Justice and its motives: On Peter Vanderschraaf’s strategic justice

2020 ◽  
pp. 1470594X2096154
Author(s):  
Paul Weithman
Keyword(s):  
Good Reason ◽  
Mutual Advantage ◽  
Do So

Peter Vanderschraaf’s Strategic Justice is a powerful elaboration and defense of what he calls ‘justice as mutual advantage’. Vanderschraaf opens Strategic Justice by observing that ‘Plato set a template for all future philosophers by raising two interrelated questions: (1) What precisely is justice? (2) Why should one be just?’. He answers that (1) justice consists of conventions which (2) are followed because each sees that doing so is in her interest. These answers depend upon two conditions which Vanderschraaf calls Baseline Consistency and Negative Mutual Expectations. I contend that the plausibility of the first condition depends upon principles which are prior to Vanderchraaf’s conventions of justice and that the second condition does not account for the interest Vanderschraaf must think we take in those principles. I therefore worry that Vanderschraaf does what he accuses other theorists of justice as mutual advantage of doing: going outside the bounds of justice as mutual advantage. To lay the groundwork for his conditions, Vanderschraaf analyzes the circumstances of justice. I argue that, his claims to the contrary notwithstanding, he does not take the circumstances to be the kind of conditions Hume takes them to be, but that he has good reason to do so.

scholarly journals Essence and Mere Necessity

2018 ◽  
Vol 82 ◽  
pp. 309-332 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jessica Leech
Keyword(s):  
Good Reason ◽  
The Other ◽  
De Re ◽  
The World ◽  
Do So

AbstractRecently, a debate has developed between those who claim that essence can be explained in terms ofde remodality (modalists), and those who claim thatde remodality can be explained in terms of essence (essentialists). The aim of this paper is to suggest that we should reassess. It is assumed that either necessity is to be accounted for in terms of essence, or that essence is to be accounted for in terms of necessity. I will argue that we should assume neither. I discuss what role these key notions – essence and necessity – can reasonably be thought to contribute to our understanding of the world, and argue that, given these roles, there is no good reason to think that we should give an account of one in terms of the other. I conclude: if we can adequately explainde remodality and essence at all, we should aim to do so separately.

Clusters Of Polyhedra In Architecture

1996 ◽  
Vol 11 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 97-101
Author(s):  
J. Francois Gabriel
Keyword(s):  
Good Reason ◽  
Modern Technology ◽  
Rectangular Grid ◽  
Connected Network ◽  
Advantages And Disadvantages ◽  
Truncated Octahedron ◽  
The Past ◽  
Building Systems ◽  
Visual Order ◽  
Do So

Conventional structural and building systems could not in the past bring into existence medium-rise buildings based on polyhedra. Modern technology makes it now possible to conceive and erect such buildings. One good reason to do so is that clusters of polyhedra can satisfy an essential need of architecture: the need for visual order. Too many contemporary buildings rely on a simplistic rectangular grid. The effect is, indeed, orderly, but it is also usually boring and non-hierarchical. The configuration selected here is the 12-connected network considered as a habitable three-way, multi-layer space frame. It is presented along with two variations. One is an infinite structure of three polyhedra also derived from the 12-connected network, the truncated octahedron, the cuboctahedron and the truncated tetrahedron. The other configuration is the honeycomb pattern resulting from the absorption of tetrahedron by adjacent octahedra, to which I have given the name Hexmod. Similarities and differences are identified and advantages and disadvantages of the three patterns are examined. Finally, combinations between patterns are introduced.

The Key of e

1972 ◽  
Vol 65 (1) ◽  
pp. 5-8
Author(s):  
Bernard M. Oliver
Keyword(s):  
Good Reason ◽  
Complex Numbers ◽  
Rigor Mortis ◽  
The Third ◽  
Mathematics Curricula ◽  
Traditional Curricula ◽  
Do So

The first two topic were usually part of traditional curricula; the third often was. Complex numbers were first widely introduced in the “new” mathematics curricula, with their heavy emphasis on sets and numbers. There is good reason to question the validity of attempting to teach many of the abstraction contained in these new courses (especially when we do so with a rigor sometimes perilously close to rigor mortis) when, for the majority of youngsters, a better mastery of arithmetic or an introduction to calculu would be more widely use ful knowledge.

Subjective Measures of Well‐Being: Philosophical Perspectives

2009 ◽  
Author(s):  
Erik Angner
Keyword(s):  
Good Reason ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Subjective Measures ◽  
Philosophical Foundations ◽  
Main Thesis ◽  
Do So

The goal of this article is to explore some fundamental assumptions underlying subjective measures of well-being, as compared to more traditional economic measures. Its main thesis is that psychologists and economists have sharply different philosophical commitments, a fact that is seldom made explicit. Although it is perfectly reasonable for social and behavioral scientists to be wary of spending too much time thinking about the philosophical foundations of their enterprise, there are moments when it is eminently useful to do so. In this case, this article maintains, there is good reason to attend to these foundations, since they are directly relevant to the assessment of the various measures. A better grasp of fundamental commitments, this article argues, goes a long way toward explaining why psychologists' and economists' efforts to measure welfare or well-being are so different, and why there is relatively little fruitful communication and collaboration across fields.

Epistemic infinitism

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Scott Aikin
Keyword(s):  
Infinite Series ◽  
Good Reason ◽  
The Other ◽  
Regress Problem ◽  
Two Factors ◽  
Particular Solution ◽  
Basic Beliefs ◽  
Better Than ◽  
Epistemic Regress Problem ◽  
Do So

If you believe something rationally, you believe it for a reason. And that reason can’t just be any old reason. You’ve got to rationally hold it as a good reason. In order to do so, you must have another reason. And that reason needs another. And so a regress of reasons ensues. This is a rough-and-ready picture of the epistemic regress problem. Epistemic infinitism is the view that justifying reasons are infinite, and so it is a particular solution to the regress problem. Consider, also, that justification comes in degrees – some beliefs are better justified than others. Moreover, it seems that people can know things better than others. Call this the gradability phenomenon. Epistemic infinitism is the view that for someone to be justified maximally is for that person to have an infinite series of supporting reasons. Epistemic infinitisms admit of a wide variety. Differences between versions of infinitism arise according to two factors for the view: one dialectical, the other ecumenical. The dialectical factor for epistemic infinitisms is the matter of what philosophical problems or questions they answer. Infinitisms are designed to either provide models for how to solve the epistemic regress problem or address the phenomenon of the gradability of justification and knowledge. Infinitisms will differ depending on which issue they are designed to address, and an infinitism designed to address one issue may not be the same as one designed to address another. The ecumenical factor for epistemic infinitisms is the matter of how consistent the view is with other competing theories about how to address the regress problem and the gradability phenomenon. With the regress problem, infinitism’s main competitor theories are foundationalism, the view that there are basic beliefs for which there is no need for further reason, and coherentism, the view that justifying reasons come in large mutually supporting packages. For the most part, infinitism is taken to be a form of noncoherentist antifoundationalism about justification, because the infinitist holds that reasons must be infinitely long chains of nonrepeating reasons. However, there are versions of infinitism consistent with both foundationalism and coherentism. Infinitism faces a variety of challenges, and two of particular importance are whether infinitism is actually a form of scepticism and whether infinitism is a complete theory of justification.

When Death Comes Too Late: Radical Life Extension and the Makropulos Case

2021 ◽  
Vol 90 ◽  
pp. 147-166
Author(s):  
Michael Hauskeller
Keyword(s):  
Good Reason ◽  
Life Extension ◽  
Bernard Williams ◽  
The World ◽  
Radical Life Extension ◽  
Do So ◽  
Makropulos Case

AbstractFamously, Bernard Williams has argued that although death is an evil if it occurs when we still have something to live for, we have no good reason to desire that our lives be radically extended because any such life would at some point reach a stage when we become indifferent to the world and ourselves. This is supposed to be so bad for us that it would be better if we died before that happens. Most critics have rejected Williams’ arguments on the grounds that it is far from certain that we will run out of things to live for, and I don't contest these objections. Instead, I am trying to show that they do not affect the persuasiveness of Williams’ argument, which in my reading does not rely on the claim that we will inevitably run out of things to live for, but on the far less contentious claim that it is not unthinkable we will do so and the largely ignored claim that if that happens, we will have died too late.

Support of Athenian intellectuals for Philip: a study of Isocrates' Philippus and Speusippus' Letter to Philip

1976 ◽  
Vol 96 ◽  
pp. 80-99 ◽  
Author(s):  
Minor M. Markle
Keyword(s):  
Philip Ii ◽  
Mutual Advantage ◽  
Do So

In the year 346 Isocrates wrote his discourse the Philippus (v) which he sent to Philip II of Macedon urging him to lead the Hellenic cities in an invasion of Persia. This ninety-year-old teacher of rhetoric did not invent the so-called Panhellenic idea; it was first proposed by Gorgias in 392 and again celebrated by Lysias in 384. When Isocrates took up the notion in his Panegyricus (iv) of 380 and urged Athens and Sparta to assume joint leadership in a war against Persia, he repeatedly defends himself for speaking on a well-worn theme by the claim that he will do so in a superior fashion (iv 3–4, 7–10, 15). Ignored by the Athenians and Spartans, Isocrates seems to have felt that his proposal would find better reception among strong individual leaders, and he appealed probably to Jason of Pherae in the late 370s (see v 119; cf. Xen. Hell. vi 1.12; Isocr. Ep. vi 1), to Dionysius I of Syracuse in about 368 (Ep. i, esp, 7–8), and certainly to Archidamus of Sparta in about 356 (Ep. ix, esp. 17–9). The discourse to Philip, however, was surely of much greater political importance than Isocrates' previous appeals because it was addressed to an individual who was actually acquiring the strength to wage war against Persia. The Athenian rhetorician, inspired by the Peace of Philocrates, claims that he hopes to persuade both his fellow citizens and Philip that reconciliation of the Hellenic cities and an expedition against the Persians under the leadership of the Macedonian king would be to their mutual advantage (v 7–9). In this article, I shall argue, first, that certain opinions, proposals, and arguments contained in the Philippus show that the author was prevented by the requirements of good propaganda from making a fully candid and practical plan of action, but, instead, advocated a programme that would please the greatest possible number of Greeks.

The Poverty of the Claudii Pulchri: Varro,De Re Rustica3.6.1–2

1992 ◽  
Vol 42 (1) ◽  
pp. 190-200 ◽  
Author(s):  
W. Jeffrey Tatum
Keyword(s):  
Good Reason ◽  
Literary Work ◽  
Human Mind ◽  
Samuel Johnson ◽  
De Re ◽  
The Third ◽  
Do So

‘In historical composition’, said Samuel Johnson, ‘all the greatest powers of the human mind are quiescent’. Perhaps so, but even if the historian must appear dull and plodding next to his more profound and shimmering brethren, the philologists and – of course – the literary critics, still he must be granted at least one virtue in plenty and that virtue is scepticism. Especially nowadays. While not quite yet ready to surrender his province to the meta-historians (who, not much believing in facts, have no real use for scepticism anyway), the historian continues diligently to scrutinize his sources with such wary Pyrrhonism as he can muster. He is especially suspicious of those ancients whose intelligence and whose literary gifts he most admires, hence the unrelenting distrust of authors such as Cicero and Caesar – and recently even such paragons of accuracy as Polybius. Still, a few authors have earned our unconscious credence, it would seem, merely by dint of their artlessness; we simply do not respect them enough to doubt them. A case in point: Varro'sDe Re Rustica, a remarkable ensemble of three dialogues, a highly literary work, yet one whose obvious inadequacies have distracted readers from its attempts at literariness and consequently have led them to take its veracity for granted – even when it relates to items having little or nothing to do with agriculture. A brief passage in the third book ofR.R.informs us, or rather seems to inform us, that what was perhaps republican Rome's most illustrious family, the Claudii Pulchri, was reduced to poverty in the seventiesB.C. in the aftermath of the death of the consul of 79 – evidence that has been accepted widely by modern scholars. In this paper I hope to show that there is no good reason for believing Varro's Appius when he claims to have been pauperized by his father's death and, furthermore, that to do so is to fail to appreciate the artistry and wry humour with which Varro has composed Book Three.

Plutarch, Callisthenes and the Peace of Callias

1990 ◽  
Vol 110 ◽  
pp. 1-13 ◽  
Author(s):  
A. B. Bosworth
Keyword(s):  
Good Reason ◽  
Fourth Century ◽  
The Other ◽  
Modern Literature ◽  
Original Text ◽  
Source Criticism ◽  
Other Hand ◽  
Do So

The continuing and polemical debate over the authenticity of the Peace of Callias has become so complicated that it would be a positive service to scholarship to remove some of the more contentious evidence and reduce the scope of the argument. That is the object of this article. A fragment of Callisthenes has bulked very large in the modern literature. According to the received view the Olynthian historian denied the existence of a formal peace between Athens and the Persian King and alleged that the King observed a de facto limit to his empire, never venturing west of the Chelidonian islands. For sceptics this is grist to the mill. A writer of the mid-fourth century rejected the Athenian patriotic tradition, and it is assumed that he had good reason to do so. On the other hand defenders of the authenticity of the Peace stumble over Callisthenes' apparent denial and are forced to counter-denial or to sophistry. What is common to both camps is a tendency to refer to the evidence of Callisthenes without noting that the original text is lost. The ‘fragment’ (which it is not) is preserved by Plutarch in a sophisticated passage of source criticism and due attention needs to be paid to his mode of citation. Only then can we begin to elicit what Callisthenes may have said and reconstruct the probable context in his historical exposition. As always, we need to approach the unknown through proper study of the known.

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