Reply to Critics

Abstract

Cameron, Eklund, Hofweber, Linnebo, Russell and Sider have written critical essays on my book, The Construction of Logical Space (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013). Here I offer some replies.     

Reply to My Critics

Philosophical Studies -     

Reply to my Critics

In response to critical discussion of my book, A Tear Is an Intellectual Thing: The Meanings of Emotion, I clarify and develop various aspects of my analysis of jealousy in particular and affectivity in general. In relation to jealousy, I explore the nature of pathology, the role of fantasy and of the rival, and the place of examples and of evolutionary theory. In relation to affectivity, I emphasize the difference between distinguishing emotions from other psychological states and distinguishing among, within and between, particular emotions (where affectivity may not be central). In addition, I emphasize the dangers of a version of G.E. Moore's error in demanding a nonreductive analysis of good in parallel demands for a nonreductive analysis of affectivity.     

A Reply to My Critics

Abstract

In this paper, I respond to three commentators on my book Understanding Moral Obligation: Kant, Hegel Kierkegaard. Anne Margaret Baxley focuses on my treatment of Kant, Dean Moyar on my treatment of Hegel, and William Bristow on my treatment of Kierkegaard. In this reply, I try to show how the critical points that they raise can be addressed.     

A Reply to My Critics

My text is written to answer the questions asked at the APA Meeting's presentation of the book Moral Textures: Feminist Narratives in the Public Sphere by professors María Lugones and Eduardo Mendieta. The answer seeks to clarify that Lugones's infrapolitics position is not so distant from mine. I also address Mendieta's question directed more to the aesthetic domain. There, I seek to show how my position could be taken as a creative effort to extend some of Habermas's early work on the public sphere, and to develop the thesis of the important relations between the aesthetic and the moral realms.     

Debating Forgiveness: A Reply to My Critics

In this essay I offer a detailed reply to three critics (whose commentaries are included in this issue of Philosophia) of my Forgiveness: a Philosophical Exploration (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007). The topics explored include the nature and limits of forgiveness; its unconditional or conditional character; the problem of distinguishing between central and marginal cases; the analysis of political apology; and questions of philosophical methodology.     

On Equal Citizenship and Public Reason: Reply to Critics

In writing Equal Citizenship and Public Reason, we aimed to show that political liberalism is a feminist liberalism. To that end, we develop and defend a particular understanding of the commitments of political liberalism. Then, we argue that certain laws and policies are needed to protect and secure the interests of persons as free and equal citizens. We focus on the laws and policies that we think are necessary for gender justice. In particular, we apply our view to the contexts of prostitution law, family and marriage law, state support for caregivers, and religious exemptions from generally applicable laws. In this article, we consider some of the challenges made by the thoughtful critics who are part of this symposium. In particular, we address: why the collective enterprise view of liberal democracy requires shared reasons for the justification of certain laws and policies; how we understand substantive equality and why our understanding of substantive equality does not commit us to a comprehensive doctrine; how we avoid defending a particular political conception of justice in showing that political liberalism is a feminist liberalism; and how it is that, given justice pluralism, public reasons can provide stability for the right reasons.     

Reason, Responsibility, and Free Will: Reply to My Critics

This paper highlights and discusses some key positions on free will and moral responsibility that I have defended. I begin with reflections on a Strawsonian analysis of moral responsibility. Then I take up objections to the view that there is an asymmetry in freedom requirements for moral responsibility and moral obligation: obligation but not responsibility requires that we could have done otherwise. I follow with some thoughts on the viability of different sorts of semi-compatibilism. Next, I turn to defending the ??luck objection?? to a popular libertarian account of the control that responsibility requires. This is, roughly, the objection that when our decisions are indeterministically caused, their occurrence is a matter of responsibility-undermining luck. Finally, I comment on Frankfurt examples.