•  3
    Making Sense of Dignity: A Starting Point
    Conatus 5 (1): 85. 2020.
    Although appeals to human dignity became quite popular after the end of War World II in various moral and legal settings, the term retained an air of semantic indeterminacy, and scholars are of opposing minds concerning its usefulness and significance. In this essay I intend to offer a sketch of a “deflationary” account of human dignity – viewed as one moral value among many others – according to which it is conceived as the minimal respect we prima facie owe to our own personality, as well as t…Read more
  •  26
    R. M. Hare. Objective Prescriptions and Other Essays (review)
    Philosophical Inquiry 21 (3-4): 119-121. 1999.
  •  7
    Appeals to Conscience and Argumentation in Medical Ethics
    Philosophical Inquiry 30 (1-2): 213-221. 2008.
  •  24
    Jeremy Bentham's 'unusually liberal' representative democracy
    History of European Ideas 37 (4): 446-453. 2011.
    Jeremy Bentham is a philosopher who deserves a prominent position in the history of democratic ideas. He not only thought popular rule as a vehicle for materializing his vision of utilitarian society, but also gave us a detailed picture of the basic institutions of the form of democratic governance he envisaged. It is also noteworthy that in hisradical system the people, who are the ultimate and undisputable source of all power, are protected from the authoritarian tendencies of state authoritie…Read more
  •  15
    Aristotle’s Relevance to Modern Democratic Theory
    Archiv für Rechts- und Sozialphilosophie 94 (3): 283-294. 2008.
    In this essay instead of trying to deal with the dubious question whether Aristotle is a democratic or an oligarchic thinker, I try to investigate whether he has developed particular views that can be constructively engaged by modern democratic theory. I argue that we can locate a rough model of democracy in Aristotle (as well as in Isocrates) in which direct and representative democracy successfully converge and complement each other. This model is indispensable for reflecting on the nature and…Read more
  • The Moral Status Of Patients In Greece
    Eubios Journal of Asian and International Bioethics 13 (5): 176-179. 2003.
  •  1
    Individuals who value personal autonomy and sympathize with others can be guided by a set of central obligations that are familiar to those sharing in the Western moral tradition. These obligations may not be applicable to every imaginable situation, but the informed determination to act upon them is necessary for combating serious and easily identifiable moral evils. This overall argument is called a post-Kantian moral image. Here, "moral image" is understood as a comprehensive pattern of ethic…Read more
  •  41
    Autonomy and Sympathy
    Journal of Philosophical Research 30 371-382. 2005.
    Kantian moral humanism refers to Kant’s ingenious effort to conceive human beings as bearers of an intrinsic and non-negotiable value that is grounded on the fact that they are autonomous lawgivers in a kingdom of ends. However, the highly idealised character of his project and its metaphysical underpinnings render the association between man’s inner worth and autonomy problematic for the modern reader. In this essay we argue for a more down to earth moral humanism that still supports the above …Read more
  •  27
    Secondary qualities and moral values: What do we really compare? (review)
    Journal of Value Inquiry 30 (1-2): 209-211. 1996.
    The aim of this essay is to reconsider the very analogy between secondary qualities and moral values. It is argued that since the subject matter of moral evaluation are events and not objects, the function and the status of moral qualities should be understood only in terms of the olfactory and auditory qualities of events. This implies that the common comparison of moral values with colors is no longer possible
  •  7
    Does the Suppression of Pro-Terrorist Speech Enhance Collective Security?
    In Georg Meggle, Andreas Kemmerling & Mark Textor (eds.), Ethics of Terrorism & Counter-Terrorism, De Gruyter. pp. 319-328. 2004.
  • On Two Anti-Democratic Uses of Sortition
    Democratic Theory 3 (2): 26-45. 2016.
    After centuries of oblivion, the idea of using civic lotteries to select citizens to participate in major decision-making bodies has started gaining popularity among certain democratic theorists. Undoubtedly, this is an idea worth exploring, given the constantly rising dissatisfaction with the operation of major representative institutions. One should not, however, infer from this fact that any proposed sortition-based institutional arrangement is compatible with basic democratic principles. Thi…Read more
  •  13
    Autonomy and Sympathy
    Journal of Philosophical Research 30 371-382. 2005.
    Kantian moral humanism refers to Kant’s ingenious effort to conceive human beings as bearers of an intrinsic and non-negotiable value that is grounded on the fact that they are autonomous lawgivers in a kingdom of ends. However, the highly idealised character of his project and its metaphysical underpinnings render the association between man’s inner worth and autonomy problematic for the modern reader. In this essay we argue for a more down to earth moral humanism that still supports the above …Read more
  •  12
    Freedom of Expression, Autonomy, and Defamation
    Law and Philosophy 17 (1): 1-17. 1998.
  •  6
    Intellectual history for the non-converted
    History of European Ideas 43 (6): 687-690. 2017.
  •  9
    Democracy as Popular Sovereignty
    Lexington Books. 2013.
    Although democracy is in principle associated with popular rule, in practice it is best described as rule by elected elites. This form of government is not only wanting from a theoretical point of view, but it also no longer seems to meet the expectations of large segments of the citizenry. This book offers a blueprint for an alternative democratic model, democracy as popular sovereignty. Starting with the idea that the people, generously defined, are sovereign when they rule as equally valuable…Read more
  •  932
    Marsilius of Padova as a Democratic Theorist
    Roda da Fortuna 5 (1): 106-124. 2016.
    In this essay I focus on the form of government defended by Marsilius of Padua in the first Discourse of Defensor pacis (1324). The interpretation of his overall account depends heavily on our understanding of the “major and valentior part” of the citizenry upon which all legislative and elective powers are bestowed. I argue that there is sufficient textual evidence to believe that the above term refers not to some small elite group but to the totality of citizens or the overwhelming majority of…Read more