Gorgo: Sparta’s Woman of Autonomy, Authority, and Agency

Claims that Herodotus reveals himself as a proto-biographer, let alone as a proto-feminist, are not yet widely accepted. To advance these claims, I have selected one remarkable woman from one side of the Greco-Persian Wars whose activities are recounted in his Histories. Critically it is to a near contemporary, Heraclitus, to whom we attribute the maxim êthos anthropôi daimôn (ἦθος ἀνθρώπῳ δαίμων) —character is human destiny. It is the truth of this maxim—which implies effective human agency—that makes Herodotus’ creation of historical narrative even possible. Herodotus is often read for his vignettes, which, without advancing the narrative, color-in the character of the individuals he depicts in his Histories. No matter, if these fall short of the cradle to grave accounts given by Plutarch, by hop-scotching through the nine books, we can assemble a partially continuous narrative, and thus through their exploits, gauge their character, permitting us to attribute both credit and moral responsibility. Arguably this implied causation demonstrates that Herodotus’ writings include much that amounts to proto-biography and in several instances—one of which is given here—proto-feminism.

Narrative responsibility and artificial intelligence

Most accounts of responsibility focus on one type of responsibility, moral responsibility, or address one particular aspect of moral responsibility such as agency. This article outlines a broader framework to think about responsibility that includes causal responsibility, relational responsibility, and what I call “narrative responsibility” as a form of “hermeneutic responsibility”, connects these notions of responsibility with different kinds of knowledge, disciplines, and perspectives on human being, and shows how this framework is helpful for mapping and analysing how artificial intelligence (AI) challenges human responsibility and sense-making in various ways. Mobilizing recent hermeneutic approaches to technology, the article argues that next to, and interwoven with, other types of responsibility such as moral responsibility, we also have narrative and hermeneutic responsibility—in general and for technology. For example, it is our task as humans to make sense of, with and, if necessary, against AI. While from a posthumanist point of view, technologies also contribute to sense-making, humans are the experiencers and bearers of responsibility and always remain in charge when it comes to this hermeneutic responsibility. Facing and working with a world of data, correlations, and probabilities, we are nevertheless condemned to make sense. Moreover, this also has a normative, sometimes even political aspect: acknowledging and embracing our hermeneutic responsibility is important if we want to avoid that our stories are written elsewhere—through technology.

Know-How, Performance Enhancement, and Guidance Control

If intellectualism about knowledge-how is true (and so, if knowledge-how is a species of knowledge-that), then to the extent that we need an autonomy condition on know-how, it will be (simply) an autonomy condition on know-that: a condition on propositional knowledge-apt belief. However, the anti-intellectualist—according to whom know-how is fundamentally dispositional rather than propositional—would need an entirely different story here––one that places an autonomy-related restriction not on propositional-knowledge-apt belief but, instead, on know-how-apt dispositions. Chapter 4 develops exactly this kind of restriction, by cobbling together some ideas about know-how and virtue epistemology with recent thinking in the moral responsibility literature about freedom, responsibility, and manipulation. The proposal is that one is in a state of knowing how to do something, φ‎, only if one has the skill to φ‎ successfully with guidance control, and one’s φ‎-ing exhibits guidance control (and furthermore, manifests know-how) only if one’s φ‎-ing is caused by a reasons-responsive mechanism that one owns. Unsurprisingly, the devil is in these details—and this chapter aims to spell them out in a way that rules out certain kinds of radical performance enhancing cases while not ruling out that, say, one knows how to do a maths problem when one’s performance is just mildly boosted by Adderall.

„Quo Vadis, Aida?“ in the Context of Prosthetic Memory

The research for this paper was initially prompted by the insights of Alison Landsberg (Prosthetic Memory, 2004) on the development of prosthetic memory, namely the phenomenon of personally experienced content through the mass media – and the idea to apply the same insights to the film "Quo Vadis, Aida" (2020) directed by Jasmila Žbanić, because of the relevance of its topic on the Srebrenica genocide in 1995 for modern society. This paper analyzes the difference between collective and prosthetic memory, affective engagement concerning the process of identification in acquiring historical knowledge and prosthetic memory, and the elements of the film that encourage epistemological uncertainty and therefore potentially develop historical awareness and responsibility. Given the example of the film "Quo Vadis, Aida?", this paper aims to show the potential of mass media in developing prosthetic memory, which consequently brings to thinking about the other from the current perspective, thus encouraging moral responsibility and critical thinking.

Moral Responsibility for Consequences of One's Own Death: An Illustrative Analysis

This paper addresses what (if at all) is the moral responsibility of a person for consequences of their own death, and what (in)actions may be morally required of that person in order to try to optimize the balance of negative and positive consequences of their future death. Illustrative analysis using chance, choice and constraint as necessary and arguably jointly sufficient considerations is used. It concludes that a capable person's moral responsibility extends after that person's death, and that some (in)actions are morally required of the person while they are alive to try to optimize their death's consequences to others.

The change in the concept of virtue during the COVID-19 pandemic

The purpose of the article is to cover the change in the concept of virtue during the COVID-19 pandemic, show its connection with human values and ethics. Virtue is the highest spiritual quality of a person. The main virtues include wisdom, courage, justice, moderation, responsiveness, loyalty, modesty, generosity and many others that affect all aspects of human life. Despite the recognized value of virtue as a system of moral guidelines, its concept is fraught with disputes about whether it is really generally valid, as well as about the problem of the effectiveness of virtue as a universal guideline and criterion for moral choice and its relevance in modern moral experience. This article argues that the most significant shift in the concept of virtue during the pandemic was the rethinking and increased awareness of the importance of such virtues as solidarity and moral responsibility, as well as aspects of relationships with people such as kindness, compassion, and empathy. It is proved that the concept of virtue has moved from a question of choice to the category of necessity, the most important guideline and guarantee of the common good.

The Correlates and Consequences of Believing in Free Will

<p>Research has indicated that weakening people’s belief in free will may likewise weaken their belief in moral responsibility and potentially license them to morally transgress. Recent studies in social psychology suggest that diminished belief in free will is associated with a range of anti-social or otherwise negative outcomes. For example, cheating, unjustified aggression, and less prosocial helping behaviour. In response to these findings, illusionist philosophers have recommended that even if scientists somehow conclusively showed that free will does not exist it might nevertheless be necessary to foster widespread belief as a useful-fiction. In the opposing camp, free will disillusionists maintain that belief in free will has a dark side that we would be better off without. The problem they say, is the close connection between free will and the belief that people justly deserve what they get. So rather than having the instrumental benefits that illusionists claim, belief in free will is too often taken to justify treating people in severe and demeaning ways. Who then is correct? I report empirical results comparing the beliefs and attitudes of free will sceptics and people naïve to the debate. Results are consistent with the claims of disillusionists. Free will sceptics are more compassionate, and are less likely to believe in just deserts and harbour retributive attitudes.</p>

The Correlates and Consequences of Believing in Free Will

<p>Research has indicated that weakening people’s belief in free will may likewise weaken their belief in moral responsibility and potentially license them to morally transgress. Recent studies in social psychology suggest that diminished belief in free will is associated with a range of anti-social or otherwise negative outcomes. For example, cheating, unjustified aggression, and less prosocial helping behaviour. In response to these findings, illusionist philosophers have recommended that even if scientists somehow conclusively showed that free will does not exist it might nevertheless be necessary to foster widespread belief as a useful-fiction. In the opposing camp, free will disillusionists maintain that belief in free will has a dark side that we would be better off without. The problem they say, is the close connection between free will and the belief that people justly deserve what they get. So rather than having the instrumental benefits that illusionists claim, belief in free will is too often taken to justify treating people in severe and demeaning ways. Who then is correct? I report empirical results comparing the beliefs and attitudes of free will sceptics and people naïve to the debate. Results are consistent with the claims of disillusionists. Free will sceptics are more compassionate, and are less likely to believe in just deserts and harbour retributive attitudes.</p>

Zdolność reagowania na racje a odpowiedzialność moralna

Przekład na podstawie: „Responsiveness and Moral Responsibility”, w: Responsibility, Character, and the Emotions: New Essays in Moral Psychology, red. Ferdinand Schoeman (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1987), 81–106; przedruk w: John Martin Fischer, My Way: Essays on Moral Responsibility (Oxford: Cambridge University Press, 2006), 63–83. Przekład za zgodą Autora. Autor przedstawia model odpowiedzialności moralnej oparty na faktycznej sekwencji i pojęciu zdolności reagowania na racje, a następnie przeprowadza analogię między tym modelem a opracowanym przez Roberta Nozicka modelem wiedzy opartej na faktycznej sekwencji, oraz wprowadza pojęcie semikompatybilizmu.