bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Unité et profondeur théoriques comme critère d'empiricité des théories économiques
Authors: Meidinger Claude
Published: April 2010

L'histoire des sciences témoigne fréquemment de tentatives méthodologiquement divergentes visant à résoudre les anomalies d'un programme de recherche scientifique. L'accumulation d'anomalies peut être pour certains une incitation à scruter les faits, alors que pour d'autres c'est l'occasion d'une réflexion sur les fondements théoriques des constructions spéculatives. C'est en ce sens que, dans la crise relativiste de la physique classique, Einstein plaide pour une réflexion sur les fondements de la science physique alors que Poincaré soutient au contraire que la solution à une telle crise reste une affaire purement expérimentale. «Nous devons», affirme-t-il, «passer la main aux expérimentateurs et, tandis que nous attendrons d'eux une décision dans le débat, nous ne nous préoccuperons pas de ces problèmes inquiétants et, tranquillement, nous continuerons à travailler comme si les problèmes étaient toujours valables». L'histoire des sciences a également tranché sur la question de savoir qui, de Poincaré ou d'Einstein, avait raison en la matière; et ce quh'a montr' la résolution d'une telle crise n'est pas sans importance pour la philosophie des sciences. À certains instants privilégés de l'évolution scientifique, la recherche d'une plus grande unitè et profondeur théoriques permet une explication plus empirique des faits.
Economic Theory Stalled: Model-Theoretic Institutionalism as a Way Forward
Authors: Braybrooke David
Published: April 2010

Both Hausman and Rosenberg reject McCloskey's contention that economics is no more than rhetoric, and do so with cogent reasons drawn from old-fashioned views about truth and objectivity (R, pp. 30–55; H, pp. 266–67). (Hausman's treatment of McCloskey is more nuanced, but neither of them, I think, make enough allowance for McCloskey's playfulness or for the power, on his less provocative side, of his intermittent argument for a reasonably respectable pragmatism.) Rosenberg holds, very plausibly, that the ambitions of economists run higher than rhetoric in any of its current received senses (R, pp. 51–52; H, pp. 81–82) and run closer to affiliation with natural science, though economists may, in their conception of natural science, be persisting in positivist views. (McCloskey does not deny this; on the contrary, he attributes the same ambitions to economists, but he wants them to abandon the ambitions, unless—as if this were the only way of advancing beyond positivist views—they advance to a rhetorical view of natural science [McC, pp. 16–19, 32–35, 54–57].)
Commentary on W. V. Quine's “Free Logic, Description, and Virtual Classes”
Authors: Leblanc Hugues
Published: April 2010

Since I wrote my doctoral dissertation lo! these forty-seven years ago under Professor Quine, my colleague Alain Voizard thought it fitting that I comment on the paper just delivered. The invitation flattered me, I confess, as did Professor Quine's choice of a subject: free logic, a logic of which I was one of the numerous fathers thirty-five years ago. So, it is in my capacity as a commentator that I address you now, saving for tomorrow afternoon further thoughts prompted by this colloquium.
Contraposition and Lewis Carroll's Barber Shop Paradox
Authors: Gillon Brendan S.
Published: April 2010

Cet article démontre qu'un exemple cité par Ernest Adams pour montrer que l'implication matérielle n'est pas l'interprétation correcte de la sémantique de la conjonction de subordination si, n'est rien d'autre qu'un corollaire d'une observation d'jà faite par Lewis Carroll, il y a cent ans, dans l'exposition de son paradoxe du salon de coiffure.
From Duty, Moral Worth, Good Will
Authors: Curzer Howard J.
Published: April 2010

Je propose, dans cet article, une analyse détaillée des paragraphes 397 à 401 des Fondements, réfutant certaines objections traditionnelles à la position de Kant et en soulevant de nouvelles. Je proposerai et défendrai, cefaisant, une interprétation de ce que Kant veut dire par les expressions «par devoir», «valeur morale» et «bonne volonté».
Causa Prima et esse dans le Liber de causis selon Thomas d'Aquin et Siger de Brabant
Authors: Piché David
Published: April 2010

After a presentation of the main onto-theological theses contained in the Liber de causis, the author explains how they were received and interpreted by Thomas Aquinas and Siger of Brabant in their respective commentaries on the short treatise “de primis causis rerum.” Starting from a mistranslation of the word “yliathim,” Thomas “injects” into the De causis his own doctrine of the distinction between being and essence. As for Siger, while he is often regarded as an adversary of Thomas Aquinas, his ideas about the ontological difference between the Prime Cause and the created beings are on the very lines of the Thomasian lecture of the Liber de causis.
Waldron on Special Rights in rem
Authors: Cristi Renato
Published: April 2010

Jeremy Waldron's analysis of right-based arguments for private property makes use of the distinction drawn by H. L. A. Hart between special and general rights. Special rights, according to Hart, “arise out of a special transaction between individuals, or out of some special relationship in which they stand to each other.” As a result, “both the persons who have the right and those who have the corresponding obligation are limited to the parties to the special transaction or relationship.” Thus if A has consented to pay me $9.99 for the sale of a particular item, the right I have acquired over the $9.99, which is presently deposited in A's bank account, is a special right. Correlative to my right over the money she owes me, A now has a duty to pay her debt. The duty that has been generated is limited to the party of the special transaction, and so the duty belongs to no one but A. Thus, a special right is a right in personam (or ius ad rem). It is a right directed against a particular person and not against the world at large.
Le faillibilisme de Jürgen Habermas et ses difficultés : un faillibilisme conséquent est-il possible?
Authors: Courtois Stéphane
Published: April 2010

S'agissant du problème lié au statut de la connaissance humaine en général, la querelle du faillibilisme et du fondationnalisme n'est pas neuve. On peut même dire qu'elle parcourt l'histoire de la philosophie depuis ses tout débuts. Dans le contexte des préoccupations propres à la pensée contemporaine, cette querelle semble cependant se cristalliser autour de la question suivante : quel statut devons-nous aujourd'hui accorder à nos énoncés philosophiques? Pouvons-nous et devons-nous encore revendiquer pour ces énoncés, traditionnellement chargés d'établir les fondements et les principes premiers, un statut ontologique, sinon transcendantal? Ou au contraire, le développement des sciences expérimentales modernes, ayant éveillé en nous de manière sans cesse plus aiguë la conscience de la précarité de nos connaissances, ne nous incite-t-il pas désormais à envisager les propositions philosophiques comme n'étant rien de plus, malgre leur prétention et leur visée, que des énoncés faillibles, relatifs à l'expérience ou à l'histoire?
The Realm of Rights
Authors: Baier Kurt
Published: April 2010

For some 20 years now, Judith Jarvis Thomson has written penetrating, insightful and scrupulously argued essays on controversial issues involving rights. The most important of these were collected and edited by William Parent in a volume entitled Rights, Restitution, and Risk. In an Afterword, reflecting on these essays, she lists a number of things that she felt were lacking from her discussions. Three of them are particularly important: a clear account of what it is to have a right, a clear statement of what rights we have and a clear statement of the role that detailed discussions of controversial cases play in moral theory construction. The volume under review expands and refines her earlier work on rights, and provides a more systematic treatment by, among other things, filling these three gaps. Those familiar with her work will not be disappointed: the new book is as lucid, challenging, illuminating and vigorously argued as her earlier essays, but now affords an overview of the realm of rights, as well as a delineation and location of “the territory of rights” on “the continent of morality” (p. 3).
A Deadly Delight: Feldman on the Nature and Value of Death
Authors: Haji Ishtiyaque
Published: April 2010

Confrontations With the Reaper is a brilliant philosophical investigation into the nature and value of death. In what follows, I adumbrate the contents of the book and then turn to some critical discussion.
Gale on God: The Return of Philo?
Authors: Hasker William
Published: April 2010

Richard Gale, noting the “startling resurgence of theism within philosophy during the past thirty years or so” (p. 2) led by William Alston, Alvin Plantinga and Richard Swinburne, concludes that “there is need for a return visit from Hume's Philo.” But fans of Philo may be disappointed with the present version. To be sure, Gale as Philo possesses both the wit and the critical acumen to make him a worthy successor to the original. What is lacking, however, is the animus and the scornful rejection of biblical religion which so notably motivated both the original Philo and his creator.
Foucault contra Taylor: Whose Sources? Which Self?
Authors: Fillion Réal Robert
Published: April 2010

Foucault appears now and again in the work of Charles Taylor, but fleetingly, almost hauntingly. This is not surprising because Taylor and Foucault share many ideas and yet remain starkly opposed. This is especially true of Taylor's most recent work, his monumental Sources of the Self: The Making of the Modern Identity. In it he is characteristically brilliant, in the sense that he attempts to illuminate a great many things all at once. Foucault is mentioned here and there in that work, along with a great many others. However, I would claim that Foucault's presence is much more sustained than the index would have us believe. In fact, one might say that Foucault is the shadow cast by Taylor's brilliance.
Droits de l'homme, impératif catégorique et métaphysique. Autour du dernier livre d'Otfried Höffe:Principes du droit
Authors: Leydet Dominique
Published: April 2010

Le concept au centre du dernier ouvrage d'Otfried Höffe publié en français est celui d'impératif catégorique juridique. Höffe souhaite, en effet, approfondir son apologie des principes juridiques catégoriques déjà developpée dans son précédent ouvrage Lajustice politiqueen éclaircissant ses sources kantiennes. Alors que dans l'ouvrage de 1991 la figure tutélaire de Kant était restée en retrait, Höffe a voulu expliciter son rapport à Kant ét montrer la façon dont la réflexion contemporaine sur le droit et le politique devrait elle-même se dire kantienne.
The Failure of Self-Consciousness in Sartre's Being and Nothingness
Authors: Wider Kathleen
Published: April 2010

The central tenet in the ontology Sartre describes and seeks to defend in Being and Nothingness is that being divides into the for-itself and the in-itself. Self-consciousness characterizes being-for-itself and distinguishes it from being-in-itself. What it means for a being to exist for itself is that it is self-conscious. How Sartre characterizes self-consciousness in Being and Nothingness is, however, a question that remains to be asked. There is no simple answer to this question. For Sartre, there are really several levels of self-consciousness: the self-consciousness of consciousness at the pre-reflective level, at the level of reflection (both pure and impure) and at the level of being-for-others. There is a profound difference between the self-consciousness of being-for-others and impure reflection, on the one hand, and the self-consciousness of reflection and pre-reflective consciousness, on the other. With being-for-others and impure reflection, self-consciousness involves the attempt to grasp the self as an object for consciousness. Although the nature of this attempt and the reasons for its ultimate failure differ at each level, these levels are bound together by a common sense of self-consciousness as a consciousness of the self as an object.
Sanctions and the Notion of Morality
Authors: Hajdin Mane
Published: April 2010

It is sometimes thought that it is part of the notion of morality that moral norms are backed up by sanctions of some special sort. This view is sometimes explicitly argued for, as by T. L. S. Sprigge, and sometimes appears in the background of discussions that are centered around other issues, as in Narveson's The Libertarian Idea. The aim of this paper is to show that difficulties in attempts to analyze the notion of morality by appealing to moral sanctions go much deeper than is usually realized.
Henry Allison on Kant's Theory of Freedom
Authors: Baron Marcia
Published: April 2010

Henry Allison's very challenging and very rewarding book provides an analysis and defence of Kant's theory of freedom in both its theoretical and practical dimensions. His defence is qualified, acknowledging some “details” which are not defensible and some inconsistencies; however, “given a sympathetic understanding of transcendental idealism, a good case can be made for Kant's incompatibilistic conception of freedom” (p. 3). In addition to arguing that the notion of transcendental freedom is intelligible, Allison seeks to show that it is essential to Kant's theory, taking issue with those who would replace it with a more palatable, compatibilist conception. He thus has two targets: those who doubt the profundity and coherence of Kant's theory of freedom, and those who seek to defend Kant by trying to “gain a hearing for his views by depicting him as anticipating contemporary forms of compatibilism” (p. 249).
Let's All Be There
Authors: Tietz John
Published: April 2010

Hubert Dreyfus's commentary on Being and Time has been a long time in preparation but it has also been worth the wait. Dreyfus limits his account to the first division of Part I of Being and Time with some passages from Division II brought into the discussion. For Dreyfus, the first 230 pages of Being and Time comprise Heidegger's most important metaphysical innovations, while Division II, the “existentialist” side of Heidegger, contains discussions of death, guilt, resoluteness and Angst rarely, if ever, mentioned in any other works.
The Search for Bioethical Criteria to Select Renal Transplant Recipients: A Response to the Honourable Judge Jean-Louis Baudouin
Authors: Spicker Stuart F.
Published: April 2010

In selecting for discussion the general theme of the donation and sharing of cells, tissues and organs (typically accomplished by transfusion and other forms of surgical transplantation) the program committee of the Second Congress of the Canadian Bioethics Society appears to have been astonishingly prescient in anticipating that two North American physicians —clinical researchers rather than “basic” scientists, by the way —would receive, as they did just over a month ago, Nobel Prizes in Physiology or Medicine for their medical achievements.1 Dr. Joseph Murray was cited in part for successfully performing, in 1954, the first human kidney transplant (the recipient lived eight years), as well as for discovering how to minimize the body's rejection of this organ; Dr. Donnall Thomas was cited for work he accomplished in 1956 —the first bone-marrow cell transfusion to a 16-year-old patient (who is still alive) such that the human immune reaction of a graft to this recipient's body could be medically managed to avoid rejection of the transplanted material (Economist 1990). Having mentioned these awards, I should note that Dr. George Hitchings had already received the Nobel Prize in Medicine in 1988, being credited with the discovery of a powerful immunosuppressant, azathioprine, which greatly improved the survival of the recipients of unmatched graft transplants.
La structure de la théorie physique et son contenu empirique. Le problème des idéalisations et des fictions
Authors: Bourneuf Éric
Published: April 2010

Les questions qui ont suscité le présent texte concernent la relation entre la théorie et le réel empirique: comment peut-on identifier le contenu empirique d'une théorie? Dans quelle mesure sa prétention à révéler le réel estelle justifiée? La première tâche que ces interrogations commandent est celle d'exposer les conceptions de la structure des théories scientifiques les plus marquantes de ce siècle. Dans cette période la philosophie des sciences a d'abord été dominée par l'empirisme logique et son approche formelle de la structure des théories scientifiques. L'empirisme logique est certes un mouvement qui a eu une histoire mouvementée et qui a été le théâtre de nombreuses modifications, mais une de ses thèses les plus persistantes peut le caractériser de façon générale: sa représentation de la théorie sous la forme d'un système d'énoncés. Pour désigner cette position, nous utiliserons l'expression «conception assertive» comme traduction de statement view. L'approche sémantique est une conception plus récente de la structure de la théorie qui semble peu à peu vouloir prendre la place de la conception assertive. Nous décrirons donc dans un premier temps ces deux approches afin de déterminer chaque fois la fagon dont le rapport de la théorie au réel est envisagé.
What Makes Induction Rational?
Authors: Armstrong D. M.
Published: April 2010

In this paper I put forward what I think is a new approach to the problem of induction. I sketched the approach in brief sections of a book published in 1983 (chap. 4, sec. 5 and chap. 6, sec. 7). The same idea had occurred to the English philosopher John Foster and he presented it in a paper at about the same time (1983).
Knowledge and Evidence
Authors: Roth Michael D.
Published: April 2010

This is an ambitious and frustrating book. Among the many virtues which Moser claims for it are all of the following: (a) it answers the need to counteract certain “epistemologically harmful muddles with careful distinctions and arguments” (p. 2); (b) it provides the reader with a “forceful” reply to both justification scepticism and knowledge scepticism and argues that both can be “effectively challenged, if not refuted” (p. 3); (c) it “solves” the Gettier problem (p. 233); and (d) it not only removes the “normative mystery” from epistemic concepts such as knowledge and justification, but provides a meta-justification which will allow us, the readers, to see why the theoretical account offered in its pages is preferable to its competitors (p. 2–3). It is worth mentioning that the competitors over whom Moser claims his theory has a “dialectical edge” (p. 3) include accounts authored by Chisholm, Lehrer, Goldman, Alston, Bonjour, Rorty, Foley and Stroud. As I said, this is an ambitious book.
Methodology, Ideology and Rationality: J. R. Brown'sThe Rational and the Social
Authors: Scott Iain C. , Irvine Andrew D.
Published: April 2010

Two important debates have characterized mainstream epistemology in recent years. The first is the debate between foundationalists and anti-foundationalists. The second is the debate over the details of a naturalized epistemology. Both debates have meant that traditional concepts of rationality and justification are now understood in a new light. Both debates have helped focus attention on the future direction of epistemology, its goals and its limitations.
Analogical Concepts: The Fourteenth-Century Background to Cajetan
Authors: Ashworth E. J.
Published: April 2010

In 1498 Cajetan published a short book, On the Analogy of Names, which is often regarded as a masterly summary of Aquinas's doctrine of analogy. It opens in the very first paragraph with an attack on three views of the concept of being (ens): first, that it is a disjunction of concepts; second, that it is an ordered group of concepts; and third, that it is a single, separate concept which is unequally participated by substances and accidents. A number of questions immediately spring to mind. Why are concepts being discussed when analogy is said by Cajetan to be a theory of language? What is meant by ‘concept’? Who held the views under attack and why? So far as I can tell, the extensive literature on both Aquinas and Cajetan offers no satisfactory answers to these questions.
Ockham's Supposed Elimination of Connotative Terms and His Ontological Parsimony
Authors: Tweedale Martin
Published: April 2010

Two of the best currently practising scholars of Ockham, Marilyn Adams and Paul Spade, seem to have accepted a reading of Ockham's ontological program which, although it contains much that is uncontroversially correct, attributes to Ockham a reductionist view that is on my interpretation of his works far too radical to be genuinely Ockham's. Their reading runs as follows. So far as entities go, Ockham accepts only particular substances and some particular qualities. Aristotle's categories, according to Ockham, are not 10 broad classes of radically different sorts of things, but rather are classes of non-complex terms arranged roughly according to the kinds of questions they can be used to answer. When we look at these terms we find that those in the category of substance and some in the category of quality are not definable by some longer expression synonymous with them but simply signify each of the members of a certain class of substances or qualities. These terms are said to be absolute. But other terms (some in the category of quality and all in the other categories, whether abstract or concrete) can either be replaced by a definition that is synonymous with the term defined or can be interpreted as making “exponible” the sentences in which they occur. These terms are all said to be connotative. It is in principle possible to reword all the sentences in which these connotative terms appear so that the only categorematic terms left are absolute terms from the categories of substance and quality.
La philosophie et son histoire: quelques réflexions à propos d'un livre récent de W. J. Courtenay
Authors: Lusignan Serge
Published: April 2010

Dans son ouvrage Schools and Scholars in Fourteenth-Century England, William J. Courtenay nous offre une riche synthèse historique sur la philosophie et la théologie en Angleterre au XIVe siècle. Ce travail mérite la plus grande attention, autant pour sa contribution à l'histoire de la pensée, que pour ses énoncés sur les rapports entre la philosophie et la société au Moyen Âge. Car je lis le livre de Courtenay comme un fructueux dialogue entre Clio et Philosophie, et c'est le point de vue qui retiendra mon attention. La présente contribution se veut davantage une réflexion à propos du livre, qu'un véritable compte rendu. Elle tente d'explorer les difficiles rapports entre l'histoire de la philosophie et l'histoire, sur lesquels Alain de Libera (1991) nous a livré ses idées, tout récemment.
Qualia and Materialism: Introduction
Authors: Ross Don , Thorp John
Published: April 2010

Though the days of consciousness-raising are mostly passed, the days of consciousness seem to be upon us, or, at least, to be upon philosophers. Dennett's recentConsciousness Explainedis the flagship for a flotilla of new major works on the subject, by Flanagan (1992), Jackendoff (1988), Searle (1992), Seager (1992) and others. It seems to be something of a convention in such work that one begins by complaining that consciousness is a sorely neglected topic among philosophers; this cliché has created the faintly comical situation in whicheveryoneis saying that no one is talking about consciousness. For our part, therefore, we shall seek to escape the convention by inverting it: here are yet more papers about consciousness.
Materialism, Functionalism and Supervenient Qualia
Authors: Marras Ausonio
Published: April 2010

Qualia are phenomenal properties of sensations and perceptual states: they are whatever it is that gives such states their “felt,” qualitative character. (In speaking of sensations, I speak of course not of mental objects or mental contents, but of mental events—ofsensings, notsensa.)
Reference and Competence: Moravcsik's Thought and Language
Authors: Richard Mark
Published: April 2010

The book under review consists of a “Problems” section, with chapters entitled “Ontology,” “Thought” and “Language”; and a “Proposals” section, with like-titled chapters. The first section is a survey; as might be expected of one of 126 pages, compression is the watchword. The reviewer felt that it did not live up to dust jacket copy, heralding a book “easily accessible to undergraduates.”
McGinn's Cognitive Closure
Authors: Hanson Philip P.
Published: April 2010

Can we succeed in giving consciousness a naturalistic explanation, that is, an explanation in “broadly physical terms” (p. 23)? This is the “problem of consciousness” which, along with other aspects of the mind-body problem, is explored by McGinn in a collection of eight independently written but related, sometimes overlapping papers, all but two previously published. The papers span a decade and divergent approaches. The resulting juxtaposition of two contrasting “resolutions” of the problem by the same author invites their comparison.
Aristotle and the Spheres of Motivation:De AnimaIII.11
Authors: Hutchinson D. S.
Published: April 2010

Motivations can often conflict. Suppose it is six o'clock and I want a drink; suppose also that I know that it would be unwise or inappropriate in my present circumstances to drink. In cases like this I feel a struggle inside me. For Plato and for Aristotle, such struggles were an important part of moral experience, and on their description and analysis depends much of Plato's and Aristotle's moral psychology. It is not well enough appreciated that, in this respect, Aristotle was an uncritical follower of Plato. If we understand Plato's theory and how little Aristotle departed from it, we will be able to make better sense of some difficult passages, especiallyDe AnimaIII.11, and we will even be able to solve the conundrum of the ‘sphere’ which has teased scholars for two thousand years.
Le statut de l'argument dialectique d'après.Réf soph. 11, 172a9–15
Authors: Dorion Louis-André
Published: April 2010

La détermination du statut de la dialectique aristotélicienne aura certes été l'une des principales tâches auxquelles se seront consacrés les chercheurs de cette seconde moitié du siècle. Le nombre d'études qui traitent de cette question est en effet considérable. Or en dépit de tous ces travaux, l'interprétation de certains passages, où Aristote traite expressément du statut de la dialectique, demeure controversée. C'est entre autres le cas d'un court passage du chapitre 11 desRéfutations sophistiques(=RS), chapitre à propos duquel É. Weil a déjà écrit, dans un article célèbre, qu'il «est décisif pour l'interprétation de la dialectique». Nous nous efforcerons donc, dans un premier temps, d'interpréter ce passage (11, 172a9–15) à la lumière du contexte précis où il s'inscrit; puis, dans un second temps, nous présenterons et discuterons les interprétations que certains des plus grands aristotélisants contemporains (G. E. L. Owen, J. Owens et P. Aubenque) ont données de ce passage.
Aristotle's Apodeictic Syllogism
Authors: Johnston David
Published: April 2010

In the Prior Analytics Aristotle examines syllogisms that contain apodeictic and problematic premisses, as well as combinations of these with assertoric premisses. Of these various syllogisms, it is the mixed apodeictic-assertoric type that has received the most attention. Aristotle discusses this type of syllogism in Prior Analytics I.ix–xii. In this paper I will deal primarily with these syllogisms, which I will henceforth refer to simply as ‘apodeictic’.
On the Aim of Scientific Theories in Relating to the World: A Defence of the Semantic Account
Authors: Baur Michael
Published: April 2010

According to the received view of scientific theories, a scientific theory is an axiomatic-deductive linguistic structure which must include some set of guidelines (“correspondence rules”) for interpreting its theoretical terms with reference to the world of observable phenomena. According to the semantic view, a scientific theory need not be formulated as an axiomatic-deductive structure with correspondence rules, but need only specify models which are said to be “isomorphic” with actual phenomenal systems. In this paper, I consider both the received and semantic views as they bear on the issue of how a theory relates to the world (Section 1). Then I offer a critique of some arguments frequently put forth in support of the semantic view (Section 2). Finally, I suggest a more convincing “meta-methodological” argument (based on the thought of Bernard Lonergan) in favour of the semantic view (Section 3).
Thomas Pogge's Rawlsian Revival
Authors: Superson Anita M.
Published: April 2010

In Realizing Rawls, Thomas Pogge defends a Rawlsian conception of justice. The book is divided into three main parts; this discussion will concentrate on the first two. Part 1 constitutes a defence of some aspects of Rawls's theory against objections raised by Nozick and Michael Sandel. This is followed by a second part on the two principles of justice—what they amount to, and some applications of them. Part 3 argues that the Rawlsian scheme should apply globally, not merely to a single state (i.e., the principles of justice should govern the entire world, not just one society). Readers will find Pogge's book very detailed and well organized (arguments are separated into numbered sections and subsections). Pogge defends his claims with numerous helpful references to Rawls and his critics. His is a serious book, though I found the pace to be a bit slow at times, mostly because a lot of time is spent examining alternative interpretations before rejecting them.
What Sort of Science Is Evolutionary Biology?
Authors: Matthen Mohan
Published: April 2010

Paul Thompson's new book,The Structure of Biological Theories, is about the formalization of evolutionary biology. He is primarily concerned, he says, with the logical, epistemological, and methodological aspects of biological theorizing. The main theme of the book is the opposition between what Thompson calls the syntactic and the semantic conceptions of theories. He wishes to establish that the semantic account is superior to the syntactic in at least three areas: first, it offers a more faithful account of population biology; second, it facilitates a conception of evolutionary biology as a family of interacting theories; finally, it offers us a richer framework for the resolution of methodological problems that have plagued sociobiology and evolutionary epistemology.
Interests
Authors: Goldstick D
Published: April 2010

De manière générale, les désirs sont aux intérêts ce que les croyances sont aux vérités. Étant admis que ce qui est conforme à vos intérêts est ce que vous désireriez, tout compte fait, si vous étiez en possession d'une information telle au sujet de ses effets potentiels qu'aucune information additionnelle sur ces effets ne modifierait vos désirs, la conclusion selon laquelle vous désirez déjà, tout compte fait, favoriser vos intéràts peut être tirée moyennant certaines suppositions plausibles en philosophie de l'esprit.
L'éthique du discours et le problème de la connaissance morale
Authors: Courtois Stéphane
Published: April 2010

The aim of this article is to assess the coherence of the metaethical positions on which discourse ethics as developed by Habermas and Apel rests. After showing that one is faced here with a non-descriptivist, anti-realist but cognitivist moral theory, I examine whether a non-descriptivist cognitivism, on the one hand, and an anti-realist cognitivism, on the other hand, can consistently be held. I maintain that the problem of the relation between cognitivism and non-descriptivism is adequately solved by the two authors, but that the problem of the relation between cognitivism and anti-realism is still waiting for an appropriate answer, which I put forth in my article.
L'être-avec chez Heidegger
Authors: Bolduc René
Published: April 2010

Le problème de l'être-avec et de la socialité chez Heidegger a déjà une longue tradition de commentateurs. Ceux-ci se distinguent par la pluralité de leurs approches: se situant parfois à l'opposé de la méthode d'Être et temps, ils se portent alors à la défense d'autrui, insistent sur l'aspect dialogique et sur l'importance de la rationalité du discours dans le monde de la vie (Lebenswelt). D'autres encore, sans nécessairement remettre en question la méthodologie heideggérienne, défendent ou réinterprètent autrement sa phénoménologie de l'existence d'autrui: parmi eux, certains s'en tiennent uniquement à l'analytique existentiale, tandis que d'autres élargissent l'horizon de leurs critiques en tenant compte du projet global de la pensée de Heidegger. Il y a enfin les commentateurs pour lesquels cette question n'est abordée que dans le contexte politique de sa pensée.
Logique inductive et soutien probabiliste
Authors: Zwirn Denis , Zwirn Hervé
Published: April 2010

Karl Popper et David Miller (P.M.) ont soutenu l'idée selon laquelle le soutien probabiliste positif (s(h,e) = p(h,e) − p(h) > 0) que e apporte á h, lorsque de h on déduit e (h ⊢ e), ne justifie en rien l'espoir de pouvoir construire une logique inductive (L.I.) fondée sur le calcul des probabilityés.
Rationality Triumphant: Gauthier's Moral Theory
Authors: Kavka Gregory S.
Published: April 2010

Among major contractarian theorists, David Gauthier has the most ambitious philosophical aims. John Rawls has recently made clear that his theory of justice isnotintended to provide a timeless and culturally invariant account of justice derived from the theory of rational choice. Yet Gauthier, in his rightly acclaimed and widely influential writings, attempts to provide just such an account of morality and distributive justice. With this new publication of a collection of his most important articles from the past two decades following, by four years, the appearance of his systematic treatise on ethics (Morals by Agreement) we are now in a good position to assess Gauthier's moral theory.
Longino's Social Knowledge
Authors: Mason-Grant Joan
Published: April 2010

The apparently limitless philosophical terrain marked out by the debate over the relation between science and values is constructively revisited in Helen Longino's Science as Social Knowledge. This project is motivated by the view that the ideal of value neutrality places unrealistic constraints on science. Longino seeks to demonstrate that even “good science” embodies social and political interests and values because it is, irreducibly, a social activity. Her strategy is to weave a position which can make sense of both ideology and evidence in the practice of science; her underlying philosophical critique is that the standard impasse between positivism and wholism is structured by an individualist conception of science. In the development of her analysis, she examines and reworks the concepts of evidence, reasoning and objectivity to accommodate her understanding of the social practices which constitute inquiry. She then appeals to the highly charged field of research on the biological bases of alleged sex differences in temperament, behaviour and cognition, to illustrate concretely how her analysis makes sense of a variety of interactions between scientific inquiry and socio-cultural values in contemporary science. Longino thus provides an opening for modes of inquiry, such as feminist science, which are self-consciously shaped by specified socio-political interests and values; she argues that, far from contaminating science, such projects can be more objective than that mode of inquiry practised under the standard myth of asocial, acultural, apolitical objectivity characteristic of modern epistemologies.
Jean Pic de la Mirandole (1463–1494): quatre ouvrages récents
Authors: Valcke Louis
Published: April 2010

En ce cinquième centenaire de la mort de Jean Pic de la Mirandole, il peut être pertinent de présenter quatre ouvrages récents ayant trait à l'œuvre du Mirandolien. Trois d'entre eux présentent des traductions, qui en partie se recoupent, en partie sont complémentaires, et qu'il est intéressant de comparer entre elles de facon analytique et critique. Le quatrième ouvrage propose un vaste exposé systématique de l'œuvre de Jean Pic. Vu son ampleur, il mérite d'être considéré séparément des trois autres.
Matter, Form and Object: Rejoinder to Sidelle
Authors: Denkel Arda
Published: April 2010

Aristotelian notions such as matter, form and substance (or object) should be used carefully; not only is the rich tradition in their background marked by variety of interpretation, even Aristotle's own use of these concepts is far from uniform. In his different works, matter, form and (primary) substance display contents that do not always agree. There is reason for believing that in the Metaphysics Zeta the notion of form embodies (or amounts to) essence, and that accordingly something without essence does not qualify as substance. This cannot be generalized or regarded as Aristotle's standard view, however, for in the Physics there are contexts in which the form is not conceived as (or does not embody) essence. There, “the form or shape” is the arrangement of the substance's parts, or the object's shape, in addition to either all or some of its qualities (i.e., the sensible shape). Outside the Metaphysics, substance, too, seems to be a less distinguished entity. In the Physics, and especially in the Categories, substance is anything capable of independent existence, any particular concrete thing that is a bearer of attributes. To the extent that our modern “object” corresponds to Aristotle's primary substance, it has a similar polysemy. While in some contexts it will mean an articulated object belonging to a specific kind, in others it will denote bodies without organized structure, that is, it will have as extension the particular bits and pieces that fill the world. A similar diversity applies to matter. When understood, for example, as a chunk out of which an artist casts her statue, matter is an object (a substratum), a body, itself endowed with a boundary (a form) and a multitude of properties. But matter can be much simpler than that; it can be a plain homoeomere, a mere element, or as in prime matter, may lack every actual attribute. When in my “Matter and Objecthood” I criticized Henry Laycock's views propounded in “Some Questions of Ontology” I found comparable ambiguities transposed to contemporary discourse. In the paper just cited, Laycock examines the ontic status of matter, contrasting it with objects as particular concrete things; throughout his discussion no radical distinction is made between articulated objects and unorganized bodies. In my criticism I employed ‘object’ in the same inclusive sense.
La «Dialectique» de Schleiermacher
Authors: Brito Emilio
Published: April 2010

Peu de temps après la publication de sesDiscours sur la religion(1799), et dans le contexte de sa discussion avec les systèmes de Fichte et de Schelling, Schleiermacher a pris conscience de la nécessité d'élaborer une «doctrine de la science», ayant pour tâche de thématiser la connexion des sciences et dé dégager la connaissance métaphysique suprême. Sous le nom de «Dialectique», notre auteur a présenté à plusieurs reprises cette science idéale, sous-jacente aux parties réelles du système philosophique — aux sciences qui ont pour domaine l'effectivité finie — et ayant pour mission de fonder l'unité de la physique et de l'éthique, les deux sciences réelles suprêmes. Le but du présent article est d'offrir une vue déensemble de cet ouvrage, encore peu connu du public francophone. Une premiére section situe le projet de Schleiermacher par rapport aux “triumvirs de l'Idéalisme allemand” (Fichte, Schelling et Hegel). Les deux sections suivantes présentent la partie «transcendantale» de laDialektik, centrée sur la question métaphysique du fondement du savoir, de la possibilité d'une conformité entre la pensée et l'être. Une dernière section traite, plus sommairement, de la partie “technique” de l'ouvrage, axée sur le problème logique de la connexion et de la cohérence des divers domaines du savoir.
La logique interne de la théorie des probabilités
Authors: Gauthier Yvon
Published: April 2010

J'appelle empiriques ou a posteriori les probabilités déterminées par l'application de la théorie mathématique des probabilités à un domaine empirique, principalement la physique. La logique inductive ou la logique probabilitaire, les probabilités conditionnelles, etc. sont exclues de mon propos.
Matter and Objecthood
Authors: Denkel Arda
Published: April 2010

In this paper I will combat the claim that concrete matter can exist independently of objecthood. This view is a denial of the Aristotelian principles that only particular objects (primary substances) exist apart (independently), and that as a condition of concreteness, matter must have acquired form. For, it propounds that matter can be concrete and general.
The Polycentric Perspective: A Canadian Alternative to Rorty
Authors: Rabb J. Douglas
Published: April 2010

Canadian philosopher Rupert C. Lodge (1886–1961) developed a pluralistic or “comparative philosophy” in which he adopted what I shall call the polycentric perspective. The polycentric perspective recognizes that since philosophical discourse, indeed all discourse, is necessarily linear, “of only one dimension”, it follows that no one metaphysical system, no one philosophical perspective, can ever be considered adequate on its own. In this paper I argue that the philosophy of pluralism, the adoption of the polycentric perspective by Lodge and other early Canadian philosophers, can and does serve as an adequate answer and intriguing alternative to Richard Rorty's challenge to Speculative Philosophy in The Consequences of Pragmatism and Philosophy and the Mirror of Nature.
Sumner on Natural Rights
Authors: Hurka Thomas
Published: April 2010

I am pleased to participate in this joint Critical Notice, in part because it is an opportunity to pay a debt of gratitude. Thirteen years ago, as a Toronto undergraduate with interests in things like Hegelian metaphysics, I enrolled in an ethics seminar with Wayne Sumner. I had not done any ethics before, and took this course largely because I thought I ought to. But it turned out to be the best course of my undergraduate career, and permanently changed my philosophical interests. Having learned what I did in the seminar I have been doing ethics ever since—so, thank you, Wayne.
Descartes' Legacy and Deep Ecology
Authors: Miller Peter
Published: April 2010

When the history of philosophy is painted in broad strokes, the philosophy of Descartes is generally regarded as the major watershed between classical and modern outlooks. Although Descartes himself was more concerned with epistemology and metaphysics than with axiology, his successors have generally drawn as an axiological corollary of his metaphysical bifurcation of reality the thesis that all final or intrinsic values, if they exist at all, exist only in the domain of conscious subjects, or at the very least as relata dependent upon such subjects. These subjects may indeed extend beyond humankind to include gods or beasts or even, according to the speculative flights of some, the “occasions of experience” of Whiteheadian panpsychists or the universal mind of the idealists. The common denominator of all these accounts, however, is that values essentially depend upon human or quasi-human entities, i.e., conscious, experiencing subjects. This post-Cartesian thesis is in marked contrast to the axiological realism of the classical world of Plato and Aristotle, which concurs with large segments of common sense in finding objects to exist with their axiological properties independently of human and similar subjects. The Cartesian legacy in axiology has been to encourage the exploration of human values and experiences of value while creating a moratorium on the investigation of subject-independent values.
The Success of Hyperrational Utility Maximizers in Iterated Prisoner's Dilemma: A Response to Sobel
Authors: Curtis Robert A.
Published: April 2010

Several recent commentators have suggested that for fully rational agents who find themselves in iterated prisoner's dilemmas of indefinite length, co-operation is the rational strategy. Their argument is that these fully rational agents can be taught, through the co-operative actions of other agents, to bypass the dominant move of noncooperation and co-operate instead. The proponents of the “teaching strategy” seem to have ignored the compelling argument of Jordan Howard Sobel. While the teaching argument may work for agents who are less than purely rational, Sobel has pointed out that hyperrational utility maximizers cannot be taught; they reason deductively, not inductively, as the “teaching argument” requires.
Epicurus and Friendship
Authors: Stern-Gillet Suzanne
Published: April 2010

Ever since classical times, both Greek and Roman, friendship as a philosophical topic has been on the wane. The only notable exception is Montaigne's essay which, however, owes much to classical treatments. This decline of philosophical interest in friendship is not easy to account for. Alasdair McIntyre's overall thesis in After Virtue seemingly affords him with a ready interpretation. The progressive atomization of society, together with the concurrent growth of individualism that characterizes the modern era, claims McIntyre, are responsible for the demotion of friendship from the public to the private sphere.
Wilson's Laws and Other Worlds
Authors: Martin Robert M.
Published: April 2010

I like the idea behind this book. It is an empiricist alternative to the powerful and influential contemporary rationalist position on scientific law, causality, and counterfactuals, associated with Chisholm and David Lewis, which “takes its inspiration from modal logic and set theory [and] involves … an assumption of non-truth-functional connectives to define unanalyzable natural necessities, or defines such connectives and such necessities in terms of an ontology of possible worlds”. Wilson's views, springing from Hume and Nelson Goodman, involve no unobservables such as natural necessities or possible worlds, but are based instead on good old Humean laws of constant conjunction. How lovely if Wilson could pull this off!
Laws and Other Worlds:A Response to Martin
Authors: Wilson Fred
Published: April 2010

Robert Martin, in his review of myLaws and Other Worlds, has grasped the thrust of much of the argument. I would like to respond to three specific points that he makes, and to add a couple of more general comments that will bring out some other aspects of the structure of the argument that he misses, to try to show why I think the sort of enterprise the book attempts is worthwhile, more important than Martin's own pragmatic tendencies will perhaps allow.
Eternal Recurrence, Identity and Literary Characters
Authors: Conter David
Published: April 2010

“Think of our world,” writes Robert Nozick, “as a novel in which you yourself are a character.” As we shall see, this is easier said than done. In that case, would the project be worth the effort? Yes, says Alexander Nehamas. InNietzsche: Life as Literature, Nehamas suggests that we would have a better grasp of some hard doctrines of Nietzsche's, if we accepted literary texts as providing a model for the world, and literary characters as yielding models of ourselves. The idea is intriguing, in part because Nietzsche presents difficulties, and in part because it has some of the alluring obscurity of Nozick's playful charge. In what follows, however, I shall argue that Nehamas's proposals about Nietzsche and literature are not particularly helpful, that Nietzsche's doctrines remain hard to grasp even after we have considered the nature of literary texts, and that Nehamas himself is misled by ambiguities connected with literary characters and the fictional worlds they inhabit.