....Papers
Here are some of my philosophical papers. All are works in progress and comments are most welcome. (Internet Explorer is recommended for viewing. Some will not display properly at all in Netscape, and most look better with Internet Explorer.)
Can Instrumental Reasoning Stand Alone? discusses an important paper by Christine Korsgaard which argues that instrumental reasoning cannot be autonomous – that in order for us to understand the normative force of instrumental reasoning, we must admit that there are other normative principles as well.
In Chalmers and the Self-Knowledge Problem, I examine David Chalmers’ interesting argument against physicalism. I claim that even if it is sound, that does not give us adequate reason to accept its conclusion.
The research program of evolutionary psychology centers upon the attempt to identify cognitive adaptations, evolved features of the mind that are adapted to the performance of specific sorts of cognitive tasks. The program has come in for criticism on several counts to the effect that it is, in one way or another, misconceived. In Cognitive Adaptations: Some Conceptual Issues, I address some of these.
In Deciding Where to Meet for Dinner, I look at a problem involved in coming to an agreement – specifically, how two people can rationally and non-manipulatively agree to something that is not, considered by itself, the first choice of either. Each would prefer to be at a selected place only if the other will be there, but not otherwise. How do they agree? It may sound easy, but it’s not!
Foundationalism, Skepticism, Coherentism was originally written as an informal paper for a discussion group I was part of. It has changed a little – even acquired a footnote! – but it’s still fairly informal. Its theme might be said to be that foundationalism and skepticism feed on one another and that what we need to do is not to take sides with either the foundationalists or the skeptics, but to transcend the debate between them.
In How Equalization Upsets
Equality, I discuss arguments that claim to show that considerations of
the diminishing marginal utility of money support redistribution from the
wealthier to the poorer. Those arguments, I claim, fail even on a favorable
interpretation. They do not show that total utility would be increased either by
equalization or by moves in the direction of equalization of incomes.
The Backward Induction Paradox shows up in considering non-cooperative, non-zero-sum iterated games that will be played for a known, finite number of rounds. In How Not to Resolve the Backward Induction Paradox, I examine one well-known attempt, by Philip Pettit and Robert Sugden, to show that the argument for the existence of the Backward Induction Paradox is unsound. They offer a resolution which aims to adhere to game-theoretic orthodoxy. I argue that the attempt fails and suggest that if the paradox is to be resolved, we will have to modify at least some of the orthodox postulates.
Identity: Some General Considerations is actually excerpted from a longer paper addressing questions about personal identity. This portion of it, however, attempts to say something about the logic of identity and may be of broader interest.
We’ve all heard that “ignorance of the law is no excuse.” Well, why not? In Ignorance as an Excuse, I look at some possibly surprising implications that can be derived from the assumption that it is reasonable to rule out ignorance as an excuse.
On the face of things, Machiavelli seems to subscribe to some kind of psychological egoism, the doctrine that we all are so constituted psychologically that we cannot but act self-interestedly. In Machiavelli’s Conception of Human Nature, I maintain that the appearances are misleading, and that, though he does express a view of human nature, there is no particular reason to saddle him with the defense of psychological egoism.
Mill’s attempted proof that utility is the standard of morals has been famously unsatisfactory to critics almost since he composed it, and he has been charged with committing any number of transparent fallacies. In Mill’s Proof of Utility, I propose a more sympathetic interpretation – one which does not, indeed, remove all grounds for suspicion that something has gone wrong, but which defends his argument against some of the more common charges.
Here are three short papers on the meaning of life, Must a Bad Life be Meaningless?, Nagel's Meaning and Projects and the Meaning of LIfe.
In P and Possibly Not-P?, I start with the consideration of a very old problem, Aristotle’s discussion of tomorrow’s sea-battle – which may or may not occur, depending upon some chance event. He seems to argue, and I do argue, that we need an additional truth-value – say ‘indeterminate’ in addition to ‘true’ and ‘false’ – in order to accommodate such cases.
In Plan and Execution, I begin with the consideration of a problem connected with carrying out plans previously adopted. According to standard versions of decision theory, every step to be taken in the execution of the plan must be preferred to its alternatives at the time it is taken. But this requirement implies that there may be some plans, the outcomes of which are preferred to their alternatives but which cannot rationally be executed. This seems unsatisfactory, and E.F. McClennen has proposed a revisionary understanding of cases of this sort, modeling them as problems in interactive choice. I examine his proposal and conclude that it is not revisionary enough.
Roger Scruton has defended a version of conservatism that places a heavy emphasis on the role of tradition and the communities in which we live in shaping us and setting the parameters of what can be good for us. In this, his position strongly resembles that of many communitarians. In Scruton’s Illiberalism, I try to sort out (some of) what’s right and wrong in his thesis about the social embeddedness of the self and look at the bearing of those arguments on liberalism.
In Subjectivism and What Makes One’s Life Go Better, I examine a couple of prominent versions of the theory that a person’s well-being is some function of her attitudes and argue that, as so far developed, the theory does not have the resources to disentangle the impact of self-directed and other-directed motivationally salient attitudes upon a person’s well-being.
In Sunk Costs, I argue that the widely accepted claim that attending to sunk costs is irrational can only be defended upon terms that would condemn promise-keeping, which almost no one regards as symptomatic of irrationality, as well. Since the irrationality of honoring sunk costs flows straightforwardly from the best-known account of instrumental reasoning, we have reason to question the adequacy of that account. At the end, I sketch a view in terms of which the honoring of sunk costs may (sometimes) be rational.
The Basis of Liberty-Rights discusses three approaches to the defense of substantial rights to personal liberty – in terms of appeals to the intrinsic value of liberty, to consequentialist considerations, and to the importance of autonomy.
In The Mind-Body Problem: Towards a Second-Best Solution, I argue that though it is not the best that we may reasonably hope for, eliminativism is a promising approach to the mind-body problem and that the principal objections to it are based on misunderstandings of what it involves and implies.
Does it matter whether we adhere to a convention or not? Does a convention or custom or tradition give us reasons for acting one way rather than another? How could it – when the convention could have been different? In The Normative Weight of Convention, I take some initial steps in the direction of answering this. It’s an issue I’d like to get back to at greater length.
What is a state, a government? How is it different from other organizations? (Compare corporations, labor unions, charities, criminal gangs. Is there anything a government does that’s different from the kinds of things these other organizations do? Is it just that it does more of them in a single package?) In Towards an Account of the State, I look at some proposed definitions and offer one of my own.
Hey, would you like to read some other stuff (mostly correspondence)? Besides the mainly academic material above, I’ve corresponded quite a bit with several people, sometimes on philosophical themes, sometimes not. What you’ll find is a selection from that somewhat less polished material, usually with names changed to protect the guilty and lightly edited.
