In this post, I reply to my previous post on a new motivation for positing desire-like imagination. The right response to the argument sketched there, I now think, is a combination of `Who cares?’ and `What are you talking about?’. But there’s a functionalist explanation behind the indifferent shrug and the incredulous stare.

Suppose we are all good functionalists, as we should be. Then a mental state (type) is defined by the inputs and outputs that its tokens typically have. For example, a typical belief connects to desires, affective response system, behavior-generating system, and such. To answer the question ‘what is a belief’, there is nothing over and above saying what inputs and outputs that its tokens typically have. The nature of a mental state is just its functions.

In that sense, contrary to what I claim in the previous post, Currie and Doggett and Egan have indeed explained what desire-like imagination is, in virtue of the connections that they posit. In particular, Doggett and Egan say that desire-like imagination is connected to (belief-like) imagination, affective response system, and behavior-generating system. On the other hand, Currie says that desire-like imagination is connected to imagination and affective response system, but not behavior-generating system (see Currie (2002)). The connections that they posit are their respective answers to the question `what is the nature of desire-like imagination.’ Hence, talking about desire-like imagination’s direction of fit may not add to the characterizations given, and is at any rate unnecessary. Thus the indifferent shrug.

More importantly, the functionalist framework shows that a mental state (type) does not exist in a vacuum; it exists in connection with other mental states and cognitive systems. To explain a phenomenon, such as affective response to fiction or immersion in pretense, these philosophers need to posit both desire-like imagination and the appropriate connections. Hence, even if the direction-of-fit metaphor is right and the analogies go through, as argued in my previous post, all we have done is posit a mental state. Without the appropriate connections, it exists only in a vacuum and cannot do any explanatory work. Furthermore, it is far from clear how the direction-of-fit metaphor and the analogies can help us with positing desire-like imagination’s connections in the functionalist framework of mind. So there is the feeling, as Sara commented, of “what phenomenon are you talking about” because positing a mental state in a vacuum does not help explaining the phenomena in which we are ultimately interested. Thus the incredulous stare.

Desire-like imagination, or I-Desire, is said to be analogous to desire in the same way that belief-like imagination, or imagination, is analogous to belief. There are a few different arguments for positing desire-like imagination in print. Greg Currie has given a few on the grounds of inference to the best explanation: he argues that desire-like imagination can best help us explain phenomena including affective response toward fiction and seemingly conflicting desires toward fiction (Currie and Ravenscroft 2002), and imaginative resistance (Currie 2002, in Gendler & Hawthorne). Tyler Doggett and Andy Egan similarly argue that desire-like imagination can best help us explain behaviors of pretenders who are immersed in the fiction of the pretense (Doggett and Egan 2007). I am unconvinced by these arguments and remain skeptical of desire-like imagination. But in a reading group today, I tried to provide a new motivation for positing desire-like imagination.

Take as the starting point the analogy at the beginning of this post: desire-like imagination is to desire as (belief-like) imagination is to belief. There is a tradition of differentiating belief and desire by their “directions of fit”. Belief is said to have a mind-to-world fit: the aim of belief is to represent a fact about the actual world. Desire is said to have a world-to-mind fit: the aim of desire is to make the world as the non-actual state of affairs represented. Arguably, we can also say that imagination has a direction of fit, at least when we are exercising the faculty in pretense or engagement with fiction. Imagination, I want to claim, has a mind-to-fictionality fit: the aim of imagination is to represent a fact about the (relevant) fictional world. The relationships between belief, desire, and imagination are summarized by the following table:

Now it seems natural to fill out ??? with a mental state that is both desire-like and about the fictional world. Desire-like imagination fits. Following through with the analogies, desire-like imagination has a fictionality-to-mind direction of fit: the aim of desire-like imagination is to make the fictional world as the non-fictional state of affairs represented.

Whether the picture presented constitutes a positive argument for positing desire-like imagination depends on the strengths of the analogies. It seems to me that it at least offers some potential for such an argument. However, my goal for presenting this, what I think is a quite natural, picture is to use it as a pre-emptive strike against some common objections against positing desire-like imagination.

Challengers to desire-like imagination often say that (1) the nature of desire-like imagination is mysterious, and consequently, (2) it seems that we can reduce desire-like imagination to the better-understood mental state of desires: desire-like imagination is just desire about the relevant fiction. The arguments presented by Currie and Doggett and Egan somewhat address (2) but they do not appear to address (1). I think the picture I have presented can address both.

In response to (1): if the analogies about directions of fit is right, then we can in fact say something about what constitutes desire-like imagination: its direction of fit. Granted, more needs to be said, but it is at least a positive step forward.

In response to (2): we now have pretty good reasons to say that desire-like imagination is not just desire about the relevant fiction. The proponent of desire-like imagination can respond thus, “There is a difference between belief’s direction of fit and imagination’s direction of fit. Directions of fit are quite metaphorical, I admit. Given that you must think that there is a difference between imagining p and believing that p is true in the fiction, you must have some way of spelling out that difference. However you spell that out, I will borrow it to spell out the difference between desire’s direction of fit and desire-like imagination’s direction of fit. As such, desire-like imagining p and desiring p is true in the fiction have different directions of fit, so the former cannot be reduced to the latter.”

How does that sound?

revisions July 3, 2008.

[I have no idea if the following is at all novel or plausible.  Any feedback would be sweet!]

Here’s a puzzle.  David Lewis (1986) has argued for the following thesis:

L. Self-identity is not constituted, even in part, by having certain qualities.

Kit Fine (1994) argued for the following thesis:

F. An essential property of an object is any property that, in part, constitutes what it is to be that object.

Combining these two theses would seem to imply the following somewhat troubling thesis:

T. Objects do not have any qualities essentially.

I say that this thesis is troubling because, after all, it would seem to be part of, say, my essence that I have the quality of being human.[1] But how can it be both that I have no essential qualities and that being human is part of my essence? Let’s assume for the moment that we don’t want to reject either Lewis’s thesis or Fine’s thesis (I for one have been convinced by both authors). How then might we get out of trouble?

We might start by denying the claim that being human is part of my essence. We might try saying that although I am necessarily human, Fine (1994) has convinced us that not all necessarily had properties are essential properties,[2] and so it does not follow that I am essentially human. However, the claim that I am not essentially human just seems to me patently false: even if I accept Fine’s understanding of an essential property (which I do) as part of what it is for an object to be that object, it still seems to me that being human is part of my essence—that is, it seems to me that being human is part of what it is to be me.

The other way to avoid trouble is to deny the inference from (L) and (F) to (T). Is this plausible? At first it seems not. After all, the following seem to be straightforward translations of (L), (F), and (T)

L*. Given an object A and some x such that x = A, there is no quality Q such that x’s having Q constitutes, even in part, the fact that x = A.

F*. Given an object A and some x such that x = A, an essential property of A is any property P such that the fact that x has P constitutes, in part, the fact that x = A.

T*. Given an object A, there is no quality Q such that Q is an essential property of A.

And the inference from (L*) and (F*) to (T*) is clearly valid.

So what are we to do? Here’s one response I’d like to suggest: resist the interpretation of (F) as (F*) and instead hold that (F) should be understood as

F^C. Given an object A and x such that x is the counterpart of A, an essential property of A is any property P such that the fact that x has P constitutes, in part, the fact that x is the counterpart of A.

Of course, it’s plausible to interpret (F) as (F^C) only if our discourse is to be generally understood as about counterparts rather than interworld identicals. So in this way we have something of an argument for counterpart theory: it allows us to explain why three seemingly plausible theses are consistent, when otherwise they would be inconsistent.

Hey you all,

here’s a link to a blog post of mine on the Experimental Philosophy blog that describes experiments that I think suggest that the folk concept of happiness is a normative one:

Moral Judgments and Happiness

According to the hypothesis I am testing in my experiments, if the folk thinks that somebody is living a bad life—perhaps by being a morally bad person—then they are unlikely to, or will not, attribute happiness to this person even if they believe that she is in the kinds of mental states which we usually associate with happiness.

Most psychological research on happiness uses definitions of happiness that are wholly non-evaluative. This means that, when some psychologist judges that somebody is happy, the folk might not. That, I think, is an interesting result. Why? Because it means, I think, that when we give a philosophical account of happiness, then this will be a normative project at least in the following respect: we will have to give reasons for favoring either the normative concept of happiness used by the folk or the non-normative one used by psychologists and many philosophers. (That is, if, as I think, the kinds of experiments that I’ve been running show that the folk are using a partly normative concept of happiness. Again, see the link for descriptions of these experiments.)

[Read part 1]

In my last post, I presented some concerns about the institutional/interactional distinction with regards to the subject of justice and sketched a potentially new way to distinguish between the claims labeled (1) and (2) in that post. Some further thought has led me to be less confident that the worries I presented should lead us to question the adequacy of the institutional/interactional distinction. Nevertheless, I still think there’s at least one reason to shift from an institutional/interactional distinction to a structural/interactional distinction. So this post will attempt two things. First, I’ll sketch out a reason to think that institutions and structures aren’t coextensive (by arguing that institutions are instances of structure). Second, I’ll offer a reason for thinking that the important distinction is between structuralism and interactionism rather than institutionalism and interactionism. (Note: in the last post, I suggested that we ought to dump the institutional/interactional distinction wholesale in favour of a structural/non-structural distinction. For now, I’ve changed my mind; I think we should turn in the institutional/interactional distinction for the structural/interactional distinction.)

So, are ‘institution’ and ’structure’ coextensive? No. Consider a tentative definition of ’structure’:

Structure: the set of elements that constitute the situation in which agents find themselves, esp. those elements that constitute the way agents are positioned vis-à-vis each other.

To illustrate: In the contract negotiation scenario I presented last post, the contract demands made by the employees or the terms offered by the employer aren’t part of the structure of that situation. The rights each party has and the respective bargaining position of each engendered by those rights are structural features.

Now consider the two broadest definitions of ‘institution’ I could find:

Institution: a persistent and connected set of rules (formal or informal) that prescribe behavioural roles, constrain activity, and shape expectations. (R. O. Keohane, ‘International Institutions: Two Approaches’ (1988), p. 83)

Institution: ‘Organized patterns of socially constructed norms and roles, and socially prescribed behaviors expected of occupants of those roles, which are created and re-created over time.’ (R. E. Goodin, ‘Institutions and Their Design’ (1996), p. 19)

Admittedly, the examples of structural features I’ve given fit under these definitions. That’s fine. I think that institutions are structuring entities; i.e., that institutions play a significant role in constituting the situation of agents vis-à-vis each other. I also think that institutions are structural features; i.e., the presence of an institution mediating the relationship between agents is a constitutive feature of their situation. But I don’t think that institutions are the only structural features; indeed, the absence of any institution could be a feature of some structure. For example, consider a bargaining situation in the state of nature. A state of nature is, by definition, void of institutions, even in the broad sense. But we wouldn’t say that a bargaining situation in the state of nature is unstructured. At the very least, the power (in)equality and the relative bargaining position of the bargaining parties are constitutive features of their situation vis-à-vis each other.

To be clear, what I’m claiming is that institutions are (a) structuring entities and (b) a subset of all structural features. So structuralism and institutionalism don’t have different concerns — the core concern of both is the way in which social relations are structured. But structuralism is more general than institutionalism; the latter concerns itself with the justice of the structure that arises from institutions, whereas the former concerns itself with the justice of structure in the absence of institutions as well.

Given the foregoing, why adopt the structural/interactional distinction instead of the institutional/interactional distinction? Is the distinction between structures and institutions idle? Or can it do some useful work? I think the distinction between structures and institutions is especially useful when thinking about international justice. Typically, when we think of international justice problems, we think of wealth distribution, trade, humanitarian intervention, disease, climate change, etc. For the most part, there is some institutional structure in place to deal with these problems, even if it is only minimal. So it’s natural to think that one ought to be an institutionalist about justice if one is concerned about the way in which international relationships are structured (as, e.g., Pogge is). But international institutions aren’t as robust as domestic ones and we’re living at a time when the global institutional order is still being established. Accordingly, the establishment of international institutions is a significant problem of international justice. And if one is inclined to think that our primary normative concern ought to be the structure of agents’ situation vis-à-vis each other, then, at least with respect to the problem of establishing international institutions, we ought to be concerned about the structure from which institutions emerge. Indeed, it doesn’t make sense to concern ourselves the institutional arrangements from which institutions emerge; at some point, institutions must emerge from a situation where there was none.

There might be some reasons to confine ourselves to a concern about institutions rather than wider structures. In the first place, one of the primary reasons we seem to be concerned about institutions is that they are coercive and that any coercive structure ought to conform to some principles of justice. Coercion implies the intentional use of force or threats to compel certain kinds of behaviour. Thus, it seems wrong to say that preinstitutional structure (or structure in the absence of institutions) is coercive. The structural features are just natural facts: x has more power than y, so it’s a structural feature of x and y’s relationship that x has more bargaining power than y. It’s true that this situation will enable x to coerce y, but it doesn’t seem right to say that x’s capacity to coerce y is itself imposed upon x and y. So if our concern is with coercive structures, we’d be right in confining our interest to institutions. Second, even if we are concerned about the relational structure from which institutions emerge, we might think that there’s little that can be done to change it short of establishing institutions and that we could simply address our structural concerns during the institutional design phase. Thus, our concern would be properly restricted to institutions.

Despite these, I think there are some prima facie reasons for swapping a structural view for an institutional one. First, if one is concerned with making the actual world more just rather than simply theorizing about what constitutes an ideally just state of affairs (i.e., if one is interested in doing so-called non-ideal theory rather than ideal theory), then a concern for establishing just institutions must address the justice of the structure of the bargaining situations from which institutions are emerge. Realistically, the design of institutions is going to reflect the interests of the parties who are able to impose their will during the bargaining process. So non-ideal theorists should concern themselves with thinking about how to bring about more just preinstitutional bargaining structures so that we end up with more just institutions. (There’s lots more that should be said here, but I’m not yet sure what to say and, in any case, it’s peripheral to my central point.) Further, it’s not so unusual to think about the justice of preinstitutional bargaining structures. Consider Rawls’s construction of the original position. The original position is the hypothetical preinstitutional bargaining structure from which principles of just institutional design emerge. Rawls is very careful to situate his hypothetical agents vis-à-vis each other in what he feels is a just way. (For him, this means placing the agents behind a veil of ignorance, thereby eliminating any bargaining advantages that might accrue from morally arbitrary natural and social characteristics of the agents.) Now, unlike Rawls, non-ideal theorists concerned about the situation from which international institutions emerge don’t have the luxury of placing actual agents behind a veil of ignorance as a way to bring about a just preinstitutional bargaining structure. But this doesn’t mean that we can’t be concerned about the justice of preinstitutional structures; it simply means that we are constrained in our theorizing about how to bring about just preinstitutional structures.

One final (though perhaps not very strong) reason for exchanging institutionalism for structuralism is that calling one’s view ‘institutional’ when one’s primary concern is structure (as is ostensibly the case with Rawls and Pogge) is likely to be misleading. Calling the view ‘institutional’ often leads others to believe that the view is concerned exclusively with the justice of particular institutions (e.g., the UN, WTO, World Bank, etc.). While it’s undoubtedly true that a structural view is concerned with the way in which particular institutions structure the situation of agents, particular institutions are only instances of the structuralist’s primary concern. Indeed, it’s not the institutions per se that the ‘institutional’ view is fundamentally concerned with; the ultimate concern is the way in which social relations are structured. Institutions are only instrumentally important in this regard because they are the predominant structuring entity in our world. So, while this is perhaps only a cosmetic reason for abandoning the ‘institutional’ label in favour of the ’structural’ label, it’s a cosmetic change that could help clarify what precisely is at stake. (Of course, some view called ‘institutionalism’ could serve as an intermediate view between structuralism and interactionism. Ostensibly, it would be the view that is exclusively concerned with institutions because it thinks there is something special about coercive structure. This might even be the right way to read Rawls and Pogge. However, insofar as one’s concern is with structure simpliciter (coercive or not), ’structuralism’ is a better handle than ‘institutionalism’.)

If all this is adequate, my conclusion is that we ought to scrap the institutional/interactional distinction in favour of a structural distinction, at least in cases when we can’t assume the presence of institutions or where institutions are still in their formative stage, e.g., in the international sphere. (Where robust institutions are present, as in most domestic cases, the structural and institutional views would probably look too similar to distinguish between them.)

Earlier, I said that pt. 3 would offer some reasons for thinking we ought to be structuralists about justice. I guess I’ve gestured in that direction a little already; at least, I’ve offered some reasons for thinking we should be structuralists as opposed to institutionalists. Perhaps pt. 3 will outline some reasons for thinking we ought to be structuralists as opposed to interactionists.

By ’subject of justice’, I mean ‘what claims of justice are about’. So the title question, then, is: what constitutes the content of claims about justice?

Famously, Rawls (1971) answered the question as follows:

The primary subject of the principles of social justice is the basic structure of society, the arrangement of major social institutions into one scheme of cooperation. We have seen that these principles are to govern the assignment of rights and duties in these institutions and they are to determine the appropriate distribution of the benefits and burdens of social life. The principles of justice for institutions must not be confused with the principles which apply to individuals and their actions in particular circumstances. These two kinds of principles apply to different subjects and must be discussed separately. (TJ, sec. 10)

Following Rawls, a distinction has been made in the political philosophy literature between an institutional view and an interactional view. Pogge’s formulation of this distinction in ‘Cosmopolitanism and Sovereignty’ (1992) is representative:

An institutional conception postulates certain fundamental principles of justice. These apply to institutional schemes and are thus second-order principles: standards for assessing the ground rules and practices that regulate human interactions. An interactional conception, by contrast, postulates certain fundamental principles of ethics. These principles, like institutional ground rules, are first-order in that they apply directly to the conduct of persons and groups. (p. 50)

(If you’re interested, two prominent rejections of this distinction are G.A. Cohen, ‘Where the Action Is’ (1995) and L. Murphy, ‘Institutions and the Demands of Justice’ (1998). Pogge, ‘On the Site of Distributive Justice’ (2001) responds. Strictly speaking, Pogge characterizes the interactional view as a view concerning ethics as opposed to justice. But, as I’ll try to make clear below, there could be a way in which both the interactional and institutional views are views of justice.)

To illustrate the distinction, consider the following scenario:

The contract of employees at Company A is about to expire and contract negotiations with the employer are underway. The employees demand that their pay be increased to keep up with inflation, that they receive health benefits, and that certain safety measures are put in place. The employer responds with the following offer: `No pay increase, no health benefits, and no additional safety measures. Take it or leave it. If all of you reject the offer, then I’ll have no choice but to concede your demands. However, if any of you takes it, then those of you who don’t take it will be fired.’ Add to the case the following parameter: Employees lack rights that would make securing cooperation easier, i.e., they have no right to bargain collectively or to meet together under the auspices of a labour union. (Or, if you prefer, the employer has rights that enable it to protect its interests by breaking up union meetings, isolating employees in negotiations, etc.)

So, to clarify: Each employee can either accept or reject the employer’s terms. If all employees reject the employer’s terms, then each employee retains her job and gets a better contract. If an employee accepts the employer’s terms, then she retains her job but gets a worse contract. If an employee rejects while just one other employee accepts, then she loses her job.

Now, suppose we agree that there’s some injustice involved in this scenario. At least two distinct sets of claims aim at locating the injustice:

(1) The employer’s terms are unjust. Employers ought to pay their employees wages that keep pace with cost of living adjustments; they should provide access to affordable health care (in the absence of publicly provided health care); and they should guarantee their employees a safe work environment. By failing to meet these just demands, the employer is being unjust.

(2) This bargaining situation is unjust. Employees should have rights that grant them a more equitable bargaining position vis-à-vis their employers, i.e., a bargaining position that enables them to influence the terms of their employment. (Or: employers shouldn’t be granted rights that give them a decisive bargaining advantage over their employees, i.e., a bargaining position that enables them to unilaterally dictate the terms of employment.) The injustice here is a failure to situate employers and employees vis-à-vis each other in a way results in a fair bargaining situation.

I think there’s a genuine distinction between (1) and (2). Up til now, I’ve followed Rawls and Pogge in calling type-1 claims ‘interactional’ and type-2 claims ‘institutional’. (At least, I’ve thought I’ve been following Rawls and Pogge in distinguishing between (1) and (2) in this way. I should leave open the possibility that Pogge, at least, carves up the relevant space differently.) Intuitively, this seems plausible. The claims in (1) prima facie address the employer’s interactions with its employees; those in (2) prima facie address the rights and duties that are institutionally allocated to the employer and employees respectively. But I can see how this might be misleading for at least several reasons:

First, the motivation for (2) could be a worry about a certain class of interactions, viz., unjust bargaining interactions. The thought underlying the response could be: ‘Employers ought not be permitted to fire their employees and hire replacements when the employees refuse to accept the employer’s terms. This type of employer-employee interaction ought to be circumscribed.’ If this is right, then the supposed institutional worry would actually be an interactional one.

Second, the solution proposed to remedy the worry in (1) could be institutional: ‘We ought to establish institutions that will insure that employees wages keep pace with cost of living adjustments, that they are provided with access to affordable health care, and that they are guaranteed a safe work environment. In other words, we ought to establish institutions that constrain the contract terms any employer is able to offer.’ If this is right, then it might be tough to see how (1) couldn’t be institutional.

Third, the claims in (1) could be claims about which rights employees ought to have, i.e., they ought to have rights to affordable health care, a living wage, etc. If so, and if institutionalism is supposed to be characterized by a distinct worry about institutional schemes of rights, then (1) is ostensibly an institutional response.

Finally, institutions are often thought of as the net result of numerous individual interactions over time. If this is right (I must admit, I find this view plausible), then a worry about the justice of institutions is, at bottom, nothing other than a worry about interactions.

Perhaps the first three worries show that (1) and (2) don’t actually fall on opposite sides of the institutional/interactional divide; in that case, I’ve misconstrued the original distinction. (But the fourth worry would still have traction.) Or perhaps (1) and (2) capture the distinction just fine. In either case, and despite the foregoing worries, I still think there’s a genuine distinction between (1) and (2) and it’s this distinction I’m interested in clearly capturing. As a first approximation, I’ll say that (1) is concerned with non-structural features of the case, whereas (2) is concerned with structural features of the case. By calling the concerns in (1) ‘non-structural’, I mean to indicate that the content of ‘just contract terms’ is not dictated by constitutive features of the bargaining situation. The structural desiderata of a just bargaining situation don’t speak to the question of whether employees should be paid wages that keep up with inflation, or whether access to affordable health care ought to be provided to them, or whether they ought to be guaranteed a safe workplace. Not surprisingly, then, the concerns in (2) are ’structural’ because they are concerns about the way that the bargaining situation is constituted; in particular, the sets of rights that are granted to employers and employees respectively when they enter bargaining situations. So instead of a distinction between interactional and institutional views, perhaps the relevant distinction is that between structural and non-structural views.

Admittedly, all of this is a little undercooked. I could say more, but then the post would be unbearable long. So here are the main questions I have:

1. Do (1) and (2) adequately capture the institutional/interactional distinction introduced by Rawls and defended by Pogge? If not, suggestions on what sorts of claims would fall on either side of the divide?

2. Is the structural/non-structural distinction I’ve tried to sketch here tenable? Does it capture a genuine distinction between (1) and (2)?

To foreshadow: I plan to add at least two more installments to this thread over the next few weeks. Pt. 2 will attempt to offer some reasons for thinking that the structural/non-structural distinction isn’t coextensive with the institutional/interactional distinction (while acknowledging that there is some significant overlap). In addition, I’ll try to offer some reasons for thinking that the former offers a more helpful way to carve up the relevant space (and perhaps better captures the intuitions Rawls and Pogge were trying to capture with the institutional/interactional distinction). Pt. 3 will try to offer some reasons for thinking that we ought to be structuralists about the subject of justice. I might also say something about what I think the more substantive implications of structuralism might be for global justice problems, but that sounds too ambitious at this point.

[Read part 2]

The following principle strikes me as plausible:

If S is ideally rational, has the concept of justification, and has credence X that P,

then S believes that she is justified in having credence X that P.

In other words, ideally rational agents believe that all their credences are justified. Any thoughts? I’m sure this has been addressed in the literature, so if you know of any relevant citations, please pass them along!

I attended several interesting talks at the Central APA. This time, I tried to select more politically-oriented sessions, despite my lack of knowledge in that area. Subsequently, I was exposed to a lot of interesting issues I probably would never have thought about otherwise. One symposium that particularly got me thinking was “Responsibility for Resisting Oppression”, with Bernard Boxill, Thomas Hill, Jean Harvey, and Sarah Buss. One topic that came up was the responsibilities of “bystanders” to resisting oppressions, compared to that of the oppressed themselves.

That got me thinking: Who is a bystander? For example, are we bystanders to the Chinese government’s oppression of Tibetans? Suppose that information about this oppression were nearly impossible to get, then are we nevertheless bystanders? This hypothetical has implications for assessing our responsibilities as bystanders in everyday situations. There are many instances of systematic injustice in workplace or private homes. We might then ask: Are we bystanders to those, and if so, what are our responsibilities? Reflecting on these scenarios rather naively suggests an epistemic condition on answering the question ‘who is a bystander’: we are bystanders when we can easily obtain knowledge of the oppression.

Suppose that this is the case. A further question arises: Is this epistemic condition a constraint in theorizing about moral responsibility or is it merely a constraint on what we can do practically? Perhaps we want to say that we do always have moral responsibility to resist every oppression, but–as is the case in every instance of resistance–we do what we pragmatically can after considering the costs. On this latter point, as Buss points out in her comments, what price we ought to pay for resistance is very much related to what we can do. Still, this proposal appears to make the moral obligations of bystanders too demanding. On the other hand, it is not clear such a strong demand is a bad thing. The vagueness on one’s status ought not be a source of excuse-making. To motivate ourselves to act, perhaps, we really should think we have near-ubiquitous moral responsibility to resist every oppression as bystanders. (If the oppressed often have more moral responsibilities than bystanders, as Boxill’s talk seems to suggest, then the proposal I suggest has the consequence of assigning much more moral responsibility to the oppressed as well.)

I also thought about what one might call metaphysical conditions on being a bystander. Here is a cluster of questions: Are there other conditions in determining whether one is a bystander to oppression? For example, does one need to be simultaneous to the oppression to be a bystander? That is, are we bystanders to past oppressions or bystanders to future oppressions? Answering this cluster of questions, I think, has some relevance to telling us about our moral responsibilities when it comes to reparations and policy-making.

There probably is already a large literature in this area. Hopefully those who are more informed can tell me a bit more about it in the comments. Let me know your thoughts!

Here’s a view about propositions:

A proposition P is a set of ordered pairs <A,G> where the first object is an individual and the second a property. These propositions are generally expressed by declarative statements such as my utterance of the sentence `Alvin is Green’. Call this `Structured Propositions’.

Here’s an argument against this view of propositions.

P1) If propositions are structured then one must either: a) become Meinongian, or b) accept gappy propositions.
P2) According to Russell, Meinongianism entails contradictions, so it’s unacceptable.
P3) Gappy propositions cannot explain informative speech acts where true negative existential are asserted. Such speech acts cannot express gappy propositions. So, gappy propositions are unacceptable.
P4) From P2 and P3, it follows that we should neither be Meinongian nor gappy proposition theorists.
C) Propositions are not structured.

Here’s an argument for P1.

Suppose that the name `Alvin’ is referenceless. I go on and utter the sentence `Alvin is Green’. Which proposition did I assert? If propositions are structured, then what I asserted looks either like this ‹A, G› or like this ‹ , G›. The first one requires you to believe that Alvin, who does not exist, IS in fact some kind of object: a non-existent, or subsistent one. That’s Meinongianism. The second option requires you to believe that there are gappy propositions: propositions with unfilled spots in their structure.

For Russell’s argument for P2, read his “On Denoting’’.

As for P3, here’s an argument. Suppose you reply to my assertion by uttering the sentence `Alvin does not exist’, which happens to be true. Which proposition did you assert? Assuming that you cannot be Meinongian, the proposition looks something like this: NEG‹A, E›, where `NEG’ stands for negation and `E’ stands for the property of existence. The proposition is, clearly, a gappy one. The problem is that it should not be.

Here’s why. We need evidence to show that a particular speech act ends up having a propositional gap. More often than not, this is signaled by a presupposition failure. The traditional example is Russell’s King of France: `The present King of France is bald’ presupposes that there is some such thing as a present King of France. Since this presupposition is not fulfilled then the utterance does not express a full-blown, truth-evaluable proposition. Suppose, for argument’s sake, that that’s a good paradigm of propositional gaps. Does that happen with true negative existentials?

The answer is no. In general no existential claim carries existence presupposition. If they had then they would all be useless: i.e., they would all be asserting what they are presupposing. Your reply, for example, would like these:

Let us suppose that Alvin exists. By the way, Alvin does not exist.

Or, think of the more problematic, affirmative existential claim:

Let us suppose that Alvin exists. Now let me tell you something about Alvin. Alvin exists.

The absurdity of these speech acts goes to show that existential claims in general do not carry existence presuppositions. If you want, you can run the usual “hey, wait a minute’’ tests and see this for yourself. The main point here is that existential claims in general do not carry existence presuppositions.

How does this help? Well, if they don’t carry existence presuppositions, then your utterance of the true sentence `Alvin does not exist’ doesn’t carry an existence presupposition. If so, then the fact that `Alvin’ is referenceless does not affect the presuppositions of your speech act. In particular it does not make it so that there is some presupposition failure involved in it. And this is important because if there is no presupposition failure then there is no reason to think that what you uttered has any propositional or truth-value gap whatsoever.

It follows then that whenever someone utters a true negative existential claim they manage to convey a full-blown proposition. But non-meinongian fans of structured propositions are forced to say that these speech acts express a gappy proposition. Which is simply false. True negative existentials cannot express gappy propositions.

Structured proposition theorists are forced to be Meinongians. I referred to Russell’s argument against this view. But here’s a brief, sketch of it. What would happen if you become Meinongian in order to save the day for Structured Propositions? Well, you would end up having something like this: NEG ‹A, E› which literally says that there IS an object that does not exist. Of course, Meinongians would like to distinguish between ways of existing. What the proposition really says is that there IS a Subsistent object that does not exist. But Meinongians should also accept that there is an important set of things that REALLY do not exist: like the square circle. Otherwise you run into contradictions. So they have to distinguish between objects like Alvin and the square circle, they all have different ways of not existing. And all that just seems ridiculous.

I’m working up a paper on Newcomb and am seeking feedback on an argument for one-boxing in the infallible predictor version.

The case:

You are brought into a room with two boxes sitting on a table. One box is opaque; you are informed that it contains either $1,000,000 or nothing. The other box is transparent and contains $1,000. You are invited to either take only the opaque box (i.e. “one-box”) or take both boxes (“two-box”). Any money that you collect is yours to keep.

However, prior to making your choice, you receive the following information: Before you entered the room, an infallible predictor made a complete assessment of your psychology. If she predicted that you’d one-box, she put a million dollars in the opaque box. If she predicted that you’d two-box, she put nothing in it.

If you’re greedy and you believe everything you’ve been told (e.g. that the predictor is infallible), what is the rational choice?

The argument:

1. The predictor made a true prediction.
2. If the predictor made a true prediction, then [(you will two-box iff you'll receive exactly $1,000) and (you will one-box iff you'll receive exactly $1,000,000)].
3. You will two-box iff you’ll receive exactly $1,000.
4. You will one-box iff you’ll receive exactly $1,000,000.
5. Either you’ll two-box or you’ll one-box.
6. Either you’ll receive exactly $1,000 or you’ll receive exactly $1,000,000.
7. $1,000,000 is more money than $1,000.
8. If [(you'll receive either exactly $1,000 or exactly $1,000,000) and ($1,000,000 is more money than $1,000)], then you prefer to receive exactly $1,000,000.
9. You prefer to receive exactly $1,000,000.
10. If [(you prefer to receive exactly $1,000,000) and (you will one-box iff you'll receive exactly $1,000,000)], then you ought to one-box.
11. You ought to one-box.

Thoughts? Rejectable premises?
(I don’t deny that there is also a very compelling argument for two-boxing in this case.)

Later addition (1/6/08):

(10) is an instantiation of the following:

(10′) If [(you prefer outcome O) and (you will perform act A iff O)], then you ought to perform A.

While (10′) looks something like an instrumental rationality principle, it occurred to me that the second clause of the antecedent may be weaker than some would like. In particular, they might insist that an instrumental rationality principle will require that your performance of A is causally efficacious in bringing about O. And such objectors might only be willing to accept an instrumental rationality principle.

So, I’d like to amend the above argument in two ways. First, add the following premise:

(4a) Receiving exactly $1,000,000 is causally dependent on your one-boxing.

(4a) is true, I believe. In order for an agent in Newcomb to receive exactly $1,000,000 (as opposed to $1,001,000, $1,000, or $0), two events must occur: (i) the predictor must have placed a million in the room, and (ii) the agent must one-box. Receiving exactly a million is counterfactually dependent on the agent’s one-boxing–and, plausibly, causally dependent as well.

Second, modify (10) as follows:

(10*) If [(you prefer to receive exactly $1,000,000) and (you will one-box iff you'll receive exactly $1,000,000) and (receiving exactly $1,000,000 is causally dependent on your one-boxing)], then you ought to one-box.

These changes strengthen the argument, I think.

Later addition (3/10/08):

Dustin rightly pointed out that (11) and (11*) need to address what the agent believes is the case, and not simply what is the case. However, I think I can avoid this need by shifting from the second- to the first-person. To evaluate the argument, readers will need to imagine themselves in infallible predictor Newcomb.

1. The predictor made a true prediction.
2. If the predictor made a true prediction, then [(I will two-box iff I'll receive exactly $1,000) and (I will one-box iff I'll receive exactly $1,000,000)].
3. I will two-box iff I’ll receive exactly $1,000.
4. I will one-box iff I’ll receive exactly $1,000,000.
5. Either I’ll two-box or I’ll one-box.
6. Either I’ll receive exactly $1,000 or I’ll receive exactly $1,000,000.
7. $1,000,000 is more money than $1,000.
8. If [(I'll receive either exactly $1,000 or exactly $1,000,000) and ($1,000,000 is more money than $1,000)], then my strongest preference is to receive exactly $1,000,000.
9. My strongest preference is to receive exactly $1,000,000.
10. My one-boxing will causally promote my receiving exactly $1,000,000.
11. If [(my strongest preference is to receive exactly $1,000,000), (I will one-box iff I'll receive exactly $1,000,000), and (my one-boxing will causally promote my receiving exactly $1,000,000)], then I ought to one-box.
12. I ought to one-box.