•  2
    Maximising utility does not promote survival
    with Lauren L. Saling
    Behavioral and Brain Sciences 36 (6): 685-685. 2013.
  •  11
    The philosophy of myth in plotine and proclo. A comparative study
    with Joachim Lacrosse
    Archai: Revista de Estudos Sobre as Origens Do Pensamento Ocidental 5 77-82. 2010.
    This contribution resumes the main conclusions of a common work of philosophical comparatism between the Neoplatonism of Plotinus and Proclus, which is based on the examination of their respective reception of the traditional metaphysical use of anciant myths. This article consists in the examination of two important “definitions” of myth collected in the Enneads of Plotinus and Proclus’ Commentary on the Republic. On the basis of these analyses, it is possible to assert that, for Plotinus as fo…Read more
  •  15
    People who judge that a wrongdoer’s behaviour is determined are disposed, in certain cases, to judge that the wrongdoer cannot be responsible for his behaviour. Some try to explain this phenomenon by arguing that people are intuitive incompatibilists about determinism and moral responsibility. However, Peter Strawson argues that we excuse determined wrongdoers because judging that someone is determined puts us into a psychological state – ‘the objective stance’ – which prevents us from holding t…Read more
  •  56
    While morality prohibits us from creating miserable children, it does not require us to create happy children. I offer an actualist explanation of this apparent asymmetry. Assume that for every possible world W, there is a distinct set of permissibility facts determined by the welfare of those who exist in W. Moral actualism says that actual-world permissibility facts should determine one's choice between worlds. But if one doesn't know which world is actual, one must aim for subjective rightnes…Read more
  •  33
    Has Smith Solved the Moral Problem?
    Acta Analytica 34 (4): 463-472. 2019.
    Michael Smith attempts to solve the moral problem by arguing that our moral beliefs constitute a rational constraint on our desires. In particular, Smith defends the ‘practicality requirement’, which says that rational agents who believe that an action is right must have some desire to perform that action. We clarify and examine Smith’s argument. We argue that, for the argument to be sound, it must make two crucial assumptions about the rational agent in question: that facts about her desires ar…Read more
  •  75
    Why a victim's age is irrelevant when assessing the wrongness of killing
    Journal of Applied Philosophy 26 (4): 396-401. 2009.
    abstract Intuitively, all killings are equally wrong, no matter how old one's victim. In this paper we defend this claim — The Equal Wrongness of Killings Thesis — against a challenge presented by Kasper Lippert-Rasmussen. Lippert-Rasmussen shows The Equal Wrongness of Killings Thesis to be incompatible with two further theses: The Unequal Wrongness of Renderings Unconscious Thesis and The Equivalence Thesis. Lippert-Rasmussen argues that, of the three, The Equal Wrongness of Killings Thesis is …Read more
  •  28
    Real Materialism and other essays (review)
    Australasian Journal of Philosophy 88 (4): 758-759. 2010.
    This Article does not have an abstract
  •  2
    Introduction
    with Nick Trakakis
  •  39
    Book Notes (review)
    with Jeremy D. Bendik‐Keymer, Thom Brooks, Michael Davis, Sara Goering, Barbara V. Nunn, Michael J. Stephens, James C. Taggart, Roy T. Tsao, and Lori Watson
    Ethics 113 (2): 456-462. 2003.
  •  27
    Essays on free will and moral responsibility (edited book)
    Cambridge Scholars Press. 2008.
    The problem of free will has fascinated philosophers since ancient times: Do we have free will, or at least the kind of free will that seems necessary for moral responsibility? Does determinism - the idea that everything that happens is necessitated to happen, given the past and the laws of nature - threaten the commonly held assumption that we are indeed free and morally responsible? Although these questions have been widely discussed in the past, the present volume offers a variety of new pers…Read more
  •  80
    It is sometimes argued that if God were to exist, then the actual world would be the best possible world. However, given that the actual world is clearly not the best possible world, then God doesn’t exist. In response, some have argued that the world could always be improved with the creation of new people and that there is thus no best possible world. I argue that this reasoning gives rise to an instance of Parfit’s mere addition paradox and should thus be rejected. Others (Robert Adams, in pa…Read more
  •  206
    Finking Frankfurt
    Philosophical Studies 135 (3): 363--74. 2007.
    Michael Smith has resisted Harry Frankfurt's claim that moral responsibility does not require the ability to have done otherwise. He does this by claiming that, in Frankfurt cases, the ability to do otherwise is indeed present, but is a disposition that has been `finked' or masked by other factors. We suggest that, while Smith's account appears to work for some classic Frankfurt cases, it does not work for all. In particular, Smith cannot explain cases, such as the Willing Addict, where the Fran…Read more
  •  597
    In this paper we present an account of practical rationality and weakness of will in terms of rational capacities. We show how our account rectifies various shortcomings in Michael Smith's related theory. In particular, our account is capable of accommodating cases of weak-willed behaviour that are not `akratic', or otherwise contrary to the agent's better judgement. Our account differs from Smith's primarily by incorporating resolve: a third rational capacity for resolute maintenance of one's i…Read more
  •  1225
    Decision theory for agents with incomplete preferences
    Australasian Journal of Philosophy 92 (3): 453-70. 2014.
    Orthodox decision theory gives no advice to agents who hold two goods to be incommensurate in value because such agents will have incomplete preferences. According to standard treatments, rationality requires complete preferences, so such agents are irrational. Experience shows, however, that incomplete preferences are ubiquitous in ordinary life. In this paper, we aim to do two things: (1) show that there is a good case for revising decision theory so as to allow it to apply non-vacuously to ag…Read more