•  922
    Defining Textual Entailment
    with Daniel Z. Korman, Jacob Jett, and Allen H. Renear
    Journal of the Association for Information Science and Technology 69 763-772. 2018.
    Textual entailment is a relationship that obtains between fragments of text when one fragment in some sense implies the other fragment. The automation of textual entailment recognition supports a wide variety of text-based tasks, including information retrieval, information extraction, question answering, text summarization, and machine translation. Much ingenuity has been devoted to developing algorithms for identifying textual entailments, but relatively little to saying what textual entailmen…Read more
  •  234
    The natural right of property
    Social Philosophy and Policy 27 (1): 53-78. 2010.
    The two main theses of are: (i) that persons possess an original, non-acquired right not to be precluded from making extra-personal material their own (or from exercising discretionary control over what they have made their own); and (ii) that this right can and does take the form of a right that others abide by the rules of a (justifiable) practice of property which facilitates persons making extra-personal material their own (and exercising discretionary control over what they have made their …Read more
  •  189
    Self-ownership, marxism, and egalitarianism: Part I: Challenges to historical entitlement
    Politics, Philosophy and Economics 1 (1): 75-108. 2002.
    This two-part article offers a defense of a libertarian doctrine that centers on two propositions. The first is the self-ownership thesis according to which each individual possesses original moral rights over her own body, faculties, talents, and energies. The second is the anti-egalitarian conclusion that, through the exercise of these rights of self-ownership, individuals may readily become entitled to substantially unequal extra-personal holdings. The self-ownership thesis remains in the bac…Read more
  •  171
    Self-ownership, marxism, and egalitarianism: Part II: Challenges to the self-ownership thesis
    Politics, Philosophy and Economics 1 (2): 237-276. 2002.
    Part I of this essay supports the anti-egalitarian conclusion that individuals may readily become entitled to substantially unequal extra-personal holdings by criticizing end-state and pattern theories of distributive justice and defending the historical entitlement doctrine of justice in holdings. Part II of this essay focuses on a second route to the anti-egalitarian conclusion. This route combines the self-ownership thesis with a contention that is especially advanced by G.A. Cohen. This is t…Read more
  •  118
    Non-absolute rights and libertarian taxation
    Social Philosophy and Policy 23 (2): 109-141. 2006.
    Rights-oriented libertarian theory asserts the existence of robust individual rights - including robust rights of property. If these property rights are absolute, then it seems that all taxation is theft. However, it also seems that, if an individual is (faultlessly) in dire straits, it is permissible for him to seize or trespass in order to escape from those straits. It does seem that in this sense property rights are non-absolute. This essay examines what contribution this non-absoluteness of …Read more
  •  73
    Scanlon as natural rights theorist
    Politics, Philosophy and Economics 6 (1): 45-73. 2007.
    This article examines the character of Scanlon’s contractualism as presented in What We Owe to Each Other . I offer a range of reasons for thinking of Scanlon’s contractualism as a species of natural rights theorizing. I argue that to affirm the principle that actions are wrongful if and only if they are disallowed by principles that people could not reasonably reject is equivalent to affirming a natural right (of an admittedly non-standard sort) against being subject to such reasonably disallow…Read more
  •  72
    Prerogatives, restrictions, and rights
    Social Philosophy and Policy 22 (1): 357-393. 2005.
    I offer a defense of the moral side-constraints to which Robert Nozick appeals in Anarchy, State and Utopia but for which he fails to provide a sustained justification. I identify a line of anti-consequentialist argumentation which is present in Nozick and which, in the terminology of Samuel Scheffler, moves first to affirm a personal prerogative which allows the individual not to sacrifice herself for the sake of the best overall outcome and second moves on to affirm restrictions (i.e., moral s…Read more
  •  54
    Lysander Spooner: Nineteenth-century America's last natural rights theorist
    Social Philosophy and Policy 29 (2): 139-176. 2012.
    Research Articles Eric Mack, Social Philosophy and Policy, FirstView Article
  •  53
    Equality, benevolence, and responsiveness to agent-relative value
    Social Philosophy and Policy 19 (1): 314-341. 2002.
    Do differences in income or wealth matter, morally speaking? This essay addresses a broader issue than this question seems to pose. But this broader issue is, I believe, the salient philosophical issue which this question actually poses. Let me explain. Narrowly read, the question at hand is concerned only with inequality of income or wealth. It asks us to consider whether inequality of income or wealth as such is morally problematic. On this construal, the question invites us to consider whethe…Read more
  •  52
    Critical notice
    Economics and Philosophy 19 (1): 135-147. 2003.
    Natural Goodness, PHILIPPA FOOT. Clarendon Press, 2002, 125 pages. Philippa Foot begins her short but intriguingly rewarding book on Natural Goodness by recounting a story about Wittgenstein. Wittgenstein interrupted a speaker who had realized that he was about to say something that, although it seemed compelling, was clearly ridiculous, and was trying (as we all do in such circumstances) to say something sensible instead. “No,” said Wittgenstein. “Say what you want to say. Be crude and then we …Read more
  •  36
    Elbow room for self-defense
    Social Philosophy and Policy 32 (2): 18-39. 2016.
    This essay contrasts two approaches to permissible self-defensive killing. The first is the forfeiture approach; the second is the elbow room for self-defense approach. The forfeiture approach comes in many versions — not all of which make prominent use of the word “forfeiture.” However, all versions presume that the permissibility of X killing Y (when X must kill Y in order to prevent herself from being unjustly killed) depends entirely on there being some feature of Y in virtue of which Y has …Read more
  •  33
    Individualism and Libertarian Rights
    In Thomas Christiano & John Christman (eds.), Contemporary Debates in Political Philosophy, Wiley‐blackwell. 2009.
    This chapter contains sections titled: Introduction Prerogatives, Rationales, and Restrictions The Individualist Prerogative and Self‐Ownership The Individualist Prerogative and the Right to the Practice of Private Property A Self‐Ownership Proviso Conclusion Notes.
  •  18
    Self-ownership, Marxism, and Egalitarianism: Part I: Challenges to Historical Entitlement
    Politics, Philosophy and Economics 1 (1): 75-108. 2002.
    This two-part article offers a defense of a libertarian doctrine that centers on two propositions. The first is the self-ownership thesis according to which each individual possesses original moral rights over her own body, faculties, talents, and energies. The second is the anti-egalitarian conclusion that, through the exercise of these rights of self-ownership, individuals may readily become entitled to substantially unequal extra-personal holdings. The self-ownership thesis remains in the bac…Read more
  •  14
    Libertarianism
    Polity. 2018.
    In this book, leading expert Eric Mack provides a rigorous and clear account of the philosophical principles of libertarianism. This book will be essential reading for anyone interested in political philosophy, political ideologies and the nature of liberty and state authority, from students and scholars to general readers.
  •  14
    Self-ownership, Marxism, and Egalitarianism: Part II: Challenges to the Self-ownership Thesis
    Politics, Philosophy and Economics 1 (2): 237-276. 2002.
    Part I of this essay supports the anti-egalitarian conclusion that individuals may readily become entitled to substantially unequal extra-personal holdings by criticizing end-state and pattern theories of distributive justice and defending the historical entitlement doctrine of justice in holdings. Part II of this essay focuses on a second route to the anti-egalitarian conclusion. This route combines the self-ownership thesis with a contention that is especially advanced by G.A. Cohen. This is t…Read more
  •  3
    Two Demands Upon Luck Egalitarians
    Social Philosophy and Policy 39 (2): 233-259. 2022.
    I offer two objections to luck egalitarianism. The no-adequate-account objection takes note of the egalitarian insistence that the disvalue of inequality is only one of a plurality of values or disvalues that needs to be considered in arriving at a judgment about the ranking of alternative distributions of welfare. This turn to pluralism places a reasonable demand upon luck egalitarianism to provide an account of how the different sorts of values or disvalues that are supposed to attach to avail…Read more