Philosophical Review recent issues

Leibniz and the Puzzle of Incompossibility: The Packing Strategy

McDonough, J. K. — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 15:23:28 PST

Confronting the threat of a Spinozistic necessitarianism, Leibniz insists that not all possible substances are compossible—that they can't all be instantiated together—and thus that not all possible worlds are compossible—that they can't all be instantiated together. While it is easy to appreciate Leibniz's reasons for embracing this view, it has proven difficult to see how his doctrine of incompossibility might be reconciled with the broader commitments of his larger philosophical system. This essay develops, in four sections, a novel solution to the "puzzle of incompossibility." The first section frames the difficulty more carefully and briefly argues that the two dominant strategies developed by Leibniz's commentators fail to solve it fully insofar as they require simply abandoning one or another of its motivating commitments. The second and third sections show how Leibniz's guiding analogy of a geometrical packing or tiling problem may be applied to solve the puzzle of incompossibility in the context of finite and infinite worlds composed of extended corporeal substances. Finally, the fourth section shows how the strategy of Leibniz's packing analogy might be applied even in the context of a thoroughly idealist metaphysics in which the only true substances are nonextended, mindlike "monads." The essay concludes by drawing some connections between Leibniz's thinking about the puzzle of incompossibility and the development of his views concerning the status of corporeal substances and extended bodies.

The Explanation of Amour-Propre

Kolodny, N. — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 15:23:28 PST

Rousseau's thought is marked by an optimism and a pessimism that each evoke, at least in the right mood, a feeling of recognition difficult to suppress. We have an innate capacity for virtue, and with it freedom and happiness. Yet our present social conditions instill in us a restless craving for superiority, which leads to vice, and with it bondage and misery. Call this the "thesis of possible goodness": that while human psychology is such that men become wicked under the conditions in which we now find them, nevertheless men would be, or have been, good under other conditions. It is surprisingly difficult, or at least surprisingly complicated, however, to articulate even a possible psychology that would explain the thesis of possible goodness. Interpretations of Rousseau, even several to which the author of this essay is highly indebted, have not fully engaged, I think, with the complications. This essay tries to reconstruct psychological principles that would explain the thesis and that are at least consistent with what Rousseau otherwise says on the subject. Much of the value of this exercise, however, lies not in the particulars of the resulting psychology but rather in the depth of the tension between Rousseau's optimism and his pessimism that it reveals.

Acting for the Right Reasons

Markovits, J. — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 15:23:28 PST

This essay examines the thought that our right actions have moral worth only if we perform them for the right reasons. It argues against the view, often ascribed to Kant, that morally worthy actions must be performed because they are right and argues that Kantians and others ought instead to accept the view that morally worthy actions are those performed for the reasons why they are right. In other words, morally worthy actions are those for which the reasons why they were performed (the reasons motivating them) and the reasons why they morally ought to have been performed (the reasons morally justifying them) coincide. The essay calls this the Coincident Reasons Thesis and argues that it provides plausible necessary and sufficient conditions for morally worthy action, defending the claim against proposed counterexamples. It ends by showing that the plausibility of the thesis, which it argues is largely independent of any particular ethical standpoint, gives us some reason to doubt a class of ethical theories that includes utilitarianism.

Paolo Crivelli, Aristotle on Truth.

Shields, C. — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 15:23:28 PST

Jeffrey C. King, The Nature and Structure of Content.

Liebesman, D. — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 15:23:28 PST

May Sim, Remastering Morals with Aristotle and Confucius.

Wardy, R. — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 15:23:28 PST

David Estlund, Democratic Authority: A Philosophical Framework.

Julius, A. J. — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 15:23:28 PST

Allan Gibbard, Reconciling Our Aims: In Search of Bases for Ethics.

Star, D. — Wed, 10 Mar 2010 15:23:28 PST

BOOKS RECEIVED

Wed, 10 Mar 2010 15:23:28 PST

Decision-Theoretic Paradoxes as Voting Paradoxes

Briggs, R. — Wed, 09 Dec 2009 17:56:45 PST

It is a platitude among decision theorists that agents should choose their actions so as to maximize expected value. But exactly how to define expected value is contentious. Evidential decision theory (henceforth EDT), causal decision theory (henceforth CDT), and a theory proposed by Ralph Wedgwood that this essay will call benchmark theory (BT) all advise agents to maximize different types of expected value. Consequently, their verdicts sometimes conflict. In certain famous cases of conflict—medical Newcomb problems—CDT and BT seem to get things right, while EDT seems to get things wrong. In other cases of conflict, including some recent examples suggested by Andy Egan, EDT and BT seem to get things right, while CDT seems to get things wrong. In still other cases, EDT and CDT seems to get things right, while BT gets things wrong.

It's no accident, this essay claims, that all three decision theories are subject to counterexamples. Decision rules can be reinterpreted as voting rules, where the voters are the agent's possible future selves. The problematic examples have the structure of voting paradoxes. Just as voting paradoxes show that no voting rule can do everything we want, decision-theoretic paradoxes show that no decision rule can do everything we want. Luckily, the so-called "tickle defense" establishes that EDT, CDT, and BT will do everything we want in a wide range of situations. Most decision situations, this essay argues, are analogues of voting situations in which the voters unanimously adopt the same set of preferences. In such situations, all plausible voting rules and all plausible decision rules agree.

Monism: The Priority of the Whole

Schaffer, J. — Wed, 09 Dec 2009 17:56:45 PST

Which is prior, the whole or its parts? The monist holds that the whole is prior to its parts, and thus views the cosmos as fundamental, with metaphysical explanation dangling downward from the One. The pluralist holds that the parts are prior to their whole, and thus tends to consider particles fundamental, with metaphysical explanation snaking upward from the many. There seem to be physical and modal considerations that favor the monistic view. Physically, there is good evidence that the cosmos forms an entangled system and good reason to treat entangled systems as irreducible wholes. Modally, mereology allows for the possibility of atomless gunk, with no ultimate parts for the pluralist to invoke as the ground of being.

Epistemic Invariantism and Speech Act Contextualism

Turri, J. — Wed, 09 Dec 2009 17:56:45 PST

In this essay I show how to reconcile epistemic invariantism with the knowledge account of assertion. My basic proposal is that we can comfortably combine invariantism with the knowledge account of assertion by endorsing contextualism about speech acts. My demonstration takes place against the backdrop of recent contextualist attempts to usurp the knowledge account of assertion, most notably Keith DeRose's influential argument that the knowledge account of assertion spells doom for invariantism and enables contextualism's ascendancy.

Nature's Metaphysics: Laws and Properties

Lange, M. — Wed, 09 Dec 2009 17:56:45 PST

Wittgenstein's Apprenticeship with Russell

Sullivan, P. — Wed, 09 Dec 2009 17:56:45 PST

Kantian Ethics

Kain, P. — Wed, 09 Dec 2009 17:56:45 PST

The Riddle of Hume's Treatise: Skepticism, Naturalism, and Irreligion

Garrett, D. — Wed, 09 Dec 2009 17:56:45 PST

Free Riding

Kuhn, S. T. — Wed, 09 Dec 2009 17:56:45 PST

Morality and Political Violence

Hurka, T. — Wed, 09 Dec 2009 17:56:45 PST

Oxford Studies in Metaphysics

Leuenberger, S. — Wed, 09 Dec 2009 17:56:45 PST

Across the Boundaries: Extrapolation in Biology and Social Science

Dupre, J. — Wed, 09 Dec 2009 17:56:45 PST

BOOKS RECEIVED

Wed, 09 Dec 2009 17:56:45 PST

Persistence and the First-Person Perspective

Ninan, D. — Wed, 30 Sep 2009 15:11:56 PDT

When one considers one's own persistence over time from the first-person perspective, it seems as if facts about one's persistence are "further facts," over and above facts about physical and psychological continuity. But the idea that facts about one's persistence are further facts is objectionable on independent theoretical grounds: it conflicts with physicalism and requires us to posit hidden facts about our persistence. This essay shows how to resolve this conflict using the idea that imagining from the first-person point of view is a guide to centered possibility, a type of possibility analyzed in terms of centered worlds.

The Humean Theory of Motivation Reformulated and Defended

Sinhababu, N. — Wed, 30 Sep 2009 15:11:56 PDT

This essay defends a strong version of the Humean theory of motivation on which desire is necessary both for motivation and for reasoning that changes our desires. Those who hold that moral judgments are beliefs with intrinsic motivational force need to oppose this view, and many of them have proposed counterexamples to it. Using a novel account of desire, this essay handles the proposed counterexamples in a way that shows the superiority of the Humean theory. The essay addresses the classic objection that the Humean theory cannot explain the feeling of obligation, Stephen Darwall's example of motivationally potent reasoning that is not based on preexisting desires, Thomas Scanlon's criticism that the Humean theory fails to account for the structure and phenomenology of deliberation, and the phenomenon of akrasia as discussed by John Searle. In each case a Humean account explains the data at least as thoroughly as opposing views can, while fitting within a simpler total account of how we deliberate and act.

Noumenal Affection

Hogan, D. — Wed, 30 Sep 2009 15:11:56 PDT

A central doctrine of Kant's Critique of Pure Reason holds that the content of human experience is rooted in an affection of sensibility by unknowable things in themselves. This famous and puzzling affection doctrine raises two seemingly intractable old problems, which can be termed the Indispensability and the Consistency Problems. By what right does Kant present affection by supersensible entities as an indispensable requirement of experience? And how could any argument for such indispensability avoid violating the Critique's doctrine of noumenal ignorance? This essay develops a new solution to both problems, setting out from the continuity between Kant's early and mature views on sensibility and mind-world relations. Kant's early writings subscribe to an interactionist cosmology opposed to both Leibniz's preestablished harmony and Malebranche's occasionalism. The modern debate on mind-world relations shaping Kant's early cosmology points us to a widely recognized motivation for interactionism, turning on a constraint on agency within certain noninteractionist cosmologies. In particular, Kant's early conversion to a libertarian theory of freedom, together with his rejection of occasionalism, provides the basis for a compelling argument for the indispensability of world-mind affection relations. Extended to the transcendental idealist framework, the same argument reveals noumenal affection as an indispensable presupposition of some knowledge claims consistently upheld by Kant. This leads in turn to a satisfying solution to the Consistency Problem, showing that the doctrine of noumenal affection is not merely consistent with, but is partly motivated by, Kant's commitment to noumenal ignorance.

The Metaphysics of Everyday Life

Kearns, S. — Wed, 30 Sep 2009 15:11:56 PDT

The Autonomy of Morality

Bagnoli, C. — Wed, 30 Sep 2009 15:11:56 PDT

Only a Promise of Happiness: The Place of Beauty in a World of Art

Uidhir, C. M. — Wed, 30 Sep 2009 15:11:56 PDT

Plotinus and the Presocratics: A Philosophical Study of Presocratic Influences in Plotinus' "Enneads"

Wilberding, J. — Wed, 30 Sep 2009 15:11:56 PDT

Truth, etc.: Six Lectures on Ancient Logic

Ademollo, F. — Wed, 30 Sep 2009 15:11:56 PDT

The Correspondence between Princess Elisabeth of Bohemia and Rene Descartes

O'Neill, E. — Wed, 30 Sep 2009 15:11:56 PDT

Contradiction in Motion: Hegel's Organic Concept of Life and Value

Speight, C. A. — Wed, 30 Sep 2009 15:11:56 PDT

BOOKS RECEIVED

Wed, 30 Sep 2009 15:11:56 PDT

Perceptual Objectivity

Burge, T. — Thu, 16 Jul 2009 14:43:28 PDT

A central preoccupation of philosophy in the twentieth century was to determine constitutive conditions under which accurate (objective) empirical representation of the macrophysical environment is possible. A view that dominated attitudes on this project maintained that an individual cannot empirically represent a physical subject matter as having specific physical characteristics unless the individual can represent some constitutive conditions under which such representation is possible. The version of this view that dominated the century's second half maintained that objective empirical representation of the physical environment requires the individual to be able to supplement this representation with representation of general constitutive features of objectivity. This essay criticizes instances of this version in P. F. Strawson and Quine. It maintains that all versions of the position postulate conditions on objective empirical representation that are more intellectual than are warranted. Such views leave it doubtful that animals and human infants perceptually represent elements in the physical environment. By appeal to common sense and to empirical perceptual psychology, this essay argues that unaided perception yields objective representation of the macrophysical environment. It does so in prelinguistic animals, even in animals that almost surely lack propositional attitudes. The essay concludes with explications of nondeflationary conceptions of representation and perception. It distinguishes nonperceptual sensing from perceptual representation and explicates perceptual representation as a type of objective sensory representation. Objectivity is marked by perceptual constancies. Representation is marked by a nontrivial role for veridicality conditions in explanations of the relevant states.

On Truth-Conditions for If (but Not Quite Only If)

Gillies, A. S. — Thu, 16 Jul 2009 14:43:28 PDT

What we want to be true about ordinary indicative conditionals seems to be more than we can possibly get: there just seems to be no good way to assign truth-conditions to ordinary indicative conditionals. Some take this argument as reason to make our wantings more modest. Others take it to show that indicative conditionals don't have truth-conditions in the first place. But we have overlooked two possibilities for assigning truth-conditions to indicatives. What's more, those possibilities deliver what we want and turn out to be equivalent.

Plato's Two Forms of Second-Best Morality

Wilberding, J. — Thu, 16 Jul 2009 14:43:28 PDT

In the Republic Plato presents a hierarchy of five cities, each representing a structural arrangement of the soul. The timocratic soul, characterized by its governance by spirit and its consequent desire for esteem and aversion to shame, is ranked as the second-best kind of soul, though this should strike us as surprising since the timocratic figure would seem to be duplicitous, intellectually passive, and at the mercy of the fortuitous opinions of others. This timocrat's position thus raises problems concerning the intrinsic value of the spirited part of the soul, problems that are best solved by comparing the auxiliary to the timocrat, both of whom represent different forms of second-best morality. A lengthy discussion of the early education's effect on the spirited part shows how the auxiliary represents the best kind of moral agent that the second-best nature (silver-souled individuals) can develop into. This is because the early education ensures that the auxiliary and the philosopher share the same basic structure of soul, with reason being in control of each, though the auxiliary's natural deficiencies create some limitations in terms of his or her moral self-sufficiency. The timocrat by contrast represents the second-best kind of moral agent that the best nature (gold-souled individuals) can develop into. The timocrat is morally inferior to the auxiliary and seems to embody Homeric shame-culture. Plato is critical of this approach to morality, but the timocrat justifiably occupies the second position in the hierarchy on account of his or her concern for the opinions of others.

Aristotle

Betegh, G. — Thu, 16 Jul 2009 14:43:28 PDT

Reading Seneca: Stoic Philosophy at Rome

Long, A. A. — Thu, 16 Jul 2009 14:43:28 PDT

Aquinas on Friendship

McInerny, D. — Thu, 16 Jul 2009 14:43:28 PDT

Kant and Skepticism

Guyer, P. — Thu, 16 Jul 2009 14:43:28 PDT

Hegel and the Transformation of Philosophical Critique

James, D. — Thu, 16 Jul 2009 14:43:28 PDT

Ignorance of Language

Ludlow, P. — Thu, 16 Jul 2009 14:43:28 PDT

The Really Hard Problem: Meaning in a Material World

Dennett, D. C. — Thu, 16 Jul 2009 14:43:28 PDT

Much Ado about Nonexistence: Fiction and Reference

Lamarque, P. — Thu, 16 Jul 2009 14:43:28 PDT

Four Views on Free Will

Miller, J. S. — Thu, 16 Jul 2009 14:43:28 PDT

Self-Knowing Agents

Butterfill, S. — Thu, 16 Jul 2009 14:43:28 PDT

BOOKS RECEIVED

Thu, 16 Jul 2009 14:43:28 PDT