What You Know When You Know an Answer to a Question

A significant argument for the claim that knowing‐wh is knowing‐that, implicit in much of the literature, including Stanley and Williamson (2001), is spelt out and challenged. The argument includes the assumption that a subject's state of knowing‐wh is constituted by their involvement in a relation with an answer to a question. And it involves the assumption that answers to questions are propositions or facts. One of Lawrence Powers’ counterexamples to the conjunction of these two assumptions is developed, responses to it are rebutted, and the possibility of rejecting the second rather than the first of these assumptions is explored briefly.     

Modified Frankfurt-type counterexamples and flickers of freedom

A great deal of attention has been paid recently to the claim that traditional Frankfurt-type counterexamples to the Principle of Alternative Possibilities (PAP), which depend for their success on the presence of a perfectly reliable indicator (or prior sign) of what an agent will freely do if left to act on his own, are guilty of begging the question against incompatibilists, since such indicators seem to presuppose a deterministic relation between an agent’s free action and its causal antecedents. Objections of this sort have given rise to considerable efforts to construct alternative Frankfurt-type counterexamples that do not rely on prior signs of this kind and so do not presuppose determinism in a way that incompatibilists should find objectionable. One consequence of this shift in the way Frankfurt-type counterexamples are formulated is that it provides an opportunity for the forceful resurgence of certain versions of the so-called flicker defense of PAP. In this paper I develop two versions of the flicker defense, indicate their advantages over other versions of this strategy, and defend them against objections. Insofar as either of these is successful, it will show not only that PAP has yet to be falsified by any of the modified Frankfurt-type counterexamples currently on offer but that cases of this sort are in principle incapable of falsifying PAP.     

Perception naturalised: relocation and the sensible qualities

This paper offers a partial defence of a Sellarsian-inspired form of scientific realism. It defends the relocation strategy that Sellars adopts in his project of reconciling the manifest and scientific images. It concentrates on defending the causal analysis of perception that is essential to his treatment of sensible qualities. One fundamental metaphysical issue in perception theory concerns the nature of the perceptual relation; it is argued that a philosophical exploration of this issue is continuous with the scientific investigation of perceptual processes. Perception, it is argued, can, and should, be naturalised. A challenge for any account of perception arises from the fact that a subject’s experiences are connected with particular objects. We need to supply principled grounds for identifying which external physical object the subject stands in a perceptual relation to when they have an experience. According to the particularity objection presented in the paper, naive realism (or disjunctivism) does not constitute an independently viable theory since, taken on its own, it is unable to answer the objection. In appealing to a ‘direct experiential relation’, it posits a relation that cannot be identified independently of the underlying causal facts. A proper understanding of one central function of perception, as guiding extended patterns of actions, supports a causal analysis of perception. It allows us to draw up a set of necessary and sufficient conditions for perceiving that avoids well-known counterexamples. An analysis of this kind is congruent with the scientific account, according to which experiences are interpreted as inner states: sensible qualities, such as colours, are in the mind (but not as objects of perception). A Sellarsian version of the relocation story is thus vindicated.

     

Secondary Qualities and Self‐Location1

There is a strong pull to the idea that there is some metaphysically interesting distinction between the fully real, objective, observer‐independent qualities of things as they are in themselves, and the less‐than‐fully‐real, subjective, observer‐dependent qualities of things as they are for us. Call this (putative) distinction the primary/secondary quality distinction. The distinction between primary and secondary qualities is philosophically interesting because it is (a) often quite attractive to draw such a distinction, and (b) incredibly hard to spell it out in any kind of satisfying and sensible way. I attempt such a spelling‐out after first trying to pin down in more detail what we want from the primary/secondary quality distinction, and saying a bit about why that is such a hard thing to get.     

Subject‐Involving Luck

In recent years, philosophers have tended to think of luck as being a relation between an event (taken in the broadest sense of the term) and a subject; to give an account of luck is to fill in the right‐hand side of the following biconditional: an event e is lucky for a subject S if and only if ____. We can call such accounts of luck subject‐relative accounts of luck, since they attempt to spell out what it is for an event to be lucky relative to a subject. This essay argues that we should understand subject‐relative luck as a secondary phenomenon. What is of philosophical interest is giving an account of subject‐involving luck, i.e., filling in the right‐hand side of this biconditional: it is a matter of luck that S ?s iff ____. The essay argues that one of the upshots of focusing on subject‐involving luck is that lack of control accounts of luck (LCALs) become more attractive. In particular, a range of counterexamples to LCALs of subject‐relative luck do not apply to LCALs of subject‐involving luck.     

AGAINST LEWIS's NEW THEORY OF CAUSATION: A STORY WITH THREE MORALS

Abstract: A recent paper by David Lewis, “Causation as Influence”, provides a new theory of causation. This paper presents an argument against the theory, using a series of counterexamples that are, I think, of independent interest to philosophers of causation. I argue that (a) the relation asserted by a claim of the form “C was a cause of E” is distinct from the relation of causal influence, (b) the former relation depends very much, contra Lewis, on the individuation conditions for the event E, and (c) Lewis's account is unsatisfactory as an analysis of either kind of relation. The counterexamples presented in this paper provide, I suggest, some insight into the reasons for the failure of counterfactual accounts of causal relations.     

Methods as Tools

O'Keefe argues that the logic of experiment‐wise error correction is flawed, presenting a number of counterexamples as evidence for his claim. He asserts that there is no consistent principle that discriminates legitimate from absurd uses of this logic. I supply such a principle and defend it with his own counterexamples. In sum, O'Keefe's critique raises important methodological questions, provokes discussion that may help answer them, but goes too far in indicting the logic of experiment‐wise error correction.     

What are the Categories in Sein und Zeit? Brandom on Heidegger on Zuhandenheit

In his essay, ‘Heidegger's Categories in Sein und Zeit’, Robert Brandom argues that Heidegger, particularly in the notion of Zuhandenheit, anticipates his own normatively pragmatist conception of intentionality. He attempts to demonstrate this by marshalling short passages from right across the relevant sections of Sein und Zeit in such a way that they do seem to say what Brandom claims. But does one reach the same conclusion when one examines, more or less in sentence‐by‐sentence fashion, the large slab of text in which Heidegger introduces the notion of Zuhandenheit? I believe not. First, however, let us look at how Brandom reads Heidegger, in particular, how he interprets the notion of Zuhandenheit, which, in contrast both to Macquarrie and Robinson and to Brandom, I shall translate as ready‐to‐handedness. ^{1 1}This translation is preferable because it emphasises the character of the ready‐to‐hand as what is and will appear as relevant to ongoing practical activity in a genuinely occasional sense. Macquarrie and Robinson translate Zuhandenheit as readiness‐to‐hand, but this is something an entity possesses when it is ready‐for‐such‐and‐such should an appropriate kind of subject be there to make use of it. The term is in fact more accurately translated as ready‐to‐handedness, i.e. something an entity possesses when it is in a position to help a subject which is actually there to be helped by it. Obviously, the Zuhandenheit of an entity entails its readiness‐to‐hand, but not conversely.
     

Why Take Both Boxes?

The crucial premise of the standard argument for two‐boxing in Newcomb's problem, a causal dominance principle, is false. We present some counterexamples. We then offer a metaethical explanation for why the counterexamples arise. Our explanation reveals a new and superior argument for two‐boxing, one that eschews the causal dominance principle in favor of a principle linking rational choice to guidance and actual value maximization.     

Complexity,evolution, and creativity in new management theories … or,in other words,what is the connection between an immune system network and a corporation?

Many studies about organizational experiences and theories converge today in the idea that the economic factor, most competitive now in the production of value, is the de-materialization of the economical and organizational processes. Immaterial factors (like knowledge, services, information, relationships, virtual transactions, etc.) are the competitive and crucial innovations for future competition and, at the same time, the most important criteria to rethinking and understanding the future organization. If this is true, we can realize that every person in organizations, every personal history in organizations, or better the evolutionary uniqueness of every person in organizations, is the real depositary and bearer of this de-materialization.     

Damned If You Do; Damned If You Don’t!

This paper discusses the Principle of Normative Invariance: ‘An action’s moral status does not depend on whether or not it is performed.’ I show the importance of this principle for arguments regarding actualism and other variations on the person-affecting restriction, discuss and rebut arguments in favor of the principle, and then discuss five counterexamples to it. I conclude that the principle as it stands is false; and that if it is modified to avoid the counterexamples, it is gutted of any interest or power.

On uniqueness in candecomp/parafac

One of the basic issues in the analysis of three-way arrays by CANDECOMP/PARAFAC (CP) has been the question of uniqueness of the decomposition. Kruskal (1977) has proved that uniqueness is guaranteed when the sum of thek-ranks of the three component matrices involved is at least twice the rank of the solution plus 2. Since then, little has been achieved that might further qualify Kruskal's sufficient condition. Attempts to prove that it is also necessary for uniqueness (except for rank 1 or 2) have failed, but counterexamples to necessity have not been detected. The present paper gives a method for generating the class of all solutions (or at least a subset of that class), given a CP solution that satisfies certain conditions. This offers the possibility to examine uniqueness for a great variety of specific CP solutions. It will be shown that Kruskal's condition is necessary and sufficient when the rank of the solution is three, but that uniqueness may hold even if the condition is not satisfied, when the rank is four or higher. The authors are obliged to Henk Kiers for commenting on a previous draft, and to Tom Snijders for suggesting a proof mentioned in the appendix.     

“In One”: The Bearer Issue and the Principles of Exemplification

Traditionally, the so-called exemplification or the relation between the particular and the universal has been one of the three central problems making up the classical problem of universals: (1) What is a particular? (2) What is a universal? (3) What is the relation between the particular and the universal? I used the expression “classical problem of universals” instead of “the problem of universals” since the classical formulation of the problem could be said to contain a questionable assumption, namely that substance should be the bearer “in” which are the entities of (other) categories. Under these circumstances, a neutral approach to the problem of universals could consist in reformulating the three problems of the classical problem as follows: (4) What is the fundamental bearer of categories? (5) What categories are there? (6) What is the relation between the fundamental bearer and the categories? My purpose in this paper is to answer the latter three questions. In order to accomplish this task, I shall discuss the views of two leading figures in substance-ontology, Aristotle and Jonathan Lowe, and the views of two leading figures in fact-ontology, Gustav Bergmann and Reinhardt Grossmann. I shall answer the first question by claiming that the fundamental bearer of categories is facts; the second, by pointing out that it depends on the answer to the previous one; and the third, by showing that the relation between the fundamental bearer and the categories is the one between facts and its constituents, not between a substance or particular and its accidents or properties. In this connection, I shall argue that the “in” of property exemplification should be categorially reconstructed in order for entities other than properties, say, particulars, relations, connectives, numbers, and even facts, to be “in” facts. This categorial reconstruction will also argued for with respect to the Principle of Exemplification.     

Accidentally True Belief and Warrant

The Proper Functionist account of warrant – like many otherexternalist accounts – is vulnerable to certain Gettier-style counterexamples involving accidentally true beliefs. In this paper, I briefly survey the development of the account, noting the way it was altered in response to such counterexamples. I then argue that Alvin Plantinga's latest amendment to the account is flawed insofar as it rules out cases of true beliefs which do intuitively strike us as knowledge, and that a conjecture recently put forward by Thomas Crisp is also defective. I conclude by presenting my own suggestion as to how the account can be made less vulnerable to counterexamples involving accidentally true beliefs. Although I stay within the confines of Proper Functionism here, I think that my proposal (modulo a few details) could be attached to other externalist accounts of warrant as well.     

Can probability theory explain why closure is both intuitive and prone to counterexamples?

Epistemic closure under known implication is the principle that knowledge of \(\varphi\) and knowledge of \(\varphi \rightarrow \psi\), together, imply knowledge of \(\psi\). This principle is intuitive, yet several putative counterexamples have been formulated against it. This paper addresses the question, why is epistemic closure both intuitive and prone to counterexamples? In particular, the paper examines whether probability theory can offer an answer to this question based on four strategies. The first probability-based strategy rests on the accumulation of risks. The problem with this strategy is that risk accumulation cannot accommodate certain counterexamples to epistemic closure. The second strategy is based on the idea of evidential support, that is, a piece of evidence supports a proposition whenever it increases the probability of the proposition. This strategy makes progress and can accommodate certain putative counterexamples to closure. However, this strategy also gives rise to a number of counterintuitive results. Finally, there are two broadly probabilistic strategies, one based on the idea of resilient probability and the other on the idea of assumptions that are taken for granted. These strategies are promising but are prone to some of the shortcomings of the second strategy. All in all, I conclude that each strategy fails. Probability theory, then, is unlikely to offer the account we need.     

The Agent‐Relative Probability Threshold of Hope

Nearly all contributors to the philosophical analysis of hope agree that if an agent hopes that p, she both desires that p and assigns to p a probability which is greater than zero, but less than one. According to the widely‐endorsed Standard Account, these two conditions are also (jointly) sufficient for ‘hoping that’. Ariel Meirav has recently argued, however, that the Standard Account fails to distinguish hoping for a prospect from despairing of it – due to cases where two agents equally desire an outcome and assign to it the same probability, yet one hopes for the outcome while the other despairs of it. I argue, against Meirav, that these putative counterexamples depend crucially on the assumption – previously unquestioned – that the degree of probability necessary for hope is invariant across individuals. If the probability threshold is instead understood as agent‐relative, the difficulty disappears. Further, I argue that there is strong independent reason for taking the probability threshold of hope to be agent‐relative, based on similarities to the widely‐accepted agent‐relative probability thresholds of industriousness and risk aversion. And I conclude by noting how the agent‐relative modification to the Standard Account is better equipped than is Meirav's positive view to yield intuitive results. ¹      

I. Frege as a Realist

H. Sluga (Inquiry, Vol. 18 [1975], No. 4) has criticized me for representing Frege as a realist. He holds that, for Frege, abstract objects were not real: this rests on a mistranslation and a neglect of Frege's contextual principle. The latter has two aspects: as a thesis about sense, and as one about reference. It is only under the latter aspect that there is any tension between it and realism: Frege's later silence about the principle is due, not to his realism, but to his assimilating sentences to proper names. Contrary to what Sluga thinks, the conception of the Bedeutung of a name as its bearer is an indispensable ingredient of Frege's notion of Bedeutung, as also is the fact that it is in the stronger of two possible senses that Frege held that Sinn determines Bedeutung. The contextual principle is not to be understood as meaning that thoughts are not, in general, complex; Frege's idea that the sense of a sentence is compounded out of the senses of its component words is an essential component of his theory of sense. Frege's realism was not the most important ingredient in his philosophy: but the attempt to interpret him otherwise than as a realist leads only to misunderstanding and confusion.     

Ontological Parsimony,Erosion, and Conservatism

This article presents a novel argument against a common principle of parsimony in philosophy. First, it identifies a widely employed principle of positive ontological parsimony, according to which we should, ceteris paribus, prefer smaller ontologies to larger ontologies. Next, it shows how this principle is used as part of a strategy by which to argue for antirealist positions in many subfields of philosophy: the ockhamistic antirealist strategy. Third, it argues that this principle commits its adherents to an implausible epistemological thesis—the Eroding Ontology Thesis—according to which evidence for the existence of some entity is at least prima facie evidence against the existence of all other entities. Antirealists might decide to adopt a related position, ontological conservatism, according to which we should simply resist changing our ontology, but the article shows that it is independently unjustified. Therefore, it concludes, philosophers have good reason to cease employing one very common antirealist strategy.