Argumenta – Journal of Analytic Philosophy

 

Lying and Misleading in Context [Special Issue]

Issue: Issue 15 • Author/s: Palle Leth
Topics: Epistemology, Moral Philosophy, Philosophy of language, Theoretical philosophy

In this paper I question the lying/misleading distinction from three different angles. I argue, first, that if speakers are responsible for what they explicitly say only and hearers for what they infer that speakers implicitly convey, it is practically impossible to enforce speaker responsibility. An implication of this view is that the lying/misleading distinction is untenable. Other attempts at questioning the distinction have been countered by empirical evidence of the robustness of the distinction. However, there is also contrasting empirical evidence that people do think that it is possible to…

Dangerous Liaisons: The Pragmatics of Sexual Negotiation [Special Issue]

Issue: Issue 15 • Author/s: Claudia Bianchi
Topics: Moral Philosophy, Philosophy of language, Theoretical philosophy

The debate about speech acts in sexual contexts has been dominated by discussions of consent and refusal, two illocutions strictly connected to definitions of sexual assault and rape, which constitutes a crucial step in fighting male sexual violence against women. Many authors have recently claimed that this emphasis has a distorting and harmful impact on our understanding of sexual communication—for it highlights only its negative aspects (mostly how to avoid unwanted sex). Moreover, an account in terms of consent and refusal seems to presuppose a default asymmetrical scenario, with men…

Book Reviews

Issue: Issue 11 • Author/s: Peter Øhrstrøm, Giulia Lorenzi, Laura Caponetto, Bianca Cepollaro
Topics: Aesthetics, Epistemology, Metaphysics, Moral Philosophy, Ontology, Philosophy of language, Theoretical philosophy

Grassroots Modeling during the Covid-19 Pandemic [Special Issue]

Issue: Issue 13 • Author/s: Cecilia Nardini, Fridolin Gross
Topics: Epidemiology, Epistemology, Moral Philosophy, Philosophy of Medicine, Philosophy of science

One of the many peculiar phenomena that the Covid-19 pandemic has brought about is the engagement of non-scientists with specific questions surrounding the interpretation of epidemiological data and models. Many of them have even begun to get involved in the collection, analysis, and presentation of the data themselves. A reason for this might be that the insights that science can provide in a situation of crisis are often inconclusive or preliminary, motivating many people to look for the answers to pressing questions themselves. Moreover, public engagement is facilitated by the…

Non-Doxastic Conspiracy Theories

Issue: Issue 13 • Author/s: Anna Ichino, Juha Räikkä
Topics: Epistemology, Moral Philosophy

To a large extent, recent debates on conspiracy theories have been based on what we call the “doxastic assumption”. According to that assumption, a person who supports a conspiracy theory believes that the theory is (likely to be) true, or at least equally plausible as the “official explanation”. In this paper we argue that the doxastic assumption does not always hold. There are, indeed, “non-doxastic conspiracy theories”: theories that have many supporters who do not really believe in their truth or likelihood. One implication of this view is that some…
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