Recognition and Recruitment in Overt Dogwhistles - Alnica Visser
Seminar
Alnica argues for a distinction between two types of overt dogwhistles. The first, which Alnica calls sense codes, are overt dogwhistles that carry at least two plausible significances, at least one of which is innocent and generally known and thus available to run cover for its other more sinister…
Regret Aversion - Hayden Wilkinson
Seminar
In this paper, Hayden describes patterns of preferences that seem intuitive, and that characterise many real-world agents, but that deviate from orthodox normative decision theory. These preferences even deviate from the various less orthodox decision theories designed to accommodate risk…
Intraspecific Economics: Interpersonal Utility Comparisons, Evolution, and Culture - Armin Schulz
Seminar
One relatively recent pivot in the discussion concerning the possibility of interpersonal utility comparisons (IUC)—one of the foundational questions of economics—is centered on evolutionary biological considerations. In particular, it has been suggested that, since all human beings are part of the…
In defence of Pigou-Dalton for chances - Orri Stefánsson
Seminar
Orri defends a weak version of the Pigou–Dalton principle for chances. The principle says that it is better to increase the survival chance of a person who is more likely to die rather than a person who is less likely to die, assuming that the two people do not differ in any other morally relevant…
Pleasure Fundamentalism - Neil Sinhababu
Seminar
Pleasure fundamentalism is the view that moral value is pleasure and this explains all other moral facts. This talk presents two arguments for pleasure fundamentalism. The Reliability Argument examines how frequently the processes generating moral belief lead to truth, and finds the only reliable…
Behavioural modernity: Reframing the idea, or Past its Use-By Date?
Workshop
Join us for a groundbreaking exploration of the concept of behavioural modernity. Behavioral Modernity is a concept that has been used principally by cognitive archaeologists to answer the question “When and why did we start to act the way we do now?” In short, behavioral modernity answers this…
Patching up and tearing apart the Hart-Rawls Principle of Fairness- Richard Arneson
Seminar
In 1955 HLA Hart asserted a norm that he said was a source of special rights and obligations, not generated by consent, that rendered political obligation intelligible. Revised and reformulated as the Hart-Rawls principle of fairness, it says, “When a number of persons engage in a just, mutually…