Travis Dumsday

Very little has been published on the topic of vigilantism within recent applied ethics. Part of this dearth may be due to a perception that the issue lacks historical moorings, with little in the way of precedent in prior philosophical literature. However such a perception would be inaccurate; in fact there are interesting discussions of vigilantism in the history of philosophy. By way of illustration, this article examines an early treatment of the topic by the influential thirteenth-century Franciscan thinker, Alexander of Hales. Hales’ perspective reflects what would become a fairly general mediaeval consensus against the permissibility of vigilantism. His discussion is interesting on its own account, but the main goal of this study is to help spur further historical inquiries – and perhaps by extension to prompt further interest in vigilantism within current applied ethics.

Panentheism is among the most influential variations on classical theism found within nineteenth and twentieth century theology, a prominent perspective in the recent religion and science dialogue, and is increasing in prominence within analytic philosophy of religion. Existing works on the history of panentheism understandably focus primarily on proponents of the view and their arguments in its favor. Less attention has been given to the history of arguments against it, and in particular little has been written on mediaeval Scholastic critiques. Here, I summarize the criticisms leveled by an important thirteenth-century Franciscan, Alexander of Hales. I also assess the enduring value of his critique, arguing that it helps bring to the fore the importance of panentheism’s link with a further metaphysical debate: that between spacetime relationism versus substantivalism.

“Ramified natural theology” can be defined as natural theology employed in the service not of general theism but of some particular theistic tradition. Examples of ramified natural theology in the Christian tradition include Anselm’s philosophical arguments for the incarnation, Pascal’s use of biblical prophecy to defend the deity of Christ, the use of contemporary miracle reports to substantiate the efficacy of prayer to Christ, and so forth. In the Christian context we normally think of ramified natural theology being used to argue in favor of the claims of so-called mere Christianity over and against those of other religions or metaphysical naturalism. But historically they have also been prominent in debates between Christian denominations. It is this latter usage that I wish to explore here. I argue that the use of ramified natural theology in interdenominational debate is both unavoidable and entirely proper. I also ask which denomination, if any, are most likely to benefit from this usage.

Dispositionalism is most often paired with some form of realism about universals, whether moderate or Platonic. However, both historically and in the contemporary literature there have been advocates of nominalist dispositionalism. Here I argue that such a combination is likely to be workable only given the truth of theism. For those already inclined to favor nominalism and dispositionalism, a novel cosmological argument for theism results. Correspondingly, for nominalists already opposed to theism, it provides new reason to oppose dispositionalism, while for dispositionalists opposed to theism it provides new reason to reject nominalism.

What is it for an object to be a physical object? Here I provisionally take up the idea that spatial extension is at least a necessary condition for being a physical object, whether or not it is also sufficient. I then argue for the following conditional proposition: if spatial extension is a necessary condition for being a physical object, then metaphysical naturalism is false. Given that all religious systems affirm the falsity of metaphysical naturalism, this conditional carries obvious significance for philosophy of religion. And if it holds, two possible consequences ensue: for those committed to the idea that spatial extension is a necessary condition for being a physical object, a new disproof of metaphysical naturalism results. By contrast, for those committed to metaphysical naturalism, a new disproof of any extension-based account of the physical results. Either way, we obtain a significant conclusion.

The four principal competing substance ontologies are substratum theory, bundle theory, primitive substance theory, and hylomorphism. Both historically and in the recent literature, most arguments pertaining to these four theories have been developed under the assumption that only one of them can be true. However there is room in this debate for various forms of pluralism: mild pluralism here refers to the view that while only one of these four theories is true of our world, there is at least one other possible world in which a different substance ontology obtains; moderate pluralism refers to the view that while only one of these four theories is true of our world, there is at least one other possible world in which multiple substance ontologies obtain ; and extreme pluralism refers to the view that our own actual world contains substances belonging to different substance ontologies. In this paper I lay out a novel argument for a version of extreme pluralism.

Dispositionalism is the view that causal powers are among the irreducible properties of nature. It has long been among the core competing positions in the metaphysics of laws, but its potential implications for other key debates within metaphysics and the philosophy of science have remained under-explored. Travis Dumsday fills this major gap in the literature by establishing new connections between dispositionalism and such topics as substance ontology, ontic structural realism, material composition, emergentism, natural-kind essentialism, perdurantism, time travel, and spacetime substantivalism. He also puts forward a novel view concerning the precise relationship between causal powers and the fundamental laws of nature. His rich and accessible study will appeal to readers interested in contemporary analytic metaphysics and philosophy of science.

Pan-dispositionalism is one of the major theories in current analytic metaphysics concerning dispositional properties and how they relate to categorical properties. According to pan-dispositionalists, all fundamental properties are dispositional in nature, such that any supposed categorical properties are either unreal or reducible in some way to the dispositional. I argue that if pan-dispositionalism is true then metaphysical naturalism is false. To the extent that one finds pan-dispositionalism a plausible theory, one ought to question the truth of metaphysical naturalism. On the other hand, if one is a committed metaphysical naturalist, one ought to question the truth of pan-dispositionalism. Either way we get a significant result, of interest both to those working in metaphysics and to those working in philosophy of religion.

If elective abortion is publicly funded, then the government is obligated to take active measures designed to reduce its prevalence. I present two arguments for that conclusion. The first argument is directed at those pro-choice thinkers who hold that while some or all elective abortions are morally wrong, they still ought to be legally permitted and publicly subsidized. The second argument is directed at pro-choice thinkers who hold that there is nothing morally wrong with elective abortion and that it should be both legally permitted and publicly subsidized. The second argument employs premises that generalize beyond the abortion debate and that may serve to shed light on broader questions concerning conscience and the requirements of political compromise in a democracy.

Both Jacques and Raïssa Maritain produced large and diverse bodies of writing, and their creative lives spanned decades and encompassed the most turbulent periods of the twentieth century. Scholarly engagement with their work continues to reap new insights, and that includes engagement with the writings produced in the earlier portions of their respective careers. Those earlier portions were themselves remarkably productive, and issued not only in important writings but also in profoundly influential professional and personal relationships nurtured and developed with a truly diverse array of scholars, clergy, and artists, including such figures as Henri Bergson, Leon Bloy, Ernest Psichari, and Georges Rouault. This new anthology of essays manages both to interact with the biographies and writings of the Maritains themselves (and to a degree their close early associates) and also to contribute to novel Thomistic reflection on themes from their early careers, among them war, suffering, politics, art, intuition, and foundational issues in moral theology. The essays are historically informed yet address perennial issues of vital significance for the life of the Church and the broader culture. The contributing authors are Prudence Allen, John Deely, Elizabeth Jane Doering, Heather Erb, Doug Flippen, Heidi Giebel, Ben Huff, James Jacobs, Florian Michel, Mark Moes, Brenna Moore, Bernadette OConnor, Matthew Pugh, James V. Schall, Joshua Schulz, Daniel Shields, Michael Torre, and John Wippel.

I examine the ways in which the theological and philosophical debate surrounding transhumanism might profit by a detailed engagement with contemporary biology, in particular with the mainline accounts of species and speciation. After a short introduction, I provide a very brief primer on species concepts and speciation in contemporary biological taxonomy. Then in a third section I draw out some implications for the prospects of our being able intentionally to intervene in human evolution for the production of new species out of Homo sapiens. In a fourth section Account of Human Nature? And Where Does This Leave Transhumanism?”) I bring in the debate over the proper relationship between biological and theological conceptions of human nature, laying out the major options available and considering their possible implications for our understanding of transhumanism. In a fifth section several concrete examples are drawn out pertaining to particular subdisciplines within theology. I conclude by briefly laying out some suggestions for future work, focusing on tasks that theologians specifically ought to pursue.

Marc Lange and Ann Whittle have independently developed an important challenge to dispositionalism, arguing that dispositions are reducible to primitive subjunctive facts. I argue in reply that by pairing dispositionalism with a certain version of natural-kind essentialism, their objection can be overcome. Moreover, such a marriage carries further advantages for the dispositionalist. My aim is therefore two-fold: to defend dispositionalism, and to give the dispositionalist some new motivation to adopt natural-kind essentialism.

The problem of divine hiddenness is, along with the problem of evil, one of the two principal arguments for atheism in the current literature. Very roughly: If God really existed, then He would make His reality rationally indubitable to everyone (or at least everyone willing to engage Him in relationship). Since that hasn’t happened, God does not exist. Among the many replies made to this argument, a basic distinction might be drawn between (1) those made from within generic theism (theism prescinding from any specific religion), and (2) those made from within a definite faith tradition and employing the distinctive doctrinal resources of that tradition. That same division is apparent in the literature on the problem of evil, and among faith-specific work on that problem, one idea occasionally entertained (especially in the context of natural evil) is that the reality of evil spiritual beings may play a role in a defence or theodicy. Heretofore no one has imported that idea into the debate over hiddenness. In this paper I try out several versions of this strategy, eventually arguing that for those branches of Christianity with a doctrinal commitment to the reality of fallen angels, novel responses to the hiddenness problem are thereby made available. It is clearly a response unlikely to persuade atheists, but for Christians willing to consider the problem from within a distinctively Christian perspective it may carry some force. It may likewise be of use to those less concerned about countering atheism and more concerned with simply answering the longstanding theological question of why God might properly permit rational doubt in His reality.

Is there a fundamental layer of objects in nature? And if so what sorts of things populate it? Among those who answer ‘yes’ to the first question, a common answer to the second is ‘atoms,’ where an atom is understood in the original sense of an object that is spatially unextended, indivisible, and wholly lacking in proper parts. Here I explore some of the ontological consequences of atomism. First, if atoms are real, then whatever motion they appear to undergo must be discrete. The link between atomism and discrete motion goes back at least to Aristotle and is admitted by some atomists, but the full significance of that admission has been neglected. I argue that a commitment to discrete motion in turn entails significant and sometimes counter-intuitive results. I also examine the implications of these results for the philosophy of mind and for discussions of metaphysical naturalism.

In reply to certain cosmological arguments for theism, critics regularly argue that the causal principle ex nihilo nihil fit may be false. Various theistic counter-replies to this challenge have emerged. One type of strategy is to double down on ex nihilo nihil fit. Another, very different strategy of counter-reply is to grant for the sake of argument that the principle is false, while maintaining that sound cosmological arguments can be formulated even with this concession in place. Notably, one can employ a weaker opening premise formulated in modal terms, proceeding for instance from the proposition that for any contingent object coming into existence it is at least possible that it have a cause. My aim here is to try out a related strategy for weakening the relevant opening premise. Granting that it is possible for a contingent object to come into existence out of nothing without a cause, I proceed from the extremely modest claim that the obtaining of exceptionless longstanding contingent regularities demands an explanation. As such, the contingent regularity that empirically accessible macro-level contingent objects do not pop into existence causelessly demands explanation. And as it turns out, that explanation will have to be in terms of an object or objects possessed of at least some of the traditional divine attributes.

Hume’s destructive account of miracles has been thought by many to exclude the possibility of rationally accepting testimony to supernatural events. Here I argue that even if one grants that his argument works with respect to testimony about miracles, it does not succeed in showing that all testimony to the supernatural is inadmissible, since room is left open for religious experiences, especially those of an intersubjective kind, to function as evidence. If this is so, there is new reason to think that his exclusion of miracle claims might be unwarranted.

Robert Boyle's treatise, 'On the diversity of religions', remains a little-known work, and was unpublished during his lifetime. Nonetheless it is of considerable historical and philosophical interest. In it, Boyle attempts to answer the question of how one can hope to obtain religious truth amidst the many competing claims to revelation, a concern which had grown acute in the early modern period. In this paper I examine Boyle's arguments, considering along the way their relationship to the various contemporary debates on diversity and evaluating their present relevance.

Vigilantes are a staple of popular culture, from Charles Bronson’s 1974 classic Death Wish, and its parade of sequels, to the latest batch ofBatman films. Outside of the fictional sphere, society continues to wrestle with vigilantism, notably in the current debates over the prudence and ethics of the Minuteman civilian border patrol group. And though vigilantism has been the subject of speculation and debate among criminologists, historians, and legal scholars, it has unfortunately been given scant attention by philosophers. Surely a topic of such prominence in popular culture, and continued relevance in real life, is ripe for treatment by applied ethicists. In this paper I seek to formulate a definition of vigilantism and then argue that there are conditions under which vigilantism is not only permissible but, at least for some, obligatory.

Eschatological issues have received a great deal of attention in recent analytic philosophy of religion. Most of that attention has revolved around the metaphysics and ethics of heaven, hell, and bodily resurrection; this is unsurprising, as these doctrines are universally affirmed among theologically orthodox Christians. By contrast, the doctrine of purgatory is not the subject of universal affirmation. Nevertheless it boasts a growing literature. After an introduction to the doctrine and its place in historical theology, I proceed to survey this recent literature. I conclude by providing some suggestions for future research.

Natural-kind essentialism faces an important but neglected difficulty: the problem of complex essences (PCE). This is the question of how to account for the unity of an instantiated kind-essence when that essence consists of multiple distinct properties, some of which lack an inherent necessary connection between them. My central goal here is to propose an essentialism-friendly solution to this problem. Along the way I also employ some points from that solution to argue for the necessary truth of essentialism (necessary, that is, in all possible worlds in which there are material objects), and to support the essentialist ontology of laws over and against a major rival.

In both the historical and contemporary literature on the metaphysics of space, a core dispute is that between relationism and substantivalism. One version of the latter is supersubstantivalism, according to which space is the only kind of substance, such that what we think of as individual material objects are actually just parts of spacetime which instantiate certain properties. If those parts are ontologically dependent on spacetime as a whole, then we arrive at an ontology with only a single genuinely independent substance, namely the entire spacetime manifold. This is monist supersubstantivalism. A view on which the parts of spacetime are ontologically prior to the whole has been called pluralistic supersubstantivalism. As currently formulated, supersubstantivalism carries significant advantages and encounters major difficulties. I argue that some of the latter motivate...