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25Keeping Republican Freedom Simple: On a Difference with Quentin SkinnerPhilosophy Today 30 (3): 339-356. 2002.
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37Physicalism without pop-outIn David Braddon-Mitchell & Robert Nola (eds.), Conceptual Analysis and Philosophical Naturalism, Mit Press. 2009.Imagine a very fi ne grid or graph on which dots are placed at various coordinates so that, as a consequence, this or that shape materializes there. Depending on the coordinates of the dots, different shapes will appear, and for every shape there will be a pattern in the coordinates that guarantees its appearance. Take, for example, the diagonal line that slopes rightward and upward at an angle of 45 degrees from the origin. This line is bound to make an appearance so long as the coordinates sat…Read more
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227On the people's terms: a republican theory and model of democracyCambridge University Press. 2012.According to republican theory, we are free persons to the extent that we are protected and secured in the same fundamental choices, on the same public basis, as one another. But there is no public protection or security without a coercive state. Does this mean that any freedom we enjoy is a superficial good that presupposes a deeper, political form of subjection? Philip Pettit addresses this crucial question in On the People's Terms. He argues that state coercion will not involve individual sub…Read more
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19Social Holism and Moral Theory: A Defence of Bradley's ThesisProceedings of the Aristotelian Society 86 (1). 1986.Philip Pettit; X*—Social Holism and Moral Theory: A Defence of Bradley's Thesis, Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, Volume 86, Issue 1, 1 June 1986, Pages.
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175Descriptivism, rigidified and anchoredPhilosophical Studies 118 (1-2): 323-338. 2004.Stalnaker argues that, while the two-dimensional framework can be used to give expression to the claims associated with rigidified descriptivism, it cannot be used to support that position. He also puts forward some objections to rigidified descriptivism. I agree that rigidified descriptivism cannot be supported by appeal to the two-dimensional framework. But I think that Stalnaker’s objections can be avoided under a descriptivism that introduces a causal as well as a descriptive element – a descri…Read more
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9A Companion to Contemporary Political Philosophy, 2 Volume Set (edited book)Wiley-Blackwell. 2007.This new edition of _A Companion to Contemporary Political Philosophy_ has been extended significantly to include 55 chapters across two volumes written by some of today's most distinguished scholars. New contributors include some of today’s most distinguished scholars, among them Thomas Pogge, Charles Beitz, and Michael Doyle Provides in-depth coverage of contemporary philosophical debate in all major related disciplines, such as economics, history, law, political science, international relatio…Read more
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1ŤIntroductionŤ, u: Philip Pettit & John McDowell (ur.)In Subject, Thought, And Context, Clarendon Press. 1986.
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288Broome on reasoning and rule-followingPhilosophical Studies 173 (12): 3373-3384. 2016.John Broome’s Rationality Through Reasoning is a trail-blazing study of the nature of rationality, the nature of reasoning and the connection between the two. But it may be somewhat misleading in two respects. First, his theory of reasoning is consistent with the meta-propositional view that he rejects; it develops a broadly similar theory but in much greater detail. And while his discussion of rule-following helps to explain the role of rules in reasoning, it does not constitute a response to t…Read more
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138Non-consequentialism and universalizabilityPhilosophical Quarterly 50 (199): 175-190. 2000.If non-consequentialists are to embrace the requirement of universalizability, then they will have to adopt a surprisingly relativistic stance. Not only will they say, in familiar vein, that the premises adduced in moral argument may be only agent-relative in force, that is, may involve the use of an indexical – as in the consideration that this or that option would advance my commitments, discharge my duty, or benefit my children – and may provide reasons only for the indexically relevant agent,…Read more
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21Rules, Reasons and NormsPhilosophical Studies 124 (2): 185-197. 2005.Philip Pettit has drawn together here a series of interconnected essays on three subjects to which he has made notable contributions. The first part of the book discusses the rule-following character of thought. The second considers how choice can be responsive to different sorts of factors, while still being under the control of thought and the reasons that thought marshals. The third examines the implications of this view of choice and rationality for the normative regulation of social behavio…Read more
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54Defining and defending social holismPhilosophical Explorations 1 (3). 1998.This paper offers a definition of social holism that makes the doctrine non-trivial but possibly true. According to that definition, the social holist maintains that people depend non-causally on interaction with one another for possession of the capacity to think; the thesis is meant to be a contingent truth but one, like physicalism, that is plausible in the light of some a priori argument and some plausible empirical assumptions. The paper also sketches an argument in support of social holism…Read more
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53The Economy of Esteem:An Essay on Civil and Political Society: An Essay on Civil and Political SocietyOxford University Press. 2005.This groundbreaking book revisits the writings of classic theorists in an effort re-evaluate the importance and influence the psychology of esteem has on the economy. The authors explore ways the economy of esteem may be reshaped to improve overall social outcomes and offer new ways of thinking about how society works and may be made to work.
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17How the folk understand folk psychologyProtoSociology 14 26-38. 2000.Let folk psychology consist in the network of concepts, and associated beliefs, in terms of which we make sense of minded performance.This paper addresses the question of how we, the folk, come to understand those concepts: this, as distinct from the separate question as to how we come to apply them in the interpretation of particular minds, our own and those of others.The argument is that even though the network of concepts is akin to a set of theoretical, interdefined terms, still it is possib…Read more
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76A theory of normal and ideal conditionsPhilosophical Studies 96 (1): 21-44. 1999.It is a priori on many accounts of colour concepts that something is red if and only if it is such that it would look red to normal observers in normal circumstances: it is such that it would look red, as we can say, under normal conditions of observation. And as this sort of formula is widely applied to colour concepts, so similar schemas are commonly defended in relation to a variety of other concepts too. Not only are colour concepts connected in such a fashion with human responses, so by man…Read more
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308Making Up Your Mind: How Language Enables Self‐Knowledge, Self‐Knowability and PersonhoodEuropean Journal of Philosophy 24 (1): 3-26. 2016.If language is to serve the basic purpose of communicating our attitudes, we must be constructed so as to form beliefs in those propositions that we truthfully assert on the basis of careful assent. Thus, other things being equal, I can rely on believing those things to which I give my careful assent. And so my ability to assent or dissent amounts to an ability to make up my mind about what I believe. This capacity, in tandem with a similar capacity in respect of other attitudes, supports three …Read more
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Reply : Evaluative "realism" and interpretationIn Steven H. Holtzman & Christopher M. Leich (eds.), Wittgenstein: To Follow a Rule, Routledge. 1981.
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53Corporate Responsibility RevisitedNetherlands Journal of Legal Philosophy 38 (2): 159-176. 2009.This paper responds to four commentaries on “Responsibility Incorporated”, restating, revising, and expanding on existing work. In particular, it looks again at a set of issues related primarily to responsibility at the individual level; it reconsiders responsibility at the corporate level; it examines the connection of this discussion to issues of responsibility in law and politics
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828Three Methods of Ethics: A DebateWiley-Blackwell. 1997.During the past decade ethical theory has been in a lively state of development, and three basic approaches to ethics - Kantian ethics, consequentialism, and virtue ethics - have assumed positions of particular prominence
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78A Priori Principles and Action-ExplanationAnalysis 46 (1). 1986.This paper is a defence of the view that action explanation deploys (relatively) a priori principles. The argument is that this is so because action explanation succeeds, Not just through revealing regularity, But through exhibiting the presence of an expected and privileged pattern. Its job is to 'normalise' action, Not just 'regularise' it
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253When to defer to majority testimony – and when notAnalysis 66 (3). 2006.How sensitive should you be to the testimony of others? You saw the car that caused an accident going through traffic lights on the red; or so you thought. Should you revise your belief on discovering that the majority of bystanders, equally well-equipped, equally well-positioned and equally impartial, reported that it went through on the green? Or take another case. You believe that intelligent design is the best explanation for the order of the living universe. Should you revise that belief on …Read more
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6Chapter five. Using words to incorporateIn Made with Words: Hobbes on Language, Mind, and Politics, Princeton University Press. pp. 70-83. 2009.
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369 The common goodIn Keith M. Dowding, Robert E. Goodin, Carole Pateman & Brian Barry (eds.), Justice and Democracy: Essays for Brian Barry, Cambridge University Press. pp. 150. 2004.
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79Functional explanation and virtual selectionBritish Journal for the Philosophy of Science 47 (2): 291-302. 1996.Invoking its social function can explain why we find a certain functional trait or institution only if we can identify a mechanism whereby the playing of the function connects with the explanandum. That is the main claim in the missing-mechanism critique of functionalism. Is it correct? Yes, if functional explanation is meant to make sense of the actual presence of the trait or institution. No, if it is meant to make sense of why the trait or institution is resilient: why we can rely on it to su…Read more
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Areas of Specialization
Philosophy of Mind |
Normative Ethics |
Social and Political Philosophy |