Price On Truth

The podcast of Huw Price's (University of Sydney) recent lecture on truth is now available.

(Why is it that the podcast has replaced the transcript as the primary means of preserving public lectures?)

Philosopher’s Carnival, No. Thirty

The 30th Philosopher's Carnival is being hosted by annemiz.

On Wrongful Life: Harriton v Stephens

‘A comparison between a life with disabilities and non-existence, for the purposes of proving actual damage and having a trier of fact apprehend the nature of the damage caused, is impossible. Judges in a number of cases have recognised the impossibility of the comparison and in doing so references have been made to philosophers and theologians as persons better schooled than courts in apprehending the ideas of non-being, nothingness and the afterlife.

There is no present field of human learning or discourse, including philosophy and theology, which would allow a person experiential access to non-existence, whether it is called pre-existence or afterlife.’ – Harriton v Stephens [2006] HCA 15 at [252], [253] per Crennan J.

Harriton, which was decided by the High Court last week, deals with legal issues evoked by – the poorly labelled – ‘wrongful life’ cases. These are cases where an action is brought for damages for ‘wrongful life’ (not to be confused, in tort, with ‘wrongful birth’ cases).

See [247] for an all too brief discussion of ‘Aristotelian notions of “corrective justice”’ by Justice Crennan.

On ‘Mind and Meaning’

Samuel’s contemplation of minds and meaning, and the discussion that it sparked …

The Manifesto Club

An introduction, via spiked, to the Manifesto Club.

The sixth point of their manifesto – ‘We seek to reclaim the Enlightenment and the legacy of the Enlightenment’ – is interesting in a post ‘Was Ist Aufklärung’ era …

Questions On Sedition

Where should the line between sedition and critique of government be drawn? Should it even be drawn at all?

First On-Line Philosophy Conference – Week One Papers

The first set of papers for the much announced On-Line Philosophy Conference were presented on Sunday (there are more to be presented in the next couple of weeks). The seven papers were:

- Mary Coleman, ‘Holistic Directions of Fit and Smith’s Teleological Argument’
- Julia Driver, ‘Luck’
- Noa Latham, Fundamental Laws’
- Alfred Mele, ‘Practical Mistakes and Intentional Actions’
- Stephen Stich and Daniel Kelley, ‘Two Theories about the Cognitive Architecture Underlying Morality’
- Jessica Wilson, ‘Non-reductive Physicalism and Degrees of Freedom’
- Outstanding Undergraduate Paper: Andrew Bailey, ‘Some Unsound Arguments for Incompatibilism’

The papers and commentaries are available here, whilst comments can be made at the Conference blog.

Philosopher’s Carnival, No. Twenty-Nine

The 29th Philosopher’s Carnival is being hosted by Daylight Atheism.

DuckRabbit’s ‘10 Things’ is definitely worth a glance.