•  40
    Akrasia and the passions in Descartes
    British Journal for the History of Philosophy 7 (1). 1999.
    No abstract
  •  82
    Climate Change and Radical Hope
    Ethics and the Environment 17 (2): 165-186. 2012.
    In The Revenge of Gaia, James Lovelock provides a memorable description of what the future might hold for us in a world severely blighted by climate change. In this scenario the human population has been pushed to the high Northern latitudes: Meanwhile in the hot arid world survivors gather for the journey to the new Arctic centres of civilization; I see them in the desert as the dawn breaks and the sun throws its piercing gaze across the horizon at the camp. The cool fresh night air lingers for…Read more
  •  9
    This book explores how the history of philosophy can orient us to the new reality brought on by the climate crisis. If we understand the climate crisis as a deeply existential one, it can help to examine the way past philosophers responded to similar crises in their times. This book explores five past crises, each involving a unique form of collective trauma. These events-war, occupation, exile, scientific revolution and political revolution-inspired the philosophers to remake the whole world in…Read more
  •  13
    The Ethics of Climate Change: An Introduction systematically and comprehensively examines the ethical issues surrounding arguably the greatest threat now facing humanity. Williston addresses important questions such as: Has humanity entered the Anthropocene? Is climate change primarily an ethical issue? Does climate change represent a moral wrong? What are the impacts of climate change? What are the main causes of political inaction? What is the argument for climate change denial? What are intra…Read more
  •  392
    Situating Environmental Philosophy in Canada
    In C. Tyler DesRoches, Frank Jankunis & Byron Williston (eds.), Canadian Environmental Philosophy, Mcgill-queen's University Press. 2019.
    The volume includes topics from political philosophy and normative ethics on the one hand to philosophy of science and the philosophical underpinnings of water management policy on the other. It contains reflections on ecological nationalism, the legacy of Grey Owl, the meaning of ‘outside’ to Canadians, the paradigm shift from mechanism to ecology in our understanding of nature, the meaning of the concept of the Anthropocene, the importance of humans self-identifying as ‘earthlings’, the challe…Read more
  •  258
    Canadian Environmental Philosophy (edited book)
    Mcgill-Queen's University Press. 2019.
    Canadian Environmental Philosophy is the first collection of essays to take up theoretical and practical issues in environmental philosophy today, from a Canadian perspective. The essays cover various subjects, including ecological nationalism, the legacy of Grey Owl, the meaning of “outside” to Canadians, the paradigm shift from mechanism to ecology in our understanding of nature, the meaning and significance of the Anthropocene, the challenges of biodiversity protection in Canada, the conserva…Read more
  •  14
    A Tapestry of Concealments
    Environmental Philosophy 15 (2): 237-254. 2018.
    The Good Anthropocene is a position taken up by a diverse collection of writers, social scientists, and philosophers. Their claim is that the Anthropocene should be embraced as a more or less positive development in the history of our species. This paper pushes back against the narrative of the Good Anthropocene. But rather than confront its advocates directly, I will come at the contest obliquely. I present a Heideggerian interpretation of Annie Proulx’s Barkskins, a multi-generational novel ce…Read more
  •  12
    A Tapestry of Concealments
    Environmental Philosophy 15 (2): 237-254. 2018.
    The Good Anthropocene is a position taken up by a diverse collection of writers, social scientists, and philosophers. Their claim is that the Anthropocene should be embraced as a more or less positive development in the history of our species. This paper pushes back against the narrative of the Good Anthropocene. But rather than confront its advocates directly, I will come at the contest obliquely. I present a Heideggerian interpretation of Annie Proulx’s Barkskins, a multi-generational novel ce…Read more
  •  25
    The Question Concerning Geo-Engineering
    Techné: Research in Philosophy and Technology 21 (2/3): 199-221. 2017.
    The Anthropocene, as we encounter it now, is the age in which we can no longer avoid postnaturalism, that is, a view of the ‘environment’ as largely ‘built.’ This means that we exist in a highly technologically mediated relationship to the rest of the earth system. But because the Anthropocene has barely emerged this time is best thought of as a transition phase between two epochs, i.e., it is ‘the end-Holocene.’ The end-Holocene is essentially a period of ecological crisis, the most salient man…Read more
  • Self-Knowledge, Moral Freedom, and the Passions in Descartes
    Dissertation, University of Toronto (Canada). 1998.
    This dissertation has as its focus a tension at the heart of Descartes' theory of the passions, one which defines and therefore problematizes his final ethic. As he sees it, the passions can both contribute to our good and prevent us from seeing it perspicuously. It is not so much the presence of this tension itself in Descartes' thinking which is noteworthy---the tension is an old one in the history of philosophy---but his epistemological treatment of it, the fact that it emerges within and can…Read more
  •  4
    The Importance of Self-Forgiveness
    American Philosophical Quarterly 49 (1). 2012.
    To self-forgive is to foreswear specific self-directed negative attitudes, attitudes that result from an agent’s recognition of his own moral failing. What does this foreswearing process involve? When is it justified? And what is the relation between self-forgiveness and interpersonal forgiveness? I will make two arguments in an attempt to answer these questions. First, self-forgiveness essentially involves a process of shaming whose ultimate goal is restoration of the wrongdoer’s goodness. Seco…Read more
  •  1
    In The Devil and Secular Humanism Howard Radest explored the enlightenment roots of humanism; in this book he moves on humanism’s “personal and transcendental” features. As he sees it, contemporary humanism faces two enemies. There is, first, the “shadow enlightenment.” Radest describes this as that version of enlightenment principles with which humanists operate today, but which distorts the original meaning of those principles. Thus, for example, in place of the revolutionary idea of the moral…Read more
  • William R. Reddy, The Navigation of Emotion Reviewed by
    Philosophy in Review 22 (5): 358-360. 2002.
  • Stephen Gaukroger, Descartes' System of Natural Philosophy (review)
    Philosophy in Review 23 107-110. 2003.
  •  48
    Moral progress and Canada's climate failure
    Journal of Global Ethics 7 (2). 2011.
    In a recent letter to Canada's national newspaper, The Globe and Mail, British columnist and climate change gadfly George Monbiot pleaded with Canada to clean up its greenhouse gas emissions act. The letter appeared just a week before the Copenhagen climate conference. In it, Monbiot alleged that Canada's newly acquired status as oil superpower threatens to ?brutalize? the country, as it has other oil-rich countries (Monbiot, G. 2009. Please, Canada, clean up your act, The Globe and Mail, Novemb…Read more
  •  35
    “Complete Nihilism” in Nietzsche
    Philosophy Today 45 (4): 357-369. 2001.
  •  27
    Reasons for Action and the Motivational Gap
    Journal of Value Inquiry 39 (3-4): 309-324. 2005.
  •  18
    Descartes’s Meditations (review)
    Dialogue 45 (1): 203-205. 2006.
  • William R. Reddy, The Navigation of Emotion (review)
    Philosophy in Review 22 358-360. 2002.
  •  22
    Descartes on Love and/as Error
    Journal of the History of Ideas 58 (3): 429-444. 1997.
    In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Descartes on Love and/as ErrorByron WillistonBut if this medicine, love, which cures all sorrow With more, not only be no quintessence, But mixed of all stuffs, paining soul, or sense, And of the sun his working vigour borrow, Love’s not so pure, and abstract, as they use To say, which have no mistress but their Muse, But as all else, being elemented too, Love sometimes would contemplate, sometimes do.1One of philosophy’s most enduri…Read more
  •  3
    The recent Fifth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change suggested that continuing inaction on climate change presents a significant threat to social stability. This book examines the reasons for the inaction highlighted by the IPCC and suggests the normative bases for overcoming it.