Quasi-Psychologism about Collective Intention

This paper argues that a class of popular views of collective intention, which I call “quasi-psychologism”, faces a problem explaining common intuitions about collective action. Views in this class hold that collective intentions are realized in or constituted by individual, mental, participatory intentions. I argue that this metaphysical commitment entails persistence conditions that are in tension with a purported obligation to notify co-actors before leaving a collective action attested to by participants in experimental research about the interpersonal normativity of collective action. I then explore the possibilities open to quasi-psychologists for responding to this research.

The Free Energy Principle: Good Science and Questionable Philosophy in a Grand Unifying Theory

The Free Energy Principle (FEP) is currently one of the most promising frameworks with which to address a unified explanation of life-related phenomena. With powerful formalism that embeds a small set of assumptions, it purports to deal with complex adaptive dynamics ranging from barely unicellular organisms to complex cultural manifestations. The FEP has received increased attention in disciplines that study life, including some critique regarding its overall explanatory power and its true potential as a grand unifying theory (GUT). Recently, FEP theorists presented a contribution with the main tenets of their framework, together with possible philosophical interpretations, which lean towards so-called Markovian Monism (MM). The present paper assumes some of the abovementioned critiques, rejects the arguments advanced to invalidate the FEP’s potential to be a GUT, and overcomes criticism thereof by reviewing FEP theorists’ newly minted metaphysical commitment, namely MM. Specifically, it shows that this philosophical interpretation of the FEP argues circularly and only delivers what it initially assumes, i.e., a dual information geometry that allegedly explains epistemic access to the world based on prior dual assumptions. The origin of this circularity can be traced back to a physical description contingent on relative system-environment separation. However, the FEP itself is not committed to MM, and as a scientific theory it delivers more than what it assumes, serving as a heuristic unification principle that provides epistemic advancement for the life sciences.

Scientific Realism Without Reality? What Happens When Metaphysics is Left Out

Scientific realism is usually presented as if metaphysical realism (i.e. the thesis that there is a structured mind-independent external world) were one of its essential parts. This paper aims to examine how weak the metaphysical commitments endorsed by scientific realists could be. I will argue that scientific realism could be stated without accepting any form of metaphysical realism. Such a conclusion does not go as far as to try to combine scientific realism with metaphysical antirealism. Instead, it amounts to the combination of the former with a weaker view, called quietism, which is agnostic on the existence of mind-independent structures. In Sect. 2, I will argue that the minimal claim that brings together every scientific realist view is devoid of any metaphysical commitment. In Sect. 3, I will define metaphysical realism and antirealism. Such work will be instrumental in providing a more precise statement of quietism. Finally (Sect. 4), I will argue that assuming quietism, it is still possible to make sense of the debate between scientific realists and antirealists.

Strategy-in-Practices: A process philosophical approach to understanding strategy emergence and organizational outcomes

Emergence of a firm’s strategy is of central concern to both Strategy Process (SP) and Strategy-as-Practice (SAP) scholars. While SP scholars view strategy emergence as a long-term macro conditioning process, SAP advocates concentrate on the episodic micro ‘doing’ of strategy actors in formal strategy planning settings. Neither perspective explains satisfactorily how process and practice relate in strategy emergence to produce tangible organizational outcomes. The conundrum of reconciling the macro/ micro distinction implied in process and practice stems from a shared Substantialist metaphysical commitment that attributes strategy emergence to substantive entities. In this article, we draw on Process metaphysics and the practice-turn in social philosophy and theory to propose a Strategy- in-Practices (SIP) perspective. SIP emphasizes how the multitude of coping actions taken at the ‘coal-face’ of an organization congeal inadvertently over time into an organizational modus operandi that provides the basis for strategizing. Strategy, therefore, inheres within socio-culturally propagated predispositions that provide the patterned consistency that makes the inadvertent emergence of a coherent strategy possible. By demonstrating how strategy is immanent in socio-culturally propagated practices, the SIP perspective overcomes the troublesome micro/ macro distinction implied in SP and SAP research. It also advances our understanding of how strategy emergence impacts organizational outcomes.

Aquinas and the ‘Genius of Woman’

Aquinas views women as inferior to men at a natural level in some respects. While affirming unity of species and hence an essential equality, he views women as intellectually inferior. This article considers the root cause of this position and argues that we must make a distinction between a twofold inheritance that was bequeathed by Aristotle to Aquinas. It is the erroneous embryology of Aristotle that is the underlying cause of Aquinas’s judgment of the inferiority of women because it divides the sexes into passive and active principles of human generation. Given Aquinas’s metaphysical commitment to the superiority of act over potency, this necessarily leads to a judgment of inferiority and has far-reaching implications vis-a-vis a negative view of the intellectual capacity of women. However, there is an important metaphysical inheritance from Aristotle that, if carefully separated from the erroneous physics (i.e. from the embryology), has the power to give credibility to the idea of the ‘genius of woman’, as popularized by John Paul II. A key element of this positive inheritance is the hylomorphic theory understood to include the notion of matter having some determinative impact on the substantial form.

Territory and Ritornello: Deleuze and Guattari on Thinking Living Beings

The concepts of territory and ritornello cannot be separated from one another, despite the fact that scholarship tends to restrict the former to discussions of politics and the latter to discussions of art. Deleuze and Guattari deploy the combination of territory and ritornello, along with associated notions such as rhythm, milieu, counterpoint and force, as a method to describe and understand the formation, existence and relations of living beings. They understand ‘life’ to also include a variety of nonorganic entities, such as social formations. Territory and ritornello provide a philosophical alternative to understanding the existence of beings in terms of an immutable, unchanging transcendent structure, such as divine revelation, politico-economic ideology or cultural identity. As such, this conceptual pair is a necessary element in translating Deleuze and Guattari's metaphysical commitment to immanence and univocity into ethical and political theory and practice.

Who's afraid of Martin Heidegger? Some friendly comments on the paper by Professor Matthew Johnson

I am in general agreement with Professor Johnson's main points. To his and the editor's question, ‘is there archaeological theory?’, His answer is ‘yes and no’. This ambiguous but accurate answer can be divided variously. The first category would be archaeological theory per se, which would encompass the work and thought from that of Nicholas Steno in the 17th century to that of Michael Schiffer (2002) today. It would be about the natural transformations of ‘deposits’. Next there would be theories about the transformation of natural materials into the more or less durable remains that comprise archaeological ‘data’ – the stuff of everyday lives. Again, work of Michael Schiffer (2001) and Daniel Miller (1998) comes to mind. They and a long list of contemporary archaeologists deploy theory on behalf of the understanding of the creation of things that build the human habitat. Broader use of theory comes with the deployment of frameworks from demography to demonology and ecology to ethics that are used to structure historical and anthropological questions that might be answered with archaeological remains. Each selection of a theoretical position entails one or another metaphysical commitment about what comprises ‘data’ and ‘evidence’ and what constitutes a proper explanation. In this regard Professor Johnson asks, does archaeology indiscriminately adopt and apply various philosophical positions without proper regard for their extent, implications and conditions for application? His answer is yes, certainly, and to our disadvantage. As Christopher Chippindale and I have noted on several occasions, archaeology treats philosophical traditions a bit like a Chinese menu or perhaps the contents of a supermarket: the archaeologist takes one from column A and another from column B, and a whole bunch of stuff from the dairy aisle and more from the fruits and vegetables section. Not only is this not kosher – one does not mix dairy and Derrida – but the selections are radically contradictory and sometimes even incoherent.

Rawls and the Socratic Ideal

John Rawls’s recommendation that political philosophy should be kept free of metaphysics has recently come under attack by Jean Hampton. According to her philosophy as a Socratic quest has to orient itself by radical probing and that unavoidingly involves us in metaphysical commitment. Non-Socratic philosophy in the later Rawls, she claims, reduces itself to a mere ‘modus vivendi’. In defending Rawls the article makes clear how Hampton underrates the method of reflective equilibrium. Rawls makes a rationally reconstructed use of the Socratic ideal, that can be turned not only against Hampton’s critique of Rawls, but also against its relativist appropriation by Richard Rorty.