
Hawley, Katherine
The Leverhulme Trust
University of St Andrews. Philosophy
University of St Andrews. St Andrews Centre for Exoplanet Science
Anchoring
Social metaphysics
Grounding
Facts
Dependence
B Philosophy (General)
The Ant Trap is a terrific book, which opens up new opportunities to use philosophical methods in the social realm, by drawing on the tools and techniques of contemporary metaphysics. Epstein uses concepts of dependence, constitution, and grounding, of parts and whole, of membership and kindhood, both to clarify existing accounts of social reality and to develop an account of his own. Whilst I admire the general strategy, I take issue with some aspects of Epstein’s implementation, notably his distinction between grounding and anchoring. I recommend that he give up this distinction, which is not crucial to his project.
2018-08-12T23:33:20Z
2018-08-12T23:33:20Z
2018-08-12T23:33:20Z
2017-02-13
Journal item
Hawley , K 2017 , ' Comments on Brian Epstein's The Ant Trap ' , Inquiry - An Interdisciplinary Journal of Philosophy , vol. Latest Articles . https://doi.org/10.1080/0020174X.2017.1289694
0020-174X
PURE: 245528459
PURE UUID: 045ba94e-139b-4dab-a872-8c3e340efc89
Scopus: 85012920342
ORCID: /0000-0002-8179-2550/work/39736446
WOS: 000457144300006
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/15806
https://doi.org/10.1080/0020174X.2017.1289694
eng
Inquiry - An Interdisciplinary Journal of Philosophy
© 2017 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group. This work is made available online in accordance with the publisher’s policies. This is the author created, accepted version manuscript and may differ slightly from the final published version. The final published version of this work is available at https://dx.doi.org/10.1080/0020174X.2017.1289694
oai:research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk:10023/147192019-04-01T09:24:24Zcom_10023_117com_10023_30col_10023_119
Intuitionism and David Hume's philosophy of religion
MacRae, Malcolm Herbert
Humean philosophy has been defined in the following ways. (a) A system based on the classical influence of Cicero. (b) An attempt to offer a parallel in moral philosophy to Sir Isaac Newton's contribution to the physical sciences. (c) Intuitionism based on the Shaftesbury/Hutcheson tradition. If we consider Hume's scholarly output as a whole, it would appear difficult to select one work and claim that it represents a definitive, final position. The approach which is taken in this study is that of following the development of Hume's thinking, from his early education through to that stage in his career which saw the completion of his major philosophical works. For a significant part of the later period of his career he broke no new ground in his philosophical studies; but was content to revise his earlier works, turning attention instead to literature, history and religious disputes. When this approach is followed it becomes obvious that the secular interpretation of Humean philosophy, which has gained a great deal of acceptance this century, is far from convincing. Hume in fact wrote a fairly conservative work on natural Religion. Moreover, his Intuitionism makes little sense without the religious foundation which Shaftesbury and Hutcheson had taken for granted. What new, significant contribution did Hume make? His work can be looked upon as a fine example of 'applied philosophy', anticipating the insights of modern clinical psychology at a number of points. It is important to see Hume as working in an educational tradition. Scottish, humanistic, Reformed. His family was Presbyterian, and the young Hume would have received a good Christian training. Although he was not considered an outstandingly bright pupil, he attended Edinburgh University at an early age, and soon developed a voracious appetite for reading scholarly literature on his own. The deeply introspective side of his philosophical studies may well have come from his Presbyterian background.
2018-06-28T14:25:56Z
2018-06-28T14:25:56Z
2018-06-28T14:25:56Z
1995-07
http://hdl.handle.net/10023/14719
en
250 p.
qdc///com_10023_117/100