PEA Soup

Subjectivism and Mind-Dependence

I’ve been recently interested in subjectivism and how serious the objections to it are in the end. In part, this is a project of thinking how well or badly off the view comes out when we compare it to expressivism. In this post, I am interested in the claim that subjectivism makes morality objectionably dependent on our attitudes. The strategy which subjectivists have often recently adopted is to try to argue that subjectivists can usually give similar responses to objections as expressivists. Here, I want to use this strategy to explore the mind-dependence objection.

A Searchable Database of Philosophers?

I have been thinking for a while that it would be quite valuable if there were a list of philosophers that was searchable by area of research, gender, race, grad student/junior/senior status, etc. Such a list would appear to be useful to folks searching for appropriate referees for papers, for folks trying to make sure they are not overlooking excellent junior women for their volume or conference on Kantian ethics, or for folks trying to fill out an APA symposium on a particular topic.

After posting this idea on Facebook yesterday I learned from Sally Haslanger that the APA ad hoc committee on the status and future of the profession has determined that there is a need for such a database. I was especially happy to also learn from Dave Chalmers that the good folks who bring you Phil Papers (and such) are planning just such a database.

Moral Education Conference

Moral Education: Ancient and Contemporary

June 8th-9th, Northwestern University

Speakers & Commentators: Harry Brighouse (Wisconsin), David Ebrey (Northwestern), Kristján Kristjánsson (Birmingham), Rachana Kamtekar (Arizona), Gavin Lawrence (UCLA), Rachel Barney (Toronto), Randall Curren (Rochester), Agnes Callard (Chicago), Kyla Ebels-Duggan (Northwestern), Gabriel Richardson Lear (Chicago), Sophie Haroutunian-Gordon (Northwestern), Emily Fletcher (Wisconsin), Joseph Barnes (UC Berkeley / Humboldt), Richard Kraut (Northwestern), Darcia Narvaez (Notre Dame), Joseph Karbowski (Notre Dame)

Marc Sanders Prize for Younger Scholars in Metaethics

Russ Shafer-Landau has just announced a Call for Papers for a new paper competition: the Marc Sanders Prize in Metaethics. The winner of the prize will receive $8,000, present his or her paper at the upcoming Wisconsin Metaethics Workshop (https://sites.google.com/site/wiscmew/), and have the winning paper included in a forthcoming volume of Oxford Studies in Metaethics. Details below the fold.

 

Featured Philosopher: Tom Hurka (Part 2)

Hi all,

Tom Hurka is back for a second helping of Soup!  His post is below the fold.

-dd

1000th post at PEA Soup!

This is the 1000^th post on PEA Soup—a milestone that seems a good occasion for reflection on the blog. We would welcome fond memories of past discussions on the Soup or suggestions for how to improve it. As the newcomer to Soup, I cannot give enough shout outs to the Fantastic 4 that created and sustained it for its first 9 years: Dan Boisvert, Josh Glasgow, Doug Portmore, and David Shoemaker. Thanks guys—all of us who have benefitted from the Soup owe you.

The blog is doing well. We are now averaging over 1000 visits a day. And there are a variety of new initiatives that we are excited about that are only just starting up. We have significantly expanded the excellent journals we are partnered with, started up the Featured Philosopher series, and encouraged our contributors to post a new thread at least once a year. As you can already see, the blog is becoming more active and there will be more posts than ever before. 

Workshop on Deontological Principles and the Criminal Law

The Institute for Law and Philosophy at Rutgers University is sponsoring a workshop on Deontological Principles and the Criminal Law. (More below the fold.)

NOWAR 2 Program

The program for the second New Orleans Workshop in Agency and Responsibility is now available here.  Registration is free; e-mail dshoemakATtulaneDOTedu to do so.

Featured Philosopher: Tom Hurka (Part 1)

Hello all.  It's my supreme pleasure to introduce our inaugural featured philosopher: Tom Hurka!  I'm especially pleased because Tom has agreed to do not one but TWO posts on his current thinking.  His first starts below the fold.  (Second to follow on Friday.)

Tom certainly needs no introduction, but just a cursory glance at his body of work shows that he's clearly one of the top moral philosophers of our time.  His work on value theory, including Perfectionism; Virtue, Vice, and Value; and The Best Things in Life have certainly influenced the thinking of countless Soupers and others, including myself.  I'm tempted to say a lot more, but I don't want to dilute his post with my blathering.  So, without further ado, I'm very happy to introduce our first featured philosopher, and one of my philosophical heroes: Tom Hurka.

-dd

New Calendar Feature

Just a quick note to point out the new "Calendar of Events" feature on PEA Soup, with the link in the banner above.  It will keep you informed of forthcoming events, e.g., the Featured Philosophers scheduled to appear (several are already scheduled) and the various journal discussions.  This will better enable you to plan your life around the Soup.