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43James Stacey Taylor : The Metaphysics and Ethics of Death: Oxford University Press, New York, 2013, 271 pp. ISBN 978-0-19-975113-6 $74.00 hbk (review)Journal of Value Inquiry 49 (3): 497-502. 2015.This is the first collection of essays of philosophical thanatology that explicitly connects the metaphysical and the ethical questions of death, including some bioethical questions. The volume has four sections, and the discussion moves from historical and theoretical problems to practical issues of bioethics. However, as the editor of the book, James Stacey Taylor, has surely intended, the practical questions discussed are closely related to traditional metaphysical problems, most notably to t…Read more
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31Are there Alternative Methods in Ethics?Grazer Philosophische Studien 52 (1): 173-189. 1996.Do all methods of moral justification resemble the method of reflective equilibrium in presupposing that moral judgment's being justified depends at least in part on its being appropriately related to our actual substantial moral views? Can a moral judgment be justified without such a presupposition? I shall distinguish three versions of the no-option argument According to any version of the no-option argument, there is certain fact which characterizes moral theories, and that fact implies that …Read more
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18In this book the practical dimension of social justice is explained using the analysis and discussion of a variety of well-known topics. These include: the relation between theory and practice in normative political philosophy; the issue of justice under uncertainty; the question of whether we can and should unmask social injustices by means of conspiracy theories; the issues of privacy and the right to privacy; the issue of how certain psychological states may affect our moral obligations, in p…Read more
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53The social concept of diseaseTheoretical Medicine and Bioethics 17 (4). 1996.In the discussion of such social questions as how should alcoholics be treated by society? and what kind of people are responsible in the face of the law?, is disease a value-free or value-laden notion, a natural or a normative one? It seems, for example, that by the utterance alcoholism should be classified as a disease we mean something like the following: the condition called alcoholism is similar in morally relevant respects to conditions that we uncontroversially label diseases, and therefo…Read more
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29Redistributive Wars and Just War PrinciplesRatio.Ru 12 4-26. 2014.The topic of the paper is the justness of the so-called global redistributive wars — wars whose prime purpose would be the correction of global economic and power structures that are said to cause suffering in poor countries. My aim is to comment on Kasper Lippert-Rasmussen’s argument concerning the implications of Thomas Pogge’s theory of global poverty. Pogge has argued that affluent coun-tries uphold global institutional structures that have a significant causal role in leading to the poverty…Read more
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16On Disassociating Oneself from Collective ResponsiblitySocial Theory and Practice 23 (1): 93-108. 1997.
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29Genes and Morality: New EssaysRodopi. 1999.Most public discussion has focused on those effects of genetic research that are considered in some way unwanted or unpleasant. For example, there has been much debate concerning the risks and the ethical appropriateness of genetic screening, gene therapy, and agricultural applications based on genetic techniques. It often claimed that genetic research may cause new problems such as genetic discrimination, stigmatization, environmental risks, or mistreatment of animals. Genes and Morality: New E…Read more
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33Privacy and Self-PresentationRes Publica 23 (2): 213-226. 2017.It has often been argued that one of the reasons why we should value privacy is that it enables self-presentation and impression management. According to this approach, it is valuable to be able to govern the impression one gives, as the capacity to govern impressions is an instrument by which people take care of their various social relationships. In this paper I will take a closer look at that approach on privacy, with specific reference to the alleged threats to privacy created by brain imagi…Read more
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15Are there Alternative Methods in Ethics?Grazer Philosophische Studien 52 (1): 173-189. 1996.Do all methods of moral justification resemble the method of reflective equilibrium in presupposing that moral judgment's being justified depends at least in part on its being appropriately related to our actual substantial moral views? Can a moral judgment be justified without such a presupposition? I shall distinguish three versions of the no-option argument According to any version of the no-option argument, there is certain fact which characterizes moral theories, and that fact implies that …Read more
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106The Feasibility Condition in Political TheoryJournal of Political Philosophy 6 (1): 27-40. 1998.
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73When a Person Feels that She Is Guilty and Believes that She Is Not GuiltyThe Proceedings of the Twenty-First World Congress of Philosophy 9 149-152. 2006.Guilt feelings are an important part of our emotional life that is relevant to moral philosophy, and guilt feelings raise many theoretically interesting questions. One such question is the problem of how it is possible that sometimes people seem to feel guilty because of an act they have committed even if they believe that the act is not wrong and that it does not have any moral costs. A person raised in a religious family may have been taught that going to the theater is wrong, and even if she …Read more
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78On irrational guiltEthical Theory and Moral Practice 7 (5). 2005.A person raised in a religious family may have been taught that going to the theater is not allowed, and even if he has rejected this taboo years ago, he still feels guilty when attending theater. These kinds of cases may not be rare, but they are strange. Indeed, one may wonder how they are even possible. This is why an explanation is needed, and in my paper I aim to give such an explanation. In particular, I will first provide a brief review of the explanations of irrational guilt that are com…Read more
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17Eric Racine , Pragmatic Neuroethics: Improving Treatment and Understanding of the Mind-Brain . Reviewed byPhilosophy in Review 31 (3): 228-231. 2011.
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39Freedom and a Right (Not) to KnowBioethics 12 (1): 49-63. 1998.The article discusses the relationship between the notion of a moral right to personal self‐determination, the notion of a moral right to know and the notion of a moral right not to know. In particular, the author asks under what conditions, if any, the right to self‐determination implies a right to have information or a right not to have information. The conclusions he defends are theoretical in character rather than concrete norms and directions, and they are intended to be relevant in many co…Read more
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19The moral relevance of cultural disadvantageAustralasian Journal of Philosophy 78 (3). 2000.This Article does not have an abstract
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74Pogge on global povertyJournal of Global Ethics 2 (1). 2006.Thomas Pogge has recently defended additional ways in which to eradicate poverty from the developing world. In this article, Pogge's argument is discussed. First the premises on which Pogge relies are summarized and the logic of 'international borrowing privilege' introduced. Then it is argued that Pogge's solutions to the poverty problem would face similar difficulties to many other solutions - that is, in order to work properly they all must gain extensive international support and political w…Read more
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85Brain imaging and privacyNeuroethics 3 (1): 5-12. 2010.I will argue that the fairly common assumption that brain imaging may compromise people’s privacy in an undesirable way only if moral crimes are committed is false. Sometimes persons’ privacy is compromised because of failures of privacy. A normal emotional reaction to failures of privacy is embarrassment and shame, not moral resentment like in the cases of violations of right to privacy. I will claim that if (1) neuroimaging will provide all kinds of information about persons’ inner life and no…Read more
Areas of Interest
Normative Ethics |
Social and Political Philosophy |