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.

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.

Trauma Surgeon and Palliative Care Physician Attitudes Regarding Goals-of-Care Delineation for Injured Geriatric Patients

2019 ◽  
Vol 36 (8) ◽  
pp. 669-674 ◽  
Author(s):  
Holly B. Cunningham ◽  
Shannon A. Scielzo ◽  
Paul A. Nakonezny ◽  
Brandon R. Bruns ◽  
Karen J. Brasel ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Palliative Care ◽  
Geriatric Patients ◽  
Care Physician ◽  
Physician Attitudes ◽  
The Other ◽  
Goals Of Care ◽  
Care Community ◽  
Trauma Surgeons ◽  
Better Than ◽  
Do So

Background: The value of defining goals of care (GoC) for geriatric patients is well known to the palliative care community but is a newer concept for many trauma surgeons. Palliative care specialists and trauma surgeons were surveyed to elicit the specialties’ attitudes regarding (1) importance of GoC conversations for injured seniors; (2) confidence in their own specialty’s ability to conduct these conversations; and (3) confidence in the ability of the other specialty to do so. Methods: A 13-item survey was developed by the steering committee of a multicenter, palliative care-focused consortium and beta-tested by trauma surgeons and palliative care specialists unaffiliated with the consortium. The finalized instrument was electronically circulated to active physician members of the American Association for the Surgery of Trauma and American Academy for Hospice and Palliative Medicine. Results: Respondents included 118 trauma surgeons (8.8%) and 244 palliative care specialists (5.7%). Palliative physicians rated being more familiar with GoC, were more likely to report high-quality training in performing conversations, believed more palliative specialists were needed in intensive care units, and had more interest in conducting conversations relative to trauma surgeons. Both groups believed themselves to perform GoC discussions better than the other specialty perceived them to do so and favored their own specialty leading team discussions. Conclusions: Both groups believe themselves to conduct GoC discussions for injured seniors better than the other specialty perceived them to do so, which led to disparate views on the optimal leadership of these discussions.

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.

Why Omissions are Special

Legal Theory ◽  
1995 ◽  
Vol 1 (3) ◽  
pp. 311-335 ◽  
Author(s):  
A. P. Simester
Keyword(s):  
Criminal Law ◽  
Good Reason ◽  
Differential Treatment ◽  
The Other ◽  
Positive Interventions ◽  
Other Hand ◽  
Positive Action ◽  
The Law ◽  
Better Than

The criminal law presently distinguishes between actions and omissions, and only rarely proscribes failures to avert consequences that it would be an offense to bring about. Why? In recent years it has been persuasively argued by both Glover and Bennett that,celeris paribus, omissions to prevent a harm are just as culpable as are actions which bring that harm about. On the other hand, and acknowledging that hitherto “lawyers have not been very successful in finding a rationale for it,” Tony Honoré has sought to defend the law's differential treatment. He proposes a “distinct-duties theory” that in addition to the general duties we owe to everyone (e.g., not to inflict harm), we also owe distinct duties to a more limited collection of people and associations, specified by features of our relationship with them (we owe, for instance, duties as parents to our own children). Where a distinct duty holds, breach by omission may well be no better than breach by positive action. But absent a distinct duty, omissions, per Honoré, are less culpable. They are mere failures to intervene and improve or rectify things, whereas actions are positive interventions which make things worse. And, thus, the law has good reason to differentiate between them.

scholarly journals A new principle of plural harm

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Magnus Jedenheim Edling
Keyword(s):  
The Other ◽  
Better Than ◽  
Do So ◽  
New View

AbstractAccording to the counterfactual comparative account (CCA), an event harms a person if and only if it makes things worse for her. Cases of overdetermination and preemption pose a serious challenge to CCA since, in these cases, although it is evident that people are harmed, there are no individual events that harm them. However, while there are no individual events that make people worse off in cases of overdetermination and preemption, there are pluralities of events that do so. In light of this feature of these cases, several philosophers have suggested that it is these pluralities that do the harming. In this article, I will argue that although the most prominent accounts of plural harm – e.g., Neil Feit’s account – fare better than one might initially think, they fail to deal adequately with a number of intriguing cases of preemption first introduced by Alastair Norcross. I will also introduce a new view on plural harm and argue that this view, apart from dealing with the cases of overdetermination and preemption that the other accounts of plural harm handle, also deals adequately with Norcross’s cases.

Exploring the Bilingual Phonological Space: Early Bilinguals’ Discrimination of Coronal Stop Contrasts

2017 ◽  
Vol 61 (2) ◽  
pp. 173-198 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yevgeniy Vasilyevich Melguy
Keyword(s):  
Speech Perception ◽  
The Other ◽  
Control Group ◽  
Sound System ◽  
Bilingual Group ◽  
Phonetic Contrasts ◽  
Contrast Discrimination ◽  
Cross Language ◽  
Better Than ◽  
Do So

It is well known that the way monolingual listeners discriminate speech sounds is strongly influenced by their native (L1) sound system. Moreover, such perceptual constraints are not limited to monolinguals: multiple studies have found evidence of language-specificity in bilingual speech perception. However, the question of whether bilinguals have simultaneous access to both of their phonologies during non-native contrast discrimination has not been systematically examined. Namely, very few studies of bilinguals have specifically examined cases where a non-native contrast pair straddles the boundary between two sound systems, with one sound corresponding to a sound in the L1, and the other to a sound in the second language (L2), but with neither the L1 nor the L2 containing both. The current study aimed to do so by comparing the ability of early bilinguals to discriminate non-native phonetic contrasts consisting of sounds that exist in either their L1 or L2, but not in both. A forced-choice perception task compared two listener groups—Spanish–English bilinguals and English monolinguals—on their perception of Nepali dental–alveolar stop contrasts. Results showed that despite displaying some sensitivity to phonetic differences within each contrast pair, the bilingual group was unable to discriminate such “cross-language contrasts” significantly better than the monolingual English control group.

Closing the GAP—A 5Å Scanning Microscope

1969 ◽  
Vol 27 ◽  
pp. 6-7
Author(s):  
A. V. Crewe
Keyword(s):  
Normal Form ◽  
The Other ◽  
Resolving Power ◽  
Scanning Microscope ◽  
Conventional Microscope ◽  
Other Hand ◽  
Closing The Gap ◽  
Thermal Sources ◽  
Better Than ◽  
Transmission Microscope

We have become accustomed to differentiating between the scanning microscope and the conventional transmission microscope according to the resolving power which the two instruments offer. The conventional microscope is capable of a point resolution of a few angstroms and line resolutions of periodic objects of about 1Å. On the other hand, the scanning microscope, in its normal form, is not ordinarily capable of a point resolution better than 100Å. Upon examining reasons for the 100Å limitation, it becomes clear that this is based more on tradition than reason, and in particular, it is a condition imposed upon the microscope by adherence to thermal sources of electrons.

Factor Structure of the Hellenic WISC-III for Children with Learning Disabilities

2018 ◽  
Vol 9 (03) ◽  
pp. 20445-20451
Author(s):  
Adam A ◽  
Kiosseoglou G ◽  
Abatzoglou G ◽  
Papaligoura Z.
Keyword(s):  
Learning Disabilities ◽  
Factor Structure ◽  
Factor Model ◽  
The Other ◽  
Clinical Value ◽  
Reasoning Abilities ◽  
Picture Arrangement ◽  
Factorial Model ◽  
Verbal Subtest ◽  
Two Factors

The present research aims to examine the factor structure of the Hellenic WISC-III in a sample of 50 children with learning disabilities. The results show the existence of a factorial model with two factors, one aggregating the Comprehension verbal subtest with four performance subtests and the other the Picture Arrangement performance subtest with four verbal subtests. This two-factor model includes loadings in two factors that relate to the sequencing abilities and the verbal reasoning abilities of children. These findings assert the clinical value of the intelligence evaluation in these children.

Challenging Gender Hierarchies in Narratives of the Nation: Representations of Women in Zintgraff and the Battle of Mankon and Hard Choice

Imbizo ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 11 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Naomi Epongse Nkealah ◽  
Olutoba Gboyega Oluwasuji
Keyword(s):  
The Other ◽  
Literary Texts ◽  
Gender Differentiation ◽  
Hard Choice ◽  
Other Hand ◽  
Gender Hierarchies ◽  
The Face ◽  
The One ◽  
Representations Of Women ◽  
Do So

Ideas of nationalisms as masculine projects dominate literary texts by African male writers. The texts mirror the ways in which gender differentiation sanctions nationalist discourses and in turn how nationalist discourses reinforce gender hierarchies. This article draws on theoretical insights from the work of Anne McClintock and Elleke Boehmer to analyse two plays: Zintgraff and the Battle of Mankon by Bole Butake and Gilbert Doho and Hard Choice by Sunnie Ododo. The article argues that women are represented in these two plays as having an ambiguous relationship to nationalism. On the one hand, women are seen actively changing the face of politics in their societies, but on the other hand, the means by which they do so reduces them to stereotypes of their gender.

MUNDANE MIRACLES IN AWADH. ENCOUNTERS WITH THE REVEALED AND THE HIDDEN

2020 ◽  
pp. 130-140
Author(s):  
Maxim B. Demchenko ◽  
Keyword(s):  
The Other ◽  
Local People ◽  
Natural Phenomena ◽  
Mughal Empire ◽  
The Public ◽  
British Raj ◽  
The Subject ◽  
Other World ◽  
Better Than

The sphere of the unknown, supernatural and miraculous is one of the most popular subjects for everyday discussions in Ayodhya – the last of the provinces of the Mughal Empire, which entered the British Raj in 1859, and in the distant past – the space of many legendary and mythological events. Mostly they concern encounters with inhabitants of the “other world” – spirits, ghosts, jinns as well as miraculous healings following magic rituals or meetings with the so-called saints of different religions (Hindu sadhus, Sufi dervishes),with incomprehensible and frightening natural phenomena. According to the author’s observations ideas of the unknown in Avadh are codified and structured in Avadh better than in other parts of India. Local people can clearly define if they witness a bhut or a jinn and whether the disease is caused by some witchcraft or other reasons. Perhaps that is due to the presence in the holy town of a persistent tradition of katha, the public presentation of plots from the Ramayana epic in both the narrative and poetic as well as performative forms. But are the events and phenomena in question a miracle for the Avadhvasis, residents of Ayodhya and its environs, or are they so commonplace that they do not surprise or fascinate? That exactly is the subject of the essay, written on the basis of materials collected by the author in Ayodhya during the period of 2010 – 2019. The author would like to express his appreciation to Mr. Alok Sharma (Faizabad) for his advice and cooperation.

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