Philosophical Progress

Articles and blog posts found on 01 July 2024

2024-07-01T23:59:00Z

Stephen Read: Marsilius of Inghen on Insolubles and the English Tradition (pdf, 15134 words)

In the course of presenting his own solution to the insolubles (logical paradoxes such as the Liar), Marsilius of Inghen criticises four earlier theories, which appear to be those of Albert of Saxony, (the early) Buridan, Roger Swyneshed and a modification of William Heytesbury’s solution which we find in many textbooks and anonymous treatises known as presentations of the Logica Oxoniensis. Marsilius’s solution bears interesting resemblances to all four, but has its own distinctive features. The core idea of his solution is that all propositions have a two-fold signification, a material signification and a formal one. The material signification, also called the primary or direct signification, is what most would call the proposition’s usual signification; e.g., the material signification of ‘This proposition is false’ is that that proposition is false. Its formal, aka indirect or reflexive, signification is, in the case of affirmative propositions, that the subject and predicate supposit for the same thing, and in the case of negative propositions, that they do not. This reflexive signification derives from the meaning of the (affirmative resp. negative) copula. Thus the reflexive signification of ‘This proposition is false’ is that ‘this proposition’ and ‘false’ supposit for the same thing, that is, that it is false that that proposition is false. Presenting Marsilius’s formal signification in such cases as stating of that proposition’s being false, for example (which is the material signification of ‘This proposition is false’), that it is false (that is, falls under the supposition of ‘false’) suggested to Paul Spade that Marsilius’s solution was a development of Gregory of Rimini’s account. I will argue that any resemblance here is, in the absence of any external evidence, superficial and coincidental, and that Marsilius’s view is much closer to the Oxford solutions and Albert’s—Albert and Marsilius being, after all, members of the English Nation at Paris. Marsilius’s arguments in favour of his theory, and his application of the solution to a range of insolubles, are well worth looking at in detail, which I will do, though not at the length which Marsilius devotes to it.

Stephen Read: Wulderstorff’s Quodlibet (pdf, 16398 words)

Paul Vincent Spade contrasts the calm and measured reaction of medieval thinkers to the “insolubles” (logical paradoxes such as the Liar) with the troubled response of philosophers and mathematical logicians more recently to the semantic antinomies in modern logic and set theory. The latter is often described as a crisis in the foundations of mathematics. But there was a comparable crisis in medieval philosophy and theology, namely over the apparent incompatibility of the newly rediscovered Aristotelian logic and Christian theology, specifically in the latter’s doctrine of the Trinity. According to that doctrine, codified at the fourth Lateran Council in 1215, God is undivided in his essence but distinct according to the properties of the three persons. This appears to open the faithful to heresy through the following expository syllogism: Haec essentia est filius Haec essentia est pater Ergo pater est filius, contradicting the distinctness of the Son and the Father. The paralogism can also be formulated as a first-figure syllogism in Darii as follows: Omnis deus est pater Filius in divinis est deus Igitur Filius in divinis est pater.

The Brains Blog: Inquiry under bounds (Part 1: Introduction) (html, 456 words)

This is the first in a five-part series introducing my book, Inquiry under bounds. The book is available here under an open access model from Oxford University Press. 2. My project Humans are bounded agents. …

Articles and blog posts found on 30 June 2024

2024-06-30T23:59:00Z

Ann-Sophie Barwich: Models and analogies in science (pdf, 4845 words)

Science makes extensive use of models, i.e. simplified or idealized representations of the systems found in the physical world. Models fall into at least two categories: mathematical and physical models. In this paper, we focus attention mainly on the latter, trying to show that they are essential tools not only of the scientific description of the world ‘out there’, but of man’s cognition of things, especially things not directly accessible to the senses. The spring-and-ball (SB) model of chemistry is a most instructive example of a physical model. In other disciplines, from cosmology to physiology, models are used that are of the same kind or play the same role. It is concluded that physical models are objects which belong to the world accessible to man’s direct experience, often constructed ad hoc and possibly idealized. They serve as referents for analogies, which appear to be indispensable in most aspects of scientific theorizing, especially for the understanding of the submicroscopic levels of reality.

Bruce Rushing, Javier Gomez-Lavin: Is the Scaling Hypothesis Falsifiable? (pdf, 5707 words)

The scaling hypothesis in artificial intelligence claims that a model’s cognitive ability scales with increased compute. This hypothesis has two interpretations: a weak version where model error rates decrease as a power law function of compute, and a strong version where as error rates decrease new cognitive abilities unexpectedly emerge. We argue that the first is falsifiable but the second is not because it fails to make exact predictions about which abilities emerge and when. This points to the difficulty of measuring cognitive abilities in algorithms since we lack good ecologically valid measurements of those abilities.

Jonathan Y. Tsou: Philosophy of Psychology and Psychiatry (pdf, 5783 words)

This chapter examines the history of philosophy of psychology and philosophy of psychiatry as subfields of philosophy of science that emerged in the late twentieth and early twenty-first century. The chapter also surveys related literatures that developed in psychology and psychiatry. Philosophy of psychology (or philosophy of cognitive science) has been a well-established subfield of philosophy of mind since the 1990s and 2000s. This field of philosophy of psychology is narrowly focused on issues in cognitive psychology and cognitive science. Compared to the thriving subfield of philosophy of cognitive science, there has been a lack of corresponding interest among philosophers of science in broader methodological questions about different paradigms and fields of study in psychology. These broader methodological questions about psychology have been addressed in the field of theoretical psychology, which is a subfield of psychology that materialized in the 1980s and 1990s. Philosophy of psychiatry emerged as a subfield of philosophy of science in the mid-2000s. Compared to philosophy of psychology, the philosophy of psychiatry literature in philosophy of science engaged with issues examined in an older and more interdisciplinary tradition of philosophy of psychiatry that developed after the 1960s. The participation of philosophers of science in the literature on theoretical psychology, by contrast, has been limited.

Nathan Gabriel, Cailin O’Connor: Can Confirmation Bias Improve Group Learning? (pdf, 10125 words)

Confirmation bias has been widely studied for its role in failures of reasoning. Individuals exhibiting confirmation bias fail to engage with information that contradicts their current beliefs, and, as a result, can fail to abandon inaccurate beliefs. But although most investigations of confirmation bias focus on individual learning, human knowledge is typically developed within a social structure. We use network models to show that moderate confirmation bias often improves group learning. However, a downside is that a stronger form of confirmation bias can hurt the knowledge-producing capacity of the community.

Raoni Wohnrath Arroyo, Lauro De Matos Nunes Filho, Frederik Moreira Dos Santos: Towards a process-based approach to consciousness and collapse in quantum mechanics (pdf, 12028 words)

According to a particular interpretation of quantum mechanics, the causal role of human consciousness in the measuring process is called upon to solve a foundational problem called the “measurement problem.” Traditionally, this interpretation is tied up with the metaphysics of substance dualism. As such, this interpretation of quantum mechanics inherits the dualist’s mind-body problem. Our working hypothesis is that a process-based approach to the consciousness causes collapse interpretation (CCCI) —leaning on Whitehead’s solution to the mind-body problem— offers a better metaphysical understanding of consciousness and its role in interpreting quantum mechanics. This article is the kickoff for such a research program in the metaphysics of science.

Mostly Aesthetics: On Status and Inequality (html, 899 words)

Being low status is unpleasant. Sometimes it’s only that, and barely so: when it comes to sports, my athletic abilities mark me as inferior, and won’t get me attention from professional recruiters, but I don’t care. …

Articles and blog posts found on 29 June 2024

2024-06-29T23:59:00Z

Alex Thinius, Rose Trappes: Sex Traits and Individual Differences: Stabilising and Destabilising Binary Categories in Biological Practice (doc, 10777 words)

Sex is often thought of as a straightforwardly binary categorical variable. Yet there is considerable variation in would-be sex traits; from genitals and hormones to morphology, neurology and behaviour, there is rarely if ever a categorical binary. We introduce a strategy that researchers use to deal with this variation: Individualising Variation (IV). IV involves treating non-binary and gradual variation as idiosyncratic, as individual differences rather than sex-based differences. Using the contrasting cases of sex identification in field ornithology and the debate about sex differences in neuroscience, we illustrate IV and investigate its epistemic and conceptual consequences. We argue that IV stabilises the ontological picture of sex as categorical and binary. While IV can be an epistemically benign research strategy in some cases, we argue that it can also be epistemically detrimental. This is because of its ability to mask evidence that would otherwise challenge related assumptions about the phenomenon of interest, such as what sexes are and what they look like. We also identify an alternative strategy, De-individualising Variation, which works against IV and helps life scientists recognise variation beyond categorical binaries.

Imran Thobani: A Triviality Worry for the Internal Model Principle (pdf, 8668 words)

The Good Regulator Theorem and the Internal Model Principle are sometimes cited as mathematical proofs that an agent needs an internal model of the world in order to have an optimal policy. However, these principles rely on a definition of “internal model” that is far too permissive, applying even to cases of systems that do not use an internal model. As a result, these principles do not provide evidence (let alone a proof) that internal models are necessary. The paper also diagnoses what is missing in the GRT and IMP definitions of internal model, which is that models need to make predictions that represent variables in the target system (and these representations need to be usable by an agent so as to guide behavior).

Markus Kneer, Neri Marsili: The truth about assertion and retraction: A review of the empirical literature (pdf, 13427 words)

This chapter reviews empirical research on the rules governing assertion and retraction, with a focus on the normative role of truth. It examines whether truth is required for an assertion to be considered permissible, and whether there is an expectation that speakers retract statements that turn out to be false. Contrary to factive norms (such as the influential “knowledge norm”), empirical data suggests that there is no expectation that speakers only make true assertions. Additionally, contrary to truth-relativist accounts, there is no requirement for speakers to retract statements that are false at the context of assessment. We conclude by suggesting that truth still plays a crucial role in the evaluation of assertions: as a standard for evaluating their success, rather than permissibility.

Stefan’s Substack: Epistemic discipline can transform worldviews (html, 762 words)

One of my recurring themes is that people underrate epistemic discipline: doing the most basic legwork of good thinking. Both critical thinking books and rationalist writings often focus on fallacies involving subtleties like the Monty Hall problem and Bayes’ Theorem. …

Articles and blog posts found on 28 June 2024

2024-06-28T23:59:00Z

Eddy Keming Chena, Daniel Rubio: Evil and the Quantum Multiverse (pdf, 10182 words)

Problems in moral philosophy and philosophy of religion can take on new forms in light of contemporary physical theories. Here we discuss how the problem of evil is transformed by the Everettian “Many-Worlds” theory of quantum mechanics. We first present an Everettian version of the problem and contrast it to the problem in single-universe physical theories such as Newtonian mechanics and Bohmian mechanics. We argue that, pace Turner (2016) and Zimmerman (2017), the Everettian problem of evil is no more extreme than the Bohmian one. The existence and multiplicity of (morally) terrible branches in the Everettian multiverse in contrast to the mere possibility of them in the Bohmian universe does not entail there is “more evil” in the former than in the latter. Low probability in the Bohmian case and low branch weight in the Everettian case should modulate how we respond to them in exactly the same way. We suggest that the same applies to the divine decision of creating an Everettian multiverse. For an empirically adequate Everettian quantum mechanics that justifies the Born rule, there is no special problem of evil. In order for there to be a special Everettian problem of evil, the Everettian interpretation must already have been exposed to decisive refutation. In the process, we hope to show how attention to the details of physical and metaphysical theories can and should impact the way we think about problems in moral philosophy and philosophy of religion.

Matias Slavov: About time, concisely (pdf, 1583 words)

Adrian Bardon has produced a new version of his historical introduction to the philosophy of time. Originally published in 2013, the second edition of 2024 is partly rewritten and supplemented with a more extensive discussion on our disposition to project the passage of time. The historical exposition contains standard figures in Western philosophy, covering antiquity, the early modern era, and the 20^th century. This edition also references some schools and figures not typically included in the canon, such as very early Indian sources, Émilie du Châtelet and al-Ghazali. Although the book’s title emphasizes history, most of the chapters are directed at issues in systematic philosophy of time: the realism/antirealism debate, temporal passage, temporal experience, spacetime, direction, time travel, time and free will, and the temporal boundaries of the universe. The book is pedagogically well-designed. The chosen topics are well-balanced and the text flows smoothly from beginning to end. The perennial questions about time are presented to the reader in an accessible way.

Rose Trappes: Defining the Niche for Niche Construction: Evolutionary and Ecological Niches (pdf, 9759 words)

Niche construction theory (NCT) aims to transform and unite evolutionary biology and ecology. Much of the debate about NCT has focused on construction. Less attention has been accorded to the niche: what is it, exactly, that organisms are constructing? In this paper I compare and contrast the definition of the niche used in NCT with ecological niche definitions. NCT’s concept of the evolutionary niche is defined as the sum of selection pressures affecting a population. So defined, the evolutionary niche is narrower than the ecological niche. Moreover, when contrasted with a more restricted ecological niche concept, it has a slightly different extension. I point out three kinds of cases in which the evolutionary niche does not coincide with realized ecological niches: extreme habitat degradation, commensalism, and non-limiting or super-abundant resources. These conceptual differences affect the role of NCT in unifying ecology and evolutionary biology.

Ruth Kastner: Conventional Quantum Theory Does Not Support A Coherent Relational Account (pdf, 6504 words)

I review a counterexample to the frequent claim that discrepancies among observers resulting from conventional quantum theory’s inability to define “measurement,” such as those arising in the Wigner’s Friend thought experiment, remain private and incom-mensurable. I consider the implications for a recent attempt to shield Relational Quantum Mechanics from such inconsistencies and conclude that it is not successful.

Thomas Hurka: Moral Demands and Permissions/Prerogatives (html, 12799 words)

If morality and self-interest don’t always coincide—if sometimes doing what’s right isn’t also best for you—morality can sometimes require you to do what will be worse for you or to forgo an act that would benefit you. But some philosophers think a reasonable morality can’t be too demanding in this sense and have proposed moral views that are less so.

Valia Allori: Quantum Ontology and Intuitions (pdf, 10843 words)

Among the various proposals for quantum ontology, both wavefunction realists and the primitive ontologists have argued that their approach is to be preferred because it relies on intuitive notions: locality, separability and spatiotemporality. As such, these proposals should be seen as normative frameworks asserting that one should choose the fundamental ontology which preserves these intuitions, even if they disagree about their relative importance: wavefunction realists favor preserving locality and separability, while primitive ontologists advocate for spatiotemporality. In this paper, first I clarify the main tenets of wavefunction realism and the primitive ontology approach, arguing that seeing the latter as favoring constructive explanation makes sense of their requirement of a spatiotemporal ontology. Then I show how the aforementioned intuitive notions cannot all be kept in the quantum domain. Consequently, wavefunction realists rank locality and separability higher than spatiotemporality, while primitive ontologists do the opposite. I conclude that however, the choice of which notions to favor is not as arbitrary as it might seem. In fact, they are not independent: requiring locality and separability can soundly be justified by requiring spatiotemporality, and not the other way around. If so, the primitive ontology approach has a better justification of its intuitions than its rival wavefunction realist framework.

Varun Bhatta: The Controversy about Interference of Photons (pdf, 10097 words)

In the 1960s, the demonstration of interference effects using two laser-beams raised the question: can two photons interfere? Its plausibility contested Dirac’s dictum, “Interference between two different photons never occurs”. Disagreements about this conflict led to a controversy. This paper will chart the controversy’s contour and show that it evolved over two phases. Subsequently, I investigate the reasons for its perpetuation. The controversy was initiated and fuelled by several misinterpretations of the dictum. I also argue that Dirac’s dictum is not applicable to two photon interference as they belong to different contexts of interference. Recognising this resolves the controversy.

Articles and blog posts found on 27 June 2024

2024-06-27T23:59:00Z

Ashley Atkins: Empathy for the Dead (pdf, 15508 words)

from our empathy for the dead. Much needs to be done to give a satisfying defense of this proposal — beginning with a defense of the suggestion that empathy can extend, beyond the living, to those who experience nothing. But the very suggestion that empathy plays even some role in grief may itself come as a surprise. In fact, the suggestion goes against the grain of much recent theorizing in philosophical discussions of grief. One of the major divides in this literature is between “agent-centered” views of grief, which claim that the loss to be grieved is a loss from the perspective of the bereaved person’s life, and “object-centered” views, which claim that the loss to be grieved is an objective loss of life, not, primarily, a loss to the griever. Empathy disappears from view in this setting because it straddles the divide between self (the grieving agent) and other (the objective loss); in empathizing, it is said that one feels for another.

Colin Chamberlain: The Duchess of Disunity: Margaret Cavendish on the Materiality of Mind (pdf, 11843 words)

Thoughts are like Pancakes, and the Brain is the Pan wherein they are tossed and turned by the several Objects, as several Hands.

Eddy Keming Chen: Strong Determinism (pdf, 14815 words)

Albert Einstein, reported by Ernst Strauss understanding of determinism, its embodiments in concrete physical theories, and its relevance to long-standing issues in philosophy. Moreover, we have seen a growing interest in super-determinism. In contrast, strong determinism has received little attention. In this paper, I want to examine what it is and how it impacts some of the central issues in metaphysics and philosophy of science. Strong determinism, according to Penrose [1989], is “not just a matter of the future being determined by the past; the entire history of the universe is fixed, according to some precise mathematical scheme, for all time” (emphasis original, p. ⁴³²). This definition, I argue, risks trivializing the distinction between determinism and strong determinism. My first task is to define strong determinism in terms of fundamental laws: a strongly deterministic theory of physics is one that, according to its fundamental laws, permits exactly one nomologically possible world; our world is strongly deterministic just in case it is the only nomologically possible world. Importantly, we expect fundamental laws to be simple, which partly explains why strong determinism is difficult to achieve.

Emily C. R. Tilton: "That's Above My Paygrade": Woke Excuses for Ignorance (pdf, 12918 words)

Despite persistent misunderstandings to the contrary, standpoint theorists are not committed to an automatic privilege thesis (Wylie 2003, 27). According to an automatic privilege thesis, those who occupy marginalized social positions automatically know more, or know better, by virtue of their social location. The issues with this thesis are obvious: it is implausible; it offers no explanation of the connection between marginalized social location and epistemic advantage; and it cannot explain how it is that some marginalized individuals seem to (genuinely) buy into oppressive ideologies.

Johan E. Gustafsson: Dynamic Causal Decision Theory (pdf, 7618 words)

June 27, 2024 abstract. Causal decision theorists are vulnerable to a money pump if they update by conditioning when they learn what they have chosen. Nevertheless, causal decision theorists are immune to money pumps if they instead update by imaging on their choices and by conditioning on other things (and, in addition, evaluate plans rather choices). I also show that David Lewis’s Dutch-book argument for conditioning does not work when you update on your choices. Even so, a collective of causal decision theorists are still exploitable even if they start off with the same preferences and the same credences and will all see the same evidence. Evidential decision theorists who consistently update by conditioning are not exploitable in this way.

Alexander Pruss's Blog: Improving the Epicurean argument for the harmlessness of death (html, 267 words)

The famous Epicurean argument that death (considered as leading to nonexistence) is not a harm is that death doesn’t harm one when one is alive and it doesn’t harm one when one is dead, since the nonexistent cannot be harmed. …

Articles and blog posts found on 26 June 2024

2024-06-26T23:59:00Z

Andra Meneganzin, Anton Killin: Beyond Reasonable Doubt: Reconsidering Neanderthal Aesthetic Capacity (doc, 15855 words)

An aesthetic sense—a taste for the creation and/or appreciation of that which strikes one as, e.g., attractive or awesome—is often assumed to be a distinctively H. sapiens phenomenon. However, recent paleoanthropological research is revealing its archaeologically visible, deeper roots. The sensorimotor/perceptual and cognitive capacities underpinning aesthetic activities are a major focus of evolutionary aesthetics. Here we take a diachronic, evolutionary perspective and assess ongoing scepticism regarding whether, and to what extent, aesthetic capacity extends to our evolutionary cousins, the Neanderthals. The goal of this article is twofold. First, it serves as a defence of the attribution of Neanderthal aesthetic capacity by marshalling archaeological data best explained by positing a Neanderthal aesthetic sense. Second, it offers an opportunity to make progress on understanding some epistemically relevant features of the wider debate in evolutionary aesthetics.

Bruce Rushing: AI Safety Collides with the Overattribution Bias (pdf, 12605 words)

The field of Artificial Intelligence (AI) safety evaluations aims to test AI behavior for problematic capabilities like deception. However, some scientists have cautioned against the use of behavior to infer general cognitive abilities because of the human tendency to overattribute cognition to everything. They recommend the adoption of a heuristic to avoid these errors that states behavior provides no evidence for cognitive capabilities unless there is some theoretical feature present to justify that inference.

Daniel A. Turolla Vanzella, Jeremy Butterfield: A frame-bundle formulation of quantum reference frames: from superposition of perspectives to superposition of geometries (pdf, 16913 words)

Recent experimental advances suggest we may soon be able to probe the gravitational field of a mass in a coherent superposition of position states—a system which is widely believed to lie outside the scope of classical and semiclassical gravity. The recent theoretical literature has applied the idea of quantum reference frames (QRFs), originally introduced for non-gravitational contexts, to such a scenario.

Helen Meskhidze: The Classical Limit of Teleparallel Gravity (pdf, 10577 words)

I consider the classical (i.e., non-relativistic) limit of Teleparallel Gravity, a relativistic theory of gravity that is empirically equivalent to General Relativity and features torsional forces. I show that as the speed of light is allowed to become infinite, Teleparallel Gravity reduces to Newtonian Gravity without torsion. I compare these results to the torsion-free context and discuss their implications on the purported underdetermination between Teleparallel Gravity and General Relativity. I conclude by considering alternative approaches to the classical limit developed in the literature.

Miklós Rédei, Jing Honglin: Conditionally inaccessible decisions (pdf, 5651 words)

We define a notion of inaccessibility of a decision between two options represented by utility functions, where the decision is based on the order of the expected values of the two utility functions. The inaccessibility expresses that the decision cannot be obtained if the expectation values of the utility functions are calculated using the conditional probability defined by a prior and by partial evidence about the probability that determines the decision. Examples of inaccessible decisions are given in finite probability spaces. Open questions and conjectures about inaccessibility of decisions are formulated. The results are interpreted as showing the crucial role of priors in Bayesian taming of epistemic uncertainties about probabilities that determine decisions based on utility maximizing.

Raoni Wohnrath Arroyo, Jonas R. B. Arenhart: Quantum ontology de-naturalized: What we can't learn from quantum mechanics (pdf, 13799 words)

Philosophers of science commonly connect ontology and science, stating that these disciplines maintain a two-way relationship: on the one hand, we can extract ontology from scientific theories; on the other hand, ontology provides the realistic content of our scientific theories. In this article, we will critically examine the process of naturalizing ontology, i.e., confining the work of ontologists merely to the task of pointing out which entities certain theories commit themselves to. We will use non-relativistic quantum mechanics as a case study. We begin by distinguishing two roles for ontology: the first would be characterized by cataloging existing entities according to quantum mechanics; the second would be characterized by establishing more general ontological categories in which existing entities must be classified. We argue that only the first step is available for a naturalistic approach; the second step not being open for determination or anchoring in science. Finally, we also argue that metaphysics is still a step beyond ontology, not contained in either of the two tasks of ontology, being thus even farther from science. Keywords: ontology, ontological naturalism, quantum mechanics, metaontology.

Robbie Clark, Margarida Hermida, Nicole Russel-Pascual, Marcus Munafo, James Ladyman: Improving postgraduate researchers’ inferences with a philosophical workshop (pdf, 8133 words)

Postgraduate research training in the United Kingdom often narrowly focuses on domain-specific methods, neglecting wider philosophical topics such as epistemology and scientific method. Consequently, we designed a workshop on (inductive, deductive, and abductive) inference for postgraduate researchers. We ran the workshop three times with (N = 29) attendees from across four universities, testing the potential benefits of the workshop in a mixed-method, repeated measures design. Our core aims were to investigate what attendees learned from the workshop, and whether they felt it had impacted on their research practices six months later. Overall, learning inferential logic benefitted postgraduate researchers in various ways and to varying degrees. Six months on, roughly half of attendees reported being more critical of key aspects of research such as inferences and study design. Additionally, some attendees reported more subtle effects, such as prompting new lines of thought and inquiry. Given that self-criticism and scepticism are fundamental intellectual virtues, these results evidence the importance of embedding epistemological training into doctoral programmes across the UK.

Bet On It: You Don't Believe You! (html, 959 words)

“Woe unto you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites!” Accusing your opponents of hypocrisy is one of the most effective rhetorical tactics known to man. But does the fact that your opponents are hypocrites provide substantive evidence against the correctness of their views? …

D. G. Mayo's blog: Guest Post: Christian Hennig: “Statistical tests in five random research papers of 2024, and related thoughts on the ‘don’t say significant’ initiative” (html, 2435 words)

Department of Statistical Sciences “Paolo Fortunati” University of Bologna [An earlier post by C. Hennig on this topic: Jan 9, 2022: The ASA controversy on P-values as an illustration of the difficulty of statistics] Statistical tests in five random research papers of 2024, and related thoughts on the “don’t say significant” initiative This text follows an invitation to write on “abandon statistical significance 5 years on”, so I decided to do a tiny bit of empirical research. …

wo's weblog: Chen on our access to the physical laws (html, 1609 words)

Humean accounts of physical laws seem to have an advantage when it comes to explaining our epistemic access to the laws: if the laws are nothing over and above the Humean mosaic, it's no big mystery how observing the mosaic can provide information about the laws. …

Articles and blog posts found on 25 June 2024

2024-06-25T23:59:00Z

Alexander Dinges: Absolute gradable adjectives and loose talk (pdf, 9495 words)

Kennedy (Linguist Philos 30:1–45, 2007) forcefully proposes what is now a widely assumed semantics for absolute gradable adjectives. On this semantics, maximum standard adjectives like “straight” and “dry” ascribe a maximal degree of the underlying quantity. Meanwhile, minimum standard adjectives like “bent” and “wet” merely ascribe a non-zero, non-minimal degree of the underlying quantity. This theory clashes with the ordinary intuition that sentences like “The stick is straight” are frequently true while sentences like “The stick is bent” are frequently informative, and fans of the indicated theory of absolute gradable adjectives appeal to loose talk in response. One goal of this paper is to show that all extant theories of loose talk are inconsistent with this response strategy. Another goal is to offer a revised version of Hoek’s (Philos Rev 127:151–196, 2018, in: Proceedings of the 22nd Amsterdam Colloquium, 2019) recent theory of loose talk that accommodates absolute gradable adjectives after all, while being defensible against a range of important concerns.

Federico L.G. Faroldi: Risk and Artificial General Intelligence (pdf, 6085 words)

Artificial General Intelligence (AGI) is said to pose many risks, be they catastrophic, existential and otherwise. This paper discusses whether the notion of risk can apply to AGI, both descriptively and in the current regulatory framework. The paper argues that current definitions of risk are ill-suited to capture supposed AGI existential risks, and that the risk-based framework of the EU AI Act is inadequate to deal with truly general, agential systems.

Nazim Keven: Can episodic memory deter cheating and promote altruism? (pdf, 9481 words)

Episodic memory gives us the ability to mentally travel back in time to revisit and relive past experiences. In recent years, there has been an increased interest in the function of episodic memory. According to the orthodox view, episodic memory should be considered a part of a constructive system that simulates the future for sophisticated foresight and flexible planning. In this paper, I offer a novel alternative view. I argue that episodic memory provides invaluable information about the past behavior of others, allowing us to identify reliable and trustworthy partners while avoiding dealing with cheaters. Theoretical models demonstrate that cooperation in groups can be maintained if potential partners use information about an individual’s past behavior to guide their behavior toward that individual. In these reputation-based models of human cooperation, individuals with a history of cheating are ostracized, whereas those with a history of cooperative behavior flourish. Against this theoretical background, it is possible to see a function of episodic memory in facilitating information exchange about others, helping group members make effective partner choices, and avoiding the risk of interacting with cheaters. If correct, episodic memory may have played a significant role in the evolution of human cooperation.

Roderich Tumulka: Boundary Conditions that Remove Certain Ultraviolet Divergences (pdf, 10784 words)

In quantum field theory, Hamiltonians contain particle creation and annihilation terms that are usually ultraviolet (UV) divergent. It is well known that these divergences can sometimes be removed by adding counter-terms and by taking limits in which a UV cutoff tends toward infinity. Here, I review a novel way of removing UV divergences: by imposing a type of boundary condition on the wave function. These conditions, called interior-boundary conditions (IBCs), relate the values of the wave function at two configurations linked by the creation or annihilation of a particle. They allow for a direct definition of the Hamiltonian without renormalization or limiting procedures. In the last section, I review another boundary condition that serves to determine the probability distribution of detection times and places on a time-like 3-surface.

Stephanie Collins: Corporate Vice (pdf, 6220 words)

Vices are often attributed to corporations. We hear that casinos are ‘greedy,’ mining companies are ‘ruthless,’ or tobacco companies are ‘dishonest.’ This chapter addresses two questions. First, are such corporate vices reducible to the vices of individual role-bearers? Second, which traits of corporations are properly labelled ‘vices’? The chapter argues that corporate vice is sometimes irreducible to the vices of role-bearers: corporations can be vicious ‘over and above’ the traits of role-bearers. It further argues that different corporations should be held to different standards: what it means for a casino to be ‘vicious’ is different from what it means for a mining company to be ‘vicious,’ for example.

Xavier Parent: Conditional normative reasoning as a fragment of HOL (pdf, 10901 words)

We report on the mechanization of (preference-based) conditional normative reasoning. Our focus is on ˚Aqvist’s system E for conditional obligation, and its extensions. Our mechanization is achieved via a shallow semantical embedding in Isabelle/HOL. We consider two possible uses of the framework. The first one is as a tool for meta-reasoning about the considered logic. We employ it for the automated verification of deontic correspondences (broadly conceived) and related matters, analogous to what has been previously achieved for the modal logic cube. The equivalence is automatically verified in one direction, leading from the property to the axiom. The second use is as a tool for assessing ethical arguments. We provide a computer encoding of a well-known paradox (or impossibility theorem) in population ethics, Parfit’s repugnant conclusion. While some have proposed overcoming the impossibility theorem by abandoning the presupposed transitivity of “better than,” our formalisation unveils a less extreme approach, suggesting among other things the option of weakening transitivity suitably rather than discarding it entirely. Whether the presented encoding increases or decreases the attractiveness and persuasiveness of the repugnant conclusion is a question we would like to pass on to philosophy and ethics.

Alexander Pruss's Blog: Infinite evil (html, 181 words)

Alice and Bob are both bad people, and both believe in magic. Bob believes that he lives in an infinite universe, with infinitely many sentient beings. Alice thinks all the life there is is life on earth. …

Alexander Pruss's Blog: Using as a mere means (html, 345 words)

Carl is an inventor and Davita works for a competing company. They are stuck on a deserted island for a week. Carl informs Davita about something he has just invented. Davita is perfectly honest and if questioned in a court of law will testify to what Carl said. …

The Archimedean Point: The Need for an Epistemically Healthy Democracy (html, 2335 words)

On the occasion of the 7th International Conference on Economic Philosophy that we organized last month in Reims, we had two book sessions on recently published books dealing with the main topic of the conference, “market(s) and democracy.” One of the sessions was about Petr Špecián’s (Charles University) Behavioral Political Economy and Democratic Theory (Routledge, 2022) and the other discussed Lisa Herzog’s (University of Groningen) Citizen Knowledge. …