Volume I - The Starling Undergraduate Journal of Philosophy

VOLUME I | January 1, 2015

The Starling Undergraduate Journal of Philosophy

TABLE OF CONTENTS PREFACE ....................................................................................................................................... 3

PART 1............................................................................................................................................. 4 PRAGMATIC, CONTEXT-APPROPRIATE EXPLANATION ........................................................................ 4 DANIEL MUNRO, UNIVERSITY OF BRITISH COLUMBIA IN DEFENSE OF LOGICAL PLURALISM .............................................................................................. 12 ADRIAN YEE, UNIVERSITY OF BRITISH COLUMBIA ROWE ON FREEDOM ...................................................................................................................... 30 ANTHONY HOLBROOK, UNIVERSITY OF ARIZONA FREEDOMS UNDONE: DOMINATION BY AGENTS AND STRUCTURES IN PETTIT'S REPUBLICANISM ......... 38 MARIELA LIBEDINSKY, UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO, ST. GEORGE

PART 2........................................................................................................................................... 46 WADING THROUGH THE SWAMP OF POLITICAL LEGITIMACY ............................................................. 46 REBECCA BARRETT, UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO, ST. GEORGE THE VALIDITY OF THE EX POST FACTO NUREMBERG TRIALS ............................................................ 52 PAMELA METANI, WELLESLEY COLLEGE INTERSECTIONAL PROBLEMS WITH GENETIC ENGINEERING .............................................................. 57 VALENTINA LAGUNAS, UNIVERSITY OF ARIZONA LOCKE'S PROPERTY RIGHTS AND APPLICATIONS TO THE OIL AND GAS INDUSTRY .............................. 62 MICHAEL BURNSIDE, CARNEGIE MELLON UNIVERSITY

POSTLUDE .................................................................................................................................... 65 MAY I HAVE THIS DANCE IN THE BALLROOM OF "WESTERN ANALYTICAL" PHILOSOPHY? .................... 65 ANONYMOUS, VANDERBILT UNIVERSITY REFLECTING AND LOOKING FORWARD ............................................................................................ 66

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FOREWORD Dear Reader, I am very pleased to present to you the first volume of The Starling Undergraduate Journal of Philosophy. It is with great excitement that I share this volume with you, a volume for which submissions have come from many undergraduate institutions, in different countries. The Starling thanks all of its contributors for placing so much confidence in our first volume, and so readily sending us all of your wonderful submissions.

Before you start browsing all of the unique and intellectually-stimulating submissions featured in this volume, I would like to share with you the vision of The Starling. The Starling aims to be the most inclusive space possible for philosophical thought at the undergraduate level. It is our objective to give a voice to undergraduate philosophy, and as you will notice the submissions published in this volume range in subject area, and formatting, to name a few features. The Starling hopes to challenge the common form to which philosophical works are compared to, and we welcome submissions ranging in degree of formal presentation and creativity, keeping only one variable constant among the works: their philosophical focus.

Volume I of The Starling Undergraduate Journal of Philosophy would not have been possible without the following people who helped further increase the quality of works featured herein: Angela Sun and her superb contributions in the fields of design work and editorial work, Fani Ntavelou-Baum and her contributions with editorial work, Isabella Rosenberg and her contributions with social media work, and Snow Zhang and her contributions to editorial work.

As you embark on the enlightening adventure that we hope reading this volume of The Starling will provide, I hope that you enjoy reading the featured submissions as much as we, at The Starling, enjoying working with them!

- Pamela Metani President & Founder | The Starling Undergraduate Journal of Philosophy

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Pragmatic, Context-Appropriate Explanation DANIEL MUNRO, University of British Columbia

Introduction I would like to begin by considering pre-theoretical intuitions about several stipulated conversations. Consider the following cases:1 Paresis Case 1: Neither George nor his wife Martha is a scientist. At the dinner table, Martha tells George that their friend Nick is seeking treatment for paresis.

George asks, “Why does paresis develop?” to which Martha responds, “The only way to get paresis is to contract syphilis first; some cases of syphilis cause people to develop paresis.”

Paresis Case 2: Martha, a biologist, hires George, a graduate student, as a research assistant in her lab. Martha is investigating new treatments for paresis, and is introducing George to this condition and the work she has been doing.

George asks Martha, “Why does paresis develop?” to which Martha responds with a complex biological explanation of the processes causing syphilis to become paresis.

Murder Case 1: While reading the newspaper, Ethel finds a story about a woman named Myrtle who killed her father, which she describes to her nephew, Elwood. Elwood asks, “Why did Myrtle kill her father?” to which Ethel responds, “Because she was mentally ill.”

Murder Case 2: During a murder trial, Elwood, a judge, asks Ethel, a defense lawyer, “Why did Myrtle kill her father?” to which Ethel responds with an account 1

The paresis example is adapted from: Michael Scriven, “Explanation and Prediction in Evolutionary Theory,” Science 30 (1959): 477-482.

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of how Myrtle developed a mental illness at a young age and how this mental illness makes her prone to violent outbursts, during one of which she killed her father.

The features of these cases I want to point to are these. In Paresis Cases 1 and 2, one character asks seemingly the same “why-question,” and likewise for Murder Cases 1 and 2. In both pairs of cases, a different answer is given, of varying levels of detail. The answers all seem intuitively to be “explanations” of a given phenomenon, and, at least roughly, they seem to be the “right” responses to questions asked: if we substituted Martha’s answer in Paresis Case 1 into Paresis Case 2, it would intuitively seem woefully lacking in detail; substituting Martha’s answer in Paresis Case 2 into Paresis Case 1 seems less strange, but it would at least seem like Martha is giving a strange, needlessly detailed answer; the same things apply to the Murder Cases.

In this paper, I will argue for certain features of explanations that make all of the “explanations” in the above cases—both scientific and non-scientific—of the same kind, just varying in levels of detail. However, I will also argue that there is no sense in which more detailed scientific explanations are “better” or more “real”; rather, we should evaluate explanations more pragmatically, based on whether they appropriately answer what the explanation-seeker sought. This account of explanation will take up section 2.

In section 3, I will go on to spell out how this implies that whether any particular instance of the form “X explains Y” is an appropriate response to an explanation-seeking varies between conversational contexts, and describe the way we evaluate explanations in context based on certain conversational conventions.

Explaining Explanation Philosophers of science confront our intuitions about cases like the above to varying degrees. Hempel has argued that explanations like those of Paresis Case 1 and Murder Case 1 are actually “elliptical explanations”: rather than being “full” explanations for the phenomena in question, they are a short-cut that includes implicit, additional details.2 On the other hand, some philosophers restrict their discussions to highly scientific explanations, presupposing these are most legitimate. This camp includes Kitcher, who argues that explanations follow complex argument patterns, the best ones being those that “unify” the greatest number of phenomena under one theory. 3 Other philosophers take a more pragmatic stance, and arguing that ordinary explanations are of the same kind as scientific ones. This group includes van Fraassen4 and Woodward,5 although details vary between their accounts, and they continue to assume scientific explanations are somehow better or fuller than everyday ones. It is not always clear in 2

Carl G. Hempel, “The Thesis of Structural Identity” in Philosophy of Science: The Central Issues, ed. Martin Curd, J.A. Cover and Christopher Pincock (New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 2013), 667-76.

3 Philip Kitcher, “Explanatory Unification” in Philosophy of Science: The Central Issues, ed. Martin Curd, J.A. Cover and Christopher Pincock (New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 2013), 711-34.

4 Bas C. van Fraassen, Scientific Image (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1980).

5 James Woodward, “The Manipulability Conception of Causal Explanation,” in Philosophy of Science: The Central Issues, ed. Martin Curd, J.A. Cover and Christopher Pincock (New York: W. W. Norton & Company, 2013), 735-51.

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prominent philosophers’ theories where to place cases like Murder Case 2, which is highly detailed but doesn’t seem strictly scientific.

In this section, I will argue for some pragmatic features of explanations that rely heavily on the idea that a set of propositions X is not an explanation for a set of propositions Y unless an explanation for Y has first been sought, and X proposed in response, an idea which van Fraassen and Woodward also take very seriously.

However, with this account of explanation in mind, I will then argue that what makes any given explanation good or full should be judged relative to whether it satisfies the explanation-seeker; our criteria for what makes one explanation better than another should not simply be that it contains more detail, or that it more closely resembles scientific explanation.

It is important not to divorce an account of explanation from the pragmatic reasons behind why we construct explanations in the first place. Kitcher suggests that the “most obvious way in which to categorize explanation is to view it as an activity [in which] we answer the actual or anticipated questions of an actual or anticipated audience.”6 Importantly, Kitcher points out that an explanation is usually provided only after one is sought.7 This implies that, no matter how qualified in theory X is as an explanation for Y, X is not an explanation for Y until an explanation-seeker has sought an explanation for Y, and X has been cited in response. Van Fraassen thus suggests that an explanation “is not the same as a proposition, or an argument, or list of propositions; it is an answer.”8 A useful notion in further cashing this out is to think of explanations as answers to “why-questions.” Van Fraasen rigorously develops this ideas and argues that underlying every search for an explanation for Y is a question of the form “why is it the case that Y?”9 Salmon takes some issue with this notion, arguing that some explanations seem to be in response to “how-possibly” or “how-actually” questions;10 while I’m not convinced that any of Salmon’s counterexamples can’t be re-formulated into why-questions, the difference between Salmon and van Fraassen here is ultimately a trivial one if we take “answer to a why-question” as more of a useful tool for understanding how explanation-seeking works than as a literal definition. I think this captures what people do when they seek explanations—they look for a story describing why something came to be the way it is.

To further understand explanation, we need to understand what sort of response people look for when asking why-questions. I will follow the trend of many theorists who link explaining Y to describing the causes of Y. As van Fraassen notes, events are “enmeshed in a net of causal relations,” and explanations seem to cite the salient parts of such causal nets.11 With our understanding of explanations as answers as described above, we should take care to preserve this distinction from Woodward: “causal relationships are features of the world: they are ‘out there’ in nature. By contrast, 6

Kitcher, “Explanatory Unification,” 712-13 Of course, the explanation-seeker and explainer may be the same person or party.

8 Van Fraassen, Scientific Image, 134.

9 Ibid., 126.

10 Wesley C. Salmon, Four Decades of Scientific Explanation, in Scientific Explanation, ed. Philip Kitcher and Wesley C. Salmon (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1989), 137-138.

11 Van Fraassen, Scientific Image, 124.

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explanation is an activity carried out by humans…having to do with the discovery and provision of information, information about causal relationships.”12 Much has been said elsewhere about causal explanation, so, beyond the point that explanations are descriptions of causes, I will not say anything more specific about the fundamental nature of explanations. I think the rest of what I say in this and the next section can be grafted on to various philosophers’ accounts of causal explanations, as long as they don’t fundamentally contradict the features of explanations that I describe. I will say a bit more about this point below.

We now have enough information to draw some conclusions concerning our intuitions about the Paresis Cases and Murder Cases. Thus far, I have not said anything explicit about the distinction between scientific and non-scientific explanations. Putting aside the question of whether scientific explanations are better or fuller than nonscientific ones, I think that with the account given so far we can make the claim that the explanations in all four cases are in some basic sense of the same kind. All of them feature an explanation-seeker asking a why-question that is intended to uncover a description of the causes of a given phenomenon, and such information is provided in response. The main differences between them seem to stem from the fact that there is a continuum of level of detail between everyday explanations and scientific ones.

Woodward makes the point that people without scientific knowledge still look for explanations and pick out causes for events, and have been doing so since before scientific disciplines developed; science seems to take up the same type of activity, just in more detail.13 This implies that we should reject any account of explanation under which explanations of a non-scientific nature are not considered true explanations. This view is inconsistent with accounts like Kitcher’s, which makes explanations accessible only by scientific experts.14 Granting this, many philosophers still maintain sharp qualitative distinctions between non-scientific and scientific explanations. Under Hempel’s D-N model, for example, non-scientific explanations are not full explanations, and a full, more detailed scientific explanation underlies every non-scientific one;15 similarly, while Woodward recognizes a continuum between everyday and scientific explanations, he still considers scientific explanations “better” versions of everyday, less detailed ones.16 Accounts like these would value the explanation in Paresis Case 2 above the rest of our cases.

However, if we understand explanations as descriptions of causes provided in response to explanation-seekers’ why-questions, I don’t think we can continue to make sense of claim that scientific explanations are fuller or better than non-scientific ones, as it is unclear on what criteria this is grounded. If we look at each explanation-seeker’s why-question in context in our cases, it is intuitively clear the approximate level of detail each was looking to uncover regarding the causal net in question. The information provided in each case seems satisfying when considered alongside each why-question, and each explanation-seeker seems to have gotten what they sought. If we assume that explanations are fundamentally answers—as do many of the philosophers I have 12

Woodward, “Manipulability Conception,” 749.

Ibid.,” 745-746.

14 Kitcher, “Explanatory Unification.”

15 Hempel, “Structural Identity.”

16 Woodward, “Manipulability Conception.”

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described—it seems to follow that we should evaluate explanations based on whether they provide the explanation-seeker with the level of detail they desired: we should consider a “good” answer one that properly responds to its corresponding question, not one that gives a different level of detail than was desired by the questioner. It seems strange to say, as Hempel does, that a more detailed, scientific explanation is underlying the explanation in Paresis Case 1, because neither George nor Martha would have had anything like such a detailed model of explanation in mind when asking or answering; it also seems strange to say, as Woodward does, that the explanation in Paresis Case 1 is worse than the one in Paresis Case 2—how could it be “worse” if the explanation-seeker did not desire more detailed information than what was given?

I thus root evaluation of explanations squarely in pragmatic concerns. If we admit that explanations are not truly “out there” in the world but are responses to requests for information, I don’t see how we can have recourse to any other objective evaluative criteria. Calling scientific explanations real, better, or fuller than less detailed ones seems like little more than a masked appeal to a platonic form of explanations, rather than looking at how explanations actually operate in their respective contexts.

I proposed above that the features of explanation I describe are meant to be compatible with any accounts of explanation that don’t fundamentally contradict my descriptions. Again, this is inconsistent with an account like Kitcher’s. It also inconsistent with any account that necessitates that counterfactuals of the following form must be true in order for X to be a good explanation for Y: “if we had observed X prior to observing Y, we would have expected Y to occur.” This means that strict “nomic expectability” is not always part of a good explanation, as it is for Hempel: it may be that such a level of detail is sometimes necessary for a good explanation, if this is what is sought by the explanation-seeker—perhaps, for example, in a scientific context; however, it is a simple fact that explanation-seekers, such as George in Paresis Case 1, very often don’t seek or expect such detailed explanations, so it should not be a requirement that observing X would lead us to expect Y. There are accounts of explanation that don’t have rules fundamentally built into them about level of detail, even if their proponents presuppose that more detailed explanations are better ones. Something like Woodward’s “manipulability” account, for example, could perhaps operate according to what I’ve described in this section.

Context-Appropriate Explanations In the previous section, I argued that it is important for our understanding of explanation that explanations are (loosely) answers to why-questions, sought by explanation-seekers. Explanations describe the “causal net” leading up to phenomena; however, explanation-seekers seek different levels of detail, so the view that explanations are answers to questions implies that we should evaluate explanations based on whether they adequately deliver the explanation-seeker what they were looking for, rather than against a standard set by science. The Paresis Cases and Murder Cases make it clear that, if we evaluate explanations this way, what counts as an adequately detailed explanation for a given phenomenon will vary case by case.

At this point, it may seem very difficult to actually provide proper explanations to explanation-seekers, as well as to evaluate explanations we observe, because what

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counts as a good explanation seems to vary so wildly. If approached by an explanationseeker, or if acting as a third party evaluating an instance of explanation, how should we determine what the explanation-seeker was looking for in order to decide what a good explanation would be?

Yet, looking at the Paresis and Murder Cases, it seems that without explicitly being given this information we nevertheless can and do make intuitive evaluations of explanations. In this section, I will argue that this is because our practices of explaining conform to certain implicit conversational conventions that allow us to determine what level of detail is sought. Because of this, we can intuitively evaluate any given instance of the form “X explains Y” if we have knowledge of the conversational context in which the explanation was given.17 It seems that for any given conversational context, we automatically assume implicit expectations about the level of detail that should be given in response to a request for an explanation. Our assumptions seem to follow a rule which is roughly of the form: Rule E: “X explains Y” is an appropriate response to a why-question in context C if and only if X is a set of propositions describing Y’s causes which corresponds to the level of explanatory detail appropriate to C. This means that any given instance of “X explains Y” will be appropriate to some contexts, and not to others. We assume that explanation-seekers are operating according to the same conversational conventions as ourselves, so we expect that whyquestions will not be seeking a more detailed explanation than is appropriate to their context. This means that we understand the level of detail an explanation-seeker wants based on context, and can evaluate the adequacy of an explanation by using context to infer what level of detail the explanation-seeker was looking for. It is possible that the explanation-seeker had in mind a level of detail that was not appropriate to her context; in such a case, it could be that we evaluate an explanation as adequate when it technically is not, but this is the fault of the explanation-seeker for not conforming to proper conversational convention.

At this point Rule E still seems vague, especially in that what level of detail is “appropriate to C” is not clearly defined. While I do think that this is a largely intuitive matter, we can specify a few rough rules for how this works.

We can assume that ordinary, everyday conversational contexts require the lowest level of detail; perhaps in everyday cases, simply naming one cause of Y will be appropriate. This is illustrated by Paresis Case 1 and Murder Case 1: in each of these everyday conversational contexts, we intuitively expect that the explanation-seekers are looking for a very low level of detail, and so can evaluate the explanations based on that assumption. What if an explanation-seeker is in an everyday context, but wants to make it clear that he or she desires a more detailed explanation? In such a case, an explanation-seeker could explicitly shift an everyday context into a context requiring a higher level of detail for X: one simple example would be if George in Paresis Case 1 were to follow up his why-question “why does paresis develop?” with a statement like “and I don’t just mean that it’s caused by syphilis—but what makes some syphilitic patients develop paresis and not others?” After such a statement, the context has 17

The rest of this section owes inspiration to David Lewis’ Epistemic Contextualism. I will not give the details of Lewis’ theory here, but I am indebted to it.

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switched to one where we would no longer consider a simple explanation like “syphilis causes paresis” to be appropriate.

There are also features of conversational contexts, though, which more implicitly make the appropriate level of detail more complex. The paradigm example of this is a scientific context. When a why-question is asked in a scientific context, we implicitly assume that a high level of detail is being sought; this is why we judge Paresis Case 2 as we do. Another feature that can imply a higher level of detail than an everyday context seems to be when there are high practical stakes involved in providing an explanation. Murder Case 2 is like this: because it is a high-stakes context, we assume that Elwood is asking Ethel for a highly detailed explanation, although perhaps not as detailed as what we would assume if the same question were asked in a neuroscience lab.

Again, there is no real way to quantify exactly how much detail is appropriate to a given context, and it remains mainly an intuitive manner. It may also be that, for a given context, no two people will agree exactly about the appropriate level of detail, but only roughly. I don’t think these are faults for my arguments, as I am aiming just to describe the way we implicitly evaluate explanations, as evidenced by our intuitions about cases like the Paresis and Murder Cases. Pragmatic conversational conventions like Rule E are a product of natural language, which always has some vagueness.

There is one final concern I would like to address. It seems like we might run into counterexamples to the account I’ve just given in certain types of contexts where an explanation is false, but is in some sense still appropriate to its conversational context.

For example, we could imagine the following case. Nick, our paresis victim, is very superstitious, and goes to a psychic to ask for an explanation of his paresis. The psychic tells him “your friend Martha has a grudge against you, and put a hex on you that caused your paresis.” In such a context, if the psychic’s explanation corresponds to what Nick was seeking both in kind and in level of detail, should we say that this is equally as adequate an explanation as those in the Paresis and Murder Cases?

I admit that I have conflicting intuitions about a case like this. There is some sense in which the psychic’s explanation is pragmatically adequate; however, it also seems that we should not include explanations that aren’t “true” in the sense that the causes they describe are not real causes, no matter what the explanation-seeker believes. If we admit the latter point, however, we may run into problems even for scientific explanations: it seems like a scientific explanation given in terms of Newton’s laws would have been adequate in a scientific context before Einstein’s laws were discovered, even though we know now that they are not strictly true; if we assume even more accurate laws may be discovered in the future, what do we make of our current scientific explanations citing Einstein’s laws? And there are yet further ambiguous cases: what do we make of a context in which someone asks their pastor for an explanation of moral concepts and is given an explanation in religious terms?

Ultimately, I do not intend to propose a conclusive answer to these questions. In particular, the question about the accuracy of scientific laws is a tough one for the philosophy of science in general. However, for those vehemently opposed to accepting the psychic’s or the pastor’s explanations as being on the same footing as explanations describing more tangible, evidence-based causes, I see no problem with editing Rule E thusly:

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Rule E′: “X explains Y” is an appropriate response to a why-question in context C if and only if X is a set of propositions describing Y’s causes which corresponds to the level of explanatory detail appropriate to C, and where the propositions in X seem true according to our best evidence.

Even with this, both the psychic and the pastor are likely to disagree that their explanations are false and that there is no evidence for them. This is a symptom of a larger incommensurability problem between more naturalistically-inclined and more supernaturally-inclined individuals, one I can’t hope to address here. The most we can do is say that not everyone will agree about what types of evidence to allow in our explanations; but this is a problem for epistemology and metaphysics more generally, and I don’t think it counts as a point against my arguments.

Conclusion I have argued for a pragmatic judgment of explanations that is based largely on the fact that explanations are a provision of information about causes of a phenomenon, produced in response to a why-question. From that basic understanding of explanation, I argued that we should not see everyday explanations as of a different kind from scientific ones, but simply as having less detail. Different from many prominent accounts of explanation, though, I argued that this view of explanation implies that we cannot judge scientific explanations as “better,” “real,” or “fuller” than everyday ones; instead, if explanations are answers to questions, we should judge them as such: based on whether they answer the explanation-seeker’s question with the level of detail that was sought.

After laying out this description of explanation, I proposed that we can (and do) intuitively evaluate explanations based on whether they provide the right amount of detail appropriate for their conversational context: we expect by conversational convention that explanation-seekers are looking for the appropriate level of detail for their context, and based on this we intuit roughly what level of detail would satisfy the explanation-seeker’s desire. Various features of a conversational context—including being in a scientific or a high-stakes context—can impact either explicitly or implicitly what constitutes the appropriate level of detail that we expect an explanation-seeker to be seeking, and we provide or evaluate explanations based on this.

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In Defense of Logical Pluralism ADRIAN YEE, University Of British Columbia

Abstract In this paper I argue that there is no logic that is capable of adequately assessing every single area of human inquiry. A logic should be used contextually and abandoned if it fails to satisfy the demands of the problems it faces. I defend the position that we should use a plurality of logical systems to achieve different goals instead of a single system. I survey a range of logics ranging from classical-logic to paraconsistent logics.

Introduction It was said by Leibniz that “a world is "possible" if it does not contradict the laws of logic.�18 Logic has often be referred to as precisely that: 'Logic'. Stating the discipline in such terms has the resounding implication that there is only one true logic and that all agents of reasoning are to submit to such rules of 'The Laws of Logic'.19 The purpose of this paper is to defend logical pluralism: the thesis that there is more than one correct logic. I argue we should instead accept that there are multiple logical systems of reasoning that serve their own purposes in equally rational ways. Since classical-logic is the reigning logic of choice, most of my arguments will be towards demonstrating the inadequacy of classical-logic in a variety of scenarios. I will contrast the semantic and syntactic components while assessing formal systems' conceptual adequacy.

18

Russell, p. 589.

Leibniz is also said to have held this view; see Ibid, pp. 586-587.

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The Elusiveness of Entailment Logical systems can be broken into two distinct categories: deductive and inductive. Both serve many different purposes and are often incompatible – what is suitable for deductive logic is often unsuitable for inductive logic, and vice-versa.20 Some people may use such systems to ground arithmetic truths, as Frege and Russell attempted in the early 20th-century,21 and some may use them to formalize ways to reason coherently and consistently about our decisions, as in game theory. 22 Others may use them to prove deductively what follows from certain premises via rigidly set rules of inference, as taught in most introductory logic courses in universities. Others may use them in the court room or in arguments against friends to settle disputes based upon whatever evidence is available and using agreed-upon rules of rationality. The logical-monist, my opponent in this paper, will argue that there is a single set of inference rules and semantics capable of reasoning in all domains. Hilary Putnam, Willard Van Orman Quine, and Owen Griffiths are but a few of the many logical monists.

Furthermore, they would argue that classical-logic is the ideal logic.

When choosing one logical system over another, the primary point of contention concerns the interpretation of its symbols with regards to a natural language semantics or with regards to a system's applicability to the world.23 Most importantly, the debate over which system to use is often a debate as to which system captures the most accurate account of 'entailment' – an account of what follows from what. If all ducks have beaks, and all beaks are calcium-based, then all ducks have something calciumbased – such an inference is said to be entailed by the premises. If a contradiction is asserted then everything is true – another inference that is claimed to be entailed by the truth of its premises. The hope for the logical-monist is that there will be either a single account of entailment or an account of logical consequence that will be correct and the others will not.

We can begin by establishing some criteria for what constitutes entailment.

Following Woods, we can define a 'Conditionality of Entailment Thesis' (CET) as follows: 'A' entails 'B' if and only if there is a sense of 'If...then....' according which if 'A' then 'B' follows.24 Is there a single account of entailment that is able to capture all instances of claims made about entailment? Because (CET) is a meta-logical principle, since it speaks about systems and is not expressed within it, the debate as to whether (CET) is to be accepted or not is contingent upon how we reason outside-of-a-system.

We cannot use a logical system to decide extra-logical conditions on other systems since an account of validity and soundness can only be given via meta-logical techniques. Since we are concerned with comparing different systems' adequacy at satisfying the (CET), we must reason about these notions informally. I will attempt to demonstrate that this can be done.

Following the assertion that entailment is what defines a logic, each system is uniquely characterised by the semantics of its 'conditional-connective'. Conditionals are 20

See Priest, 'Beyond the Limits of Thought', pp. 48-49 for a discussion on whether, in particular, non-monotonic inferences are suitable for specific logics.

21 See Berto, p. 16.

22 See Priest, 'Doubt Truth to be a Liar', p. 112 – 113.

23 See Hofstadter, pp. 38-39 for a discussion on the 'mechanical-mode' versus the 'intelligentmode'.

24 Woods, 'Whither Consequence?', p. 332.

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what capture the notion of 'what follows from what' in the given system.25 In classicallogic, the '⊃ ' connective is defined as a material-conditional26, whereas in modal-logic C.I.Lewis's fishook-connective is defined as 'it is necessary that if 'A' then 'B''. Further, in intuitionist-logic, the conditional connective has consequences contingent upon truth and provability – the latter of which is not expressible in classical-logic27. As in modallogic, intuitionist-logic requires an apparatus of 'possible-worlds' – something classicallogic lacks. In the relevant logic 'B', the possible worlds semantics requires a ternaryrelation over possible-worlds rather than the sole binary-relation of the 'S-n family' of modal-logic.28 Considering the plurality of logics with different criteria for their conditional-connectives, we will have to compare each logic with one another to see which is most suited at satisfying the (CET). Depending on what system one will use, interpretations as to whether these conditionals capture a sense of 'If...then...' is what is at stake. Since reasoning is mostly about drawing connections between states of affairs, an understanding of a logic's conditional-connectives is crucial in considering whether the logic is suitable for a given task. If a logic passes the (CET) then we should say that it is a logic capable of capturing entailment. However, even if we grant that a system captures entailment more than another system, is it worth accepting the additional technical-machinery associated with it? Is it capable of capturing a sense of entailment in more scenarios that humans reason in compared to another system? Moreover, to what extent should we accept the consequences of a formal system if we accept that the formal system's rules of inference capture our intuitions?

In classical-logic29 the following claims are valid: 'Conjunction Elimination' (CE): P & Q entails P (or Q) (1) P & Q (2) P (3) Q

ASM [1] &-Elim [1] &-Elim [1]

For example, if P is the sentence “I am a human being” and Q is the sentence “I enjoy pasta” then the claim that “I am a human being and I enjoy pasta” entails that each of the two claims atomically may be inferred. Few would contest this inference.

25

In extreme cases, the entirety of a system's language may be unique to the system – with no shared features of other systems. For example, see Priest, 'Doubt Truth to Be a Liar', chapter 5 for a discussion on the widely differing accounts of the 'negation-connective'.

26 It is important to distinguish between the material-conditional and the English meaning of 'If....then....' since there are well-known paradoxes of the connective if interpreted as such: see Priest, 'Introduction to Non-Classical Logic', pp. 12-14 for more details.

27 While there is no doubt that one can prove that certain conclusions follow from certain premises in classical-logic, provability itself is not a feature of the language – it is a meta-logical concept and not one that is demonstrable in the system. See the section 'Intuitionist and Relevant Logics'.

28 The 'S-n family' refers to the kinds of logics as S0.5, S2, S4, and S5. See Priest, 'Introduction to Non-Classical Logic', chapter 10 for details on the ternary relation of 'B'.

29 The following introductory logic textbooks validate all of the instances of 'Classical-logic' inference rules that I discuss in this paper: Priest, 'Introduction to Non-Classical Logic'; Weiss, 'Intro Logic'; Barwise et al., p.204; Restall, 'Logic: An Introduction'.

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'Disjunction Elimination' (DE): P v Q entails 'R' (given that P entails R and that Q entails R) For example, we can prove that: P v Q, ~P entails Q. (1) P v Q (2) ~P (3) ~Q (4) P (5) Falsum (6) Q (7) Falsum (8) Falsum (9) ~ ~ Q (10) Q

ASM [1] ASM [2] ASM [3] ASM [4] 2,4 Falsum Introduction [2,4] ASM [5] 3,6 Falsum Introduction [3,5] 1,4,5,6,7 Disjunction Elimination [1] 3,9 Falsum Elimination [1] 9, Double-negation Elimination [1]

Similarly, in the case of (DE), if I know that a particular integer is either even or odd, and I also know that the integer is not even, then it follows classically that it is odd.

So far so good. Let us see what happens when we put these inference rules to work in connection with the 'material-conditional'.

The following inference of 'antecedent falsity'30 (AF) is classically valid: (AF) P entails ~P ⊃ Q31 (1) P (2) ~P (3) ~Q (4) Falsum (5) ~~Q (6) Q (7) ~P ⊃ Q

ASM [1] ASM [2] ASM [3] 1,2, Falsum Introduction [1,2] 3,4 Falsum Elimination [1,2] 5 DNE [1,2] 2,6, Conditional Proof [1]

Let us say that P is the sentence "It is sunny right now" and that Q is the sentence "Prime Numbers are ducks". If we accept this proof, we should accept that "It is sunny right now" entails that "If it is not sunny right now then Prime numbers are ducks". Intuitively, this inference is absurd. If I were to consider a possible state of affairs in which it is not sunny I would very likely not accept that Prime numbers are ducks as a consequence. I could very much imagine the world as being altered only to the extent that instead of it being sunny it is not sunny and that I would not have to accept that prime numbers are ducks.32 Such an inference as (AF) is an example where 30

I take this term from Priest, pp.84-85.

We use the symbol ' ⊃' as the material-implication connective. That is, 'P > Q' has the same truth table as ' ~ P v Q'.

32 The metaphysics of possible-worlds analysis has an immense literature and I will not try to defend my position vis-a-vis others here. See Simchen, Kripke, and Priest, 'Introduction to NonClassical Logic', for further discussion.

31

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we accept basic rules of inference that seem intuitive but that lead to counter-intuitive results. Should we accept these counter-intuitive consequences if we accept the rules upon which they are based? Considering that it is us who create the formal systems (unless one is a Platonic-realist about logic), it seems that there are good reasons to think we should accept (AF), because we accept the axioms of our own system. At the same time we shouldn't accept (AF) because it isn't an entailment claim that anyone would accept in their day to day life. Consider what happens if we let Q be the sentence P itself. Since (AF) is merely a schema, we may place any propositions in place of 'P' and 'Q' provided that we follow the rest of the rules of inference. We now have it that “It is sunny right now” entails that “If it is not sunny right now then it is sunny right now” which is an absurd inference and contradictory inference. AF is therefore one example of a contentious inference rule that will be challenged by the non-classical logics to be surveyed later in this paper.

Similarly, the principle of 'antecedent strengthening'33 (AS) is also a case where our acceptance of the primitive inference rules of a system lead us astray.

(AS) A ⊃ B entails (A & C) ⊃ B (1) A ⊃ B (2) A & C (3) A (4) B (5) (A & C) ⊃ B

ASM [1] ASM [2] &-Elim [2] 1,3 MP [1,2] 2,4 CP [1]

If A is the sentence "It is raining now", B is "I will buy an umbrella as soon as possible", and C is “I am hit by a car and die five seconds from now” then we are lead to believe that A and B entails: "If it is raining right now and I am hit by a car and die five seconds from now then I will buy an umbrella as soon as possible." Again, this is a case where we wouldn't accept the consequences of (AS)'s entailment claim despite accepting the rules of inference upon which this claim is made. It is unlikely any rational person would accept such an entailment since one would not be able to purchase an umbrella as soon as possible if they were dead. Such an inference is patently absurd and the irrelevance caused by the addition of sentence 'C' crippled a sensible inference to an inference of nonsense.34 We have now seen two examples where the conditional fails to capture a sense of 'if....then....' according to which we can argue that it fails to satisfy the (CET). While the material-conditional is capable of handling many standard inferences such as transitivity (“If all A's are B's, and all B's are C's, then all A's are C's.”) and modus ponens (“A is true. If A is true then B is true. Therefore, B is true.”), it fails to satisfy the (CET) in other cases. However, classical-logic is said to be an outstanding logic insofar as the following principle is valid: 'Ex Contradictione Quodlibet' (ECQ) (also called ex falso quodlibet – from a contradiction, whatever you like follows) 33

See Priest, 'Introduction to Non-Classical Logic', p. 82.

See the section on 'Intuitionist and Relevant Logics' for a discussion of relevance.

34

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(ECQ): P & ~ P entails Q (1) P & ~P (2) P (3) ~P (4) P v Q (5) Q

ASM [1] 1, Conjunction Elimination [1] 1, Conjunction Elimination [1] 2, Disjunction Introduction [1] 3,4 Disjunctive Syllogism [1]

However, (ECQ) is a highly 'irrelevant' principle and is a blatant violation of the (CET) since the antecedent of this entailment claim has nothing to do with the consequent on any level whatsoever. Moreover, this principle does not cohere well with perfectly reasonable, inconsistent beliefs that we are justified in having. 35 This is the prime objection to (ECQ). Such objections often come from the so-called 'Relevant Logic' and 'Conditional Logic' camps to which we turn now.

Intuitionist and Relevant Logics Consider now the infamous 'paradoxes of the material-conditional',36 both of which are valid inferences in classical-logic.

(P1) P & ~P entails Q (this is just ECQ) (P2) Any proposition Q entails P v ~P (from a truth any tautology follows) It is clear that the antecedents of both entailment claims lack relevance with respect to their consequents and therefore violate the (CET); P has nothing to do with Q, given that P does not equal Q. As was demonstrated in the case of (AF) and (AS), in no sense is it necessary that the conclusion share anything relevant with the premises in classical-logic. Both (P1) and (P2) are problematic for reasoning in a classical-logic manner and are clear violations of the (CET).

Given the problems that classical-logic has with regards to relevance, some logicians began creating logics called 'Relevant Logics'. As shown with the paradoxes of the material-conditional there are clear instances of irrelevance between the premises and the conclusion – Relevant Logics seek to repair this relationship. In the system 'B' (for Basic), the following formulas and rules of inference are all valid:37 (A1) A >> A38 (A2) A >> (A V B) (and B >> (A V B)) (A3) (A & B) >> A (and (A & B) >> B) (A4) A & (B v C) >> ((A & B) v (A & C)) (A5) ((A >> B) & (A >> C)) >> (A >> (B & C)) (A6) ((A >> C) & (B >> C)) >> ((A v B) >> C) 35

See the section on 'Dialetheism' for further discussion.

See Priest, 'Introduction to Non-Classical Logic', section 1.7 to 1.10 for details.

37 Priest, 'Introduction to Non-Classical Logic', pp. 192-193.

38 We draw a distinction between ' ⊃' and '>>'; the former is understood to be a materialconditional while the latter is understood to be a relevant-conditional.

36

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(A7) ~ ~A >> A (R1) A, A >> B entails B (R2) A, B entails A & B (R3) A >> B entails (C >> A) >> (C >> B) (R4) A >> B entails (B >> C) >> (A >> C) (R5) A >> ~B entails B >> ~A (A1) – (A7) and (R1) – (R5) refer to the axiom schemas and rules of inference respectively for 'B'. The philosophical motivation behind the construction of relevant logics is to satisfy the (CET) in a very direct way. According to Priest, it is a necessary condition for A to entail B, in the system 'B', if A and B both share a propositional parameter in common.39 All of the following are valid: modus ponens (R1), conjunction elimination (R2), a variant of contraposition (R5), disjunction introduction (A2), distribution (A4), among many others. The system 'B' therefore looks to be an adequate logic capable of solving problems of relevance that plagued (AF) and (AS). It is clear that the paradoxes of the material-conditional are invalid in 'B' and that 'B' is a logic capable of maintaining the rational kind of relevance one would need to maintain beliefs suitable to the actual world.

However, 'B' has its own issues. First off, the possible-worlds semantics for it is unparsimonious.40 Second, (A7) isn't the best principle to accept, especially if one has intuitionist-logic sensibilities. The intuitionist denies double-negation elimination (~ ~A entails A) but they have no problems with the opposite inference (A entails ~ ~ A).41 Their reasons are quite rational. The intuitionist-negation is to be interpreted as “it is provable that it is not provable that...” As such, the symbol '~' is not to be interpreted as “it is not the case that...” but instead to be interpreted as a symbol concerning provability. So 'P' means “It is provable that 'P' ” and '~P' means “It is provable that it is not provable that 'P'...”. With this in mind, consider the 'Continuum Hypothesis' - the thesis that there are no infinite sets whose size is intermediate between the natural numbers and the real numbers.42 The logician Kurt Godel demonstrated in the 1940s that the negation of the hypothesis is not provable from the axioms of standard set theory. However, it does not follow that the 'Continuum Hypothesis' is provable. On the otherhand, if something is proven (such as the existence of an infinity of prime numbers

by Euclid), then it follows that is provable that it is not provable to prove that it is unprovable ( 'P' entails ~ ~ 'P'). Moreover, logical-exhaustion is rejected since it is not true that every mathematical conjecture is provable or disprovable.43 For the classicallogician, he/she would make no distinction between the notions of provability and truth.

So while it is rational to accept (A7), on the basis that the negation-connective '~' is to be interpreted as “it is not the case that,” it is rational only insofar as one subscribes to both the principles of exhaustion and exclusion and that they are not concerned with the 39

Ibid., p. 172.

Ibid., see section 10.2 on the tableau for 'B'.

41 See Priest, 'Introduction to Non-Classical Logic', p. 109 and p. 111.

42 Berto, p. 164.

43 In fact, according to Godel's first incompleteness theorem, if a formal system is capable of producing a certain amount of arithmetic then there are necessarily undecidable propositions in the system. See Berto, pp. 98-99.

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details of provability. Unfortunately, intuitionist logic is subject to all the problems that classical-logic has since intuitionist logic may prove all of the following valid: (ECQ), (AS), (AF), as well irrelevance between antecedent and consequent. Further, (A4) is contested by quantum logic44. Intuitionist logic's primary strength over classical-logic is its ability to distinguish between truth and provability, as its possible-worlds semantics is technically constructed for precisely that task.45 The primary shortcoming of 'B' is its abstruse ternary-relation, as concerns its possible-world semantics. Considering its conceptual adequacy, namely its ability to satisfy the (CET), 'B' is a strong logic for the task of reasoning about a variety of situations. Also, a relevant logic called 'R' (in a similar family as 'B') is a strong enough logic that it is capable of proving relevant arithmetic absolutely consistent.46 However, relevant arithmetic is incapable of proving a small subset of Peano arithmetic (the first-order system of choice in the early 20thcentury), so it is not as strong as one would like it to be for grounding mathematics.

Despite its shortcomings, relevant logics have been used as the basis for other mathematical theories.47 One may object by stating that in the realm of pure-logic and mathematics, “application to the 'real-world'� is not a necessary, nor (in some cases) a useful, criteria to adhere to. Indeed, number theory is a discipline within mathematics that is notoriously pure, and often devoid of real-world applications, yet logical reasoning (especially 'the law of excluded middle' and 'the law of non-contradiction)48 is crucial for deciding properties of integers. For example, the theorem that if n is an odd integer then 3n + 7 is an even integer relies on the assumption that a number cannot be both even and odd at the same time. The proof is as follows: if n is odd then n = 2k + 1, for some integer k. Therefore, 3(2k + 1) +7 = 6k + 3 + 7 = 6k + 10 = 2(3k + 5). Since 3(2k + 1) +7 = 2(3k +5), and 3k +5 is an integer, we know that 3n + 7 is an even integer if n is an odd integer. We know that it cannot be odd as well since we cannot make 6k + 10 = 2q+ 1 for any integer q. This theorem has no currently known application to the real world yet it may be useful for real-world application in the future.

It can be responded that while a condition of relevance is not important for reasoning in pure mathematics and logic, it is important when dealing with the realworld. As the examples in the section 'The Elusiveness of Entailment' demonstrate, questions of relevance are of the utmost importance if a real-world agent is to rationally model itself after a formal logic to reason about the world.

Another objection would be that issues of relevance are not important in pure mathematics so long as neither (P1) nor (P2) are violated. For example, defenders of (P1) might claim that mathematics must rule out, to the best of its ability, any possibility whatsoever for contradictions since according to classical-logic, any proposition whatsoever follows from a contradiction. The first response to this is that it begs the question to say that it is a theorem of classical-logic that (P1) holds since that is the very theorem that non-classical logicians are questioning. Another response to this view is 44

Svozil, Karl. 'Quantum Logic: A Brief Outline', p.4.

See Priest, 'Introduction to Non-Classical Logic', chapter 6.

46 See Mares' encyclopedia article on 'Relevant Logic' on the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy website.

47 Ibid.

48 The law of excluded middle states that only one of P or ~P holds and not both.

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that the import of Godel's Second Incompleteness Theorem suggests that there does not exist a classically-consistent formal-system that can rule out the possibility of a contradiction, since if that system is consistent then it cannot prove its own consistency.

Indeed, if one accepts the axioms of a system like Peano Arithmetic, he/she must trust that the axioms are consistent from the get-go. To this defers of (P1) can claim that contradictions are inherently absurd, to which dialetheists proclaim that they are again begging the question.

Dialetheism Graham Priest pioneered the study of dialetheism – the study of true contradictions - in his seminal text 'In Contradiction'.49 I will briefly survey some of his arguments in favour of this position and then defend each of them from criticisms from adherents of classical-logic. If Priest is right, there are rational reasons that nonparaconsistent-logics50 are incapable of accounting for certain facts – namely, facts that are true contradictions.

I will analyze first the infamous Liar's Paradox and its variants. There are two types of Liar's Paradoxes: semantic and set-theoretic.51 I will focus primarily on the semantic variants. Consider the sentence '(δa)': (δa) “ (δa) is false.” (δa) states that it is itself false. This is because (δa) has (δa) within itself where this second (δa) refers to the entire sentence, of which it itself is part of, as (δa). So (δa) is self-referential sentence that picks itself out as its referent. Let us consider the truthvalue options of (δa). If (δa) is false, then it is false that it is false. If it is false that (δa) is false then it is true, since it states exactly that it is false. Hence, it is true. But if it's true then we are back at the beginning and are led to believe it is false. However, it does not necessarily follow that the sentence is true, if it is false, since it could well be neither true nor false. While a double-negation, in classical-logic, is said to be equivalent to a truth of a proposition, this is so only because classical-logic is a bivalent logic – that is, a logic that accepts only two truth values: true and false. Classical-logic is therefore a logic that is exhaustive: every proposition is either true only or false only. Furthermore, classical-logic is exclusive since it has as a principle that: ~(P &~P) – nothing can be both truth and false. However, for the many-valued logician, it is perfectly coherent to 49

The majority of the examples here are taken from Priest, 'In Contradiction' with my own argumentation and rationale inserted. For a more rigorous defence of dialetheism, see all of the rest of references listed under Priest's bibliography as well as essays in Priest et al. 'Law of NonContradiction'.

50 A logic is paraconsistent if and only if it is capable of proving contradictions without allowing the provability of any arbitrary sentences as a result. Thus a distinction may be made between 'negationinconsistency' and 'absolute-inconsistency'. A logical system is 'negation-inconsistent' if it capable of proving at least one proposition 'p' and its negation. A system is 'absolutely-inconsistent' if for every proposition 'p', it and its negation are provable. In classical-logic, 'negation-inconsistency' necessarily entails 'absolute-inconsistency'. In paraconsistent logics, this inference fails; paraconsistent logics may be 'negation-inconsistent' without being 'absolutely-inconsistent'.

51 Priest, 'In Contradiction', p. 9.

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accept a third truth-value, i, where i may be defined as “neither true nor false” - hence, capable of ascribing a truth-value gap.52 Therefore, the truth-value of i may be ascribed to (δa) rendering the paradox non-contradictory; instead, (δa) is neither true nor false under a paracomplete interpretation.53 The paracomplete interpretation might bother the classical-logician. The classical-logician wants to say that (δa) is a perfectly reasonable sentence that is capable of having a truth-value, since it is of the form 'x' is 'F' where something is being claimed to have the property 'F'. Further, the classical-logician might object that i is not really a truth-value since i lacks any positive-value. The paracompletist might reply by arguing that it doesn't want to get into contradictions and so argues that it is taking the safe route by denying logical-exhaustion, and claims that it is perfectly reasonable to deny that everything is either true or it is false. Since accepting a bi-valent interpretation of (δa) entails an unending vacillation between truth and falsity, the paracompletist argues that i is the reasonable path to go down. Now, if the classical-logic accepts that (δa) is true if and only if it is false, then the classical-logician is at fault for accepting a contradiction, which therefore causes them to believe everything is true. The paracompletist is at fault for failing to live up to the task of assessing the truth-value of (δa).

At this point the dialetheist comes on the scene. The dialetheist believes that there are true contradictions – that it is rational to believe some propositions and their negations simultaneously. The dialetheist accepts a third truth-value, besides true only and false only: both true and false. (δa) is precisely one example of rationally believing a true contradiction. Re-iterating the previous argument, (δa) says about itself that it is false. However, if it is false then we know that it's true. But if it's true then it's false, since that's what it says. We are now committed to the following two conditionals: (C1) “If (δa) is false, then it's true.”

(C2) “If (δa) is true, then it's false.”

So if we accept that it is false then we accept that it is true. If we accept that it is true then we accept that it's false. Since the only four options are true, false, neither true nor false, and both true and false, the dialetheist is perfectly able to claim that is both true and false. They reason that since accepting (δa) to be true entails falsity and accepting (δa) to be false entails truth, they accept that is (δa) is both true and false.

Immediately, the classical-logician might complain that the dialetheist is a Trivialist.54 But this is not so. The dialetheist only believes that some contradictions are true – not that all of them are. So the dialetheist does not unconditionally accept such claims as “It is raining and not raining” or that “two plus two equals four and two plus two does not equal four”. The dialetheist only accepts claims what he/she feels is rational to accept; this may vary depending on context. In the case of (δa), an 52

For example, the logics K3 and L3 allow a third truth-value of neither true nor false. See Priest, 'Introduction to Non-Classical Logic', section 7.3 for more details.

53 A paracompletist accepts that there are 'truth-value gaps' – that there are propositions that are neither true nor false.

54 The position that everything is true is called 'Trivialism'. For discussions on the implications of such a view, and how dialetheism avoids Trivialism, see Priest, 'Could Everything Be True' and Priest, 'In Contradiction'.

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assessment of the consequences of accepting the truth of (δa) lead us to believe that is false, and vice-versa for accepting its falsity. The dialetheist reasons that we should abandon our presuppositions about exclusion and exhaustion and we should accept that this is a bona fide true contradiction.

The next objection would be that to accept that this is a true contradiction is to accept that everything is true since a contradiction entails that everything is true. The dialetheist responds by saying that it is not an unconditional rule that ex contradictione quodlibet holds. In the logic RM3 (standing for the paraconsistent logicians Routley and Meyer), the truth of a contradiction does not entail any arbitrary sentence. This is because of its particular conditions on validity. Validity is defined in RM3 as the structure: <V, D, {fc ; c is a member of C }> where V is the set of truth-values {1,0, i}, D is the set of values that are preserved in valid inferences called 'designated values' {1,i}, and C is the set of all connectives in the language: {&,?,~, ⊃}.55 A counter-model is provided by considering v(p) = 1 and the v(q) = 0 for the ex contradictione quodlibet argument: P & ~P entails Q (ECQ). Since the set of designated values in this logic is {1, i }, and 0 is not a member of the set of designated values, the inference is invalid. Thus the dialetheist is immune from Trivialism. The dialetheist now has the upper-hand on both the classical-logician and the paracompletist since he can coherently assign a truth-value to (δa). Thus dialetheism is the most adequate position to assessing the truth value of this claim.

It may further be objected by the classical-logician and the paracompletist that RM3 is an entirely ad hoc logic – it adds the third truth-value just to get around semantic paradoxes and its inability to express 'antecedent falsity', among a few other inferences, is a drawback.56 However, as we have seen (AF) is not a principle worth accepting.

Moreover, RM3 is capable of proving transitivity, antecedent strengthening, modus ponens, contraposition, and certain forms of distribution, among other commonly used inferences. These inferences, frequently used by logicians, are still usable within the framework of RM3. Furthermore, RM3 invalidates many irrelevant rules of inference such as ex contardictione quodlibet as well as necessarily-true conditionals that have a tautology as a consequent. So RM3 is not as ad hoc as it initially might seem; in fact, it is quite powerful and relevant to one's interests. We turn now to the so-called strengthened liar to see how well classical-logic, paracomplete interpretations, and paraconsistent/dialetheic interpretations fair.

Consider now the sentence: (δb) “(δb) is not true.” '(δb)' is an unavoidable dialetheia irrespective of whether one accepts a paracomplete57 account of (δb) or not.58 This is because (δb) is a sentence that states 55

See Priest, 'Introduction to Non-Classical Logic', section 7.2.

See Ibid, p. 126 for a detailed table demonstrating what is derivable in what system.

57 A paracompletist accepts that propositions may be neither true nor false. That is, they are someone who rejects that sentences are either true only or false only. The existence of propositions which lack truth-values are called 'truth-value gaps'. See Priest, 'Introduction to Non-Classical Logic', p.127 for more details.

58 See Priest, Beall, Bradley Amour-Garb's collection of essays on the 'Law of Non-Contradiction' 56

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that it is not true. Suppose (δb) is not true. Then it is what it says it is. But then it is not true that it is not true. So it is true, since what is states is now true. The paracompletist may try the same tactic as in the case of (δa). However, since 'being neither true nor false' falls into the realm of 'not-true', this tactic fails; the paracompletist is committed to either agnosticism or to dialetheism with regards to (δb). Similar objections go toward the classical-logician as illustrated in responses to (δa). Thus (δb) is a full-fledged true contradiction.

Dialetheism is not limited to such semantic paradoxes. For example, Russell's Paradox of set-theory may be interpreted coherently to be a case where 'the set of all normal59 sets is both a member of itself and not a member of itself', so long as we tweak the appropriate logical machinery to invalidate (ECQ).60 Moreover, consider the following set of laws held in a hypothetical country61: (*) No first-nations person shall have the right to vote. (%) All those who own property have the right to vote.

Let us say that as this country became more progressive they allowed a third law to pass: (#) First-nations now have the right to own property.

What are we to say of the voting-status of a First-nation living in a country whose laws contain (*),(%), and (#)? The dialetheist argues that first-nations people would both have the right to vote and not have the right to vote. While it may be objected that no country would pass such laws, it is plausible that due to the immense amount of legislature that is passed in countries world-wide that inconsistencies are imbedded, hidden deep within. So, it remains a fact of the matter that until one of the above three laws is changed, there exists a true, contradictory law within the country's legal code.

Again, a classical-logic would be incapable of reasoning fairly about these laws.

If a single inconsistency were found in the law, the classical-logician would be right in being permitted to do anything they choose to do whatsoever.62 Since there is good evidence that humans make mistakes, even in the creation of laws, we should not think it rational that people are allowed to do whatever they want if they find a contradiction in the law. A society that allowed classical-logicians to argue this way would allow classical-logicians to take over the world very quickly, since they could make it for more detailed discussion, specifically the first two papers by Priest and Beall.

59 A set is normal if and only if it is not a member of itself. So the 'set of all cats' is itself not a cat and is therefore a normal set.

60 See Ross Brady's essay 'On the Formalization of the Law of Non-Contradiction' for inconsistent set-theories that don't explode. The essay can be found in Priest et al., 'Law of Non-Contradiction'.

See especially a discussion on the work on inconsistent arithmetic done by De Costa and Arruda, pp.

43-44.

61 Sadly, these likely are either still in place or have happened in reality at one point or another.

However, the veridicality of this scenario is besides the point of the discussion.

62 The argument is as follows. Let us say that it is permissible that P and impermissible that P. Then it follows that either it is permissible that P or that it is permissible that Q. Since it is impermissible that P it then follows that it is permissible that Q (via disjunctive syllogism; (DS) ).

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permissible that they create an entire new constitution for each contradiction they found in a country's legal coding. Whether or not one would mind classical-logicians taking over the world is besides the point. The point is that a dialetheist, who does not accept ex contradictione quodlibet, will be the far more rational agent in this debate since he will not think it rational to be at liberty to do whatever he likes and is only at the cost of believing a true contradiction.

One may still argue that all the aforementioned “true contradictions” are still not quite real contradictions since they are language and society are human constructs. I argue that we should consider the metaphysical status of change, something I argue is an example of spatio-temporal dialetheias.

Consider a glass breaking against a table.63 Let t1 be the interval of time, one second away from being 'not-intact' (broken), when the glass is 'intact'. Let t3 be the interval of time, one second after the moment of impact, in which the glass is 'not-intact' (broken). Let t2 be the single instant at which the glass is between t1 and t3 – the point at which the glass is symmetrically divided in time between t1 and t3. What is the status of t2? There are only four options: 'intact', 'not-intact', 'neither intact nor not-intact', or 'both intact and not-intact'. Which is it? Say that one argues that t2 is a time of intactness. This is false since we are not considering some time t such that t1 < t < t2, which is the period of intactness. Similarly, it is false that it is not-intact since the period of not-intactness is defined as some time t such that t2 < t < t3. The paracompletist says that it is neither. This is a borderline irrational position to hold since we are denying an aspect of the spatio-temporal world any property.64 The dialetheist, however, can say that t2 is both intact and not-intact and can say so coherently due to their paraconsistent principles. Thus, the dialetheist is able to provide a coherent account of a metaphysical dialetheia whereas other logics fail to. As has been shown, non-dialethic logics are again incapable of reasoning in all situations, especially inconsistent ones. At this point, a question may be raised as to whether we might be confusing what can be reasoned about with what one does reason about. While a contradiction entails the truth of everything in classical-logic do we have to draw such a claim? Are all classical-logicians forced to believe the truth of everything if we believe a single contradiction? This leads naturally into a discussion of the distinction between having beliefs and drawing those beliefs where the former does not necessarily entail the latter.

Validity Susan Haack distinguishes between two types of validity: syntactic and semantic:65

63

Thanks to Jon Cogburn for inspiring this example.

Not just any property is being denied – it is the property of bi-valence in a deep, metaphysical sense. For if one wants to deny that “it is neither raining nor not raining” what then is the weather? The same question should be directed to the paracompletist – what is the status? A paracomplete interpretation denies any property since 'neither intact nor not-intact' rules out any other possible option available (besides of course, both true and false). A paracomplete interpretation will be inadequate in comparison with any interpretation that is capable of providing a positive, rather than a negative, answer to the question.

65 Haack, p. 113.

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'Syntactic-validity' (SV): An argument with premises A1,...An-1 entailing An is syntactically valid (in Language 'L') just in case the conclusion, An, is deducible from the premises A1,...An-1, and the axioms of 'L', in virtue of the rules of inference of 'L'.

'Semantic Validity' (MV): An argument with premises A1,...An-1 entailing An is semantically valid (in Language 'L') just in case it is impossible for the premises (A1,...An-1) to be true while the conclusion (An) to be false.

Haack's definition of (SV) is broad enough to be applicable to a range of nonclassical logics since it has no definition of truth imbedded within it. It is directly analogous to Douglas Hofstadter's concept of the 'mechanical-mode', where one simply follows rules without having to attach any semantic content.66 However, as it concerns the discussion of when to choose a logic for what task, we are more concerned with a semantic account of validity (MV). Once truth is added to the definition of validity, matters can quickly become controversial since it is a non-trivial question to ask how many truth-values are involved in such a definition of validity. Since Haack avoids this issue, my focus will be primarily upon (MV). Haack doesn't discuss in her paper what an account of validity is besides a syntactic rule-following nature or an account based on truth. I argue that what we should accept as valid any arguments that are rationally justified. What amounts to rational justification will be explained within the context of the issues discussed in the following.

One problem with Haack's conception of (MV) is that it is applicable only to the case of a logic that accepts 'true' and 'false as its only truth-value. As such, it is an inapplicable criterion for the majority of non-classical logics, especially a paracomplete logic such as L3 or a dialetheist logic such as LP. For example, in 'Normal Modallogics',67 validity is defined as an ordered-triple <W, R, v > where W is a non-empty68 set containing possible-worlds, R is a set of all the binary-relations between the possibleworlds, and v is a function that assigns a truth-value (true or false) to each pair comprising a world, w, and a sentence, p.69 So claims involving the modal-notions of 'possibility', 'necessity', 'contingency', and 'impossibility' may be reasoned mathematically in a rigorous way with this account of validity. However, there are a few problems. Consider a person who is walking from one room to another room. At time t1, the person is in room 'a'; at time t3, the person is in room 'b'. Let t2 be the single, symmetrical instant at which the person is between both rooms. Is the person in room 'a' or room 'b'? If one were to argue that the person is in room 'a' they would be mistaken since the person is at the exact instant between both rooms (e.g. the threshold of the door). Similarly for arguments in favour that the person is in room 'b'. Someone 66

Hofstadter, p. 194.

The use of the word 'normal' here is not meant as a description of “usual” or “conventional” modal-logics but has a precise meaning. 'Normal' is used to differentiate a possible-worlds semantics that differs from 'non-normal' modal-logics, where the semantics of 'non-normal' logics allow everything to be possible and nothing to be necessary. See Priest, 'Introduction to Non-classical Logic', chapter 4 for details.

68 'Non-empty' is a non-trivial condition. For what would a model of something be if there were no possible states of affairs – that is, no possible worlds? Such an empty model is not a candidate for the kind of validity I intend to discuss.

69 Priest, 'Introduction to Non-Classical Logic', p. 21.

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who accepts truth-value gaps would argue that the person is in neither since he/she is not in room 'a' nor in room 'b', since he/she is in the exact threshold point. So long as the truth-value gappist maintains their reasoning within the context of a three-valued logic paracomplete logic, such as K3 or L3, their position is perfectly rational. On the other hand, someone who accepts truth-value gluts would argue that the person is both in room'a' and not-in room 'a' (as well as both in room 'b' and not-in room 'b'). Similarly, so long as the truth-value gluttist maintains their reasoning within a paraconsistent logic, such as LP or RM3, their position is perfectly reasonable as well.

While a classical-logician will complain that contradictions can never be true because they are inconsistent, the classical-logician is begging the question since what is at issue here is why inconsistency is an unconditionally invalid way to reason. As is shown in the previous cases of dialetheism, there are reasonable candidates for there being true contradictions and so long as one adheres solely to a paraconsistent logic one can argue coherently about such cases. It is therefore reasonable to accept that the person is both in room 'a' and not-in room 'a' or that they are in neither (the paracomplete interpretation). The existence of paracomplete and paraconsistent interpretations of the room scenario are both objections to the account of validity as defined by (MV), since the definition fails to account for the truth-values 'both true and false' and 'neither true nor false'. So (MV) fails to account for all kinds of inferences we take to be rational. One may object that the scenario involving single-instants of time was an ad hoc example irrelevant to the issues that we often reason about. To this I respond that there are many other cases too where accepting an account of validity that is strictly bi-valent will be problematic.

Consider which of the two claims is true. (σ 1) 2 + 2 = 78 (σ 2) 2 + 2 = 3.99 Immediately, we want to say that neither is true. This is a perfectly reasonable response since in mathematics accepting only the truth, and nothing but the truth, is a rational criteria for assessing arithmetical claims. Even though (σ 2) is closer to the truth than (σ 1), truth is an all-or-nothing game in bi-valent logics. However, consider these two sentences: (S1) “Evening begins at 7pm.”

(S2) “Evening begins at 6pm.”

This is more challenging since it is not well-defined what constitutes 'the evening'. If you were to tell your friend that you would come over to his/her house in the evening for dinner, would you think that S1 or S2 is the true 'evening'? For the classicallogician, one of them has to be the “true evening” since it cannot be the case that “the evening begins at 7pm” and “it is not the case that the evening begins at 7pm” (i.e. - that evening begins at 6pm) due to both (ECQ) and logical-exclusion. Which is it? How are the friends to decide when the evening and the meal begins? One method that is frequently used is to designate an ad hoc time for when 'the evening' begins. In this way, the military commander who says that the invasion begins at dusk will have a

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clearly defined time if he equates dusk with '19:00:00' – 7pm exactly at one time and '20:21:15' at another time. However, this is often not how we act in day-to-day conversations. We say we saw a “good movie” without defining what is meant by “good” and we say that “I'll see you around lunch-time at the basketball court” without establishing what exact time “lunch-time” is.

Standard bi-valent or paraconsistent/paracomplete interpretations of everyday language will be futile to give an adequate and appropriate semantics of such aforementioned sentences. One plausible alternative is to subscribe to a fuzzy logic which accepts any truth-value of 'x' (where 0 < x < 1, and 0 is absolutely false and 1 is absolutely true).70 This is a key example where what is considered a valid way of arguing is contingent upon what one wants to reason about. In classical-logic, it may be sufficient to subscribe to (MV) for deductive arguments. However, such a notion of validity is wildly different than the account of validity provided by a rigorous fuzzy-logic.71 If these objections are correct, it is unlikely that any universal account of semantic validity (MV) can be provided given that the reasonable application of manyvalued logics (such as fuzzy-logic) may be applied to scenarios where classical and paraconsistent logics are inadequate at assessing.

Quine and Putnam's Objections Writing in 1971, Putnam argues that logical results, once proven, remain “forever accepted as correct” and that “logic changes not in the sense that we accept incompatible logical principles in different centuries but in the sense that the style and notation that we employ in setting out logical principles varies enormously, and in the sense that the province marked out for logic tends to get larger and larger.” 72 The claim here is that logic changes only insofar as knowledge of logical consequences grows; what has been proven remains proven forever. For Putnam, once it has been proven that, for example, if A entails B, then A and C entails B (antecedent strengthening), this is an eternal classically-valid truth. To quote: “All this disagreement about fine points should not be allowed to obscure the existence of a substantial body of agreement among all logicians – even logicians in different centuries. All logicians agree, for example, that from the premises “all men are mortal and all mortals are unsatisfied” one may validly infer “all men are unsatisfied” even if they sometimes disagree about the proper statement of the general principle underlying this inference. Similarly, all logicians agree that if there is such a thing as the Eiffel Tower, then claim that “The Eiffel Tower is identical with the Eiffel Tower” is one that all logicians agree...So there is a “permanent doctrine" in logic.”73 In light of the previous discussions, this position is not as tenable as it may seem.

70

It is worth pointing out that fuzzy logic is unique from probability theory and they should not be confused with one another. See Ibid., chapter 11 for further details.

71 The definition is as follows: Let e be the determinate value, where e is 0 < e < 1, such that some given property 'p' has the truth-value 'x', where 'x' is also 0 < x < 1, for x > e. Correspondingly, for every e, taking the set of designated values De, {x: x > e}, will produce a definition of validity. Thus, some given set of premises 'Q' semantically entails a proposition 'A' if and only if for all interpretations, v, if v(B) > e , which is a member of the set of 'Q', then v(A) > e. See Ibid., pp. 224-226 for details.

72 Quine, Philosophy of Logic, p. 28.

73 Putnam, Philosophy of Logic, pp.6-7.

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Further, Putnam commits himself implicitly to a third truth-value when he claims that there are meaningless propositions, that is propositions that are neither true nor false.

Putnam provides the humorous example of: “if all boojums are snarks, and all snarks are eggelumphs, then all boojums are eggelumphs.” Putnam's reasons are that it isn't a valid statement; all he says in the passage (and in the rest of the book) it has the form of a logically valid statement, but, I think, it is is not a statement at all, and neither true nor false. Indeed, to call the previous sentence true requires some revision of the usual logical rules...The three components corresponding to p, q, and r are neither true nor false."

My own criticism is to ask what exactly is invalid about this inference? The reasoning is standard transitive reasoning: even a classical-logician could accept it. All that is required for semantic validity is that it is impossible for the premises to be true while the conclusion is false. This is still one of those cases! Just because each of the propositions lacks a truth-value doesn't mean that it is possible for the premises to be true and the conclusion false (rendering the proposition invalid). Indeed, it means that it is really impossible for the premises to be true while the conclusion is false since the premises in this case aren't either true or false. So validity is satisfied.

For Quine the truths of logic and mathematics are “true in all possible worlds.”

Quine argues that any non-classical logic (he calls them “deviant logics”) is not actually deviant since, according to Quine, such disputes between classical and non-classical logic are merely verbal disputes. To use Quine's example: suppose someone were to propound a heterodox logic in which all the laws which have up to now been taken to govern alternation [disjunction] were made to govern conjunction instead, and vice versa. Clearly we would regard his deviation merely as notational and phonetic.”74 This point is certainly granted: in the case of intuitionist negation, negation is not understood to be “it is false that...” but instead to be understood as “it is disprovable that...”. Thus, debates about intuitionist vs. classical negation are in some senses non-issues since they are speaking about different concepts.

Quine has a more contentious position on paraconsistent logics. To quote: “What if someone were to reject the law of non-contradiction and so accept an occasional sentence and its negation both as true? An answer one hears is that this would vitiate all science. Any conjunction of the form `P & ~P' logically implies every sentence whatever; therefore acceptance of one sentence and its negation as true would commit us to accepting [emphasis added] every sentence as true, and thus forfeiting [emphasis added] all distinction between true and false.

In answer to this answer, one hears that such a full-width trivialization could perhaps be staved off by making compensatory adjustments to block this indiscriminate deducibility of all sentences from an inconsistency. Perhaps, it is suggested, we can so rig our new logic that it will isolate its contradictions and contain them.

My view of this dialogue is that neither party knows what he is talking about.

They think they are talking about negation, `&', and `not'; but surely the notation ceased to be recognizable as negation when they took to regarding some conjunctions of the 74

Ibid., p. 81.

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form `p & ~p' as true, and stopped regarding such sentences as implying all others.

Here, evidently, is the deviant logician's predicament: when he tries to deny the doctrine he only changes the subject."75 The first problem with this view is that ex contradictione quodlibet only occurs in non paraconsistent-logics. Second, Quine presupposes that there is a single correct account of negation which is contentious since he says â&#x20AC;&#x153;they think they are talking about negationâ&#x20AC;? in a way that supposes there is objective concept of negation. 76 Third, if the reasoning about the Liar's paradox is correct, there are rational reasons to accept true contradictions. Quine does not consider the liar's paradox as rational since it is a contradictory statement; yet, this just begs the question because we are asking why exactly a contradictory statement cannot be true. If his reasons are only because of logical explosion, then the question is why should we accept logical explosion?

Basically, I think Quine begs the question in all three cases.

Conclusion The purpose of this paper has been to defend the view that the existence of a plurality of logical systems is fruitful for human knowledge and should be welcomed as useful conceptual tools instead of being received as a scandal of reason. I have argued that attempts at finding a single, all-encompassing logical system will likely fail and that we should instead investigate the consequences that can be drawn from various nonclassical logic systems as well as retaining the uses of classical-logic for more conventional purposes. No principles should be unconditionally ruled out a priori nor are they to be unconditionally ruled out a posteriori.77 If what I have argued is persuasive, each logical system is to be accepted on the basis of their ability to solve the problems contextually and need not be accepted in unrestrictedly general cases. As a consequence, logic should be seen as an area of inquiry that is not merely positivistic in nature but in part normative as well.

75

Quine, Philosophy of Logic, p. 81.

See Priest, 'Doubt Truth to Be a Liar' for sections questioning a universal account of what it means to negate a proposition.

77 Quine, 'Two Dogmas of Empiricism', p. 40.

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Rowe on Freedom

ANTHONY HOLBROOK, University of Arizona

Introduction Rowe explores the issue of human freedom and its relation to causality and moral accountability by presenting two historically significant doctrines, those most famously defended by Locke and Reid respectively. Both doctrines hold the volitional theory of action to be true, namely the theory by which an occurrence of a certain bodily motion or thought qualifies as an action if it is preceded by a certain act of will which is the cause of the bodily motion or thought. I will present the doctrine of Lockean freedom and Roweâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s criticism of it, followed by the doctrine of Reidian freedom and Roweâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s defense of it in the face of objections. Reidian freedom will then be evaluated as to its ability to act as a proper guide between actions deemed freely done and actions for which agents are held morally accountable. I will then develop my own criticisms of Reidian freedom and possible responses to those objections.

Lockean Freedom Locke was not concerned with whether or not the will is free per se, but preferred to focus his attention on whether or not a freedom to act is present. He distinguished between two types of actions: voluntary action and free action. A voluntary action is one which an agent wills to do and which is performed, presumably as a result of their willing to do it. A free action is a voluntary action with the additional constraint that had the agent willed to do otherwise, they would have been able to do otherwise. For Locke a

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free action is one which is within the agentâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s power to do if they will it and which is within their power to refrain from doing should they will to refrain from doing it.

Prima facie there is a potential problem for Lockean freedom concerning causal necessity, particularly for those in the necessitarian camp. Necessitarians hold that we have Lockean freedom and that our actions and acts of free will are subject to the laws of causal necessity, two ideas which intuitively seem to be at odds. The idea that our desires, judgments, and the prevailing circumstances we face are all causally determined and outside of our control implies that we cannot have acted differently than we did. But, as mentioned before, the Lockean is not concerned with whether or not the will itself is free to choose. All that matters is that, had the agent willed to refrain from the action or to do otherwise, then they would have been able to refrain or to do otherwise. The implication that we cannot, in actual fact, have done otherwise does not bear on the idea that if we had willed otherwise then we would have been able to do otherwise.

Rowe is not convinced by the Lockean insistence that freedom remains in the face of causal necessity and the determination of desires, judgments, and prevailing circumstances. If all of these factors are indeed causally determined, then our power of will is effectively reduced to a balancing act of weights on a scale. We would have no more power to will to do otherwise than a scale has the power to weigh otherwise when given a certain set of weights to balance. If our will to act is completely determined by causal necessity, then even though it is the case that had we willed otherwise we would have been able to do otherwise, there seems to be no way for us to actually have willed to do otherwise.

Another attack along similar lines on Lockean freedom is given in the form of a thought experiment involving a sitting man who refuses to rise and go to the window.

Had the manâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s legs been paralyzed, then he would lack the power to rise even if he had willed to rise and go to the window; in such a case he would not have Lockean freedom.

But if a machine had been attached to the man which forced him to will to remain sitting, then by Lockean freedom he would be free even though there is a very strong intuition that he is not free in such a case. The idea that our freedom to will has no bearing on Lockean freedom makes the doctrine unsatisfactory for Rowe. Rowe does not think there are responses which can save Lockean freedom in the face of these objections, and he takes Reidian freedom to present a better framework for conceiving of free will and its connection with moral accountability.

Reidian Freedom Reidian freedom counts an agentâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s liberty, their power over the determination of their own will, to be a crucial factor in determining whether or not an action is free.

There are two conditions which must be met under Reidian freedom in order for an act to be free, one negative and one positive. The negative condition requires that the act of will cannot have been causally necessitated by any prior events, either internal or external to the agent. The positive condition requires that the act of will is caused by the

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agent whose act it is. Taken together, these two conditions create a situation in which an agent is considered free by the Reidian doctrine of freedom. Patently, the negative condition prevents exactly the problem which faced the necessitarians who held to the Lockean conception of freedom; an agent cannot be free if their act of will is causally determined. The positive condition requires examination as to just what is meant by agent causation.

The motivation for agent causation is ensuring that every event has a cause whilst preserving the fact that agents can cause their acts of will. Reidians will not argue that there are events without causes, but they will argue that not all events have eventcauses. Some events, namely acts of will by agents, have agent-causes. Reid lays out three conditions for agent-causation: the agent must have the power to bring about a change in the world, the agent must exert their own power to bring about that change, and the agent must have the power not to exert their power to bring about that change.

The latter of the three conditions is a mechanism much the same as the ‘power to have done otherwise had they willed otherwise’ found in the Lockean conception of freedom.

An additional constraint is that no agent or event can cause an agent to agent-cause an event. This entails that in cases of coercion or physical constraint, the agent does not agent-cause the relevant event.

Freedom under the Reidian doctrine is a power over the determinations of will, and power comes in degrees. This means agents can have more or less freedom under various circumstances. In order to determine the degree to which an agent acts freely, Reid asks us to consider two factors: the degree of power over their will which the agent possesses apart from the influence of their desires and passions, and the strengths of their desires and passions. Power over the will is diminished as the agent becomes unable to resist their desires and passions; presumably this runs on a continuum between something like a small bribe and being tortured on the rack. But patently, judgments about the strengths of desires and passions can at best be only reasonable approximations. Degrees of freedom is intuitively correct, but does carry the consequence of making perfect and objective judgments about freedom nearly impossible.

Objections to Reidian freedom come from two main veins. The first is that the view is impossible because it is internally inconsistent or does not mesh with some wellestablished principle of causality or explanation. The second is that the possession of Reidian freedom is itself harmful because it makes an agent’s actions arbitrary and uninfluenced by motives, rewards, or punishments. Rowe focuses his attention on the former of the two types of objections. In particular, the most serious objection comes from the following line of thought: in order to bring about a change in the world, the agent must have exerted their power to bring about that change; but exerting that power is itself an event, and so must have had a cause of its own. This produces an infinite regress, and it is one which Rowe believes does actually fall out of Reidian freedom as it was originally drawn up by Reid.

Even though Reid’s view of agent-causation, in conjunction with the principle that every event has a cause, entails an infinite series of events in order to create even a single act of will, Rowe believes a solution to the problem is not hard to find. One

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possible solution is to stipulate that some acts of agents are basic acts, where basic acts are caused by the agent but not by any exertion of power or any other act. Indeed, the alternatives to accepting some acts as basic seem quite unattractive: accept the infinite regress, accept that some events are uncaused, or accept that acts of will are not events at all (this latter of which is explicitly shot down by Reid himself 78). Rowe thinks it is quite intuitive that some actions are caused by the exertion of a power by the agent in question, but that other acts are produced directly by the agent and not by any exertion distinct from the act of will which is produced. In fact, to deny the possibility of the latter is to deny agent-causation and assert that only events can truly be the cause of events.

Understanding agent-causation properly, it is implied that some events are agent-caused in a manner which does not require bringing any other event about as a means to producing the act of will. This effectively short-circuits the infinite regress. With Reidian freedom now slightly revamped, we can put it to the test as a guide to determining whether or not agents are to be held morally accountable for their actions.

Morality and Reidian Freedom Rowe holds that there are good reasons to doubt the traditional, and Lockean, claim that an agent is morally responsible for doing an action A only if she could have avoided or refrained from doing A. Prima facie it seems that if the above doubts are well-warranted, then an agent will not be morally responsible if she possesses Reidian freedom. If Reidian freedom is merely Lockean freedom with the additional requirement that the agent must have power over their will, then moral responsibility will fail to entail Reidian freedom. This would undermine what is arguably Reidâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s strongest point in favor of his view, namely the argument from practice. Whatever any theory suggests about freedom, it just is a fact that we make a practice of holding agents morally responsible for their actions in our everyday lives. If a theory of freedom cannot accommodate this fact and preserve the powerful intuitive relationship between moral accountability and freedom, then so much the worse for that theory.

But Rowe asks that we more closely examine Reidian freedom, and upon doing so we find that it is not actually a requirement that the agent had the ability to do otherwise; this makes it of a different kind than Lockean freedom and not just a modified version of it. All that is required for Reidian freedom is that if an agent wills to perform some action and does that action, then the action is free provided that they had the power not to will to do that action. There is no mention of having the power not to do the action in question, only the power not to will to do it. Quoting directly from Reid: â&#x20AC;&#x153;If, in any action, he had the power to will what he did, or not to will it, in that action he is free.â&#x20AC;?79 This allows us to distinguish the man who willingly remains within a locked room unaware that he cannot leave from the man who knows that he cannot leave. We can 78 79

Rowe 380 Rowe 381

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hold agents morally responsible for actions when they believe it is in their power to do otherwise even if they could not have actually done otherwise.

Perhaps the most interesting challenge posed to Reidian freedom is the mad scientist thought experiment, an argument advanced by Nozick and Frankfurt. Imagine that a mad scientist has gained access to your volitional capacity and can see your acts of will on a machine he has invented. What is more, his machine predicts your acts of will before they happen and allows him both to cancel your naturally occurring acts of will and to create acts of will in you that you would not have had otherwise. Now imagine that the mad scientist very much wishes Jones to be killed, and knows that you are presently deliberating whether or not you should kill Jones. In the first mad scientist scenario, his machine predicts that you are about to have an act of will not to kill Jones, so he intervenes and uses the machine to cause the act of will in you to kill Jones.

Then, you kill Jones.

Clearly, you are not morally responsible for killing Jones in such a scenario. Even though it is true that you willed to kill Jones in the end, you were not the agent-cause of that act of will. An important constraint on agent-causation is that no agent or event can cause an agent to agent-cause an event, and in the thought experiment the scientist causes your act of will. But the second mad scientist scenario is the truly challenging case. Consider the same situation as above, but this time after deliberating you decide for yourself to kill Jones without the mad scientist having to intervene. Then, as in the first case, you kill Jones. This time you are certainly the agent-cause of your act of will to kill Jones, as the mad scientist did not do anything. Yet bizarrely, it seems that you did not act freely in this second mad scientist case according to Reidian freedom. If your deliberation was going to lead to your having an act of will not to kill Jones, the mad scientist would have intervened just as in the first scenario. So it was not actually within your power to prevent your willing to kill Jones; you did not have the power to will to do otherwise. Therefore you were not free in your action and cannot be held morally accountable for killing Jones. Something has clearly gone wrong, Nozick and Frankfurt want to say, with Reidian freedom.

Frankfurt offers his own solution to the problem, claiming that circumstances which make it impossible for an agent to avoid willing otherwise (the mad scientist) only destroy moral accountability should those circumstances actually be brought about. In the second mad scientist scenario, since the scientist never actually had to intervene, his mere potential intervention does not serve as a morally mitigating factor. Rowe thinks Frankfurt’s move is not needed, and that instead we should draw a careful distinction between two different ideas: whether it is within the agent’s power not to will doing some action A, and whether it is within the agent’s power not to cause their volition to do A. Rowe mentions some of the factors which, according to Reid, influence whether or not an agent is the cause of their volition to bring about an act of will. These include the will of God, the agent’s continued existence, and the absence of causally determining factors which ensure such a volition’s coming about. In the second mad scientist case, it is the scientist whom is responsible for bringing about the act of will in

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you. The scientist does this only if you are about to have a volition to have the act of will not to kill Jones. While it was impossible for you to have the act of will not to kill Jones (the mad scientist would have interfered), Rowe thinks it is possible for you to have the volition not to kill Jones. Having such a volition would have prompted the mad scientist to cause the Jones-killing act of will in you, but you still would have had the volition. An agent’s having the volition to do A just is causing the act of will in the agent to do A, but we can still ask whether or not the agent was the cause of the volition.

By tightening up the distinction between volitions and acts of will, Rowe comes up with the following principle: “(P) – A person is morally accountable for his [voluntary] action A only if he causes the volition to do A and it was in his power not to cause his volition to do A.”80 Rowe believes this to be the best possible formulation of Reidian freedom. In the first mad scientist case, the mad scientist caused the volition in the agent and so the agent was not the agent-cause of their action and not morally accountable. In the second mad scientist case, the agent causes their own volition and had the power not to cause their volition, so therefore the agent is morally accountable.

In order to deal with a new mad scientist’s machine causing the agent to cause their own volitions, Rowe (following Reid) claims that such an idea is a conceptual impossibility.81 Because having the power to produce an effect implies the power not to produce it, the mad scientist cannot cause an agent to cause a volition. The machine might conceivably cause volitions, but by doing so the agent is no longer the agentcause of the ensuing act of will.

Final Objections and Conclusion There are three main objections I have to Rowe’s final account of Reidian freedom: the conceptual impossibility of causing an agent to cause their own volition, the idea of agent-causation, and a bizarre potential implication of a specific kind of lack of free will which I will call the dragon dilemma. To say that it is a conceptual impossibility to cause the agent to cause their own volition becomes problematic in a modified mad scientist case. Consider an agent who, unbeknownst to them, has a host of violent repressed memories which they have subconsciously anchored to the characteristic smell of the corpse flower. This agent is deliberating whether or not to kill Jones, and the mad scientist has the familiar machine predicting the forthcoming act of will. If the machine detects that the agent is going to have the volition to cause the act of will not to kill Jones, the mad scientist releases corpse flower odor and thereby causes the agent to cause their own volition to kill Jones. Perhaps we want to hold such an agent morally accountable, though that seems somewhat unfair. It comes down to the unfortunately difficult matter of determining the degree to which the agent had the power to overcome their desires and judgments in having volitions. If the agent was in no way empowered to overcome the violent anger of the repressed memories attached to the odor corpse flowers, then technically they were not free because they could not have had the volition not to kill Jones.

80 81

Rowe 383 Rowe 386

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Agent causation is a wonderful idea, but it does face this daunting concern. In the mad scientist case, there seems to be no objective way to determine whether or not the machine or the agent caused the act of will. If there is no discernable difference between agent-caused neurophysiological effects and mad-scientist-machine caused neurophysiological effects, then to say that one is agent-caused and one is not becomes a difficult distinction to make. Presumably the response to this would be that in order to determine agent-causation, one needs to be well informed about the overall system which the agent is a part of. A maximal knowledge of the system may not be necessary, but the presence of a mad scientist and his machine seems to be a large and noticeable difference that one could point to. If the mad scientist denies that he ever activated his machine, the first mad scientist case becomes problematic. Unless there is some way to examine the machine and determine whether or not it was activated, there is no way to tell whether the agent or the machine was responsible for the act of will to kill Jones. The solution to this might be to question the importance of thought experiments which so push the limits of possibility, but that seems an unsatisfactory response.

My final objection concerns the idea that, presumably, we are not free about some of our thoughts. Consider the agent who reads (as you are about to) the words “imagine a dragon.” I am supposing that, upon reading the words, such an agent would agent-cause an act of will to imagine a dragon. I am also supposing that the agent did not have the power not to will to do so. Given that the agent was conscious of and attending to the words, imagining a dragon after reading the words is analogous to the movement of the knee during a reflex test at the doctor’s office. This in itself does not pose a problem, as I take it we are not morally accountable for some of our thoughts (perhaps not for any of them). But the possibility of accumulating a large number of thoughts in an agent, thoughts which they are not free in having, over a long enough span of time might allow for an interesting case. Suppose a mad social scientist spends two decades prompting many of these unfree thoughts in an agent, and that these thoughts are violent in nature. This culminates in the agent having an act of will to commit a blatantly unjustified murder, but had the mad social scientist not spend so much energy and cunning planting the unfree thoughts then the agent would not have committed the murder.

In this case, the questions of freedom and moral accountability are equally murky. Rowe would probably respond by saying that the work of the mad social scientist was undermining the agent’s power over their will, slowly chipping away by degrees until the agent had none left in the case of whether or not to commit the murder.

Because of this, the agent did not have the power to have the volition to will to do otherwise and was therefore not free. Additionally, the fact that there were circumstances created by the mad social scientist which (by hypothesis) necessitated the agent’s committing the murder, the agent was not the agent-cause of their act of will.

Rowe’s defense of Reidian freedom does an excellent job of highlighting the main issues involved in discussions of free will and moral accountability. The problem of determining the degree of power an agent possesses based on their strength to resist

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desires looms most large, but I think this is a natural problem. It is, after all, part of what goes into determining mens rea during criminal law cases. The consequence of degrees of freedom is that we might be much less free than we had previously thought (unless you were an incompatibilist). Aside from that, although agent causation is intuitive in the sense that we all feel as though we have it, providing some sort of criteria for objectively determining it would be an enormous help in the defense of Reidian freedom.

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Freedoms Undone: Domination by Agents and Structures in Pettit's Republicanism MARIELA LIBEDINSKY, University of Toronto, St. George

Abstract “Freedoms Undone” is an academic essay that aims to critique and combat the views on freedom as non-domination as presented by Phillip Pettit in his work, “Republicanism”. The author focuses on the instability of Pettit’s theory of freedom and places emphasis on the less-than-ideal form of political society. The discussion is based around agents and non-agents of domination as well as visible and invisible dominators.

There include persons, forms of stigma, disability and accessibility as examples of freedom-required entities in society which Pettit lacks to address. The spectacle is focused on how we see freedoms: as physical or material things which limit us in nonphysical and non-material ways.

Understanding our freedoms has previously revolved around the division of two terms: positive and negative freedom82. Positive freedom refers to the idea that we are free to do as we please; we are our own masters. Negative freedom refers to the idea that we are free from; we have no masters over ourselves, we are free from domination.

Philip Pettit’s Republicanism: A Theory of Freedom focuses on the latter of these ideas.

The core of his political analysis is from a perspective where republicanism allows for an environment in which freedom reigns as non-domination. Freedom as non-domination is the idea that one can live in a society while exercising their liberty without being restricted by the freedoms or liberties of others. Pettit presents a series of examples, 82

Berlin, Isaiah (1958), Two Concepts of Liberty (Oxford: Oxford University Press)., 3

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which attempt to prove how freedom as non-domination is the most effective and just form of government. In this essay, I debunk his theory. I maintain that not only are Pettit’s views on republicanism weak as a form of government, but that freedom as nondomination is insufficient and incomplete, and in many cases hurts the relationships between agents and institutions.

This paper consists of the following six sections: Section I, titled Republicanism, outlines the main ideas behind Pettit’s theory of republicanism as a successful regime.

Section II explains Freedom as Non-Domination and it outlines the positive and negative connotations with Pettit’s theory. It provides a foundation of understanding for the following two sections. Sections III and IV are where I introduce the Visible and Invisible Dominators. I explore different ways in which Pettit’s theory lacks stability with regards to supporting and encouraging our freedoms in society from the relationships of agent-to-agents and agents-to-non-agents. Section V provides a potential reply on behalf of Pettit, and my personal counterargument. Following section V I provide a conclusion where I summarize the points of this essay.

Section I: Republicanism Before I delve into the issues of these abstract ideas I feel it is fundamental to understand the terms. Pettit describes republicanism as the “importance of having certain institutions in place…a mixed constitution, in which different powers serve to check and balance each other; and a regime of civic virtue, under which people are disposed to serve, and serve honestly, in public office”83. It is a democratic system in which a relationship of power, not dominance or interference, exists between authority and citizens. Therein are institutions such as judicial review and representatives for the peoples to provide outlets of contestation and reformation of the laws. Pettit argues that the republicanism ideal is the paramount political regime because it relies on freedom as non-domination as opposed to freedom as non-interference.

Freedom as non-domination is the main concept of the following section, so I will only focus on the idea of freedom as non-interference here. Interfering power is that of a bearer who has the capacity to arbitrarily rule over another person. This is true even if they would never come to use that power; the mere capacity to exercise it is enough to claim a potential interference84. Pettit deems this an insufficient form of freedom due to the symptoms that may arise as a result of even the chance for interference. The awareness that another person may have the capacity to arbitrarily disrupt your life, in positive or negative ways, is prone to cause anxiety, distrust in others and in your government, as well as impending subconscious limitations of freedoms upon yourself.

In my regard, this view is not all that different from what Pettit considers the ideal. Since

83

Pettit, Philip. (1997). Republicanism a theory of freedom and government. Oxford: Oxford University Press., 20 84

Ibid. 41

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we have established the key terms, allow me now to delve into the crux of Pettit’s republican form of freedom.

Section II: Freedom as Non-Domination In this section I will outline Pettit’s definition of freedom as non-domination. This will serve as a platform to understand the possible problems with regards to the vocabulary Pettit decides upon, as well as an introduction for the following two sections in outlining the problems with freedom as non-domination. Domination is formally defined as the relationship of master to slave or master to servant; the dominant part can interfere on the basis of an interest or an opinion that need not be shared by the person affected85. The interference is not necessarily arbitrary. The difference between domination and interference is that the dominated party is aware of the dominator and the power that they are being held against.

In an interfering relationship, this is not the case. Pettit attempts to convince us that freedom, as non-domination is better than freedom as non-interference. This is because, according to Petit, non-domination provides the basis for self-mastery86. Pettit calls freedom as non-domination as a “political ideal”87. To him, non-domination is explicated and expected well enough as an alternative from non-interference to support the trust in fellow citizens. In other words, non-domination removes the fears and anxieties of arbitrary power being upheld over you, so as far as discipline and legal limits are concerned88, non-domination is a fair balance. It is a fair balance between being your own master and having the law regulate what you can and cannot do. You are not being interfered with as far as the availability of your options go, but when it comes to what those options are, there are legal limitations, where Rousseau’s Social Contract is alluded to89.

Non-domination is more prominent in Pettit’s ideal republic because it upholds a high standard of trust and rationality between citizens. This means that in order for freedom as non-domination to work to its best effect, citizens must understand and abide by the laws. There are further issues with this view that I will only briefly mention but not discuss in depth in this paper. Some of these issues are with regards to equal representation in public officials and the screening process in which they arrive at their position. Many public officials are chosen for the job through non-democratic practices, so we must consider the morality and equality of their gaining the power to make choices on behalf of others when they were not democratically elected. Additionally, the problem of interest tracking appears. Once these public officials have been “selected”, part of their duty is to translate the problems of the citizens to the government. How can we be assured that our interests are getting represented in a fair and just way? These are some examples that deserve further examination with regards to the republic as a 85

Ibid. 22 Ibid. 82 87 Ibid. 80 88 Which I claim, are still a requirement.

89 Pettit, Philip. (1997)., 253 86

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whole, and freedom as non-domination as one of its many features. However, the problems of freedom as non-domination that I will focus on here are the following: agent-to-agent domination and agent-to-non-agent domination.

Section III: Problem One: Visible Dominators This first problem is two-fold: first, there is the domination of freedoms between people. Second, there is the domination of freedoms between people and non-people.

In this case, I will discuss how buildings dominate the freedoms of physically disabled persons. What I will prove in this section is how the notion of freedom as nondomination in Pettit’s republican ideal is, indeed, ideal and incomplete. This notion of freedom is a lot more dominating than it may appear at first. Freedom as nondomination between persons has been addressed in the previous section as public officials. This differs from non-interference because the amount of power one person holds over another is not directly to one individual and it is not arbitrary.

For example, Nicolette works for the Toronto District School Board. She is in charge of allocating the budget surplus to appropriate programs throughout the district. Part of her job is to listen to presentations from different schools in order to learn about the programs that would benefit from extra funding. Nicolette was not elected into her position, she was chosen after a series of interviews. Her job allows her to have the authority over where money gets allocated. At the end of the day, regardless of the presentations, she may arbitrarily choose a program to give the extra money to. Are the freedoms of the schoolchildren and the program facilitators dominated by Nicolette’s choices at her job? Are their interests being tracked in a fair and just way? It appears that even though she does not have the power to dominate them directly 90, her decisions are impeding on the freedoms of others91. This example was meant to portray agent-to-agent relations as visible dominators. Next, I will pose an example showing agent-to-non-agent domination.

Anthony was in a major car accident when he was very young and as a result has lost the ability to walk. He uses a mobility assistance device, in this case, a wheelchair.

Anthony is window-shopping and sees something he likes in a store. He approaches the main entrance only to see that there is no accessibility ramp. He is forced to turn around and take his business elsewhere. Was Anthony’s freedom not dominated by the physical structure of the building in there not being an accessibility ramp for him to use?

These examples served the purpose of challenging Pettit’s view of freedom as nondomination. Freedom as non-domination is not as black-and-white as Pettit would like it to be. In the example cases from earlier, we must still consider; who is to blame? In the case of Nicolette, is it really her dominating others if she is just doing her job? Can we not trust that she has been well trained and equipped not to make corrupt choices? In Anthony’s case, is it the building doing the dominating, or can we trace back the blame 90 91

program.

Physically, or otherwise.

In this case, to organize the program for schoolchildren, and for the children to attend said

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to the contractors who didn’t think to put in an accessibility ramp in the first place? Or perhaps the safety inspectors? Or even the store manager? Is agent-to-non-agent domination possible, or can all modes of domination be traced back to human relations?

It is not enough to be faced with a problem, recognize it, and let it be. The value of political discourse is that there is room for improvement.

Pettit comments that “the ideal [republicanism and freedom as non-domination] is dynamic, because there is never a final account available of what someone’s interests are or of whether certain forms of interference – certain forms of state interference, in particular – are guided by ideas that they share”92. To me, this sounds like an account for a large margin of error. Indeed, these ideas are abstract so it is not expected that they will have right-or-wrong answers, but my goal here is to shine light on the fact that not only is republicanism not an ideal, it may in fact be hurting our freedoms more than helping them. If there is not a decisive and clear limit on this notion of domination, isn’t the problem just as “dynamic” as the potential solutions? Pettit makes a connection between freedom and enjoyment, where “the public life of a community is of the utmost importance for the enjoyment of non-domination”93. It is difficult to imagine how public life can be enjoyed when there are such dominations being enabled by the very “ideal” of the society. As far as visible dominators go, it is not sufficient to claim trust and contract between citizens and simply expect freedoms to be as respected, or more importantly, represented. It is worthwhile mentioning the topic of blame and intention of domination, but I will save this commentary for section V.

Section IV: Problem Two: Invisible Dominators This section belongs to the discussion of freedoms that are dominated by unseen dominators. As in the previous section I outlined physical barriers like buildings, in Anthony’s case, here I will focus on social structures. Social structures are the parts of society that set limits and moulds to our freedoms without physical restrictions. An example of a dominating social structure is stigma. What I argue here is that Pettit’s republicanism ideal and freedom as non-domination does not cover the protection for its citizens with regards to dominating social structures.

Allow me to present another example: Sarah is a young woman in her 20s. One evening she stays at her place of work longer than expected to cover for a coworker who has called in sick. Her place of work is conveniently close to her home; a mere twenty-minute-walk away. As she exist her office and begins walking home, she notices a man walking towards her. As he passes her, he makes a sexist remark about what she is wearing. She feels uncomfortable and unsafe, so she walks to the nearest intersection and hails a cab to take her home.

This is an example of how social structures have limited someone’s freedoms in spite of the ideal republican form on non-domination. Sarah was free to walk home, but 92 93

Pettit, Philip. (1997) 146 Ibid. 166

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sexism prevented her from doing so. Sexism is not a visible social structure in the same way that a building is a visible structure without an accessibility ramp. In this case, freedom as non-domination fails to protect its citizens on two accounts, exemplifying agent-to-agent domination as well as agent-to-non-agent domination. What is important to consider in this section pertaining to invisible dominations is that freedoms are still being limited regardless of no physical force being used. Stigma and social structures take many forms, but in this example, sexism is not a force that is physically limiting to Sarah. Here is the next problem: Sarah feels her freedom was dominated by the social structure of sexism. Who do we blame for this problem? The man for his sexist behavior? Sexism as the invisible dominator, even though there was no physical force used upon Sarah to make her change her mind about walking home? What about the state, who has the duty to protect its citizens and advocate for their interests (recall: interest tracking), but according to Pettit would be interfering with their freedoms if more rigorous forms of discipline were set in place.

Marilyn Freidman comments on about domination and feminism in a reply to Pettit titled, “Pettit’s Civic Republicanism and Male Domination”. She writes, “These structures and institutions [those that encourage, at least, don’t deter male domination] are not in any way diminished merely by policies of deterring individual men from dominating women, since law enforcement is inconsistent and may well be ineffective against the force of institutional support for male domination”94. Further, she, like myself, claims that Pettit’s form of republican ideal and freedom as non domination may be applicable in some sense, but the ideal is incomplete and insufficient as it stands: “Although Pettit does not emphasize these structural social reforms, they are not inconsistent with his account and suggest an additional amendment to his account that would improve its ability to deal with male domination”95. As we have seen, domination takes a variety of shapes and forms in order to limit the liberties of others. Pettit’s attempt to bracket off a selection of inevitable actions and situations in a normal society are what make his ideal less than so. In the following section I will focus on understanding where to place the blame or place of responsibility for the cause of domination. I will suggest a reply from Pettit’s perspective, as well as provide a reply of my own.

Section V: Contesting the Past, Challenging the Future This section will focus on the confrontation of the problems, understanding blame for the dominators and dissecting possible solutions for the current and future situations.

As we have seen, the problem of freedom as non-domination is anything but an ideal, as Pettit puts it. There is simply too much room for error and too many cases in which citizens can be dominated. This can occur in cases of visible or invisible agents, or nonagents. What is undeniably missing from this problem is the source. The source would be the place of blame; who do we penalize for the domination of other’s freedoms? In the examples I proposed it’s not always so clear if we blame a person, a movement, or a building. One thing is certain: the dominated is not to be blamed. Pettit would reply to 94 95

Ibid. 256 Ibid. 257

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this by claiming that indeed, it is not so much about blame as it is about intention. One must have the intention to be dominating in order for their actions, or in-actions, to be blame-worthy.

How can one take responsibility for the past if you don’t know the problems of the future?

Pettit would remind us of the restrictions and differences between dominating and interfering: interference is arbitrary, but dominance is with the intent of dismissing the interests of those being dominated. Is that really occurring here? It may not be possible to blame the people of the past for problems we currently have. After all, can we grant them the benefit of the doubt that they did not know they were dominating someone’s freedom? This is another rule for domination and interference: they must be aware of their doings. If we don't expect them to know about how their irresponsibility of their past to address important socio-political problems of the present, can we grant them the title of having been dominating the freedoms of others? Pettit would say that this is an invalid claim and these problems can only be worked on to be resolved in the future.

What I would like to propose next is a step in the direction to confront and solve these issues.

A further problem is that I do not see a way in which republicanism, as an ideal, can allow for this either. In order for a society and community to be unified constantly, we must work to rectify the ways in which domination is still present. We require the freedom to change the situation from now onwards; but this could be considered as interference. The only logical step is to remove the arbitrary work of citizens and establish laws that will only serve to protect the freedoms of others from nondomination. As Pettit says, a “system should constitute [of] an ‘empire of laws and not of men’”96. At this point, we are led back to the beginning. We recognize that none of the efforts are worth it if we cannot trust the citizens. In order for the solutions to be implemented and for domination to decrease, we must be willing to trust that citizens will follow the rules, just as we have expected them to abide by the laws of noninterference and non-domination. The difference now is that we are aware of what those dominators are, so we can address them. It is very possible that in the future this debate will be revisited and new dominators and few forms of the interference of freedom will have been realized. At that time, it will be another opportunity to refine these theories.

To me, it seems like the act of taking responsibilities should be about acceptance.

Once we are aware of the ways in which we have wronged someone, it is a moral duty to own up to those mistakes. We can see instances of this having occurred in recent history. For example, as the Government of Canada issued a formal apology to former students of the Indian Residential Schools97, we can see how this has been a step towards rectifying the domination of the freedoms of the Indian and First Nations Peoples of Canada. This could be considered an example of the domination of freedom between agents as well as non-agents. Similarly, we can see that the apology issued to 96 97

Ibid. 173 Statement of Apology. Harper, Stephen (2010, September 15).

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the LGBTQ Community by a Christian group98 had similar positive outcomes. In both cases, the issue of dominating freedoms was recognized and addressed properly in order to work towards finding a solution. Not all solutions follow apologies or are geared towards establishing funded programs for their former oppressed.

In the case of Stop Gap, the way a solution for dominating the freedoms of others from non-agents is by the building and donating of accessibility ramps. The group aims to raise awareness about physical disabilities and the ways in which we see this stigma in every day life99. These are just some examples that encourage us to stop thinking about society as leaves on a tree, and encourage us to think of society as a forest.

Conclusion The aim of this paper has been to focus on Philip Pettit’s notion of republicanism as an ideal and freedom as non-domination. What I have argued is that Pettit’s definition of freedom as non-domination is insufficient and incomplete in order to account for all the problems that currently happen in our society with regards to how freedoms are dominated. I posed a series of examples that showed how freedoms are dominated in an agent-to-agent relationship as well as in agent-to-non-agent relationships. This was done by the proposition of visible and invisible dominators. The ways in which stigmas and physical establishments in our societies limit our freedoms are just as significant, if not more so, than the limitations of our freedoms upon someone using excessive force. I provided a series of points of resolution, such as how it is a moral duty to own up to our mistakes, even of the past, and work together as community to find solutions and avoid further dominance.

Theoretically, Pettit could have pushed back on these propositions in a number of ways. For starters, we must decide whether it would be acceptable to blame those of the past for their decisions and how they have dominated the freedoms of the present, or could potentially limit those of the future. Is this a truly reasonable course of action?

Further, It could be argued that even our attempting to modify the laws in order to make them more accepting to others would be a form of domination. I concluded by posing a series of examples in which my suggestion for recognition and responsibility of domination has been successful and has allowed positive relationships between government and citizens to flourish. The aim here is to realize that we have come a long way from the initial establishments of societies, and likewise, the subjects of autonomy, representation and freedom have changed drastically. It is imperative to continue to evolve as a society to find problems and recognize solutions. In this model, there is no room for an ideal.

98

Crary, D. (2013, June 20). ‘We’ve hurt people:’ Christian group devoted to ‘curing homosexuality,’ shuts down, apologizes to gay community. National Post.

99 "StopGap: The Community Ramp Project." StopGap: The Community Ramp Project.

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Wading Through the Swamp of Political Legitimacy REBECCA BARRETT, University of Toronto, St. George

In his Second Treatise of Government, Locke posits that legitimate government power is limited. In this essay, I show his argument is based on the idea that a legitimate government is supposed to benefit its people by protecting their private property. When it works contrary to this fundamental role by harming its people’s property, it is acting illegitimately. This essay will consist of four parts. First, I will define the terms Locke employs in his argument. Second, I will reconstruct a Lockean government, to show that it is meant to benefit the people by protecting their private property. Third, I will show, with the use of an example, that a Lockean government uses it power illegitimately when it harms private property. Finally, I will analyze an implication that arises from this view: the problem generated by government owned property.

The concepts fundamental to Locke’s view of government include the commons, the ‘no harm’ principle, and appropriation. The commons is the world’s pre-societal state, wherein all resources belong to man in common, and no one is more inherently entitled to them than another.100 In the commons, man wanders around gathering resources to meet his needs. The ‘no harm’ principle is a formula that determines whether man can claim a certain resource from the commons.101 It dictates that man

100

John Locke, “Second Treatise on Government” in Two Treatises of Government, ed. Peter Laslett (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1988), 269, 286.

101 Ibid, 270-271.

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can claim a resource as long as doing so causes no harm to anyone else.102 If his conduct might reasonably be expected to harm someone, he must consult the negatively affected party to obtain consent before claiming the resource. 103 Appropriation is the term Locke uses to describe the non-violent act of taking a resource from the commons and making it one’s own.104 Appropriation is only just when it conforms to the ‘no harm’ principle.105 I will now reconstruct Locke’s hypothetical transition from commons to civil society to show that legitimate government is meant to benefit its people by protecting their private property. This transition from commons to civil society is the result of everyone wanting the ‘no harm’ principle enforced such that their private property will not be taken without their consent. As such, this enforcement is the mandate of a legitimate government. In the commons, men are given the world’s resources to share.106 But Locke argues that when men start to appropriate resources from the commons, as they do when they try to get food or water, those resources are no longer a part of the commons and therefore no longer available equally to everyone.107 They become private property, according to the ‘no harm’ principle. For when a man appropriates a resource, he uses his hands and mind to attain the resource – he exerts physical and mental labor.108 And once he exerts labor in attaining a resource, his peers may no longer appropriate that resource for themselves.109 For if a peer subsequently took the resource he had labored for, that labor would have been wasted since he did not get to reap its benefits.110 But to justly appropriate a resource and remove it from the commons, you must satisfy two criteria of the ‘no harm’ principle. The first is that you must not take more than you can use, since this would result in wasted resources.111 This harms others because you are withholding resources from them without cause. The second criterion is that there must be “enough and as good” left for others after you have appropriated your share, so that you do not harm anyone by taking the last of a resource they might also need.112 For example, Anna and Ben are in the commons. Anna sees a rabbit and catches it to eat. This is just according to the ‘no harm’ principle because it passes both the above criteria: first, she only caught one rabbit and can reasonably be expected to eat it before it spoils. Thus the rabbit will not be wasted, meaning her actions will not have unnecessarily denied Ben food. Second, there are plenty of other rabbits running

102

Ibid, 271.

Ibid, 289, 290-91.

104 Ibid, 286-288.

105 Ibid, 291.

106 Ibid, 286.

107 Ibid, 287-288.

108 Ibid, 288.

109 Ibid.

110 Ibid, 291.

111 Ibid, 290.

112 Ibid, 290-91.

103

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around for Ben to eat. Thus Anna has satisfied the “enough and as good” constraint by not significantly impacting her peer’s ability to catch his own rabbits in the future.

Next, say Ben sees Anna with her rabbit and wants to steal it. If he did this, Ben would be breaking the ‘no harm’ principle. If he stole the rabbit, he would be harming Anna because the labor she exerted in chasing and killing the rabbit will have been nullified and wasted.113 Furthermore, Anna can launch a justifiable war on Ben in defense of her claim over the rabbit, for she has earned a right to property, which is the rabbit, by investing her labor in it, according to the ‘no harm’ principle.114 Appropriation becomes a trickier concept when applied to limited resources, like land. In the case of land, there is an “initial land grab”, wherein all the available land is appropriated by the individuals who get to it first (let’s call them the wealthy). 115 The descendants of these first right-claimants come to own all available land, and all other people are left with nothing.116 Locke says the resulting unequal appropriation of land is justified by the wealthy when they heed the ‘no harm’ principle’s two criteria: 117 1. The unequal distribution of land is justified according to the spoilage criterion because the wealthy cannot farm their large estates themselves. 118 Thus to avoid the land remaining unfarmed and wasted, they exchange their perishable land for an imperishable resource of others that does not perish: money.119 The wealthy sell property rights to their land to those people who did not get land in the “initial land grab” and those people farm the land on the wealthy’s behalf to prevent it from spoiling. 120 2. The unequal distribution of land is also just according to the “enough and as good” constraint because the people who were unable to get land at the outset, though now obliged to pay rent for what was earlier free in the commons, nevertheless benefit.121 Though not enough land was left for them, they get access to the improved land that was developed by the wealthy’s ancestors.122 The already improved land of the wealthy is a more efficient growing environment than the virgin forest that they might alternatively have claimed if enough was left for them in the “initial land gab”.123 This presumably offsets any argument of not having “enough and as good” for lack of common resources because everyone maintains access to the resources of the land.

113

Ibid, 288.

114

Ibid, 272.

Ibid, 292.

116 As an aside, Locke seems to hold that property rights are transferrable to children upon their parents’ deaths, although his argument for why property rights are transferrable in general is not obvious.

In the case of children inheriting their parents’ land, we can assume that because children customarily helped work their parents’ land, they would have mixed their own labor into the land from an early age.

This gave the children a claim to ownership of their parents’ land.

117 Locke, “Second Treatise”, 293.

118 Ibid, 294-95.

119 Ibid, 294, 299-301.

120 Ibid, 295-6.

121 Ibid, 294-95, 299.

122 Ibid, 294, 295.

123 Ibid.

115

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By heeding the ‘no harm’ principle, the commons can develop from individuals appropriating rabbits to wealthy families appropriating estates. But as estates and accumulation of private property develops, there grows an increasing incentive to create government.124 For in the commons, there are no agreed-upon laws to dictate what is right or wrong, and no unbiased judge to mediate disputes or enforce right behavior. 125 Thus one’s hold on one’s property is insecure. For example, Ben means to steal Anna’s rabbit. In the commons, Anna can launch localized warfare against Ben, but that is undesirable to her because she is never assured absolute victory or security. 126 Alternatively, Anna might consent to live under a government that is designed to enforce universal laws of right and wrong.127 She no longer has to launch onerous war on Ben for stealing her rabbit –the government will do that for her.128 In the commons, we increasingly worry about preventing infringements on our property rights by people like Ben, who break the ‘no-harm’ principle and steal others’ private property.129 This political tension causes us to create an institution specifically designed to protect property and enforce the ‘no harm’ principle for us – the government. 130 Having given Locke’s account for the legitimate role of government, I will now illustrate how government uses its power illegitimately when it harms people. Say there is a swamp in which mosquitoes breed, and some proximate residents want to drain it in order to get rid of the mosquitoes. But when they try and collect money to drain the swamp, they fall considerably short of the necessary contributions because many people refuse to contribute even though they would benefit from the project. In response, the government intervenes and imposes a mandatory local tax to raise enough money to have the swamp drained. By Locke’s view, the government is unjustified in this use of power.

When the government imposes tax on the people, it has to receive the people’s consent. This is because tax is harmful to those being taxed – they labored for their money and it is therefore their property.131 Taking their money (their property) away without their consent is harmful to them, an action ironically contrary to the very purpose for which government was created.132 Furthermore, not only did the government fail to even consult the people about whether it would impose the tax, it ignored the people’s earlier refusal to contribute money. This earlier refusal is proof that the same people would not consent to the government’s tax.

124

Ibid, 282, 338-39.

Ibid, 326.

126 Even if Anna hires helpers or a mercenary army to protect her rabbit, she still has to go to radical extremes and deal with Ben’s inconvenience out of her own pocket. Furthermore, even with this moderate degree of protection, the safety of Anna’s rabbit’s is not guaranteed because the mercenaries could turn on her.

127 Locke, “Second Treatise”, 324.

128 Ibid.

129 Ibid, 282, 338-39.

130 Ibid, 324, 327.

131 Ibid, 288.

132 Ibid, 324.

125

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While the people may benefit from the initiative to drain the swamp, Locke would say that does not matter since they care not for the benefit. Whether they value their wealth more than a nicely drained swamp is not for the government to decide. The government is simply supposed to respect and enforce whichever decision the people make by protecting the property they retain.133 By this view the government should have enforced the people’s decision not to pay, instead of forcing them to pay. Even though the government’s failure to intervene would negatively impact those who were willing to pay the tax, by denying them the benefit they want (a nicely drained swamp), the dispute is between the two groups of citizens (paying and non-paying).134 A legitimate government would play no role in determining who would pay, and would simply let the paying people try to get the non-paying people’s consent in using their money. This example shows that the government can act against its intended beneficial purpose of protecting private property by enforcing laws that take away private property. This is an illegitimate use of the government’s power because it breaks the ‘no harm’ principle, the very thing that justified the government’s creation.

The swamp example is problematic in a deeper sense that Locke does not directly address in his argument. This is because it is a piece of land that needs to be improved.

Since no one has worked the swamp, it must start off in the commons.135 But whoever drains the swamp has invested labor into improving it and, according to Locke, has appropriated it.136 But when both the government and the people have put their labor into the swamp, it is unclear who owns the swamp. For the government, as an entity in itself, has exerted labor in trying to develop a funding solution, but the people have invested their individual property into the government’s project. Both contributions give rise to legitimate claims to ownership according to Locke, as he posits that appropriation can be done by labor of the mind (the government’s devising a tax plan) or the hands (the people physically handing over the product of their labor). 137 Locke does not deal with the implications of government-owned property, although the above example illustrates just how easily governments can claim private rights. As an aside, when I refer to the government as the owner of private property, I do not mean it owns enclosed property. I am imagining a situation more reflective of today’s provincial forests or protected animal habitats, wherein the government “owns” the land but allows citizens to walk the forests’ paths or observe the animals. That is to say that citizens can use the land according to rules set by the owning government.

Once the government becomes a property owner by its own right, its legislation and treatment of the people’s property will be biased because it now has a personal priority to protect, its own property. This could prevent it from pursuing the unbiased protection of everyone else’s property – now it might continue to tax the unwilling people so it can pay for more improvements to its swamp. But it is now governing with considerable hypocritical conflict of interest. This indicates that as soon as the 133

Ibid, 324-25.

Ibid, 289.

135 Ibid, 286.

136 Ibid, 288.

137 Ibid.

134

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government develops its own property interests, the system of property ownership is no more stable than it was in the commons: the government has become none other than Ben, a competitor for Anna’s resources – in fact, the very competitor it was created to punish.

While Locke does not directly address this conflict of interests, he would have felt that legitimate government tacitly forfeits its right to private property upon accepting power. Tacit consent is unspoken, but implied.138 Legitimate government tacitly consents to forfeit property rights because its conceptual foundation is unbiased resolution of property disputes.139 So any institution that accepts that role and acts upon such a mandate has accepted that it must remain unbiased, which in turn depends on not having private property. So in formally accepting this unbiased role and exercising the power conferred by it, a legitimate government gives unspoken (tacit) consent to forfeit property rights.

To conclude, Locke holds that the government’s legitimate power is limited. I have argued that according to his view on the development of civil society, legitimate government power is measured by its ability to benefit the people and not harm them. I have shown that legitimate government serves the beneficial purpose of protecting man’s property, while illegitimate government uses its power to take away man’s property. I have shown why a legitimate Lockean government would not perform “popular” community-interest improvement programs (such as draining a swamp using the wealth of unwilling property owners). A government that flaunts its mandate in such a fashion is in conflict with its citizens because it is using its unique legal right to use force against people it was invented to benefit. I have also shown that for the same reason, legitimate government is forbidden from claiming private property itself.

138 139

Ibid, 347-348.

Ibid, 324.

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The Validity of the Ex Post Facto Nuremberg Trials PAMELA METANI, Wellesley College

When asked about the Nuremberg Trials of November 20, 1945 to October 1, 1946, known as the Major War Criminalsâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; Trial, one might be quick to express appreciation towards the British and American law systems for merging to hold one of the most significant trials in recent history, one which sought to indict and sentence 24 high ranking individuals and six criminal Nazi organizations of the Third Reich, in the name of justice. However, a sharper focus on the matter leads to the surfacing of a fundamental problem with the creation and implementation of the Nuremberg Trials, and brings into questioning the validity of the laws and rulings applied therein. The mission of this paper is to, while recognizing the Nuremberg Trials as the first major congregation of a world law, analyze the validity of such laws from the defense strategy utilized in the procedures, which stated that the crimes defined in the London Charter were examples of ex post facto laws, criminalizing actions committed before the laws were drafted. We will commence our mission by analyzing the etymology of words crucial to this paper, such as valid, and ex post facto, continue by studying the ex post facto laws applied during the trial, and conclude by defining the validity of the ex post facto Nuremberg Trials and what procedures should have been implemented in lieu of those previously mentioned.

Let us now turn our attention to defining those words which will be crucial in helping us better our understanding of the Nuremberg Trials, and the position of this

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paper on the matter. "Ex post facto” is an adjective of Latin origin for “after the fact”, which refers to “laws adopted after an act is committed making it illegal although it was legal when done, or increases the penalty for a crime after it is committed.”140 Although the purpose of these laws can sometimes be desired by the defendants, in the case that the ex post facto aspect may render their offense less serious according to the new law created, such laws are prohibited by the U. S. Constitution, Article I, Section 9, and have been since the time of Thomas Jefferson “"The sentiment that ex post facto laws are against natural right is so strong in the United States, that few, if any, of the State constitutions have failed to proscribe them.”141 Allowing a government to craft a law which deems an act punishable by law after the act has occurred is to give a dangerous amount of absolute power to the sovereign, whether it be an individual or a collective, whereby any act may be deemed punishable for a number of reasons which did not exist at the time of when the act took place. The very idea of ex post facto laws leads to the foundations of democracy being usurped due to the uncertainty of a law in place and the failure of the law to reflect people’s interests, as the people would not be consulted in the creation of such a law if the sovereign is the one responsible for having altered the original law, going against the expectation that citizens are entitled to know what they can and cannot do.

As it stands today, Article 11, Paragraph 2 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights provides that “no person be held guilty of any criminal law that did not exist at the time of offence nor suffer any penalty heavier than what existed at the time of offence.”

If this is the case then the 4 counts of the indictment of War Crimes are deemed invalid, for the laws necessary to apply such counts, which we will later turn our attention to, were not in place during the time in which the individuals and organizations charged committed their acts.

Before we begin to analyze the ex post facto laws applied during the trial, let us conclude this etymology section, by defining the word valid. As we are well-aware, in philosophy an argument can be deemed as valid "if and only if there is no logically possible situation where all the premises are true and the conclusion is false at the same time".142 When looking at the ex post facto laws one may infer that it is not logical to punish someone for an act construed as legal at the time it occurred, or to increase the penalty for a crime, by creating a law after the act has been studied and it appears that the officials in place are catering the laws to the acts committed as to guarantee the culpability of the defendants. When asked about the validity of the Nuremberg Trials, Chief Justice of the United States Supreme Court, Harlan Fiske Stone, called them a fraud. "(Chief U.S. prosecutor) Jackson is away conducting his high-grade lynching party in Nuremberg," he wrote. "I don't mind what he does to the Nazis, but I hate to see 140

Legal Dictionary, last modified December, 2014, http://legal-dictionary.thefreedictionary.com/ex+post+facto 141 American History, From Revolution to Reconstruction, last modified in 2012, http://www.let.rug.nl/usa/presidents/thomas-jefferson/letters-of-thomas-jefferson/jefl220.php 142 Validity, last modified in 2014 http://philosophy.hku.hk/think/arg/valid1.php

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the pretense that he is running a court and proceeding according to common law. This is a little too sanctimonious a fraud to meet my old-fashioned ideas."143 Let us now turn our attention to the four counts of indictment; conspiracy, crimes against peace, war crimes, and crimes against humanity, presented at the Major War Criminals’ Trial against the defendants, and study the validity, or lack thereof, of these ex post facto counts. Count 1 served to charge for conspiracy and alleges that “conspiracy embraces the commission of Crimes against Peace; it came to embrace the commission of War Crimes … and Crimes against Humanity,”144 The flaw in this count is not that it indicts those guilty of the planning, and carrying out of the murders, in which no problem arises, however, the allegation aims to make liable everyone for the wrongs of their colleagues, often times which they had not foreseen happening. What leads one to assert that this count is invalid is that it is accusing many people for the wrongdoings of one, under the umbrella of conspiracy. To word this dilemma simply, if a member of government is charged for committing a crime, is their entire party to be charged with conspiracy, simply because they worked alongside him, despite that they may have had no knowledge or regard for his actions? The answer should be no. This claim would be deemed invalid and the same can be said for Count 1, as it relies unfairly on the premise that working alongside someone implies that one would be well informed of the actions, ideas, etc., of their coworker, and one must make the distinction that physical work association with someone does not translate into further association of ideas and conspiracies, as assumed by Count 1 of the Major War Criminals’ Trial.

Count 2 of the indictment was for crimes against peace. It alleges that “the defendants participated in the planning, preparation, initiation and waging of wars of aggression, which were also wars in violation of international treaties, agreements and assurances.” As read in Judge Wyszanski’s article, this count makes reference to the Briand-Kellogg Pact of August 27, 1928 which defined crimes against peace as a crime applicable to sovereign nations, not individuals. This count, which rests entirely on ex post facto amendments tried to direct the allegations only applicable to sovereign nations to individuals, and satisfies the definition of a retroactive law. Retroactive rulemaking is deemed as invalid in numerous court systems around the world, and in being a retroactive law, Count 2 is not logically valid as it follows a flawed method of reasoning whereby, the laws were altered as a means of inculpating certain individuals, as opposed to those individuals being guilty because they broke clear laws that were established at the time that their actions took place.

Count 3 accuses the defendants of war crimes, and like the two before it, should be regarded as invalid due to its ex post facto nature. What we have been trying to establish is that not only the counts themselves, but their very existence, and the process through which they came about can be deemed invalid, therefore, if one can affirm the process of the existence of such laws invalid, as has already been done in 143

Katherine Le Roy and Cheryl Saunders, The Rule of Law (Sydney: The Federation Press, 2003), 104.

144 Judge Charles E. Wyzanski, "Nuremberg - A Fair Trial? A Dangerous Precedent" The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 177, No.4, p. 66-70

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many countries included the United States of America145, then is the product that resulted from an invalid process not invalid itself? In Articles 46 and 47 of the Hague Convention of 1907 countries around the world assembled to accept “that in an occupied territory of a hostile state, family honor and rights, the lives of persons, and private property, as well as religious conviction and practice, must be respected”. What this citation tells us is that the legal rights of this nation are not open to doubt and that a German cannot be tried for his actions in an occupied territory.

Concluding the counts is Count 4, which accuses the defendants of crimes against humanity, and as it pertains to this case the murder, torture, and persecution of minority groups like the Jews. The tenth paragraph of these accusations alleges that the wrongdoings of those individuals and organizations involved in this trial “constituted violations of international conventions, or internal penal laws, of the general principles of criminal law as derived from the criminal law of all civilized nations and were involved in and part of a systematic course of conduct,”146. This citation, however, fails to provide reference for the “international laws” previously mentioned and in failing to do so make it appear that the ones in charge of formulating the indictments were using words loosely in an effort to formulate a means of inculpating those on trial. The citation implies that such laws of inculpation exist in the broadest of forms as universal international criminal law. However, if the only source for the foundations of this trial stems from some unspecified, unreferenced, and arguably yet-to-be appropriately developed sense of international law, it would be difficult to be interpreted as a concrete basis for this trial. If one of the premises which the conviction relies on is the referencing of said international laws to strengthen its case, yet said laws are not referenced, can this premise really stand as grounds for conviction? Simply put, the basis for the allegations behind Count 4 is substandard and unprofessional in its legal origins, and through the process which one could accept as making a law up as they go go, or at least amending it to suit their judicial objectives, both Count 3 and 4 can be regarded as ex post facto, whereby nullum crimen et nulla poena sine lege (no crime and no penalty without an antecedent law) should have been observed.

After having analyzed the four counts of indictment above, and established an understanding of why they may be regarded as ex post facto, let us conclude with some ideas about what procedures should have been implemented in lieu of those previously mentioned. To do so, it should be noted that what may lead one to question the validity Nuremberg Trials is not that the 24 aforementioned individuals and 6 organizations were tried, and punished, for any reasonable person would infer that the members on trial had committed crimes for which they were legally guilty of, however, it is the basis of why they were indicted that continues to inspire this discussion. The advantage of having such a trial was that it allowed a chance for the defendants to make statements on their behalf, and potentially exonerate themselves, as was the case with the four individuals which were acquitted of all charges. Further, this case set a precedent for 145

American History, From Revolution to Reconstruction, last modified in 2012, http://www.let.rug.nl/usa/presidents/thomas-jefferson/letters-of-thomas-jefferson/jefl220.php 146 Judge Charles E. Wyzanski, "Nuremberg - A Fair Trial? A Dangerous Precedent" The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 177, No.4, p. 66-70

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future leaders and established firmly the message that acts of aggression, murder, or torture, as seen with Nazi Germany under Hitler’s rule, would be dealt with harshly by the rest of the world. The disadvantage of the Nuremburg Trial is that its counts, which served as the basis for indictment of those found guilty can be, and have been, successfully argued by many to be ex post facto, and therefore invalid in nature as we have tried to explain herein, and in turn, have brought forth confusion in the world of international law.

It is not open to doubt that those individuals who committed crimes during the Nazi regime should be found legally responsible for their wrongdoings, and therefore be legally sentenced in a court of law, but perhaps the procedure did not to need to be as complex. What would have happened if the countries deemed victorious after World War II had convened and simply gathered and executed the remaining members of the Nazi party? It is a popular belief that all is fair in war, and from a war perspective the victorious countries had the power to do as they pleased with the members of the losing side, and execution of the wrongdoers was certainly an option. Further, why not charge those indicted on the basis of less legally complex allegations, such as murder and manslaughter, and not have to amend laws such as those of conspiracy and crimes against humanity in an ex post facto manner and twist them for a desired effect?

Granted, although the two previously mentioned suggestions would have dealt with the individuals and organizations of the Major War Criminals’ Trial in an acceptable fashion, their international effect would not have had the magnitude that the Nuremberg Trials had in being praised by some as the “first effective recognition of a world law for the punishment of malefactors"147.

In conclusion, the arguments provided in this paper, the mission of which was to analyze the Nuremberg Trials and arrive at the understanding that they were ex post facto and therefore invalid, aimed to analyze the etymology of words such as valid, and ex post facto, study the ex post facto laws applied to the four counts of indictment present in the trial, and conclude by offering alternate procedures of indictment in lieu of those which were used. Any reasonable person would arrive at the conclusion that individuals and organizations found guilty of murder, aggression, and torture during the Nazi regime should be punished for their actions, however, punishing them in a way through which laws criminalize actions committed before the laws were drafted or increasing the penalty for a crime after it is committed, as was the case with the four counts; conspiracy, crimes against peace, war crimes, and crimes against humanity, is not legally just. Ex post facto laws have been banned in most democratic countries, and their existence contradicts the existence of democracy, whereby “citizens are entitled to know what they can and cannot do, and the ability to change that after the fact denies citizens due process, and would give the government too much power” 148, and their presence in the international court of law formed for the Nuremberg Trials was as unacceptable and unwarranted as it would be in the courts of modern day America.

147

Judge Charles E. Wyzanski, "Nuremberg - A Fair Trial? A Dangerous Precedent" The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 177, No.4, p. 66-70 148 Ex Post Facto, last modified in 2014 http://www.qdt.com/business-career/legal/ex-post-facto

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Intersectional Problems With Genetic Engineering VALENTINA LAGUNAS, University of Arizona

Two particular subcategories of genetic engineering (GE) will be discussed in this essay. Both consist in refinements of GE that would allow couples to choose detailed genetic information to be present in their babies before they are born. I will consider one kind of GE I call genetic health-enhancement (GHE), which will be used for situations in which there are genetic modifications for â&#x20AC;&#x153;health purposes onlyâ&#x20AC;?. The other, I name genetic socioeconomic signaling(GSS), a phenotype modification for aesthetic and social class signaling purposes. For example, if a couple decided to change their baby's genome so it is less prone to develop cancer, the case would classify as GHE. On the other hand, if a couple decided to change the genes of the baby so it's born a white, cisgendered man, the case would fall under the category of GSS. This paper will make an analysis of both categories of GE in a hypothetical tone, noting the distinctions in order to make a moral assessment of the possible outcomes if such technology was refined and made available to the public. I will argue that the GSS can lead to a plethora of diversity and intersectional problems, and could be used as a powerful tool for oppression that fits all the criteria given in Iris Marion Young's essay, Five Faces of Oppression149.

Intersectional Theory in Sci-Fi Societies Intersectionality is a political theory given by Kimberle Crenhaw in 1993150 It refers to the different identity categories that are excluded and marginalized, and it makes the case that embracing intragroup differences leads to a better understanding 149

Young, Iris Marion. "Five Faces of Oppression." In Justice and the Politics of Difference.

Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1990.

150 Crenshaw, K. Mapping the Margins: Intersectionality, Identity Politics, and Violence Against Women of Color. Stanford Law Review, 1993.

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of oppression. In her paper Mapping the Margins, she writes “The problem with identity politics is not that it fails to transcend difference, as some critics charge, but rather the opposite—that it frequently conflates or ignores intragroup differences”151. To ignore a part of someone's identity when trying to analyze their oppression, is likely to result in a myopic account. This essay discusses the intersectional problems with a technology that has yet to be realized, but that could arrive so suddenly that our moral progress regarding identity politics might not have a chance to keep up. To clarify, I will give an example from Gattaca, a 2004 motion picture directed by Andrew Niccol152. In this movie the characters live in a futuristic society that is somewhat different to ours; one that has been shaped by the use of GE for generations. The plot summary explains, Vincent is one of the last "natural" babies born into a sterile, geneticallyenhanced world, where life expectancy and disease likelihood are ascertained at birth.

Myopic and due to die at 30, he has no chance of a career in a society that now discriminates against your genes, instead of your gender, race or religion 153.

The fictional society of Gattaca has an entirely different set of group identities, or so it seems. Both racism and sexism seemed to disappear because of the new generations of genetic health-enhanced humans, leaving the ones who could not afford the change to be the new oppressed kind. Still, it seems hard to believe that GE would change dramatically our current state of affairs by shifting all instances of oppression to a group that was already oppressed (the working class). The plot also doesn't mention other identities, such as LGBTQA+. Even in Gattaca's nominally post-racial and postsexist society, some biases evidently remain. If a society is still capable of classism and heteronormativity, I don't see why it would stop being racist and cis-sexist. After all, there would still be group intersections within the dominated class. This fictional society uses GE to discard identities such as LGBTQA+, and as they do so, they perpetrate genetic-class discrimination. That makes Gattaca's identity politics not too different from ours, and opens the door for an intersectional critique: ignoring the mentioned identities will lead to a misunderstanding of what oppression constitutes.

The Problem of Disability Gattaca did not go far into the possibilities of GE technology, but it seems just as credible to hand pick any genetic information not available in the parents and put it in the baby's genotype. I will assume for the rest of the paper that this is an option for the parents, which will make it plausible to make some genetic health-enhancement tools available. One of these tools could be similar to a vaccine, for example. A genetic vaccine could make it possible for people to eliminate any disease that they might be prone or vulnerable to have. This is a good thing, or at least that is my first attitude towards GHE. Walter Glannon describes gene therapy as “an intervention aimed at

151

Ibid.

Gattaca. Columbia Tristar Home Video, 1998. DVD. 153 Ibid.

152

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improving functions and capacities that already are adequate”154. This definition could be used for both GHE and GSS, but I will come back to that. By improving certain factors such as our immune system, we could achieve a more than adequate prevention against disease. Now the problem at hand is what is considered a disease? When is it okay to eliminate traits and when is it not? For example, myopia. I consider not many people with myopia would be offended at the thought of eliminating it from the genetic make-up of their descendants. But it might not be the case for every phenotype or even trait. Groups with a large history of culture, such as deaf people or dwarf people, might not want to erase that genetic heritage. The truth of the matter is that it's very hard to make a distinction between GHE and GSS when it comes to non-abled bodied agents.

At the risk of making an ableist judgment, I will draw the line and say that I do not consider erasing certain phenotypes co-morbid with syndromes and disease to be GSS. We are already extinguishing such phenotypes because they carry uneventful physical needs that might not be affordable (among other inconveniences). For instance, people vaccinate against poliomyelitis, and poliomyelitis can cause paraplegia. Some women screen for syndromes that the baby might carry, and decide against having the baby if she/he does. John Harris writes about disability, “if a pregnant mother knew that [a condition] affected her fetus and knew also she could remove the condition by simple dietary adjustment, then to fail to do so would be to knowingly harm her child”155. For these examples the decision to eliminate traits does not come from a place of bigotry, or social assimilation, but from a consideration for the baby's quality of life that goes far beyond the social discrimination and discomfort they might encounter by belonging to other marginalized groups. And for the same reason I believe vaccines should be available and mandatory for everybody, I will claim that GHE should as well.

Two Scenarios To reflect on how GSS might be harmful, I want to start by assuming two different scenarios. In one of them, GSS is not separated from its arguably morally benign version, GHE. As I mentioned in the previous paragraph what Glannon calls “gene therapy” entails both GHE and GSS. Let us imagine that both are available to the masses. One trait that I suppose could be very hard to label as either GHE or GSS, is intelligence. However, I believe prenatal tests already have the capacity to tell us when a child is going to have a less than average intelligence, for that trait is almost always comorbid with some other condition. Therefore, I believe “adding” intelligence should be labeled as GSS. Glannon elaborates on this intuition, Insofar as the possession of [beauty, sociability, and intelligence] gives some people an advantage over others in careers, income, and social status, the competitive nature of these goods suggests that there would be no limit to the benefits that

154

Vaughn, L. Contemporary moral arguments: readings in ethical issues. New York: Oxford University Press, 2010.

155 Ibid.

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improvements to physical and mental capacities would yield to those fortunate enough to avail themselves of the technology156.

Of course, in the particular scenario that I'm describing, this is not a problem because GHE and GSS are available for everyone. But if they are indeed available to everyone with our current status quo, it would mean massive extinction for some identities. In some male-dominated societies, like China, the so-called gene therapy would severely affect the gender balance (even more!). The same case can be made with any LGBTQA+ identities, as I mentioned before. In predominantly reflexive racist countries, such as Mexico and India, many people would change the color of their baby's skin to a whiter palette (or make them totally white). Many people might wonder what is wrong with that. Why is it that just able-bodied identities are important to keep in existence? Both abled and non-abled identities are discriminated against, but not with quite the same intentions. As I argued earlier, disabilities are erased in many cases as a matter of health interest and common well-being, not as a matter of social disgust. In other words, the social rejection of group identities is a side effect of living in a white, rich, cisgendered, male-dominated society. But the prevention of disabling traits, is not necessarily so.

In the second scenario, GHE and GSS are still not separated into different subtypes of genetic engineering, but they are not available for everyone. To illustrate how bad this scenario would look, I will talk about the criteria for oppression that Iris Marion Young came up with in her paper, Five Faces of Oppression.

Exploitation, Marginalization, Powerlessness, Cultural Imperialism, and Violence Young explains Marx's theory of exploitation by exemplifying, “In both slave society and feudal society the right to appropriate the product of the labor of others partly defines class privilege, and these societies legitimate class distinctions with ideologies of natural superiority and inferiority”157. In contrast, the capitalist society “removes these distinctions and promotes a belief in the legal freedom of persons”158.

Capitalism maintains class domination through other means, ones that involve a less obvious kind of exploitation. Capitalist exploitation is repleted with mythical libertarian propaganda, such as “working hard will get you places”, and the notion that one has to earn “the American Dream”. In the futuristic society where GHE and GSS exist as gene therapy, and only the ruling class has any access to this technology, it seems like the model of exploitation resembles the slave/feudal society more than it resembles the less conspicuously exploitative capitalist model. The “natural” superiority and inferiority ideologies might not ever be claimed or discussed in the political spotlight, but they will be embedded in the cultural paradigm. Young states that “Marginalization is perhaps the most dangerous form of oppression. A whole category of people is expelled from useful participation in social life and thus potentially subjected to severe material

156

Ibid.

Young, Iris Marion. "Five Faces of Oppression." In Justice and the Politics of Difference.

Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1990.

158 Ibid.

157

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deprivation and even exterminationâ&#x20AC;?159. This depiction of marginalization would become painfully accurate in the second scenario. The resources would never be redistributed, for just as Glannon expressed in the citation I used, the ruling class would signal all instances of status and have every physical and mental capability to maintain their privileged place in the patriarchy. The final fate of this society could very well remind us of an Ayn Rand novel. The working class, and maybe all identities who have intersected with it, eventually disappearing. This might seem like a bad capitalist strategy because it would also mean the end of capitalism as we know it. Nevertheless, the ruling system could shift to a kind of bourgeois liberalism powered by machinery instead of workers.

But as long as it existed, the working class would be permeated by an unbearable sense of powerlessness. They would be less healthy, less intelligent, and with far less chances of mimicking the media-propagated conceptions of beauty. Cultural Imperialism would be incarnated in each of the designed generations to represent the status quo. I'm inclined to think that these expectations of beauty would be the same as ours, for there is nothing in Gattaca that makes me think otherwise. In spite of what the plot claims, Gattaca has very few people of color, and none of them were main characters. Also, as I elaborated earlier, Gattaca makes a weak case for the shift of oppression. The genetic-class discrimination of Gattaca is in no way exclusive of racism and cis-sexism. Therefore, this neo-natural superiority ideology would also affect every other ostracized group that does not intersect with the working class.

Finally, violence would be perpetrated in the form of humiliation and denial of human rights. Young reflects on systematic violence, â&#x20AC;&#x153;The oppression of violence consists not only in direct victimization, but in the daily knowledge shared by all members of oppressed groups that they are liable to violation, solely on account of their group identityâ&#x20AC;?160. Physical violence is just one of the many flavors that oppression of violence has to offer. Some might not be physically damaged, but new eugenic forms of class manipulation will harm and eventually extinguish many ostracized identities.

A Better Management of Genetic Engineering Hopefully, the two scenarios described herein will never become a reality, but that does not mean that I am fully against certain subcategories of genetic engineering.

If the time comes when both GHE and GSS can be achieved, I think the best option would be to make a real distinction between them. I discussed very superficially what I believe should be the difference, but my focus was more on the diversity problems that GSS might entail. When they are at last separated, then GHE can be implemented as part of a governmentally paid health service. As far as GSS goes, I am not sure that it should be legal. I cannot talk for real future societies because I don't know what kind of identity politics we might employ in the future, but as far as fictional societies go, Gattaca has proved itself not morally worthy of using GSS, and, for that matter, our current society has not either.

159

Ibid.

Ibid.

160

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Locke's Property Rights and Applications to the Oil and Gas Industry MICHAEL BURNSIDE, Carnegie Mellon University

John Locke’s Second Treatise, while published in the seventeenth century, possesses applications even today. Locke’s ideas and philosophies were undoubtedly present in the minds of America’s Founding Fathers. His ideologies can be traced like a thread through American history up to the present day; his works are still interpreted and debated in any number of relevant issues. Specifically, his chapter Of Property from the Second Treatise has implications in today’s oil and gas industry. The works and effect of the oil and gas industry are hotly debated and contain a myriad of controversial issues; not least of which is the ongoing battle between property owners and oil companies. I argue that oil companies violate Locke’s Second Treatise by ignoring his restrictions upon the use of land they have claimed as property.

The first important concept that we must understand in Locke’s establishment of property rights is the idea that we are all living within a “social contract.” While this social contract is not what one may think of as a contract, it is a critical piece of Locke’s ideology. Locke posits that, by virtue of being an inhabitant of this earth and electing to live within a society, a person implicitly consents to being governed. As a result, such a person is free to enjoy the mutual benefits of governance, including, but not limited to, protection from external forces and the unsavory actions of other citizens. However, a man governed by society must relinquish baser desires to live within a safer, more regulated community.

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Of no less importance is Locke’s explanation of the “natural state of man.” This pre-existing condition is critical to Locke’s argument. In this natural state, Locke argues that God “has given the earth to the children of men.”161 As such, in Locke’s initial allocation, man owns all earth in common, meaning that, to begin with, no one person is entitled to any portion of it. Furthermore, earth and all the beasts it contains, fruits it bears, land it is comprised of, or petroleum underneath it, is to be used by man in the pursuit of “life and convenience.”162 While earth is to be subjugated at the will of man in the furtherance of life, a man’s body and his labor are exempt from Locke’s concept of ownership in common. No one owns a man’s body and labor but himself.

In order to validate existing ownership rights, Locke builds up a “mixing argument.” Specifically, Locke is attempting to determine at which point a man can claim ownership over something that had previously belonged in the commons. Locke uses the example of a man gathering acorns. Does a man own those acorns when he picks them up from the ground or does he own them when he boils them in preparation to eat? Surely, no one can contend that once the man eats the acorns, they belong to him.163 Since Locke states that a man’s labor is intrinsically his own, his contention is that once man mixes his labor with property in the commons, he takes such property out of commons and therefore owns it. To be precise, once a man gathers the acorns, or plows the field, or retrieves the oil, the so-called “fruit of his labor” becomes his property.

Furthermore, Locke protects his mixing argument by laying down two fundamental limits. The first is that a man cannot take so much that others are left without (known as the “as much” clause). The second states that a man cannot take so much as to be wasteful (known as the “as good” clause).

As Locke himself illustrates, “Nobody could think himself injured by the drinking of another man, though he took a good draught, who had a whole river of the same water left him to quench his thirst…”164 This statement is particularly pointed when one examines oil companies’ violation of the limits in Locke’s second treatise.

Once Locke’s argument for property rights is properly understood, it can easily be seen how oil companies violate his treatise. Oil companies routinely monopolize more land than they can use. These companies purchase or lease large swaths of land; it is simply easier for them than purchasing small tracts individually as the need arises. Subsequently, it is often the case that large acreages are left fallow and unused by oil companies because there are a finite amount of resources to extract the oil. In addition, another man, to quote Locke, in the pursuit of “life and convenience,” cannot utilize this land. When oil companies own or lease the land yet do nothing with it for many years, as is often the case, this is in clear violation of the “as much” clause in Locke’s restriction of property rights. Moreover, once oil companies’ leases expire, and they have recovered all of the oil, the land is left scarred; various forms of production equipment are left on the property, the soil is often unsuitable for farming or raising 161

John Locke, “On Property,” in Second Treatise, 111.

Ibid., 111.

163 Ibid., 112.

164 Ibid., 114.

162

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cattle in the wake of oil production, and an abandoned well is left open. These actions directly contradict the “as good” clause in Locke’s treatise.

Oil companies monopolize the vast majority of petroleum reserves worldwide. It is not too much of a stretch to equate oil reserves to the water from the river in Locke’s example. Surely, no man contends that another who drinks from a roaring river harms him; there is enough water to be had. But what can be said if the same man dammed and wholly diverted the river, thereby denying others downstream of the river’s water?

That situation is not merely intuitively unjust; it clearly runs contrary to Locke’s intention for one not to take so much that others cannot take as well. A dammed and diverted river is analogous to an oil company who recovers all available oil reserves in a given area. An oil company that removes every drop of petroleum from underneath a property is violating Locke’s tenet as much as the pernicious man who diverts the river. One might object that a private citizen has no means to extract unrefined crude oil coming directly out of the ground, nor does he have any use for it. This might be true, but it is often the case that property owners are not compensated for the subsurface minerals that are recovered from their property. At best, they are merely paid for the use of the property’s surface, at market price per acreage or below. This leads to a striking disparity between the realized income of current or former property owners and oil companies’ revenues for the oil they extract from that same land. To be blunt, oil companies do not pay for the oil recovered. As such, the potential counterargument claiming that the exchange of money nullifies the “as much” clause is invalid. Fairness cannot exist while oil companies refuse to pay for the petroleum they extract. As a result, in order to be considered moral actors, oil companies either need to pay for the oil they have extracted or leave a portion of oil for the property owner to do with as he sees fit.

Oil companies act immorally by overexploiting and underutilizing land that they claim as property and then turning a tremendous profit. Somewhat beyond the scope of this paper, but crucially, they also act in contradiction to Locke’s treatise because they do not carry on with the consent of all others in society. The landowner who sees his land scarred and does not receive just remuneration can hardly be said to give consent, and it goes without saying that there are many groups voicing their displeasure at the actions of oil companies worldwide. Similarly, oil companies’ actions do not benefit everyone. Though one may argue that the landowner is able to heat his home or drive his car due to the efforts and output of the oil companies, there is no guarantee that those benefits outweigh the costs of having effectively lost his property to the production of oil upon it. That argument additionally does not take into account the detrimental consequences associated with the work of the oil and gas industry, such as displaced native populations, various forms of toxic pollution, and a massive unequal distribution of wealth. It is clear, after Locke’s idea of property rights is formulated, that oil companies are acting immorally. Although these actions may lead us to conclude instinctively that oil companies act immorally, it is evident when supported by Locke’s Second Treatise and its long-standing implications regarding the use of property.

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POSTLUDE Is this philosophy?

May I Have This Dance in the Ballroom of "Western Analytical" Philosophy?

ANONYMOUS, Vanderbilt University When I dance, I become a writer of the aeons, a poet who dives into the sea of my heart's ink with each pirouette and delicate transformation of the space my body sculpts. In between the curves of my waist is a story that transcends history, and my arms and legs the chandeliers through which the light of the moon can shine. My milky white skin becomes the refuge of the Big Dipper, and every finger and toe become a paintbrush for the graceful strokes of my birthright. Ballet transports me to a magical world where human fear can no longer touch me, and in this borderland which erases my existence, I become fully and colorfully human.

The curtains open to herald the crossroads of everywhere and nowhere. Here, all boundaries dissolve, to the point that even the idea of "other" does not exist. My spirit soars as I peer out into the sea of blackness, where I am cradled by a million eyes.

Tchaikovsky's concerto is my heartbeat, my heartbeat which dissolves all consciousness of myself, and therefore frees me to dance as pure energy. I am a symphony of particles, a waterfall of atoms, and as my ashes crash on the shore, I rise again as the phoenix, my wings spanning the bridge where life and death are one highway. Here, on the corner of crescendo and descendo, is my home.

My home springs from my navel and is rooted in between my outward facing thighs. My arms, legs, fingers, and feet become the constellations revolving around my center of gravity. My dance is steeped in blood and grounded in the pulsation of black light. Black is ultraviolet, and my soul is ultra black.

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REFLECTING AND LOOKING FORWARD We hope that you have enjoyed reading Volume I, of The Starling Undergraduate Journal of Philosophy. If you have any questions or comments regarding any of the work featured in this volume, please feel free to email us at starlingujp@hotmail.com.

Further, if you are interested in submitting your own piece for the consideration of The Starling, please review our website for submission guidelines at http://starlingjournal.wordpress.com/, and send us your wonderful work, by 15 May, 2015, at starlingujp@hotmail.com .

Wishing you happy philosophizing!