這本分量十足的論文集是為祝賀劉述先先生八秩壽慶，由香港中文大學哲學系與臺灣中央研究院中國文哲研究所共同策劃出版。文集收錄了香港、臺灣、中國大陸及海外學者共三十三篇文章，分為四組：「當代新儒家」、「宋明 理學與東亞儒學」、「先秦儒學」及「全球議題」。文章的作者或是受教於劉先生的門生、與劉先生共事的同寅、曾向劉先生問學的後輩、與劉先生切磋的同道，都曾以不同方式得益於劉先生豐厚學養的教誨與指點。現在大家呈 奉研究心得匯集成書，都是懷著相同的感恩和致敬的心意，祝福劉先生壽如南山、茂如松柏。.

The current COVID-19 pandemic and the previous SARS/MERS outbreaks of 2003 and 2012 have resulted in a series of major global public health crises. We argue that in the interest of developing effective and safe vaccines and drugs and to better understand coronaviruses and associated disease mechenisms it is necessary to integrate the large and exponentially growing body of heterogeneous coronavirus data. Ontologies play an important role in standard-based knowledge and data representation, integration, sharing, and analysis. Accordingly, we initiated the (...) development of the community-based Coronavirus Infectious Disease Ontology in early 2020. -/- As an Open Biomedical Ontology (OBO) library ontology, CIDO is open source and interoperable with other existing OBO ontologies. CIDO is aligned with the Basic Formal Ontology and Viral Infectious Disease Ontology. CIDO has imported terms from over 30 OBO ontologies. For example, CIDO imports all SARS-CoV-2 protein terms from the Protein Ontology, COVID-19-related phenotype terms from the Human Phenotype Ontology, and over 100 COVID-19 terms for vaccines (both authorized and in clinical trial) from the Vaccine Ontology. CIDO systematically represents variants of SARS-CoV-2 viruses and over 300 amino acid substitutions therein, along with over 300 diagnostic kits and methods. CIDO also describes hundreds of host-coronavirus protein-protein interactions (PPIs) and the drugs that target proteins in these PPIs. CIDO has been used to model COVID-19 related phenomena in areas such as epidemiology. The scope of CIDO was evaluated by visual analysis supported by a summarization network method. CIDO has been used in various applications such as term standardization, inference, natural language processing (NLP) and clinical data integration. We have applied the amino acid variant knowledge present in CIDO to analyze differences between SARS-CoV-2 Delta and Omicron variants. CIDO's integrative host-coronavirus PPIs and drug-target knowledge has also been used to support drug repurposing for COVID-19 treatment. -/- CIDO represents entities and relations in the domain of coronavirus diseases with a special focus on COVID-19. It supports shared knowledge representation, data and metadata standardization and integration, and has been used in a range of applications. (shrink)

Current COVID-19 pandemic and previous SARS/MERS outbreaks have caused a series of major crises to global public health. We must integrate the large and exponentially growing amount of heterogeneous coronavirus data to better understand coronaviruses and associated disease mechanisms, in the interest of developing effective and safe vaccines and drugs. Ontologies have emerged to play an important role in standard knowledge and data representation, integration, sharing, and analysis. We have initiated the development of the community-based Coronavirus Infectious Disease Ontology (CIDO). (...) As an Open Biomedical Ontology (OBO) library ontology, CIDO is an open source and interoperable with other existing OBO ontologies. In this article, the general architecture and the design patterns of the CIDO are introduced, CIDO representation of coronaviruses, phenotypes, anti-coronavirus drugs and medical devices (e.g. ventilators) are illustrated, and an application of CIDO implemented to identify repurposable drug candidates for effective and safe COVID-19 treatment is presented. (shrink)

In ‘Equity and Marxist Buddhism,’ Tzu-wei Hung engages with the Marxist Buddhism developed by Taiwanese philosopher Lin Qiu-wu in the 1920s, brings this underexplored theory to the table and discusses a few merits and insights of the theory. Building on Hung’s analysis, this paper elaborates on the lessons and insights that Taiwanese Marxist Buddhism provides for modern times. The first three lessons are distinctive points that Taiwanese Marxist Buddhism brings to the discussion on combining Marxism and Buddhism: the connections between (...) the ethical and political, the responsibility for pursuing social justice and the nonviolent means towards social justice. The last lesson comes at the meta-philosophical level, focusing on how Hung’s engagement with Taiwanese Marxist Buddhism sheds light on the issue of diversifying the discipline philosophy. Overall, I argue that Taiwanese Marxist Buddhism not only makes contributions to theoretical frameworks while providing a practical means for pursuing equity and social justice, but it also manifests the epistemic and moral values for engaging with under-represented philosophical traditions. (shrink)

This article reviews and develops an epistemological tradition in the philosophy of science, known as convergentism, which holds that inference methods should be assessed based on their ability to converge to the truth across a range of possible scenarios. Emphasis is placed on its historical origins in the work of C. S. Peirce and its recent developments in formal epistemology and data science (including statistics and machine learning). Comparisons are made with three other traditions: (1) explanationism, which holds that theory (...) choice should be guided by a theory's overall balance of explanatory virtues, such as simplicity and fit with data; (2) instrumentalism, which maintains that scientific inference should be driven by the goal of obtaining useful models rather than true theories; and (3) Bayesianism, which shifts the focus from all-or-nothing beliefs to degrees of belief. (shrink)

Metaphysical rationalism, the doctrine which affirms the Principle of Sufficient Reason (the PSR), is out of favor today. The best argument against it is that it appears to lead to necessitarianism, the claim that all truths are necessarily true. Whatever the intuitive appeal of the PSR, the intuitive appeal of the claim that things could have been otherwise is greater. This problem did not go unnoticed by the great metaphysical rationalists Spinoza and Leibniz. Spinoza’s response was to embrace necessitarianism. Leibniz’s (...) response was to argue that, despite appearances, rationalism does not lead to necessitarianism. This paper examines the debate between these two rationalists and concludes that Leibniz has persuasive grounds for his opinion. This has significant implications both for the plausibility of the PSR and for our understanding of modality. (shrink)

Evaluative studies of inductive inferences have been pursued extensively with mathematical rigor in many disciplines, such as statistics, econometrics, computer science, and formal epistemology. Attempts have been made in those disciplines to justify many different kinds of inductive inferences, to varying extents. But somehow those disciplines have said almost nothing to justify a most familiar kind of induction, an example of which is this: “We’ve seen this many ravens and they all are black, so all ravens are black.” This is (...) enumerative induction in itsfullstrength. For it does not settle with a weaker conclusion (such as “the ravens observed in the future will all be black”); nor does it proceed with any additional premise (such as the statistical IID assumption). The goal of this paper is to take some initial steps toward a justification for the full version of enumerative induction, against counterinduction, and against the skeptical policy. The idea is to explore various epistemic ideals, mathematically defined as different modes of convergence to the truth, and look for one that is weak enough to be achievable and strong enough to justify a norm that governs both the long run and the short run. So the proposal is learning-theoretic in essence, but a Bayesian version is developed as well. (shrink)

This paper calls for a paradigm shift in studying academic dependency, towards the paradigm of brokered dependency. Using Chinese academia as an example, I demonstrate how the neocolonial condition of academic dependency is always mediated through blockage-brokerage mechanisms. The two most salient blockage-brokerage mechanisms of dependency in the Chinese context are linguistic barrier and authoritarian malepistemization, and the effects of the latter consist of three layers: institutional, informational and incorporational. On top of their domestic impacts, those mechanisms jointly exacerbate spectacularized (...) postcoloniality in anglophone-hegemonic global academic publishing. The paradigm of brokered dependency not only represents a more nuanced approach to the study of academic dependency, but also underscores the fact that the dismantling of the neocolonial condition cannot be conceived and pursued in isolation from comprehending and confronting the authoritarian condition, especially when the latter pertains under the disguise of anticolonialism. (shrink)

Structural injustice exists when the influence of social structure exposes some groups of people to undeserved burdens while conferring unearned power to others. It has been argued that the responsibility for addressing structural injustices should be shared among those participating in the social structure and can only be discharged through collective action; however, the proper form of collective action does not happen easily. To address structural injustice effectively, we need to gain clarity on the practical challenges that are involved and (...) explore possible means of implementing shared responsibility. This chapter thus aims to contribute to the study of addressing structural injustice in the following two ways. First, building on previous studies, I categorize three forms of practical challenges that have been encountered by existing proposals for discharging shared responsibility for structural injustice. Second, I offer an alternative proposal, which I will refer to as the deliberative mini-public proposal, and argue that it has the potential to mobilize structural change and better overcome the identified practical challenges. (shrink)

The call to make artificial intelligence (AI) more democratic, or to “democratize AI,” is sometimes framed as a promising response for mitigating algorithmic injustice or making AI more aligned with social justice. However, the notion of “democratizing AI” is elusive, as the phrase has been associated with multiple meanings and practices, and the extent to which it may help mitigate algorithmic injustice is still underexplored. In this paper, based on a socio-technical understanding of algorithmic injustice, I examine three notable notions (...) of democratizing AI and their associated measures—democratizing AI use, democratizing AI development, and democratizing AI governance—regarding their respective prospects and limits in response to algorithmic injustice. My examinations reveal that while some versions of democratizing AI bear the prospect of mitigating the concern of algorithmic injustice, others are somewhat limited and might even function to perpetuate unjust power hierarchies. This analysis thus urges a more fine-grained discussion on how to democratize AI and suggests that closer scrutiny of the power dynamics embedded in the socio-technical structure can help guide such explorations. (shrink)

This paper proposes a theory of perceptual responsibility, which I term perceptual responsibilism. The theory comprises three central claims: (1)We have perceptual responsibilities—responsibilities to perceive in certain ways—as moral, social, or epistemic agents; (2) These responsibilities are epistemic in nature, or at least exhibit a unified epistemic character; (3) When a person forms a belief based on a perceptual experience that was irresponsibly formed, that belief is doxastically unjustified, assuming no other basis is available.

abstract: Leibniz holds that there are no two perfectly similar things, a doctrine he calls the Principle of the Identity of Indiscernibles (the PII). What is his attitude toward its modal status? Most commentators hold that the principle is best understood as a necessary truth because it is allegedly entailed by doctrines such as the conceptual containment theory of truth, the Principle of Sufficient Reason (the PSR), and the denial of purely extrinsic denominations, which are arguably regarded by Leibniz as (...) necessary truths. In this paper, I argue against this consensus and show that (1) neither the conceptual containment theory of truth, nor the PSR, nor the denial of purely extrinsic denominations give Leibniz a good reason to hold that the PII is necessary; (2) Leibniz says that the PII is contingent in the correspondence with Clarke and not for dialectical reasons; and (3) the argument that Leibniz gives for the PII in §21 of his Fifth Letter to Clarke has been misunderstood; properly interpreted, it gives Leibniz a cogent argument rooted in some of his most important doctrines for the conclusion that the PII is a contingent truth. (shrink)

Bernard Williams contends that philosophy is part of a broader humanistic enterprise of “making sense of” ourselves and our activities, including the activity of science. Whereas the scientific enterprise purports to offer an absolute conception of the world as it is (independently of any local perspective on it), the humanistic enterprise cannot disengage itself from the contingent history of our ideas upon which it operates. While I agree with Williams that philosophy should be more attentive to history, his account of (...) philosophy, from which he derives this conclusion, is fatally flawed, being unable to meet three perennial challenges to any principled defense of philosophy as a discipline: i.e. the questions of authority, incubativity and peculiarity. Those challenges can be met only if we understand philosophy not as a humanistic discipline that is part of the broader humanistic enterprise, but as a distinctively normative discipline that tasks itself with finding answers to explicitly or implicitly normative questions, in contrast to various scientific and humanistic disciplines of descriptive inquiry. In this paper, I argue for the equivalence of philosophicality with normativity, explicate the theoretical and practical implications of the normative account of philosophy, and defend it against potential objections. (shrink)

The debate between scientific realism and anti-realism remains at a stalemate, making reconciliation seem hopeless. Yet, important work remains: exploring a common ground, even if only to uncover deeper points of disagreement and, ideally, to benefit both sides of the debate. I propose such a common ground. Specifically, many anti-realists, such as instrumentalists, have yet to seriously engage with Sober's call to justify their preferred version of Ockham's razor through a positive account. Meanwhile, realists face a similar challenge: providing a (...) non-circular explanation of how their version of Ockham's razor connects to truth. The common ground I propose addresses these challenges for both sides; the key is to leverage the idea that everyone values some truths and to draw on insights from scientific fields that study scientific inference—namely, statistics and machine learning. This common ground also isolates a distinctively epistemic root of the irreconcilability in the realism debate. (shrink)

Although the idea that sexual violence is a “structural” problem is not new, the lack of specification as to what that entails blocks effective responses to it. This paper illustrates the concept of sexual violence as structural in the sense of containing a type of moral wrong called “structural wrong” and discusses its practical implications. First, I introduce a distinction between two types of moral wrongs—interactional wrongs and structural wrongs—and I argue that the moral problem of sexual violence includes both (...) types, each of which calls for a different set of moral responses. Second, drawing on Iris Marion Young’s social connection model of responsibility, I argue that recognizing the structural-wrong element of sexual violence does not reduce individual perpetrators’ responsibility for it. Instead, it implies that a broader group of agents are required to join collective actions to reform the social structure. I conclude by evaluating some preventive programs against sexual violence through the lens of structural wrongs and providing directions to advance them. (shrink)

Abstract: The growing debate over zetetic responsibility—our duty to inquire or inquire further—has split into two main camps: the epistemic camp, which treats it as a distinctive form of epistemic normativity, and the practical camp, which argues it is wholly practical. This paper contends that both views are incomplete. Zetetic normativity is pluralistic, grounded in practical, socio-epistemic, and genuinely epistemic reasons. Through an analysis of cases—including high-stakes decisions, social-epistemic roles, and situations involving salient or opaque evidence—I show that obligations to (...) inquire arise from varied sources. To unify these, I advance a Zetetic Transmission Principle: if an agent has final reason to adopt a settled attitude toward a question, and inquiry serves as a means to that end, then they have a corresponding reason to inquire, matching the nature and strength of the final reason. This framework not only addresses objections such as overgeneralization and normative clashes but also clarifies the structure and source of zetetic obligations. In doing so, it offers a more nuanced and comprehensive theory of why, when, and in what form we ought to inquire. (shrink)

Cover Date: July 2006.Source Info: 115(3), 317-354. Language: English. Journal Announcement: 41-2. Subject: ACTION; CAUSATION; METAPHYSICS; REPRESENTATION; TELEOLOGY. Subject Person: SPINOZA, BENEDICT DE (BARUCH). Update Code: 20130315.

While I find Huaping Lu-Adler’s excavation of Kant’s long-overlooked linguistic Orientalism both enlightening and thought-provoking, I disagree with her diagnosis of its theoretical and practical relevance. On the one hand, while I agree that Kant’s positionality renders all his writings and teachings presumptively impactful, there is reason to doubt that his peculiar construction of the linguistic Oriental Other had much actual impact on his disciples. On the other hand, while I agree that the Kantian ideal of public reason is inapt (...) for rectifying the linguistic-epistemic injustices of global knowledge production, I disagree on why it is so. In particular, I argue for a shift in theoretical and practical focuses, from linguistic biases and prejudices, to the structural epistemic constraints of linguistic diversity, as well as to other political-structural conditions shaping global knowledge production. (shrink)

According to a recent proposal, the epistemic aim of metaphysics as a discipline is to chart the different viable theories of metaphysical objects of inquiry (e.g. causation, persistence). This paper elaborates on and seeks to improve on that proposal in two related ways. First, drawing on an analogy with how-possibly explanation in science, I argue that we can usefully understand this aim of metaphysics as the charting of epistemically possible answers to metaphysical questions. Second, I argue that in order to (...) account for the epistemic goodness of this aim, one should appeal to the epistemic value it has in virtue of providing resources for non-factive understanding of the objects of metaphysical inquiry.**This paper is part of a special issue of Argumenta on the Epistemology of Metaphysics**. (shrink)

There has long been an impression that reliabilism implies externalism and that frequentist statistics, due to its reliabilist nature, is inherently externalist. I argue, however, that frequentist statistics can plausibly be understood as a form of internalist reliabilism -- internalist in the conventional sense, yet reliabilist in certain unconventional and intriguing ways. Crucially, in developing the thesis that reliabilism does not imply externalism, my aim is not to stretch the meaning of ‘reliabilism’ merely to sever the implication. Instead, it is (...) to gain a deeper understanding of frequentist statistics, which stands as one of the most sustained attempts by scientists to develop an epistemology for their own use. (shrink)

In “Confucianism and Same-Sex Marriage,” published recently in Politics and Religion, Professor Tongdong Bai argues for a “moderate Confucian position on same-sex marriage,” one that supports its legalization and yet endeavors “to use public opinion and social and political policies to encourage heterosexual marriages, and to prevent same-sex marriages from becoming the majority form of marriages” (Bai 2021:146). Against the backdrop of downright homophobia prevalent among vocal Confucians in mainland China today, Bai claims that his pro-legalization rendition “show[s] a different (...) version of Confucianism that challenges the received perception of Confucianism that it is deeply conservative, a perception that often lies at the core of the rejection of its contemporary relevance, especially by the so-called ‘liberals’ in China and elsewhere” (Bai 2021:133). Furthermore, Bai claims that his moderate Confucianism is normatively preferrable to “the typical liberal or individualist position” of a marriage equality supporter, because the specter of polygamy – the conservative trope of invoking polygamy as a reductio ad absurdum against same-sex marriage – imposes “a serious challenge” to liberals but not to moderate Confucians (Bai 2021:146, 153). -/- Both of Bai’s claims falter upon scrutiny, however. Granted, it is applaudable that Bai tries to dissuade his more conservative Confucian colleagues from opposing the legalization of same-sex marriage. But as Section 1 of this Response will show, the alternative rendition of Confucianism he presents, along with the way he presents it, is premised on a highly contested conception of what shared Confucian values are; does injustice to Confucians who embrace marriage equality more unreservedly (i.e., without caveats à la Bai); fails to produce new arguments that “enrich the theoretical basis for same-sex marriage” (Bai 2021:133); and, ironically, reinforces – rather than “challenges” – the “received perception” of Confucianism as deeply conservative. Meanwhile, Section 2 will show that Bai’s comparison between liberalism and moderate Confucianism relies both upon an apparent unfamiliarity with the extensive and nuanced liberal discussions on polygamy, and upon fallacious methods of assessing comparative normative valence. -/- Finally, Section 3 will offer some concluding thoughts from the perspective of decolonial theory, examining the dynamic of spectacularized postcoloniality that propels the production and consumption of dubious theoretical projects like Bai’s. As it turns out, this case serves not only as a cautionary tale of how not to conduct comparative normative theorizing, but also as a cautionary tale of how not to let the spectacle of postcoloniality derail the pursuit of academic decolonization. (shrink)

This article examines the puzzling phenomenon that many Chinese liberal intellectuals fervently idolize Donald Trump and embrace the alt-right ideologies he epitomizes. Rejecting ‘pure tactic’ and ‘neoliberal affinity’ explanations, it argues that the Trumpian metamorphosis of Chinese liberal intellectuals is precipitated by their ‘beacon complex’, which has ‘political’ and ‘civilizational’ components. Political beaconism grows from the traumatizing lived experience of Maoist totalitarianism, sanitizes the West and particularly the United States as politically near-perfect, and gives rise to both a neoliberal affinity (...) and a latent hostility toward baizuo. Civilizational beaconism, sharing with its nationalistic counterpart -- civilizational vindicativism -- the heritages of scientific racism and social Darwinism imported in late-Qing, renders the Chinese liberal intelligentsia receptive to anti-immigrant and Islamophobic paranoia, exacerbates its anti-baizuo sentiments, and catalyzes its Trumpian convergence with Chinese non-liberals. (shrink)

Empiricist modal epistemologies can be attractive, but are often limited in the range of modal knowledge they manage to secure. In this paper, I argue that one such account – similarity-based modal empiricism – can be extended to also cover justification of many scientifically interesting possibility claims. Drawing on recent work on modelling in the philosophy of science, I suggest that scientific modelling is usefully seen as the creation and investigation of relevantly similar epistemic counterparts of real target systems. On (...) the basis of experiential knowledge of what is actually the case with the models, one can draw justified conclusions about what is de re possible for the target systems. (shrink)

Several philosophers of science claim that scientific toy models afford knowledge of possibility, but answers to the question of why toy models can be expected to competently play this role are scarce. The main line of reply is that toy models support possibility claims insofar as they are credible. I raise a challenge for this credibility-thesis, drawing on a familiar problem for imagination-based modal epistemologies, and argue that it remains unanswered in the current literature. The credibility-thesis has a long way (...) to go if it is to account for the epistemic merits of toy models. (shrink)

Locke is often thought to have introduced the topic of personal identity into philosophy when, in the second edition of theEssay,he distinguished the person from both the human being and the soul. Each of these entities differs from the others with respect to their identity conditions, and so they must be ontologically distinct. In particular, Locke claimed, a person cannot survive total memory loss, although a human being or a soul can.

: Perhaps the central problem which preoccupies Spinoza as a moral philosopher is the conflict between reason and passion. He belongs to a long tradition that sees the key to happiness and virtue as mastery and control by reason over the passions. This mastery, however, is hard won, as the passions often overwhelm its power and subvert its rule. When reason succumbs to passion, we act against our better judgment. Such action is often termed 'akratic'. Many commentators have complained that (...) the psychological principles that Spinoza appeals to in his account of akrasia are mere ad hoc modifications to his philosophical psychology. I show, on the contrary, that these principles follow from some of the most important and interesting aspects of Spinoza's philosophy of mind. (shrink)

Often, inquirers who do not know the right answer to a question they are inquiring into are nevertheless in a position to grasp a range of possible answers to it. This article proposes that such inquirers are in a position to have a particular form of understanding: non-factive objectual understanding. The state differs from non-factive states discussed in the extant understanding literature by focusing on grasping of multiple accounts that are all live possibilities. Non-factive objectual understanding is an epistemic improvement (...) that primarily enriches the subject’s grasp on the target phenomenon. Once the contours and the value of this state are made clearer, its importance in accounting for nuances of epistemic progress in many different contexts also emerges—including, but not limited to, progress made in inquiries where knowledge and factive understanding is, practically or as a matter of principle, out of reach. (shrink)

Veritists hold that only truth has fundamental epistemic value. They are committed to explaining all other instances of epistemic goodness as somehow deriving their value through a relation to truth, and in order to do so they arguably need a non-instrumental relation of epistemic value derivation. As is currently common in epistemology, many veritists assume that the epistemic is an insulated evaluative domain: claims about what has epistemic value are independent of claims about what has value simpliciter. This paper argues (...) that the insulation approach to epistemic value is incompatible with non-instrumental epistemic value derivation. Veritsts who want to avail themselves of this important explanatory resource should therefore abandon the insulation approach. (shrink)

Using Wang Anshi's Reform as a case study, Yuhua Wang's "Blood is Thicker Than Water" (American Political Science Review, 2022) argues that geographically dispersed kinship networks incentivize political elites to support the building of a strong state, whereas geographically concentrated kinship networks undermine state building. In this paper, I improve the sample with the help of additional historical records, and show that the reported correlation fails to replicate when either the control issue or the outlier issue is considered. I then (...) propose two alternative hypotheses on the role of kinship network dispersal in Wang Anshi's Reform, based on two common explanations of its partisanship geography in Chinese historical scholarship, i.e. status-competition and policy-adaptiveness. After examining those hypotheses respectively, I reflect on the limits of quantitative history this case illustrates. (shrink)

The desire-satisfaction theory of welfare says that what is basically good for a subject is the satisfaction of his desires. One challenge to this view is the existence of quirky desires, such as a desire to count blades of grass. It is hard to see why anyone would desire such things, and thus hard to believe that the satisfaction of such desires could be basically good for anyone. This suggests that only some desires are basically good when satisfied, and that (...) desire satisfactionists owe us an account of which desires these are, and why. In "Quirky Desires and Well-Being," Donald Bruckner proposes such an account: a desire is welfare-relevant (i.e., such that its satisfaction would be basically good for its subject) if and only if and because its subject could describe its object in a way that makes it comprehensible what about the object attracts him or appeals to him. We are inclined to view quirky desires as welfare-irrelevant because we assume that their objects cannot be described in such a way. But if there were a quirky desire whose object could be so described by the subject whose desire it is, then this desire would be relevant to that subject's welfare. I will argue that while Bruckner's view delivers plausible verdicts about the cases to which it is meant to apply, its account of what makes a desire welfare-relevant is unmotivated and implausible. Desire satisfactionists can retain what is plausible about his view while endorsing a better explanation of why welfare-relevant desires have that status if they accept the following account instead: a desire is welfare-relevant if and only if and because something about its object attracts, or appeals to, the subject who has the desire. (shrink)

Given the scarcity of long-term job opportunities in contemporary academia, early-career academics often need to accept short-term positions practically anywhere in the world to remain competitive in building an academic career. As a result, the nomadic experience of repeated relocation following a series of short-term employment has become a common condition for early-career academics. I call this phenomenon the norm of academic mobility (NAM). This paper provides a structural analysis of the NAM. First, I argue that the NAM constitutes a (...) case of structural injustice as the structural force discriminates against those who encounter higher barriers to relocation and pushes them out of the field. I further examine how the narrative surrounding “ideal academics” works to justify the NAM and exacerbate two types of precarity in academia. I end by discussing some potential directions to disrupt this unjust structure. (shrink)

Philosophers often make exotic-sounding modal claims, such as: “A timeless world is impossible”, “The laws of physics could have been different from what they are”, “There could have been an additional phenomenal colour”. Otherwise popular empiricist modal epistemologies in the contemporary literature cannot account for whatever epistemic justification we might have for making such modal claims. Those who do not, as a result of this, endorse scepticism with respect to their epistemic status typically suggest that they can be justified but (...) have yet to develop some distinct, workable theory of how. That is, they endorse a form of non-uniformism about the epistemology of modality, according to which claims about philosophically interesting modal matters need to be justified differently from e.g. everyday or scientific modal claims, but they fail to provide any more detail. This article aims to fill this gap by outlining how such a non-uniformist view could be spelled out and what story about philosophically interesting modal justification it could contain. (shrink)

This paper summarizes the evolution of analytic philosophy in Taiwan, examines its impact within and beyond academia, and discusses the future of the discipline. The roots of modern philosophy in Taiwan can be traced back to the Japanese colonial era, and analytic philosophy was introduced to the country in the late 1940s when many intellectuals in China moved to Taiwan. However, massive curbs were imposed on philosophy during Chiang Kai-shek’s dictatorship, and the discipline began to thrive again only after Taiwan’s (...) democratization in the late 1980s. Nonetheless, since its introduction in the colonial era, modern philosophy has made significant contributions in Taiwan, encouraging interdisciplinary engagements, advancing civic education, and promoting the spirit of democracy and political liberation. Philosophy has played a key role in Taiwan’s remarkable transformation from an island colonized for hundreds of years to a country that recognizes democracy, freedom, and human rights. The themes of anti-colonialism and anti-domination seen in the works of modern Taiwanese philosophers not only reflect the discipline’s political and historical underpinnings but also signal how Taiwanese philosophy can acquire a distinct identity, despite being influenced by many other philosophical traditions. While still at a nascent stage, Taiwanese philosophy has the potential to join forces with other philosophical traditions in advancing the vision of decolonizing philosophy. (shrink)

The problem of theory choice and model selection is hard but still important when useful truths are underdetermined, perhaps not by all kinds of data but by the kinds of data we can have access to ethically or practicably—even if we have an infinity of such data. This article addresses a crucial instance of that problem: the problem of inferring causal structures from nonexperimental, nontemporal data without assuming the so-called causal Faithfulness condition or the like. A new account of epistemic (...) evaluation is developed to solve that problem and justify a standard practice of causal inference in data science. (shrink)

Field’s challenge to platonists is the challenge to explain the reliable match between mathematical truth and belief. The challenge grounds an objection claiming that platonists cannot provide such an explanation. This objection is often taken to be both neutral with respect to controversial epistemological assumptions, and a comparatively forceful objection against platonists. I argue that these two characteristics are in tension: no construal of the objection in the current literature realises both, and there are strong reasons to think that no (...) version of Field’s epistemological objection which has both Neutrality and Force can be construed. (shrink)

Philosophers have always taken an interest not only in what is actually the case, but in what is necessarily the case and what could possibly be the case. These are questions of modality. Epistemologists of modality enquire into how we can know what is necessary and what is possible. This dissertation concerns the meta-epistemology of modality. It engages with the rules that govern construction and evaluation of theories in the epistemology of modality, by using modal empiricism – a form of (...) modal epistemology – as a running example. In particular, I investigate the assumption that it is important to be able to meet the integration challenge. Meeting the integration challenge is a source of serious difficulty for many approaches, but modal empiricism is supposed to do well in this respect. But I argue that once we have a better grasp of what the integration challenge is, it is not obvious that it presents no problem for modal empiricism. Moreover, even if modal empiricism could be said to be in a relatively good position with respect to integration, it comes at the cost of a forced choice between far-reaching partial modal scepticism and non-uniformism about the epistemology of modality. Non-uniformism is the view that more than one modal epistemology will be correct. While non-uniformism might not in itself be unpalatable, it must be defined and defended in a way which squares with the modal empiricist’s other commitment. I explore two ways of doing so, both involving a revised idea of the integration challenge and its role for the epistemology of modality. One involves a bifurcation of the integration challenge, and the other a restriction of the integration challenge’s relevance. Both ways are interesting, but neither is, as it turns out, a walk in the park. (shrink)

Several philosophers of science have drawn attention to a number of modeling practices where scientific models primarily contribute modal information. Examples now abound, and, recently, there have also been some preliminary attempts to address questions of under what conditions, and by virtue of what, models can perform this modal epistemic function. This paper sets out to constructively review those attempts through a prism of the more general literature on the epistemology of modality. One aim of this exercise is to expose (...) the underlying justificatory strategies of the modal modeling accounts – which are strikingly convergent with those already identified by modal epistemologists. Another aim is to highlight some challenges familiar to modal epistemology and discuss the form they take in the context of modal modeling as well as the resources that modal modeling accounts have for dealing with them. This is all done with an eye to pointing out ways forward in further developing the work on the epistemology of modal modeling. (shrink)

Material from this paper appears in Chap. 7 of my book Reason and Being, but there is also stuff here that isn't in the book. In particular, it discusses the claims that, for Spinoza, conceiving implies explaining and that existence is identical to or reducible to conceivability. So, if you're interested in those issues, this paper might be worth a read.

Machine and Sovereignty offers a future-oriented mode of political thought that encompasses the unprecedented global challenges we are confronting: the rise of artificial intelligence, the ecological crisis, and intensifying geopolitical conflicts. Arguing that a new approach to planetary thinking is urgently needed, Yuk Hui presents new epistemological and technological frameworks for understanding and rising to the crises of our present and our future.

This paper proposes a novel symbolic formalization of dialectical logic, synthesizing Hegelian ontological structures with insights from Buddhist philosophy to construct a rigorous "Dialectical Logic Symbol System" (DLSS). The system introduces a unique set of operators including Being ὄ, Nothing ⌀, Negation ¬, the Affirmation/Copula ≡, and the Self ἐ situated within a topological framework of four specific logical positions. These positions map the phenomenological movement of consciousness as it alternates between "entering" (nominalization) and "leaving" (adjectivization) conceptual terms. The study (...) systematically derives the logical categories of the Doctrine of Being, Essence, and Actuality (AC), demonstrating how determinate being and standard definitions are generated through the dialectical interplay of negation and position-shifting operators (such as Identity). Crucially, the system culminates in the Category of Substantial Relationships by introducing the operator of the "Self" ἐ. The "Self" ἐ functions as a transient catalytic agent that intervenes in the logical calculus to generate irreducible subjective determinations (represented as new terms a, b), thereby integrating the subjective construction of meaning into the formal derivation of objective reality. Furthermore, this paper utilizes DLSS to reconstruct the Three Laws of Thought of traditional formal logic. By translating dialectical formulas into propositional forms, the study proves that within a closed logical "Loop," the "Specific Law of Identity" (P=P) and "Specific Contradiction" (P∧¬P) can hold simultaneously without leading to inferential explosion. This paper argues against the "direct" validity of the Three Laws of Thought, positing that they are not absolute axioms but "specific" laws that hold only under specific loop paths. Thereby, the study demonstrates that contradiction is not the rendering of definition into meaninglessness, but the deepening of meaning, thus integrating traditional formal logic as a special state within dialectical movement. (shrink)

The 2021 Nobel Prize in Economics recognized an epistemology of causal inference based on the Rubin causal model (Rubin 1974), which merits broader attention in philosophy. This model, in fact, presupposes a logical principle of counterfactuals, Conditional Excluded Middle (CEM), the locus of a pivotal debate between Stalnaker (1968) and Lewis (1973) on the semantics of counterfactuals. Proponents of CEM should recognize that this connection points to a new argument for CEM---a Quine-Putnam indispensability argument grounded in the Nobel-winning applications of (...) the Rubin model in health and social sciences. To advance the dialectic, I challenge this argument with an updated Rubin causal model that retains its successes while dispensing with CEM. This novel approach combines the strengths of the Rubin causal model and a causal model familiar in philosophy, the causal Bayes net. The takeaway: deductive logic and inductive inference, often studied in isolation, are deeply interconnected. (shrink)

While the traditional conception of inductive logic is Carnapian, I develop a Peircean alternative and use it to unify formal learning theory, statistics, and a significant part of machine learning: supervised learning. Some crucial standards for evaluating non-deductive inferences have been assumed separately in those areas, but can actually be justified by a unifying principle.