Margaret Gilbert

Are social groups real in any sense that is independent of the thoughts, actions, and beliefs of the individuals making up the group? Using methods of philosophy to examine such longstanding sociological questions, Margaret Gilbert gives a general characterization of the core phenomena at issue in the domain of human social life. After developing detailed analyses of a number of central everyday concepts of social phenomena--including shared action, a social convention, a group's belief, and a group itself--she proposes that the core social phenomena among human beings are "plural subject" phenomena. In her analyses Gilbert discusses the work of such thinkers as Emile Durkheim, Georg Simmel, Max Weber, and David Lewis. "Gilbert's book aims to... exhibit some general and structural features of the conceptual scheme in terms of which we think about social groups, collective action, social convention, and shared belief.... [It] offers an important corrective to individualistic thinking in the social sciences...."--Michael Root, Philosophical Review "In this rich and rewarding work, Margaret Gilbert provides a novel and detailed account of our everyday concepts of social collectivity. In so doing she makes a seminal contribution to... some vexed issues in the philosophy of social science.... [An] intellectually pioneering work."--John D. Greenwood, Social Epistemology.

I respond to some questions raised by Frances Kamm with respect to my book Rights and Demands (2018). The book focuses on demand-rights and asks how we accrue them. In other words, how does one accrue the standing to demand an action of someone or rebuke them for non-performance? My response to Kamm emphasizes how I understand “directed duties” in this context. Contrary to the standard practice of rights theorists, I do not start from the assumption that directed duties are constituted by “plain” duties in the context of other factors (about which rights theorists disagree). Rather, I understand my duty to you as the correlative and equivalent of your standing to demand the action in question. I offer a number of further clarifications and conclude by distinguishing the targets of my discussion from other phenomena of interest to moral philosophers, such as complaining and blaming.

One of us [Gilbert, M.. “Collective Belief and Scientific Change.” Sociality and Responsibility. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield. 37-49.] has proposed that ascriptions of beliefs to scientific communities generally involve a common notion of collective belief described by her in numerous places. A given collective belief involves a joint commitment of the parties, who thereby constitute what Gilbert refers to as a plural subject. Assuming that this interpretive hypothesis is correct, and that some of the belief ascriptions in question are true, then the members of some scientific communities have obligations that may act as barriers both to the generation and, hence, the fair evaluation of new ideas and to changes in their community’s beliefs. We argue that this may help to explain Thomas Kuhn’s observations on “normal science”, and go on to develop the relationship between Gilbert's proposal and several features of a group of physicists working on a fundamental physical theory called “string theory”, as described by physicist Lee Smolin [Smolin, L.. The Trouble with Physics. Mariner Books: New York.]. We argue that the features of the string theory community that Smolin cites are well explained by the hypothesis that the community is a plural subject of belief.

Behavior, language, development, identity, and science—all of these phenomena are commonly characterized as 'social' in nature. But what does it mean to be 'social'? Is there any intrinsic 'mark' of the social shared by these phenomena? In the first book to shed light on this foundational question, twelve distinguished philosophers and social scientists from several disciplines debate the mark of the social. Their varied answers will be of interest to sociologists, anthropologists, philosophers, psychologists, and anyone interested in the theoretical foundations of the social sciences

This paper discusses certain desiderata for an acceptable »Simmelian« account of social groups, and explains why my own account of social groups as plural subjects is preferable to the accounts considered. With regard to the »we«-intentionality of plural subjects, this theory of social groups should be taken to demand only that some rough general type of shared action or shared cognition must be understood to be in question of all sides. It is hoped, then, that this theory of plural subjects in general may turn out to be of help in demystifying older accounts of collectivity

Numerous social and political theorists have referred to social groups or societies as “unities.” What makes a unity of a social group? I address this question with special reference to the theory of social groups proposed in my books On Social Facts and Living Together: Rationality, Sociality and Obligation. I argue that social groups of a central kind require an underlying “joint commitment.” I explain what I mean by a “joint commitment” with care. If joint commitments in my sense underlie them, what kind of unity does this give social groups? In what sense or senses is it objective?

This article offers a critique of Thomas Scanlon's well-known account of promissory obligation by reference to the rights of promisees. Scanlon's account invokes a moral principle, the "principle of fidelity". Now, corresponding to a promisor's obligation to perform is a promisee's right to performance. It is argued that one cannot account for this right in terms of Scanlon's principle. This is so in spite of a clause in the principle relating to the promisee's "consent", which might have been thought to do the trick. Most likely this argument can be applied to all "moral principle" accounts of promissory obligation. An alternative both to these and to "social practice" accounts is needed.

A number of authors, Including Thomas Schelling and David Lewis, have envisaged a model of the generation of action in coordination problems in which salience plays a crucial role. Empirical studies suggest that human subjects are likely to try for the salient combination of actions, a tendency leading to fortunate results. Does rationality dictate that one aim at the salient combination? Some have thought so, Thus proclaiming that salience is all that is needed to resolve coordination problems for agents who are rational in the sense of game theory. I argue against this position; rational agents will not necessarily aim for the salient. It remains to explain how the salient comes to be chosen by human beings. Various possibilities are noted. One involves a mechanism invoked by Hume and Wittgenstein in other contexts: we may project an unreasoned compulsion onto reason, falsely believing that rationality dictates our choice of the salient.

How is one to act so as to do as well as possible according to one’s ranking of the possible outcomes? How—as it may be put—is one to act rationally? Sometimes the possible outcomes are not under one’s own control: an outcome is a combination of one’s own and another agent’s action. Often, then, one must try to work out what the other agent will do, in order to do as well as possible in one’s own lights. It is situations of this sort—situations of “strategic interaction”—that most concern the game theorist.

Two claims common in wittgenstein exegesis are addressed, With special reference to a well-known discussion by Peter Winch. First: the claim that one person's language must be intelligible to another is ambiguous; one interpretation is intuitively plausible; strong, Less plausible versions are ascribed to Wittgenstein. Inattention to the ambiguity noted could facilitate their acceptance. Second: the claim that the necessity for standards of correctness in the use of language has as a direct consequence the need for social standards is false and probably misrepresents Wittgenstein.