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Most people believe some moral propositions are true. Most people would say that they know that rape is wrong, torturing people is wrong, and so on. But despite decades of intense epistemological study, philosophers cannot even provide a rudimentary sketch of moral knowledge. In my view, the fact that we have very strong epistemic confidence in some fundamental moral propositions and the fact that it is extremely difficult for us to provide even the basics of an account of moral knowledge gives us an important clue. Both of these facts stem from the very nature of moral knowledge. In this paper I provide an intuitionist account of moral knowledge. I try to remove misunderstanding and add to our understanding of the contemporary account of self-evident moral propositions. For a theory of moral knowledge to be acceptable it must explain both the moral knowledge we have and why it is so very difficult for us to explain. My theory meets both requirements.

Most physics theories are deterministic, with the notable exception of quantum mechanics which, however, comes plagued by the so-called measurement problem. This state of affairs might well be due to the inability of standard mathematics to "speak" of indeterminism, its inability to present us a worldview in which new information is created as time passes. In such a case, scientific determinism would only be an illusion due to the timeless mathematical language scientists use. To investigate this possibility it is necessary to develop an alternative mathematical language that is both powerful enough to allow scientists to compute predictions and compatible with indeterminism and the passage of time. We argue that intuitionistic mathematics provides such a language and we illustrate it in simple terms., First presented at the workshop "Experiencing Reality Directly" (Jerusalem, May 22-24, 2019)

This chapter traces out the implications of meta-ethical view defended in this book, and of quietism more broadly, for questions in moral epistemology. It begins by cataloguing some cases in which normative-ethical inquiry has been distorted by philosophers who have mistakenly treated metaphysics, semantics, and so on, as relevant to first-order ethics. The chapter then considers the upshots of pragmatist quietism for the question of how, if at all, to modify one’s ethical beliefs in the face of others’ disagreement. It then addresses the related issue of how much toleration we should extend to those whose ethical views we judge to be mistaken. It concludes by showing how the pragmatist quietism defended in this book is better equipped than some other objectivist views to reply to evolutionary and other debunking arguments.

Investigating the reliability of moral intuitions is not only one of the hot topics in moral psychology but also of high importance for philosophical questions. In a recent study, the influence of ...

In this paper, I present theoretical assumptions behind Teoria/Literatura, a multifaceted digital research and publishing project on 20th-century Polish literary thought. The point of departure is the conjecture that the tensions between the digital and the humanistic in present-day DH help bring out in full relief the cardinal conflict line in Polish literary theory – between formalism/structuralism on the one hand and phenomenology on the other. Conversely, the order of concepts in the corpus of Polish literary theory enables the researcher to pinpoint the relation of the humanistic and the digital (or formalist) within DH so that it might be challenged and/or upgraded. In the first section, I provide an overview of the project's strata and its wide-ranging goal, i.e., a corpus of Polish literary theory. In section two, I examine the way in which the structure of the corpus can help elucidate the general problem of the relation between the digital and the humanistic in DH. Specifically, I relate this issue to the quarrel in constructive mathematics between mathematical intuitionism and formalism. The third section is devoted to a synecdochal representation of the general problem of the duality of intuitionism and formalism – the visualisation of narrative temporality.

In 1928 Ivan Orlov published a remarkable paper which contains the first formulation of a relevant logic. The paper remained largely unknown to English-speakers until this discovery of relevant log...

We investigate which part of Brouwer’s Intuitionistic Mathematics is finitistically justifiable or guaranteed in Hilbert’s Finitism, in the same way as similar investigations on Classical Mathematics (i.e., which part is equiconsistent with $\textbf {PRA}$ or consistent provably in $\textbf {PRA}$ ) already done quite extensively in proof theory and reverse mathematics. While we already knew a contrast from the classical situation concerning the continuity principle, more contrasts turn out: we show that several principles are finitistically justifiable or guaranteed which are classically not. Among them are: (i) fan theorem for decidable fans but arbitrary bars; (ii) continuity principle and the axiom of choice both for arbitrary formulae; and (iii) $\Sigma _2$ induction and dependent choice. We also show that Markov’s principle MP does not change this situation; that neither does lesser limited principle of omniscience LLPO (except the choice along functions); but that limited principle of omniscience LPO makes the situation completely classical.

We continue the investigation of the first paper where we studied logics with various negations including empirical negation and co-negation. We established how such logics can be treated uniformly with R. Sylvan's CCω as the basis. In this paper we use this result to obtain cut-free labelled sequent calculi for the logics.

We try to translate the intuitionistic propositional logic INT into Brouwer's modal logic KTB. Our translation is motivated by intuitions behind Brouwer's axiom p →☐◊p The main idea is to interpret intuitionistic implication as modal strict implication, whereas variables and other positive sentences remain as they are. The proposed translation preserves fragments of the Rieger-Nishimura lattice which is the Lindenbaum algebra of monadic formulas in INT. Unfortunately, INT is not embedded by this mapping into KTB.

We investigate the relationship between M. De's empirical negation in Kripke and Beth Semantics. It turns out empirical negation, as well as co-negation, corresponds to different logics under different semantics. We then establish the relationship between logics related to these negations under unified syntax and semantics based on R. Sylvan's CCω.

EnglishThe contribution pursues two interrelated aims: the first one is to interpret the transition from Morality to Ethical Life in the Elements of the Philosophy of Right as a theory of moral justification; the second one is to show the meaning of this theory for contemporary philosophy. The essay thus seeks to turn to Hegel’s conception in order to shed light on the limits of the current discussion in moral epistemology and then to present a possible alternative. To this end, Hegel’s text is confronted with the main theses of intuitionism, on the one hand, and Kantian constructivism, on the other, as the most prominent contemporary forms, respectively, of ethical foundationalism and coherentism. portuguesO artigo tem dois objetivos mutuamente interligados: o primeiro e interpretar a transicao da moralidade para a etica nas Linhas fundamentais da filosofia do direito como uma teoria da justificacao moral; o segundo e mostrar o significado dessa teoria para a filosofia contemporânea. Dessa forma, o artigo procura retomar a reflexao hegeliana para lancar luz sobre alguns limites do debate contemporâneo acerca da epistemologia moral e, a seguir, apresentar uma possivel alternativa. Para tanto, o texto hegeliano e posto em dialogo com as teses centrais do intuicionismo, de um lado, e do construtivismo kantiano, de outro, na medida em que representam as formas contemporâneas que tem mais autoridade, respectivamente, a do fundacionalismo e a do coerentismo etico.

espanolEl presente texto trata de la teoria de Charles Larmore, mas precisamente, de las relaciones entre las concepciones de desacuerdo razonable, de pluralismo y de liberalismo. Tal teoria tiene como caracteristicas el intuicionismo racional, contextualismo y defiende una posicion realista de la moralidad. EnglishThe present text deals with Charles Larmore’s theory, more precisely, of the relations between the conceptions of reasonable disagreement, pluralism and liberalism. Such a theory has as its characteristics rational intuitionism, contextualism and defends a realistic position of morality.

Spinoza’s epistemology is complex, with both a rationalist and an intuitionist side. The key to understanding Spinoza’s epistemology is to focus on the notion of intuitive knowledge (scientia intui...

The debate between Einstein and Bergson is a salient episode in the history of modern physics and a telling example of the interaction between science and philosophy. This paper initially discusses five reasons why Bergson criticised Einstein for giving up absolute time. The most important one was Bergson’s commitment to an intuitionist, anti-Kantian metaphysics informed by common sense. Apart from that, he knew that the theory of special relativity permits “duration” (durée) in the form of the passage of proper time, to which Bergson referred as “real time”. Neither static eternalism (which excludes temporal passage) nor dynamic eternalism (which, like the former, claims the existence of the future) are acceptable from Bergson’s philosophical perspective, which acknowledges the role of temporal experience and everyday thinking in addition to science and metaphysics. He understood temporal passage as creation of new existence, anticipating what later became known as the growing block theory of time. The pointy relativistic variant of this theory, which divides the universe into blocks of growing past light cones, does justice to large parts of his philosophy, including the distinction between the actual and the virtual. Supporters of Bergson’s account of duration should adopt this theory of time.

The aim of this paper is to establish a phenomenological mathematical intuitionism that is based on fundamental phenomenological-epistemological principles. According to this intuitionism, mathematical intuitions are sui generis mental states, namely experiences that exhibit a distinctive phenomenal character. The focus is on two questions: what does it mean to undergo a mathematical intuition and what role do mathematical intuitions play in mathematical reasoning? While I crucially draw on Husserlian principles and adopt ideas we find in phenomenologically minded mathematicians such as Hermann Weyl and Kurt Gödel, the overall objective is systematic in nature: to offer a plausible approach towards mathematics.

Reflective equilibrium (RE) has been criticized for various reasons ever since the publication of Rawls’A Theory of Justice. Recent empirical research into moral decision-making poses new challenges to RE because it questions the reliability of moral intuitions. This research might discredit moral intuitionism in general and RE in particular insofar as it ascribes epistemic value to moral intuitions. These findings suggest, for instance, that moral intuitions vary with cultural background, gender or framing. If it could be shown that all or certain kinds of moral intuitions are unreliable, this would diminish the plausibility of the claim that they provide good reasons to believe in the truth of their content, especially given the growing evidence that professional philosophers are just as biased and susceptible to distorting factors as lay people. In this paper I critically discuss three recent defenses of RE against this unreliable intuitions objection (UIO). Two of these defenses argue that the UIO misses its target, because RE does not depend on intuitions, or because the relevant considered judgments in RE are not intuitions. The third defense grants that RE depends on intuitions and that some Rawlsian considered judgments are intuitions. But it argues that the notion of considered judgments can be revised, and that wide reflective equilibrium (WRE) has the means to adopt the criticism because it can use information about unreliable intuitions and exclude those from further consideration. I argue that the first two defenses do not succeed. The third defense is the most promising one. However, I argue that this defense also fails. In this defense, RE is not a distinctive moral epistemic theory: different versions of RE would be conceivable, all of which are deeply problematic. I conclude with a discussion of the broader philosophical implications of the UIO, specifically whether or not accepting the UIO would warrant skepticism regarding moral knowledge.

We provide a framework for understanding agnosticism. The framework accounts for the varieties of agnosticism while vindicating the unity of the phenomenon. This combination of unity and plurality is achieved by taking the varieties of agnosticism to be represented by several agnostic stances, all of which share a common core provided by what we call the minimal agnostic attitude. We illustrate the fruitfulness of the framework by showing how it can be applied to several philosophical debates. In particular, several philosophical positions can be aptly conceived of as instances of agnosticism whilst retaining their differences and distinguishing features.

The present study examines the relation between the moral intuitions proposed by the ‘Moral Foundations Theory’ according to J. Haidt and the moral orientations in relation with moral competence, as described by the ‘Dual-Aspect Model of Moral Behaviour’ according to G. Lind.It is an empirical exploration of the relation between the five foundational domains (and/or the corresponding two higher-order clusters) and the moral orientations, as this results from the theoretical assumptions of both theories, and the influence on and of the moral competence on these aforementioned relations. The shared affective and, at the same time, habitual characteristics of moral intuitions and moral orientations, although based on different theories (intuitionism, respectively, cognitivism) should converge in a dynamic relationship. The basic motivation is the need to overcome the affective-cognitive disjunction in the study of moral judgment, which is artificial. The human (moral) reasoning is always a situated and situating one, in a symbolic narrative universe, in which the cognitive-affective dichotomy forms a dynamic unity. This overstated dichotomy is only a methodological necessity, but unfortunately hypostasized in an explanatory mechanism that leads to the impermissible simplification of the phenomenon that it seeks to understand.The empirical results confirm the limits of both cognitive and intuitions paradigms and advocates for a more nuanced and dynamic approach in understanding the moral judgment within a more comprehensive conception on human personality. Finally, the implications for the contemporary psychology’ paradigm are discussed.

This paper presents a way of formalising definite descriptions with a binary quantifier $\iota$, where $\iota x[F, G]$ is read as `The $F$ is $G$'. Introduction and elimination rules for $\iota$ in a system of intuitionist negative free logic are formulated. Procedures for removing maximal formulas of the form $\iota x[F, G]$ are given, and it is shown that deductions in the system can be brought into normal form.

This is a careful study of the more methodological chapters of the Posterior Analytics. Bronstein probes Aristotle’s accounts of demonstration, definition, and induction. He rejects an intuitionist...

Sidgwick's seminal textThe Methods of Ethicsleft off with an unresolved problem that Sidgwick referred to as the dualism of practical reason. The problem is that employing Sidgwick's methodology of rational intuitionism appears to show that there are reasons to favour both egoism and utilitarianism. Katarzyna de Lazari-Radek and Peter Singer offer a solution in the form of an evolutionary debunking argument: the appeal of egoism is explainable in terms of evolutionary theory. I argue that like rational prudence, rational benevolence is subject to debunking arguments and so problematic, but also – and more importantly – that debunking arguments are irrelevant in the debate over the dualism of practical reason on the view of reason and rational intuitionism that Lazari-Radek and Singer embrace. Either both egoism and utilitarianism are debunked, or neither are. If I am right, Sidgwick's dualism is left standing.

This chapter lays out an account of the particularist approach to epistemological inquiry and develops a version of it in terms of epistemic intuitions, which are seemings about epistemic value (such as justification or knowledge). It begins by briefly reviewing the history of particularism, from Thomas Reid through G. E. Moore to Roderick Chisholm, and then gives a clear statement of the particularist methodology. The remaining sections elaborate the view, giving pride of place to epistemic intuitions, which is why the resulting view is called ‘intuitionist particularism.’ Particularism in epistemology (which tends to be endorsed by commonsense anti-skeptics) puts more weight on epistemic intuitions about particular cases and which of our beliefs are rational. It stands opposed to methodism, which is typically endorsed by proponents of radical skepticism and puts more weight on epistemic intuitions about principles that say what’s required for a belief to be rational. In their extreme forms, these positions occupy two ends of a spectrum. The position advocated in this chapter is a moderate one that leans toward the particularist end of the spectrum, in a way that is compatible with both internalism and externalism in epistemology.

How Moore’s open question argument works, insofar as it does, remains a matter of controversy. The author’s purpose here is to construct an open question argument based on a novel interpretation of how Moore’s argument might work. In order to sidestep exegetical questions, he does not claim to be offering Moore’s own argument. Rather, the author offers a reconstruction, making use of important elements of Moore’s methodology and assumptions that could be reasonable within a Moorean viewpoint. The crucial role within the argument is played by what the author calls the real thought move. He shows that the reconstructed argument is more defensible from some standard objections than the common construction. The author finishes by drawing attention to a neglected objective that would make sense within Moore’s viewpoint, showing that it fits with a major commitment of Bonjour’s moderate rationalism, and showing how the package might be important for the non-naturalist today.

espanolEste trabajo examina la concepcion de la justificacion en la que se inscribe el metodo al que Rawls apela para justificar sus principios de justicia, una de las cuestiones metodologicas que mas reparos ha generado. En este sentido, se propone explicar por que el equilibrio reflexivo supone una explicacion ampliamente coherentista de la justificacion, asi como de que modo la vision que ofrece de esta trata de evitar cualquier elemento de naturaleza fundacionalista. Puesto que, en cuanto teoria de la justificacion, el fundacionalismo es el enfoque que mas abiertamente parece oponerse al coherentismo, pero algunas de las criticas que se han formulado del equilibrio reflexivo han tratado de presentarlo como una forma encubierta de intuicionismo –la version mas importante de fundacionalismo moral–, el trabajo intenta poner de manifiesto algunas de las diferencias mas relevantes que cabe trazar entre esos dos modos de concebir la justificacion. Tomando esto como base, pretende evidenciar por que los intentos de presentar la justicia como equidad como participando de esa clase de fundacionalismo son poco razonables, pero, sobre todo, ofrecer algunas respuestas a proposito de ese tipo de reproches, subrayando las cuestiones en las que debe ponerse el foco a la hora de evaluarlos. EnglishThis paper examines the conception of justification that the method to which Rawls appeals to justify his principles of justice falls within, one of the methodological questions that more objections has generated. In this sense, it sets out to explain why reflective equilibrium supposes a broadly coherentist account of justification, as well as how the vision that it offers of this seeks to avoid any element of a foundationalist nature. Since foundationalism is the approach to justification that it seems to oppose coherentism most straightly, but some of the criticisms of reflective equilibrium have attempted to present it as a disguised form of intuitionism –the most important version of moral foundationalism–, the paper tries to highlight some of the most significant differences that can be drawn between these two ways of seeing justification. Taking this as a basis, it aims to show why attempts to present justice as fairness as participating in that kind of foundationalism are unreasonable, but, above all, to offer some answers regarding these objections, emphasizing the questions that must be put the focus when evaluating them.

Walter Sinnott-Armstrong argues that moral disagreement and widespread moral bias pose a serious problem for moral intuitionism. Seneca’s view that we just recognise the good could be criticised using a similar argument. His approach to argumentation offers a way out, one that may serve as a model for a revisionary intuitionism.

The paper defines and explores objectivism and subjectivism in legal reasoning. The term subjectivism is used to describe two directions of legal arguments which play a crucial role basically in all legal systems: Firstly, subjectivism may refer in private law to the intention of one or more parties. Secondly, in the context of interpretation of all “authoritative” legal sources (statutes, precedents et al.), it may aim at the intention of the “legislator” (parliament; court et al.). On this definition basis, the paper presents – in a quite simple and synoptical manner – 12 statements which sketch out some limits of subjectivism, define some potentials of what may be established as the contrast criterion of objectivism and, finally, to establish intuitionism as a complementary and in the context meaningful third category.

The chapter features, first, a critical presentation of Brouwer’s intuitionistic doctrines concerning logic, the real numbers, and continuity in the real number system, including his Principle for Numbers and Continuity Theorem. This is followed by a parallel examination of Hermann Weyl’s quasi-intuitionistic views on logic, continuity, and the real number system, views inspired by (but grossly misrepresenting) ideas of Brouwer. The whole business wraps up with an attempt to place Brouwer’s and Weyl’s efforts within the trajectory of informed thinking, during the late 19th and early 20th centuries, on the subjects of continua, magnitudes, and quantities.

This chapter offers a sustained commentary on Crispin Wright’s paper “On Being in a Quandary: Relativism, Vagueness, Logic Revisionism.” It begins by giving a brief introduction to the issues surrounding vagueness and the sorites paradox before going on to reconstruct the main argument of Wright’s paper “Vagueness: A Fifth Column Approach”. It then proceeds to endorse Wright’s principal reasons for discounting epistemicist and supervaluationist treatments of vagueness. The chapter then develops a critique of Wright’s technical notion of quandary and of his attempt to solve the Sorites Paradox along intuitionistic lines. Despite venturing some criticisms, the chapter concludes that Wright is correct in thinking that vagueness needs to be explained in terms of the sort of quandary state one is in when one takes a proposition to be borderline.

This chapter provides a reply to the chapters in Part II of this book. It looks at the philosophical challenges presented by vagueness. Philosophers of language from Frege on had been for the most part content to theorize in ways that ignored vagueness, or to focus on idealized languages in which there was none. And no one writing before 1970 seemed fully to have taken the measure of the awkwardness of the Sorites paradox, or the depth of its roots in our intuitive thinking about what kind of ability mastery of a language is. The chapter concludes that the intuitionistic approach, with its integral repudiation of any idea of vagueness as constituted in semantic facts that somehow underlie and explain the distinctive patterns of use of vague expressions, and its consequent commitment to liberalism about verdicts in the borderline region, does exactly that.

Over the course of human history there appears to have been a global shift in moral values towards a broadly ‘liberal’ orientation. Huemer (Philosophical Studies 173: 1983–2010, 2016) argues that this shift better accords with a realist than an antirealist metaethics: it is best explained by the discovery of mind-independent truths through intuition. In this article I argue, contra Huemer, that the historical data are better explained assuming the truth of moral antirealism. Realism does not fit the data as well as Huemer suggests, whereas antirealists have underappreciated resources to explain the relevant historical dynamics. These resources include an appeal to socialization, to technological and economical convergences, to lessons learned from history, to changes induced by consistency reasoning and to the social function of moral norms in overcoming some of the cooperation problems that globalizing societies face. I point out that the realist’s explanans has multiple shortcomings, that the antirealist’s explanans has several explanatory virtues, and conclude that the latter provides a superior account of the historical shift towards liberal values.

Sarah McGrath argues that moral perception has an advantage over its rivals in its ability to explain ordinary moral knowledge. I disagree. After clarifying what the moral perceptualist is and is not committed to, I argue that rival views are both more numerous and more plausible than McGrath suggests: specifically, I argue that (a) inferentialism can be defended against McGrath’s objections; (b) if her arguments against inferentialism succeed, we should accept a different rival that she neglects, intuitionism; and (c), reductive epistemologists can appeal to non-naturalist commitments to avoid McGrath’s counterexamples.

Normative ethics asks: What makes right acts right? W. D. Ross attempted to answer this question inThe Right and the Good(1930). Most theorists have agreed that Ross provided no systematic explanatory answers. Ross's intuitionism lacks any decision procedure, and, as McNaughton (2002: 91) states, it ‘turns out after all to have nothing general to say about the relative stringency of our basic duties’. Here I will show that my own Rossian intuitionism does have a systematic way of explaining what makes right acts right. Deontological theories have struggled to say what internal to acts could make them right. From Price to Ross, the striking but uninformative answer has beenthe natureof the act. In this paper I will provide a Rossian theory of the moral natures of acts. It contains a set of self-evident principles of moral stringency and other considerations that can assist agents in deciding what prima facie duty overrides what.