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21Coordination problems and the evolution of behaviorBehavioral and Brain Sciences 7 (1): 106. 1984.
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471Collective epistemologyEpisteme 1 (2): 95--107. 2004.This paper introduces the author's approach to everyday ascriptions of collective cognitive states as in such statements as we believe he is lying. Collective epistemology deals with these ascriptions attempting to understand them and the phenomena in question.
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273Belief and acceptance as features of groupsProtoSociology 16 35-69. 2002.In everyday discourse groups or collectives are often said to believe this or that. The author has previously developed an account of the phenomenon to which such collective belief statements refer. According to this account, in terms that are explained, a group believes that p if its members are jointly committed to believe that p as a body. Those who fulfill these conditions are referred to here as collectively believing* that p. Some philosophers – here labeled rejectionists – have argued tha…Read more
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773Agreements, coercion, and obligationEthics 103 (4): 679-706. 1993.Typical agreements can be seen as joint decisions, inherently involving obligations of a distinctive kind. These obligations derive from the joint commitment' that underlies a joint decision. One consequence of this understanding of agreements and their obligations is that coerced agreements are possible and impose obligations. It is not that the parties to an agreement should always conform to it, all things considered. Unless one is released from the agreement, however, one has some reason to …Read more
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201Agreements, conventions, and languageSynthese 54 (3). 1983.The question whether and in what way languages and language use involve convention is addressed, With special reference to David Lewis's account of convention in general. Data are presented which show that Lewis has not captured the sense of 'convention' involved when we speak of adopting a linguistic convention. He has, In effect, attempted an account of social conventions. An alternative account of social convention and an account of linguistic convention are sketched.
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Collective belief, Kuhn, and the string theory communityIn Michael Brady & Miranda Fricker (eds.), The Epistemic Life of Groups: Essays in the Epistemology of Collectives, Oxford University Press Uk. 2016.
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186Is an agreement an exchange of promises?Journal of Philosophy 90 (12): 627-649. 1993.This paper challenges the common assumption that an agreement is an exchange of promises. Proposing that the performance obligations of some typical agreements are simultaneous, interdependent, and unconditional, it argues that no promise-exchange has this structure of obligations. In addition to offering general considerations in support of this claim, it examines various types of promise-exchange, showing that none satisfy the criteria noted. Two forms of conditional promise are distinguished …Read more
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28Ulysses Unbound: Studies in Rationality, Precommitment, and ConstraintsMind 111 (442): 399-403. 2002.
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77Social Rules: Some Problems for Hart’s Account, and an Alternative Proposal (review)Law and Philosophy 18 (2): 141-171. 1999.What is a social rule? This paper first notes three important problems for H.L.A. Hart's famous answer in the Concept of Law. An alternative account that avoids the problems is then sketched. It is less individualistic than Hart's and related accounts. This alternative account can explain a phenomenon observed but downplayed by Hart: the parties to a social rule feel that they are in some sense 'bound' to conform to it.
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808Collective guilt and collective guilt feelingsThe Journal of Ethics 6 (2): 115-143. 2002.Among other things, this paper considers what so-called collective guilt feelings amount to. If collective guilt feelings are sometimes appropriate, it must be the case that collectives can indeed be guilty. The paper begins with an account of what it is for a collective to intend to do something and to act in light of that intention. An account of collective guilt in terms of membership guilt feelings is found wanting. Finally, a "plural subject" account of collective guilt feelings is articula…Read more
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719Rationality in collective actionPhilosophy of the Social Sciences 36 (1): 3-17. 2006.Collective action is interpreted as a matter of people doing something together, and it is assumed that this involves their having a collective intention to do that thing together. The account of collective intention for which the author has argued elsewhere is presented. In terms that are explained, the parties are jointly committed to intend as a body that such-and-such. Collective action problems in the sense of rational choice theory—problems such as the various forms of coordination problem…Read more
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380Modelling collective beliefSynthese 73 (1): 185-204. 1987.What is it for a group to believe something? A summative account assumes that for a group to believe that p most members of the group must believe that p. Accounts of this type are commonly proposed in interpretation of everyday ascriptions of beliefs to groups. I argue that a nonsummative account corresponds better to our unexamined understanding of such ascriptions. In particular I propose what I refer to as the joint acceptance model of group belief. I argue that group beliefs according to th…Read more
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3Considerations on joint commitment: Responses to various commentsIn Georg Meggle (ed.), Social Facts and Collective Intentionality. Philosophische Forschung / Philosophical research, Dr. Haensel-hohenhausen. pp. 1--73. 2002.
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1Acting togetherIn Georg Meggle (ed.), Social Facts and Collective Intentionality. Philosophische Forschung / Philosophical research, Dr. Haensel-hohenhausen. 2002.
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1072Walking Together: A Paradigmatic Social PhenomenonMidwest Studies in Philosophy 15 (1): 1-14. 1990.The everyday concept of a social group is approached by examining the concept of going for a walk together, an example of doing something together, or "shared action". Two analyses requiring shared personal goals are rejected, since they fail to explain how people walking together have obligations and rights to appropriate behavior, and corresponding rights of rebuke. An alternative account is proposed: those who walk together must constitute the "plural subject" of a goal. The nature of plural …Read more
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338Social convention revisitedTopoi (1-2): 5-16. 2008.This article will compare and contrast two very different accounts of convention: the game-theoretical account of Lewis in Convention, and the account initially proposed by Margaret Gilbert (the present author) in chapter six of On Social Facts, and further elaborated here. Gilbert’s account is not a variant of Lewis’s. It was arrived at in part as the result of a detailed critique of Lewis’s account in relation to a central everyday concept of a social convention. An account of convention need …Read more
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549On Social FactsRoutledge. 1989.This book offers original accounts of a number of central social phenomena, many of which have received little if any prior philosophical attention. These phenomena include social groups, group languages, acting together, collective belief, mutual recognition, and social convention. In the course of developing her analyses Gilbert discusses the work of Emile Durkheim, Georg Simmel, Max Weber, David Lewis, among others.
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154Group wrongs and guilt feelingsThe Journal of Ethics 1 (1): 65-84. 1997.Can it ever be appropriate to feel guilt just because one's group has acted badly? Some say no, citing supposed features of guilt feelings as such. If one understands group action according to my plural subject account of groups, however, one can argue for the appropriateness of feeling guilt just because one's group has acted badly - a feeling that often occurs. In so arguing I sketch a plural subject account of groups, group intentions and group actions: for a group to intend (in the relevant …Read more
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1Collective Intentions, Commitment, and Collective Action ProblemsIn Fabienne Peter (ed.), rationality and commitment, Oxford University Press Usa. pp. 258. 2007.
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2820Belief, Acceptance, and What Happens in Groups: Some Methodological ConsiderationsIn Jennifer Lackey (ed.), Essays in Collective Epistemology, Oxford University Press. 2014.This paper argues for a methodological point that bears on a relatively long-standing debate concerning collective beliefs in the sense elaborated by Margaret Gilbert: are they cases of belief or rather of acceptance? It is argued that epistemological accounts and distinctions developed in individual epistemology on the basis of considering the individual case are not necessarily applicable to the collective case or, more generally, uncritically to be adopted in collective epistemology.
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156Remarks on collective beliefIn Frederick F. Schmitt (ed.), Socializing Epistemology: The Social Dimensions of Knowledge, Rowman & Littlefield. pp. 235-56. 1994.The author develops and elaborates on her account of collective belief, something standardly referred to, in her view, when we speak of what we believe. This paper focuses on a special response hearers may experience in the context of expressions of belief, a response that may issue in offended rebukes to the speaker. It is argued that this response would be appropriate if both speakers and hearers were parties to what the authors calls a joint commitment to believe a certain proposition as a bo…Read more
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357Obligation and Joint CommitmentUtilitas 11 (2): 143. 1999.I argue that obligations of an important type inhere in what I call 'joint commitments'. I propose a joint commitment account of everyday agreements. This could explain why some philosophers believe that we know of the obligating nature of agreements a priori. I compare and contrast obligations of joint commitment with obligations in the relatively narrow sense recommended by H. L. A. Hart, a recommendation that has been influential. Some central contexts in which Hart takes there to be obligati…Read more
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173Collective preferences, obligations, and rational choiceEconomics and Philosophy 17 (1): 109-119. 2001.Can teams and other collectivities have preferences of their own, preferences that are not in some way reducible to the personal preferences of their members? In short, are collective preferences possible? In everyday life people speak easily of what we prefer, where what is at issue seems to be a collective preference. This is suggested by the acceptability of such remarks as ‘My ideal walk would be . . . along rougher and less well-marked paths than we prefer as a family’. One can imagine, ind…Read more
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