Monday, February 29, 2016
Formalizing Mandates
After an election, there is often some talk of a 'mandate' that licenses the winning party to push for its reforms. There is something somewhat strange about this, since margins of victory are rarely very large and even then, since voting is a binary affair, it is hard to infer a whole lot about which party actually received more support (as opposed to support from more individuals).
Despite its problems, this idea of a mandate still has some value in providing people with a reason to vote. Currently, individual votes don't make a difference in the result of the election. They might, however, directly contribute to the mandate received by the political party.
Supposing this is a good thing, why not formalize it? Obama beat Romney by about 5 million votes in the last election. Suppose that for every 100,000 votes that a president beats their opponents by, they can flip one vote on one bill in the house of representatives, or for every 500,000, they can flip one vote in the senate. In a evenly split congress, this could make a significant different on getting one or two bills passed, allowing the new president to push through some of his or her agenda, but it wouldn't have a huge impact on the power of the balance of power.
Saturday, January 2, 2016
Monism, Dualism, and Pluralism
Monism suggests that there is only one sort of stuff -- typically physical stuff -- and every (contingent) entity in the world is made of stuff of that kind.
Dualism suggests that there are two sorts of stuff -- typically physical stuff and mental stuff -- and every (contingent) entity in the world is made of one or both kinds of stuff.
Trialism suggests on the other hand that there are three kinds of stuff.
Quadralism suggests that there are four kinds of stuff.
And so on.
In philosophy, the debate over which of these views is correct invariably centers on monism and dualism. Monists suggest that everything is physical (or mental) and dualists maintain that both sorts of stuff exist.
Is there a good reason to rule out trialism, quadralism, or any of the alternatives?
Dualism is generally motivated by the idea that consciousness cannot be the same sort of thing as the material objects around us. We know this only because of our first-person perspective on it. The nature of mental stuff (so the story goes) reveals itself to us to be different from physical stuff.
We don't have any reason to think that our subjective experience presents any other kinds of stuff to us, that cannot be reducible to physical stuff in the same way. Thus, we don't have the same reason to posit any more than two kinds of stuff. But this doesn't mean that we should rule out the possibility that there are more.
Here is an argument for thinking that there are other kinds of stuff. Our perspective on the mental stuff is quite fortuitous. Consciousness is not generally thought to ubiquitous in nature. It doesn't exist in rocks, or stars, or hurricanes. On the contrary, it appears to be limited to highly-organized collections of neurons. We are fortuitously positioned to recognize conscious stuff because they are closely with our bodies, and because they constitute a fundamental part of our own nature.
This raises the possibility: might there be a third sort of stuff, that is related to some other natural phenomenon the way that consciousness is related to brains? Might this stuff be produced by hurricanes, or galactic systems, or nuclear fussion?
At present, I don't think that we have any particular reason to believe in such stuff. But a zombie scientist who studied us would have no evidence for consciousness (apart, perhaps, from our testimony). The simple fact that we lack evidence isn't much of a reason to discount the possibility. We are like the zombie scientist with respect to other possible stuff produced by other natural systems.
So we have little reason to posit any particular third sort of stuff. Parsimony gives us some reason not to postulate any additional kind of stuff. But parsimony only provides us with weak reasons. If the only place that we have special epistemic access to does involve an additional kind of stuff, we shouldn't discount the possibility that other natural phenomena produce other non-physical and non-mental stuff.
Dualism suggests that there are two sorts of stuff -- typically physical stuff and mental stuff -- and every (contingent) entity in the world is made of one or both kinds of stuff.
Trialism suggests on the other hand that there are three kinds of stuff.
Quadralism suggests that there are four kinds of stuff.
And so on.
In philosophy, the debate over which of these views is correct invariably centers on monism and dualism. Monists suggest that everything is physical (or mental) and dualists maintain that both sorts of stuff exist.
Is there a good reason to rule out trialism, quadralism, or any of the alternatives?
Dualism is generally motivated by the idea that consciousness cannot be the same sort of thing as the material objects around us. We know this only because of our first-person perspective on it. The nature of mental stuff (so the story goes) reveals itself to us to be different from physical stuff.
We don't have any reason to think that our subjective experience presents any other kinds of stuff to us, that cannot be reducible to physical stuff in the same way. Thus, we don't have the same reason to posit any more than two kinds of stuff. But this doesn't mean that we should rule out the possibility that there are more.
Here is an argument for thinking that there are other kinds of stuff. Our perspective on the mental stuff is quite fortuitous. Consciousness is not generally thought to ubiquitous in nature. It doesn't exist in rocks, or stars, or hurricanes. On the contrary, it appears to be limited to highly-organized collections of neurons. We are fortuitously positioned to recognize conscious stuff because they are closely with our bodies, and because they constitute a fundamental part of our own nature.
This raises the possibility: might there be a third sort of stuff, that is related to some other natural phenomenon the way that consciousness is related to brains? Might this stuff be produced by hurricanes, or galactic systems, or nuclear fussion?
At present, I don't think that we have any particular reason to believe in such stuff. But a zombie scientist who studied us would have no evidence for consciousness (apart, perhaps, from our testimony). The simple fact that we lack evidence isn't much of a reason to discount the possibility. We are like the zombie scientist with respect to other possible stuff produced by other natural systems.
So we have little reason to posit any particular third sort of stuff. Parsimony gives us some reason not to postulate any additional kind of stuff. But parsimony only provides us with weak reasons. If the only place that we have special epistemic access to does involve an additional kind of stuff, we shouldn't discount the possibility that other natural phenomena produce other non-physical and non-mental stuff.
Wednesday, December 30, 2015
Atemporal Idealistic Solipsism
Consider two theories of the universe:
1. The universe consists of a large amount of matter spread throughout a vast amount of space that has existed since the universe began some 14 billion years ago. The universe began in a condensed state and experienced a long stage of expansion where stars and planets and life formed. The behavior of matter is governed by complex physical laws.
2. The universe consists in a single conscious experience occupied by a single mind at a single time. There is no matter. There are no laws. Nothing changes.
Both options seem like epistemic possibilities to me. Even if (2) is a weird skeptical scenario, it could be true. We should be 100% confident that it is false.
So how do we evaluate which theory is more credible? We should look to their individual theoretical virtues.
Theory 1 is fairly unified -- it suggests an internally coherent explanation of our evidence that is somewhat parsimonious (all things considered) given that it starts with a relatively homogeneous stuff and explains the complexity we see through the operation of simple physical laws. Furthermore, it is aesthetically pleasing. It is a neat little theory. It is totally consistent with what evidence we have.
Theory 2, on the other hand, is so simple that it lacks any possibility of unification. On fit with the evidence, it seems to do as well as theory 1, at least if we take our evidence to be constituted by only our present conscious experiences, which, on the theory, would have to be the only thing to exist. Theory 2 is not especially aesthetically pleasing -- it isn't neatly wrapped up and internally coherent, but it is extremely parsimonious.
If parsimony is a significant theoretical virtue that generally outweighs internal coherence and aesthetic tidiness, then Theory 2 looks like a much more credible theory than Theory 1. There seems to be a pretty straightforward argument to thinking that we should assign it much much more credence then we actually do. I tend to think that this is right. Theory 2 is a very inherently plausible theory of reality. However, it would be very extreme to think that we should actually prefer it to Theory 1.
The most plausible way to reject the theory would be to argue that we must include more evidence then we generally do. We should not just include our present evidence when deciding fit, we should consider what evidence we have had in the recent past. Our recent evidence would serve to rule out Theory 2.
This response seems to proves too much. Theory 2 should be an epistemic possibility. It seems to fit with the evidence that we have. Someone who rules it out out of hand is acting epistemically impetuous. If we can rule it out, then we shouldn't treat it as an epistemic possibility. This goes too far.
Thus, it seems that we have a dilemma. Unless we take our evidence to include things that would rule out Theory 2, we should prefer it over Theory 1.
1. The universe consists of a large amount of matter spread throughout a vast amount of space that has existed since the universe began some 14 billion years ago. The universe began in a condensed state and experienced a long stage of expansion where stars and planets and life formed. The behavior of matter is governed by complex physical laws.
2. The universe consists in a single conscious experience occupied by a single mind at a single time. There is no matter. There are no laws. Nothing changes.
Both options seem like epistemic possibilities to me. Even if (2) is a weird skeptical scenario, it could be true. We should be 100% confident that it is false.
So how do we evaluate which theory is more credible? We should look to their individual theoretical virtues.
Theory 1 is fairly unified -- it suggests an internally coherent explanation of our evidence that is somewhat parsimonious (all things considered) given that it starts with a relatively homogeneous stuff and explains the complexity we see through the operation of simple physical laws. Furthermore, it is aesthetically pleasing. It is a neat little theory. It is totally consistent with what evidence we have.
Theory 2, on the other hand, is so simple that it lacks any possibility of unification. On fit with the evidence, it seems to do as well as theory 1, at least if we take our evidence to be constituted by only our present conscious experiences, which, on the theory, would have to be the only thing to exist. Theory 2 is not especially aesthetically pleasing -- it isn't neatly wrapped up and internally coherent, but it is extremely parsimonious.
If parsimony is a significant theoretical virtue that generally outweighs internal coherence and aesthetic tidiness, then Theory 2 looks like a much more credible theory than Theory 1. There seems to be a pretty straightforward argument to thinking that we should assign it much much more credence then we actually do. I tend to think that this is right. Theory 2 is a very inherently plausible theory of reality. However, it would be very extreme to think that we should actually prefer it to Theory 1.
The most plausible way to reject the theory would be to argue that we must include more evidence then we generally do. We should not just include our present evidence when deciding fit, we should consider what evidence we have had in the recent past. Our recent evidence would serve to rule out Theory 2.
This response seems to proves too much. Theory 2 should be an epistemic possibility. It seems to fit with the evidence that we have. Someone who rules it out out of hand is acting epistemically impetuous. If we can rule it out, then we shouldn't treat it as an epistemic possibility. This goes too far.
Thus, it seems that we have a dilemma. Unless we take our evidence to include things that would rule out Theory 2, we should prefer it over Theory 1.
Sunday, December 13, 2015
Taxation and Harm to the One Percent
I've recently been reading Mankiw's paper "Defending the One Percent". Mankiw writes:
An alternative to the social insurance view of the income distribution is what, in Mankiw (2010), I called a “just deserts” perspective. According to this view, people should receive compensation congruent with their contributions. If the economy were described by a classical competitive equilibrium without any externalities or public goods, then every individual would earn the value of his or her own marginal product, and there would be no need for government to alter the resulting income distribution. The role of government arises as the economy departs from this classical benchmark. Pigovian taxes and subsidies are necessary to correct externalities and progressive income taxes can be justified to finance public goods based on the benefits principle. Transfer payments to the poor have a role as well, because fighting poverty can be viewed as a public good.
I take it that this view reflects a fairly common approach to the ethics economic inequality. The thought is that we shouldn't overly tax the wealthy because they deserve the fruits of their labor. To the extent that it is acceptable to tax the wealthy, it is only justifiable in terms of its effect on the common good and on helping the least well off.
The underlying assumption is that taxation of the wealthy is detrimental to them: that it is bad for the wealthy to be taxed. While I would agree that taxation is typically detrimental to the person being taxed, and it is not obvious that this is the case for the very wealthy.
It is conceivable that taxing the wealthy has virtually no effect on their well-being. It might make sense to say that, up to the first million dollars of yearly income, wealth adds something significant to the quality of our lives. We can afford to live safely and securely. We can afford practically any hobby that people engage in. But beyond that level of income, it is hard to imagine that additional income adds much. The average quality of life, measured in terms of whatever makes a life go best, among people that are very wealthy must not be that much higher than moderately well off. If this is the case, then the increases that come with additional income must become vanishingly small.
If this is the case, then why do people continue to pursue greater amounts of wealth? There might be several reasons -- first, it might be comparative levels of wealth make a difference. If I can make more money this year than I did last year, that might make me happier. Or if I can make more money than my neighbor, I might feel more satisfaction with my accomplishments. This need not have anything to do with how much I actually make, once I can take care of all of my major concerns.
Second, there might be something valuable and motivating about simply achieving what counts as material success in one's culture or subculture. Making a lot of money might be a good thing simply because it involves achieving one's potential given the limits imposed by the system. This may change as one changes subcultures. If one starts off in poverty, a middle class income might count as a success. If one starts off in substantial wealth, success might come from being very wealthy. Taxation could change what we count as success, and so a tax might lower someone's income without making them any worse off (so long as it doesn't change the level of success we attribute to that income.)
So it is possible that taxation might not harm the wealthy much at all. If quality of life isn't much affected by income level, and if it is more significantly influenced by relative income, then taxing everyone might not take anyone (much) worse off.
There is, however, a stronger point that may be made. It is not obvious that taxation is not in the interests of the wealthy. It is deeply plausible that limitations are an important part of a good life. If we could get whatever we wanted with the snap of a finger, our life might not be as good as if we had to work to get what we wanted, and were sometimes disappointed. The ability to buy whatever we want might actually make our life worse.
It might be thought that taxation must not be in the interest of the wealthy, because they are not rushing to donate money to the government on their own initiative. This can be explained by the difference between internally imposed constraints and externally imposed constraints. It might be that internally imposed constraints are less good for us than externally imposed constraints. If we decide that it is better to live a life with limitations, then we might seek to impose limitations on ourselves. However, limiting ourselves not be satisfying. It removes something of the genuineness of what successes we have.
For example, it is not very enjoyable to play chess when you are vastly better than your opponent. You could voluntarily make bad moves to make the game fairer, and to make it less likely that you would win, but there is no guarantee that it would make it any more enjoyable. What is enjoyable about chess is being challenged, and rising to that challenge. Self-imposed limits are not as satisfying to us as externally imposed limits. Since donating money to the government might be a self-imposed limit, it is not necessarily a suitable rectification in having life go too easy.
So it might turn out to be in the interest of the wealthy to be taxed. It may be that the limits that a government would impose upon wealthy individuals benefit them in ways that couldn't be done entirely with their consent. These sorts of considerations seem to be very important in the justification of taxation in current society.
An alternative to the social insurance view of the income distribution is what, in Mankiw (2010), I called a “just deserts” perspective. According to this view, people should receive compensation congruent with their contributions. If the economy were described by a classical competitive equilibrium without any externalities or public goods, then every individual would earn the value of his or her own marginal product, and there would be no need for government to alter the resulting income distribution. The role of government arises as the economy departs from this classical benchmark. Pigovian taxes and subsidies are necessary to correct externalities and progressive income taxes can be justified to finance public goods based on the benefits principle. Transfer payments to the poor have a role as well, because fighting poverty can be viewed as a public good.
I take it that this view reflects a fairly common approach to the ethics economic inequality. The thought is that we shouldn't overly tax the wealthy because they deserve the fruits of their labor. To the extent that it is acceptable to tax the wealthy, it is only justifiable in terms of its effect on the common good and on helping the least well off.
The underlying assumption is that taxation of the wealthy is detrimental to them: that it is bad for the wealthy to be taxed. While I would agree that taxation is typically detrimental to the person being taxed, and it is not obvious that this is the case for the very wealthy.
It is conceivable that taxing the wealthy has virtually no effect on their well-being. It might make sense to say that, up to the first million dollars of yearly income, wealth adds something significant to the quality of our lives. We can afford to live safely and securely. We can afford practically any hobby that people engage in. But beyond that level of income, it is hard to imagine that additional income adds much. The average quality of life, measured in terms of whatever makes a life go best, among people that are very wealthy must not be that much higher than moderately well off. If this is the case, then the increases that come with additional income must become vanishingly small.
If this is the case, then why do people continue to pursue greater amounts of wealth? There might be several reasons -- first, it might be comparative levels of wealth make a difference. If I can make more money this year than I did last year, that might make me happier. Or if I can make more money than my neighbor, I might feel more satisfaction with my accomplishments. This need not have anything to do with how much I actually make, once I can take care of all of my major concerns.
Second, there might be something valuable and motivating about simply achieving what counts as material success in one's culture or subculture. Making a lot of money might be a good thing simply because it involves achieving one's potential given the limits imposed by the system. This may change as one changes subcultures. If one starts off in poverty, a middle class income might count as a success. If one starts off in substantial wealth, success might come from being very wealthy. Taxation could change what we count as success, and so a tax might lower someone's income without making them any worse off (so long as it doesn't change the level of success we attribute to that income.)
So it is possible that taxation might not harm the wealthy much at all. If quality of life isn't much affected by income level, and if it is more significantly influenced by relative income, then taxing everyone might not take anyone (much) worse off.
There is, however, a stronger point that may be made. It is not obvious that taxation is not in the interests of the wealthy. It is deeply plausible that limitations are an important part of a good life. If we could get whatever we wanted with the snap of a finger, our life might not be as good as if we had to work to get what we wanted, and were sometimes disappointed. The ability to buy whatever we want might actually make our life worse.
It might be thought that taxation must not be in the interest of the wealthy, because they are not rushing to donate money to the government on their own initiative. This can be explained by the difference between internally imposed constraints and externally imposed constraints. It might be that internally imposed constraints are less good for us than externally imposed constraints. If we decide that it is better to live a life with limitations, then we might seek to impose limitations on ourselves. However, limiting ourselves not be satisfying. It removes something of the genuineness of what successes we have.
For example, it is not very enjoyable to play chess when you are vastly better than your opponent. You could voluntarily make bad moves to make the game fairer, and to make it less likely that you would win, but there is no guarantee that it would make it any more enjoyable. What is enjoyable about chess is being challenged, and rising to that challenge. Self-imposed limits are not as satisfying to us as externally imposed limits. Since donating money to the government might be a self-imposed limit, it is not necessarily a suitable rectification in having life go too easy.
So it might turn out to be in the interest of the wealthy to be taxed. It may be that the limits that a government would impose upon wealthy individuals benefit them in ways that couldn't be done entirely with their consent. These sorts of considerations seem to be very important in the justification of taxation in current society.
Sunday, November 15, 2015
Bring on the (Utilitarian) Robot Apocalypse!
Humanity is flawed in a number of ways. We naturally and inevitably grow weak and infirm. We die long before most of us have gotten all that we want to out of life. We are often cruel, selfish, or careless. We choose short-sighted actions that produce more harm than good. We deplete the planets' resources, and cause a significant amounts of damage to practically every ecosystem on the earth.
We (mostly) all agree that these are problems that are worth solving. And we are making some amount of progress toward addressing some of them. Medical technology has greatly extended our lifetimes, and the promise of genetic engineering suggests that far greater advancements may come. It is not implausible that we could use such technologies to also make ourselves less cruel, selfish or careless, and consequently to help end war, poverty, and needless human suffering. Furthermore, we may have some hope of producing food and energy in cheaper, more environmentally friendly ways.
While it is conceivable that we will address these problems in the next 100 years, it won't be easy. It is difficult to mold one thing into another. We were designed by nature, and nature didn't build us to these problems easily solvable. I suspect that there may be a much simpler way.
Suppose that in the next 50 years, we are able to make and perfect artificial intelligence. There is no clear reason to think that we shouldn't be able to do with chips and software and planning what nature did with neurons and random chance. Suppose further that we are able to create intelligences with whatever sorts of properties we like. We can make them intelligent or stupid, emotional or stoic, we can give them a sense of humor. Etc. If we can make succeed in making malleable artificial intelligences, then we can also make artificial lives. Such creatures would get the same sort of value out of their lives that we do out of ours.
It strikes me as extremely plausible that we should be able to more easily perfect AIs than perfect human beings. We can design AIs from scratch, and give them whatever features we want. They won't have to worry about war. There is no reason to think that they would have to worry about aging either. Since they would not have the same natural history as we do, they would also be immune to disease. They could, plausibly, survive outside of the earth, and could plausibly be sustained much more easily in an environmentally friendly way.
In order to perfect human beings, we have to tamper with an existing thing. It might be possible to get rid of human flaws, but probably at a greater effort and cost.
So if we ever get to the point where we can develop such AIs, why not just put the human race to rest and allow these AIs to take over? We took over from homo heidelbergensis, and they gave birth to us. Why not do the same thing with artificial intelligences. What do we have of value that we can't program into an AI?
We (mostly) all agree that these are problems that are worth solving. And we are making some amount of progress toward addressing some of them. Medical technology has greatly extended our lifetimes, and the promise of genetic engineering suggests that far greater advancements may come. It is not implausible that we could use such technologies to also make ourselves less cruel, selfish or careless, and consequently to help end war, poverty, and needless human suffering. Furthermore, we may have some hope of producing food and energy in cheaper, more environmentally friendly ways.
While it is conceivable that we will address these problems in the next 100 years, it won't be easy. It is difficult to mold one thing into another. We were designed by nature, and nature didn't build us to these problems easily solvable. I suspect that there may be a much simpler way.
Suppose that in the next 50 years, we are able to make and perfect artificial intelligence. There is no clear reason to think that we shouldn't be able to do with chips and software and planning what nature did with neurons and random chance. Suppose further that we are able to create intelligences with whatever sorts of properties we like. We can make them intelligent or stupid, emotional or stoic, we can give them a sense of humor. Etc. If we can make succeed in making malleable artificial intelligences, then we can also make artificial lives. Such creatures would get the same sort of value out of their lives that we do out of ours.
It strikes me as extremely plausible that we should be able to more easily perfect AIs than perfect human beings. We can design AIs from scratch, and give them whatever features we want. They won't have to worry about war. There is no reason to think that they would have to worry about aging either. Since they would not have the same natural history as we do, they would also be immune to disease. They could, plausibly, survive outside of the earth, and could plausibly be sustained much more easily in an environmentally friendly way.
In order to perfect human beings, we have to tamper with an existing thing. It might be possible to get rid of human flaws, but probably at a greater effort and cost.
So if we ever get to the point where we can develop such AIs, why not just put the human race to rest and allow these AIs to take over? We took over from homo heidelbergensis, and they gave birth to us. Why not do the same thing with artificial intelligences. What do we have of value that we can't program into an AI?
Sunday, November 8, 2015
A puzzle about reflection
A puzzle.
After a sinful life, a formal epistemologist appears before the gates of heaven. St. Peter takes pity on the fellow, and offers the following deal. God will choose a number in one of two ways. First, God might choose the number randomly from the set of all possible numbers, with each number being equally likely to be chosen. Second, God might choose the number by flipping a coin some number of times -- the number chosen will be equal to the number of heads results before the first tails results. If the epistemologist can guess which method God used the epistemologist can go to heaven. In order to help him make his choice, St. Peter relates to the epistemologist that God's method lead him to the number 2.
Which should the epistemologist choose?
At first glance, it seems like God obviously chose the second method. The probability that God would have chosen 2 using that method is .25. The probability that God would have chosen 2 using the first method is practically 0. Given the fact that it is vastly more likely that would have chosen 2 with that method, the epistemologist should become much more confident that it is.
What is weird about this answer is that it doesn't really depend upon the particular number chosen. The logic holds just as well if God chose 16, or 10 million, or a googolplex. No matter what, it is vastly more likely that any given finite number will be chosen using the second method than the first. In fact, the second method will produce each number with some positive finite probability, while the first will only produce any number with an infinitesimal probability.
Before St. Peter relates the number God chose, the epistemologist shouldn't feel strongly either way. Afterward, he should become very confident that God chose the second method, no matter what number St. Peter says. The epistemologist should know this, and so the situation should violate van Fraassen's reflection principle: while the epistemologist knows that his future evidence will make a certain judgment rational, that judgment is not rational for the epistemologist at the time.
While reflection principle is controversial, this seems like a very weird violation of it. But one that, as far as I can tell, is inescapable. Short of denying the possibility of the scenario, it seems impossible to avoid.
(I found this puzzle in a paper by a statistician many years ago, and I have not seen it again in print.)
After a sinful life, a formal epistemologist appears before the gates of heaven. St. Peter takes pity on the fellow, and offers the following deal. God will choose a number in one of two ways. First, God might choose the number randomly from the set of all possible numbers, with each number being equally likely to be chosen. Second, God might choose the number by flipping a coin some number of times -- the number chosen will be equal to the number of heads results before the first tails results. If the epistemologist can guess which method God used the epistemologist can go to heaven. In order to help him make his choice, St. Peter relates to the epistemologist that God's method lead him to the number 2.
Which should the epistemologist choose?
At first glance, it seems like God obviously chose the second method. The probability that God would have chosen 2 using that method is .25. The probability that God would have chosen 2 using the first method is practically 0. Given the fact that it is vastly more likely that would have chosen 2 with that method, the epistemologist should become much more confident that it is.
What is weird about this answer is that it doesn't really depend upon the particular number chosen. The logic holds just as well if God chose 16, or 10 million, or a googolplex. No matter what, it is vastly more likely that any given finite number will be chosen using the second method than the first. In fact, the second method will produce each number with some positive finite probability, while the first will only produce any number with an infinitesimal probability.
Before St. Peter relates the number God chose, the epistemologist shouldn't feel strongly either way. Afterward, he should become very confident that God chose the second method, no matter what number St. Peter says. The epistemologist should know this, and so the situation should violate van Fraassen's reflection principle: while the epistemologist knows that his future evidence will make a certain judgment rational, that judgment is not rational for the epistemologist at the time.
While reflection principle is controversial, this seems like a very weird violation of it. But one that, as far as I can tell, is inescapable. Short of denying the possibility of the scenario, it seems impossible to avoid.
(I found this puzzle in a paper by a statistician many years ago, and I have not seen it again in print.)
Monday, November 2, 2015
Dynamic papers
Presently, academic papers are fairly static things. The author writes them, works on them for a period of time, in which they may undergo a series of changes, until they get published.
Once a paper is published, it retains the same content indefinitely. Occasionally, reprinted papers might be expanded or might include a series of objections and replies. But this is fairly rare. .
There is a somewhat older tradition in which academic books would change and grow through multiple editions. The changes were never as extreme as, say, the many editions of Leaves of Grass, but authors could flesh out their views in light of new considerations. I am not sure if this was ever really the norm, but it certainly was much more common in the past than it is today. Though authors do often write new papers to update their old ideas, they seldom go back and actually rewrite their old papers.
Why should this be the case?
I take it that there are two primary reasons. First, it doesn't fit in well with print journal culture. An article which is available primarily in printed form must be reprinted if it is to be changed, and that seems to rarely happen, especially to journal articles.
Second, there is something nice about having a static target for other people to cite and discuss. Papers which change might change in ways which make criticisms unwarranted.
Nevertheless, I think that the internet should make new forms of scholarship possible, and one thing that it seems to allow us to do is to make new versions of papers accessible while keeping old versions available as well. This need not be a common thing, but I think it would make sense for at least some papers to continue to be updated after the initial state of publication.
Each paper could be assigned a version number that gets updated, with a list of major changes, on the author's webpage. While this would make it slightly more difficult to keep subsequent discussions of the original paper clear, but it would help to keep scholarship organized (as opposed to series of changes where authors revise and update their old ideas in new papers),and would serve to improve the quality of philosophical literature.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)