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446Experimental PhilosophyAnnual Review of Psychology 63 (1): 81-99. 2012.Experimental philosophy is a new interdisciplinary field that uses methods normally associated with psychology to investigate questions normally associated with philosophy. The present review focuses on research in experimental philosophy on four central questions. First, why is it that people's moral judgments appear to influence their intuitions about seemingly nonmoral questions? Second, do people think that moral questions have objective answers, or do they see morality as fundamentally rela…Read more
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24Strawson, Shoemaker, and the Hubris of TheoriesCriminal Law and Philosophy 13 (4): 561-572. 2019.David Shoemaker’s Responsibility from the Margins is chock full of valuable insights on the nature of our responsibility, and it has more in common with P.F. Strawson’s approach in “Freedom and Resentment” than the accounts of most philosophers who call themselves Strawsonians. On one central issue of interpretation, however, Shoemaker gets Strawson wrong. Like many interpreters, Shoemaker sees Strawson as defending a “quality of will” theory of responsibility. This idea fundamentally misunderst…Read more
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6Free Will and Experimental Philosophy: An InterventionIn J. Clausen & Neil Levy (eds.), Handbook of Neuroethics, Springer. pp. 273-286. 2014.This chapter reviews and then criticizes the dominant approach that experimental philosophers have adopted in their studies on free will and moral responsibility. Section “Experimental Philosophy and Free Will” reviews the experimental literature and the shared approach: probing for intuitions about the so-called compatibility question, whether free will is compatible with causal determinism. Section “The Intervention” argues that this experimental focus on the compatibility question is fundamen…Read more
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54Strawson, Shoemaker, and the Hubris of TheoriesCriminal Law and Philosophy 13 (4): 561-572. 2019.David Shoemaker’s Responsibility from the Margins is chock full of valuable insights on the nature of our responsibility, and it has more in common with P.F. Strawson’s approach in “Freedom and Resentment” than the accounts of most philosophers who call themselves Strawsonians. On one central issue of interpretation, however, Shoemaker gets Strawson wrong. Like many interpreters, Shoemaker sees Strawson as defending a “quality of will” theory of responsibility. This idea fundamentally misunderst…Read more
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75Yuck: The Nature and Moral Significance of Disgust. By Daniel Kelly. (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2011. Pp. 208pp. Price $30.00/£20.95)Philosophical Quarterly 63 (250): 172-174. 2013.
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144Of zombies, color scientists, and floating iron barsPSYCHE: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Research On Consciousness 8. 2002.In this paper I challenge the core of David Chalmers' argument against materialism-the claim that "there is a logically possible world physically identical to ours, in which the positive facts about consciousness do not hold." First, I analyze the move from conceivability to logical possibility. Following George Seddon, I consider the case of a floating iron bar and argue that even this seemingly conceivable event has implicit logical contradictions in its description. I then show that the disti…Read more
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18IntroductionIn Relative Justice: Cultural Diversity, Free Will, and Moral Responsibility, Princeton University Press. pp. 1-6. 2012.
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25Chapter Two. Moral Responsibility and the Culture of HonorIn Relative Justice: Cultural Diversity, Free Will, and Moral Responsibility, Princeton University Press. pp. 33-62. 2012.
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16BibliographyIn Relative Justice: Cultural Diversity, Free Will, and Moral Responsibility, Princeton University Press. pp. 213-222. 2012.
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1428More work for hard incompatibilismPhilosophy and Phenomenological Research 79 (3): 511-521. 2009.No Abstract
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287Experimental philosophy and free willPhilosophy Compass 5 (2): 199-212. 2010.This paper develops a sympathetic critique of recent experimental work on free will and moral responsibility. Section 1 offers a brief defense of the relevance of experimental philosophy to the free will debate. Section 2 reviews a series of articles in the experimental literature that probe intuitions about the "compatibility question"—whether we can be free and morally responsible if determinism is true. Section 3 argues that these studies have produced valuable insights on the factors that in…Read more
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32Chapter One. The Appeal to IntuitionIn Relative Justice: Cultural Diversity, Free Will, and Moral Responsibility, Princeton University Press. pp. 9-32. 2012.
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7749The objective attitudePhilosophical Quarterly 57 (228). 2007.I aim to alleviate the pessimism with which some philosophers regard the 'objective attitude', thereby removing a particular obstacle which P.F. Strawson and others have placed in the way of more widespread scepticism about moral responsibility. First, I describe what I consider the objective attitude to be, and then address concerns about this raised by Susan Wolf. Next, I argue that aspects of certain attitudes commonly thought to be opposed to the objective attitude are in fact compatible wit…Read more
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530Partial DesertIn David Shoemaker (ed.), Oxford studies in agency and responsibility, Oxford University Press. 2013.Theories of moral desert focus only on the personal culpability of the agent to determine the amount of blame and punishment the agent deserves. I defend an alternative account of desert, one that does not focus only facts about offenders and their offenses. In this revised framework, personal culpability can do no more than set upper and lower limits for deserved blame and punishment. For more precise judgments within that spectrum, additional factors must be considered, factors that are in…Read more
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19IndexIn Relative Justice: Cultural Diversity, Free Will, and Moral Responsibility, Princeton University Press. pp. 223-230. 2012.
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26Chapter Three. Shame Cultures, Collectivist Societies, Original Sin, And Pharaoh’s Hardened HeartIn Relative Justice: Cultural Diversity, Free Will, and Moral Responsibility, Princeton University Press. pp. 63-83. 2012.
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18ContentsIn Relative Justice: Cultural Diversity, Free Will, and Moral Responsibility, Princeton University Press. 2012.
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43More Work for Hard Incompatibilism1Philosophy and Phenomenological Research 79 (3): 511-521. 2009.
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25Chapter Six. A Metaskeptical Analysis of Libertarianism and CompatibilismIn Relative Justice: Cultural Diversity, Free Will, and Moral Responsibility, Princeton University Press. pp. 133-172. 2012.
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250The two faces of revenge: Moral responsibility and the culture of honorBiology and Philosophy 24 (1): 35-50. 2009.Retributive emotions and behavior are thought to be adaptive for their role in improving social coordination. However, since retaliation is generally not in the short-term interests of the individual, rational self-interest erodes the motivational link between retributive emotions and the accompanying adaptive behavior. I argue that two different sets of norms have emerged to reinforce this link: (1) norms about honor and (2) norms about moral responsibility and desert. I observe that the primar…Read more
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20AcknowledgmentsIn Relative Justice: Cultural Diversity, Free Will, and Moral Responsibility, Princeton University Press. 2012.
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135Relative Justice: Cultural Diversity, Free Will, and Moral ResponsibilityPrinceton University Press. 2012.[Publisher's description:] When can we be morally responsible for our behavior? Is it fair to blame people for actions that are determined by heredity and environment? Can we be responsible for the actions of relatives or members of our community? In this provocative book, Tamler Sommers concludes that there are no objectively correct answers to these questions. Drawing on research in anthropology, psychology, and a host of other disciplines, Sommers argues that cross-cultural variation raises s…Read more
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166In memoriamThe Philosophers' Magazine 52 (52): 89-93. 2011.Experimental philosophy has received a great deal of attention in scholarly journals and the popular media. Often the topic of these articles is precisely what I claim is a non-issue – the value of experimental philosophy as a movement. And here I am writing about this same topic yet again. But I am not going to provide another argument for an obvious position. Instead, I’m writing this as an obituary – an obituary for the so-called controversy about experimental philosophy, and an attempt to di…Read more
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94This year marks the 80 th anniversary of Clarence Darrow’s brilliant and passionate defense of Nathan Leopold and Richard Loeb, two wealthy teenagers who pled guilty to the kidnapping and murder of 14 year old Bobby Franks. On August 22, 1924 Darrow gave his famous twelve hour closing statement, bringing tears to the eyes of the presiding judge and saving his clients from the death penalty. Here are two excerpts from the summation.
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22Chapter Four. Can the Variation Be Explained Away?In Relative Justice: Cultural Diversity, Free Will, and Moral Responsibility, Princeton University Press. pp. 84-108. 2012.
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