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33577.635111
Current political affairs offer interesting, even if dramatic, instances of applied political philosophy problems. Reading the news today, I found at least two such problems, both related to populist politics – one concerns Meloni and Italy, and the other concerns Trump and the U.S. …
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33578.635233
Drug overdose deaths have more than doubled in America in the past 10 years, mainly due to the appearance of Fentanyl and other synthetic opioids. These drugs combine incredible ease of manufacture with potency in tiny amounts and dangerousness (the tiniest miscalculation in dosage makes them deadly). …
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33579.635258
To Advocate "Don't Do Anything Risky!" is Risky
Passivity norms and status quo bias
Many people endorse norms that presumptively oppose action in the face of uncertainty. They unreflectively assume that passivity is the “cautious”, risk-averse option. …
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70631.635278
Chandrashekar, P., Adelina, N., Zeng, S., Chiu, Y., Leung, Y., Henne, P., Cheng, B., Feldman, G. (2023). Defaults Versus Framing: Revisiting default effect and framing effect with replications and extensions of Johnson and Goldstein (2003) and Johnson, Bellman, and Lohse (2002). Meta-Psychology, 7.
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87786.635309
Readers: With this third stop we’ve covered Tour 1 of Excursion 1. My slides from the first LSE meeting in 2020 which dealt with elements of Excursion 1 can be found at the end of this post. There’s also a video giving an overall intro to SIST, Excursion 1. …
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91886.635358
Relevance Theory (RT; Gutt, 1989, 1991, 2000) stipulates that translation is an act of interpretive language use, establishing interlingual interpretive resemblance between source and target language utterances, rather than describing, assessing or transferring truth values of utterances. In an extension to the original RT framework, Gutt (2004, 2005) distinguishes between two modes of translation - a stimulus mode (S-mode) and an interpretive mode (I-mode) - by which translators establish interpretive resemblances across languages. S-mode translation is tightly linked to linguistic forms, while I-mode translation appeals to the translator’s (self) awareness of the cognitive/cultural environment in which the translation unfolds. In this chapter, I argue that interlingual resemblance and contentful representation, as in descriptive language use, are two incompatible categories and that translation – defined as interlingual interpretive resemblance – can be seen as a form of non-representational language production. I suggest that translation as interpretive language use is heavily based in priming processes. While perceptual/semantic/affective priming mechanisms drive S-mode translation, the phenomenal consciousness of subjective experiences underly I-mode translation.
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91914.63538
I offer a response to the explanatory challenge, ‘Why is time Markovian?’ (i.e., why is it that the future is constrained by the present just as strictly as it is constrained by the entire history of the universe up to and including the present?). My response to this explanatory challenge does not rely on any claims about the ontology of time, undermining a recent empirical argument for Presentism which appeals to the fact that Presentism can be used to address this explanatory challenge. My account shows that we can accept explanatory challenges of this sort, while denying that they lead to any strong metaphysical conclusions.
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91983.635401
I analyze the possibility of free-will in the many-worlds interpretation (MWI), arguing for their compatibility. I use as a starting point Nicolas Gisin’s “The Multiverse Pandemic” (Gisin, 2022, ), in which he makes an interesting case that MWI is contradicted by our hard to deny free-will. The counts he raised are: (1) MWI is deterministic, forcing choices on us, (2) in MWI all our possible choices happen, and (3) MWI limits creativity, because everything is entangled with everything else. I argue that each of these features of MWI is in fact compatible with more freedom than it may seem. In particular, MWI allows compatibilist free-will, but also free-will very much like the libertarian free-will defined by Chisholm. I argue that the position that alternative choices exist as possibilities does not make sense from a physical point of view, but MWI offers a physical ground for alternatives.
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92010.635421
The extant literature on AI (and popular culture more generally) has a few popular slogans that seek to dismiss the cognitive capacities of current large-language models (LLMs). Here, from a conceptual standpoint, we assess whether two such slogans have any teeth. The first such slogan is that “LLMs can only predict next-tokens”. The second is that “AIs are stochastic parrots”. We will briefly explain these two slogans, and argue that, in plausible construals, they do not imply fundamental limitations to cognition and semantic grounding (which of course does not imply anything positive about current AI’s cognitive capacities). The difference between our approach and that of the burgeoning literature reaching a similar conclusion is that we base our arguments on the idea of ‘knowledge-first epistemology’.
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92041.63544
The hole argument of general relativity threatens a radical and pernicious form of indeterminism. One natural response to the argument is that points belonging to different but isometric models should always be identified, or ‘dragged-along’, by the diffeomorphism that relates them. In this paper, I first criticise this response and its construal of isometry: it stumbles on certain cases, like Noether’s second theorem. Then I go on to describe how the essential features of Einstein’s ‘point-coincidence’ response to the hole argument avoid the criticisms of the ‘drag-along response’ and are compatible with Noether’s second theorem.
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92074.635462
In the philosophical literature, symmetries of physical theories are most often interpreted according to the general doctrine called ‘traditional sophistication’. But even this doctrine leaves two important gaps in our understanding of such theories: (A) it allows the individuation of isomorphism-classes to remain intractable and thus of limited use, which is why practising physicists frequently invoke ‘relational, symmetry-invariant observables’; and (B) it leaves us with no formal framework for expressing interesting counterfactual statements about different physical possibilities. I will call these Limitations of TS. Here I will show that a new Desideratum to be satisfied by theories with symmetries allows us to overcome these Limitations. The new Desideratum is that the theory admits what I will call representational schemes for its isomorphism-classes. Each such scheme gives an equally valid reduced formalism for a theory.
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174020.635485
I claim that there is no general, straightforward and satisfactory way to define a total compa.rative probability with the standard axioms using full conditional probabilities. By a “straightforward” way, I mean something like:
- A ≲ B iff P(A−B|AΔB) ≤ P(B−A|AΔB) (De Finetti)
or:
- A ≲ B iff P(A|A∪B) ≤ P(A|A∪B) (Pruss). …
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206607.635506
Today’s essay is about “normalization,” a concept that appears repeatedly (though sometimes called differently) in many different contexts in social sciences and political discussions. An approximative definition is a social process through which individuals increasingly conform to a set of norms and patterns, making their behavior more predictable and uniform. …
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207381.635526
This paper sets forward a novel theory of temporal binding, a mechanism that integrates the temporal properties of sensory features into coherent perceptual experiences. Specifying a theory of temporal binding remains a widespread problem. The popular ‘brain time theory’ suggests that the temporal content of perceptual experiences is determined by when sensory features complete processing. However, this theory struggles to explain how perceptual experiences can accurately reflect the relative timing of sensory features processed at discrepant times. In contrast, ‘event time theories’ suggest that the temporal content of perceptual experiences reflects the relative event time of external sensory features and that the brain accommodates differential processing times. We can formulate retrodictive and predictive versions of this theory. Retrodictive event time theories propose that we accommodate desynchronised processing retrodictively. Predictive event time theories propose that we accommodate desynchronised processing by predictively modelling the event time of sensory features. I argue that both views have strengths and weaknesses.
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207410.63555
Human computers and scanners were scientific workers who performed calculations or reduced and analysed data before the advent of electronic computers. They were a staple of big science during the 19th century and early to mid 20th century. Yet, despite their prevalence within big science their epistemic roles remain virtually unexamined. This paper investigates the epistemic roles of the Harvard Human Computers at the Harvard College Observatory 1880-1920 and of the Bristol Scanners at the Bristol Nuclear Research Group 1935-1955.
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207439.635569
Relativistic quantum field theory (QFT) is ostensibly a quantum mechanical theory of fields, but determining exactly what these are is a thorny metaphysical task in the face of no-go arguments given by Baker (2009). This paper explores three possible answers according to which quantum fields are (I) superpositions of classical fields, (II) fields of expectation values for local observables, or (III) fields of local quantum states. I argue that each of these ontologies has resources available to respond to Baker’s challenge, though all three face residual puzzles.
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207473.635587
I extend the literature on norms of assertion to the ubiquitous use of graphs in scientific papers and presentations, which I term “graphical testimony.” On my account, the testimonial presentation of a graph involves commitment to both (a) the in-context reliability of the graph’s framing devices and (b) the perspective-relative accuracy of the graph’s content. Despite apparent disagreements between my account and traditional accounts of assertion, the two are compatible and I argue that we should expect a similar pattern of commitments in a set of cases that extends beyond the graphical one. I end by demonstrating that the account resolves apparent tensions between the demands of honesty and the common scientific practice of presenting idealized or simplified graphs: these “distortions” can be honest so long as there’s the right kind of alignment between the distortion and the background beliefs and values of the audience.
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207508.635607
This paper is an exploration of the nuanced realm of reference frames within the framework of General Relativity. Our analysis exposes a violation of Earman’s SP1 principle in scenarios involving fields that are dynamically uncoupled, a common assumption for reference frames. Unlike other violations, we cannot foreclose it by eliminating background spacetime structure. Our analysis also leads us to challenge the conventional notion of partial observables as quantities that are associated with a measuring instrument and expressed within a coordinate system. Instead, we argue that a partial observable is inherently relational, even if gauge-variant, and needs dynamical coupling with other partial observables to form a bona-fide, gauge-invariant complete observables. This perspective allows us to distinguish between being relational and being gauge-invariant, two properties that are often conflated.
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207541.635627
We attempt to reconstruct Hans Reichenbach’s arguments for a macroscopic causal definition of the direction of time. Our analysis reveals that Reichenbach’s formulation of “screening off” is equivocal between the now common notion of conditional independence of two variables given others and a weaker notion that requires the conditional independence only for specific values of the variables. We also find that on the now common notion of screening off his own conditions for the “usual…conjunctive forks” are mathematically impossible for binary variables. Finally, we note that as a corollary to his familiar Principle of the Common Cause, Reichenbach’s argument embraces a No Fatalism principle that forbids explaining earlier probabilistic associations by values of later variables.
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207607.63565
In general relativity, the strong equivalence principle is underpinned by a geometrical account of fields on spacetime, by which all fields and bodies probe the same geometry. This geometric account implies that the parallel transport of all spacetime tensors and spinors is dictated by a single affine connection. No similar account of gauge theory is put forward by standard textbooks, which use principal bundles to coordinate the parallel transport of different, interacting particles. Nonetheless, here I argue that gauge theory does afford such a geometric account, obviating the need for principal bundles.
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230097.63567
While Locke is remembered for his numerous contributions to a wide
range of fields—philosophy, political theory, economics,
religious exegesis, education and psychology—and while he took
on numerous roles in his career—academic, diplomat, secretary,
tutor, advisor and civil servant—it is easy to forget that he
was a trained and qualified professional. Locke spent a good part of
his career—at least a decade—studying, training, writing,
apprenticing and eventually practicing as a physician. He worked
closely with a number of leading researchers on a range of
contemporary medical, physiological and related subjects, taking
hundred of notes, and authoring several extended reflections on
medical matters.
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249219.635689
Works by (Humberstone 1981, 2011), van Benthem (1981, 2016), Holliday 2014, forthcoming, and Ding & Holliday 2020 attempt to develop a semantics of modal logic in terms of “possibilities”, i.e., “less determinate entities than possible worlds” (Edgington 1985). These works take possibilities as semantically primitive entities, stipulate a number of semantic principles that govern these entities (namely, Ordering, Persistence, Refinement, Cofinality, Negation, and Conjunction), and then interpret a modal language via this semantic structure. In this paper, we define possibilities in object theory (OT), and derive, as theorems, the semantic principles stipulated in the works cited. We then raise a concern for the semantic investigation of possibilities without a modal operator, and show that no such concerns the metaphysics of possibilities as developed in OT.
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252626.635708
David Hume is perhaps most celebrated for his analysis of causation and of inductive causal reasoning. Moreover, his quest to understand causal power and necessity played a central role in his philosophy and was arguably the primary stimulus behind his Treatise of Human Nature (Millican 2016, 86–93).
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252782.635729
Since the influential work of Norman Kemp Smith, it has become standard to interpret and debate Hume’s philosophy in terms of the broad themes of “scepticism” and “naturalism”. This has been particularly popular with scholars – notably Peter Strawson – who favour a relatively consistent narrative, whereby Hume’s “naturalism” is understood as providing some general response – or even a resolution – to the sceptical problems (and some related issues) that he raises. My aim here is to challenge this sort of narrative, by drawing distinctions within both scepticism and naturalism, and showing how Hume’s attitudes and responses to his most prominent philosophical challenges are importantly different, while the idea that he employs a broadly consistent “naturalist” strategy to address them is also misguided when examined in detail.
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252801.635749
Hume’s argument against the credibility of testimony for miracles – in Section 10 of his Enquiry concerning Human Understanding – is one of the most famous in the philosophical canon. Yet both its interpretation and its assessment are highly controversial. I have discussed the most common interpretative issues elsewhere, and will mainly pass over these here (with references to those previous discussions in case readers wish to follow them up). My main aim now is to focus instead on the cogency and force of Hume’s argument, and how it relates to his more general scepticism about theism as manifested in his Dialogues concerning Natural Religion. So this is primarily a philosophical rather than interpretative investigation.
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253457.635769
This article attempts to identify certain shortcomings in analytic philosophy as practised today. First, it identifies a disconnect between the darker aspects of the human condition and philosophers’ inability to engage with them. Second, it locates this inability in a certain logic of detachment, explored by Peter Strawson. Third, it points out problems with Strawson’s analysis, which it then tries to overcome, using Constantin Noica’s account of the Platonising attitude philosophers are perennially tempted by – one of several ways in which humans try to overcome their fallen condition. This is contrasted with Thomas Nagel’s valuable but still deficient discussion of the “cosmic question”. This brings us, finally, to a reconsideration of an older tradition in philosophy, which focused more explicitly on human fallenness. Petrarch’s Secretum meum is used as an example to show that while the failure of analytic philosophers has deep existential roots, it is not commendable. Philosophers must learn, again, to reflect on the darkness of the human soul – their own darkness.
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260475.635788
Paraphrase is relevant to the existence of properties because there are apparently true claims that apparently entail the existence of properties. This gives us good reason to think there are properties, unless it can be plausibly argued that at least one of those appearances is misleading. In typical (perhaps all) cases, this will involve giving a paraphrase of the apparently true claims—a less misleading restatement—that plausibly doesn’t entail the existence of properties (see, e.g., Jackson 1977 and Hoffman and Rosenkrantz 2005).
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269456.635805
Some people think that simplicity of laws of nature is a guide to truth, and some think beauty of laws of nature is. One might ask: Is the beauty of laws of nature a guide that goes beyond simplicity? …
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269457.635825
Suppose we have a full conditional probability P(A∣B) defined for all pairs of events (stipulating that P(A∣⌀) = 1 if we wish). Two methods have been proposed for defining a probability comparison using conditional probabilities:
Pruss: A ⪅ B iff P(A∣A∪B) ≤ P(B∣A∪B). …
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306484.635845
There is now extensive discussion in normative philosophy about personal relationships— from older debates about their nature and value, to more recent discussions of their implications for institutional design and freedom of association. The literature is primarily focused on dyads: close relationships between two people, such as romantic partnerships, two-person friendships, or parent-child relationships, and their perhaps distinctive contributions to our lives.