Lockean Empathy

This paper offers an epistemic defense of empathy, drawing on John Locke's theory of ideas. Locke held that ideas of shape, unlike ideas of color, had a distinctive value: resembling qualities in their objects. I argue that the same is true of empathy, as when someone is pained by someone's pain. This means that empathy has the same epistemic value or objectivity that Locke and other early modern philosophers assigned to veridical perceptions of shape. For this to hold, pain and pleasure must be a primary quality of the mind, just as shape is a primary quality of bodies. Though Locke did not make that claim, I argue that pain and pleasure satisfy his criteria for primary qualities. I consider several objections to the analogy between empathy and shape‐perception and show how Locke's theory has resources for answering them. In addition, the claim that empathetic ideas are object‐matching sidesteps Berkeley's influential objection to Locke's theory of resemblance. I conclude by briefly considering the prospects for a similar defense of empathy in contemporary terms.     

A Lockean Argument for Black Reparations

This is a defense of blackreparations using the theory of reparations setout in John Locke's The Second Treatise ofGovernment. I develop two mainarguments, what I call the ``inheritanceargument' and the ``counterfactual argument,'both of which have been thought to fail. In nocase do I appeal to the false ideas that presentday United States citizens are guilty ofslavery or must pay reparation simply becausethe U.S. Government was once complicit in thecrime.     

The Embodiment Thesis

In this essay I articulate and defend a thesis about the nature of morality called “the embodiment thesis”. The embodiment thesis states that moral values underdetermine the obligations and entitlements of individual persons, and that actual social institutions must embody morality by specifying these moral relations. I begin by presenting two thought experiments that elucidate and motivate the embodiment thesis. I then proceed by distinguishing the embodiment thesis from a Rawlsian doctrine about the nature of justice, from the doctrine of moral relativism, and from solutions to the coordination problem of rational choice theory.     

Spoilage and Squatting: A Lockean Argument

Res Publica - John Locke is generally seen as an unequivocal defender of private property. However, taken normatively, certain aspects of his argument leave room for interesting loopholes with...     

尊礼的义务:洛克式爱国主义的构成与展现

洛克的爱国主义思想主要是通过"尊礼的义务"体现出来的。从尊礼家长到尊礼君王、再到尊礼国家,构成洛克式爱国主义的脉络。在洛克的语境中,尊礼家长的义务不是一项政治义务,但它具有与同意、自愿、职责、共同福祉相关的政治特质,这是洛克式爱国主义的根源。在政治社会中,不可取消的、永恒的、尊礼家长的非政治义务转变为可取消的、有条件的、尊礼君王的政治义务,以平衡尊礼政治权威与规训君王权力之间的张力。而当人民反抗君王的权利与人民尊礼君王的义务之间的矛盾需要调解时,尊礼的对象则落定为君王所代表的政治共同体——国家,以便与可反抗的君王自然之身区别开来,由此呈现出洛克式爱国主义的主旨——捍卫共同福祉。英国光荣革命后,有效协调个体与集体、人民与君王、人民及其代表之间的有限君主制,不仅成为洛克尊礼的对象,也成为洛克式爱国主义的具体范例。     

Lockean Essentialism and the Possibility of Miracles

If the laws of nature are metaphysically necessary, then it appears that miracles are metaphysically impossible. Yet Locke accepts both essentialism, which takes the laws to be metaphysically necessary, and the possibility of miracles. I argue that the apparent conflict here can be resolved if the laws are by themselves insufficient for guaranteeing the outcome of a particular event. This suggests that, on Locke's view, the laws of nature entail how an object would behave absent divine intervention . While other views of laws also make miracles counterfactually dependent on God's will, I show how this view is consistent with the essentialist commitment to the view that the laws are metaphysically necessary. Further, I argue that Locke's view is a relatively attractive version of essentialism, in part, because it allows for the possibility of miracles.     

The Finite-Dimensional Freeman Thesis

I suggest a modification—and mathematization—of Freeman’s thesis on the relations among “perception”, “the finite brain”, and “the world”, based on my recent proposal that the theory of finite topological spaces is both an adequate and a natural mathematical foundation for human psychology.

The Happy-Productive Worker Thesis Revisited

Despite extensive research on the subject spanning over 70 years, uncertainty still remains as to whether happier workers are in fact more productive. This study combined longitudinal prospective and experience sampling methods to examine the relationship between happiness and self-reported productivity among Directors employed in the public and private sectors. Analyses at a trait level suggested happy people were more productive. Similarly, at the state level of analysis, people were more productive when they were happier. Among the happiness indicators examined (job satisfaction, quality of work life, life satisfaction, positive affect, and negative affect) positive affect was most strongly, but not exclusively, tied to productivity at both the state and trait levels. Discussion focuses on reconciling a long history of mixed findings regarding the happy-productive worker thesis.