Epistemic Schmagency?

Constructivist approaches in epistemology and ethics offer a promising account of normativity. But constructivism faces a powerful Schmagency Objection, raised by David Enoch. While Enoch’s objection has been widely discussed in the context of practical norms, no one has yet explored how the Schmagency Objection might undermine epistemic constructivism. In this paper, I rectify that gap. First, I develop the objection against a prominent form of epistemic constructivism, Belief Constitutivism. Belief Constitutivism is susceptible to a Schmagency Objection, I argue, because it locates the source of normativity in the belief rather than the agent. In the final section, I propose a version of epistemic constructivism that locates epistemic normativity as constitutive of agency. I argue that this version has the resources to respond to the Schmagency Objection

Just war and military morale: a brief reflection on the correlation between the legality of war and the moral repercussions for members of US and UK forces arising from the questionable legality of the campaign Iraqi Freedom of March 2003

Does it matter to a member of the military whether the military campaign in which he is taking part is lawful or not? Despite the observation that the crime of aggression (post Kampala 2010) constitutes a ‘leadership crime par excellence,’ which limits any (future) criminal responsibility accordingly, the legality or illegality of any military action under international law can create moral implications for the common foot soldier and mid-level officer and also have a tangible impact on the national legal frameworks under which these forces operate. This short article uses the example of Operation Iraqi Freedom (2003) to discuss the repercussions of a—most likely—illegal military campaign for individual members of democratic armed forces before the background of the present discussion of NATO led action in Libya

Spatial distribution of heterogeneity as a modulator of collective dynamics in pancreatic beta-cell networks and beyond

This is the final version. Available on open access from Frontiers Media via the DOI in this recordData availability statement: The datasets presented in this study can be found in online repositories. The names of the repository/repositories and accession number(s) can be found below: https://github.com/dgalvis/network_spatialWe study the impact of spatial distribution of heterogeneity on collective dynamics in gap-junction coupled beta-cell networks comprised on cells from two populations that differ in their intrinsic excitability. Initially, these populations are uniformly and randomly distributed throughout the networks. We develop and apply an iterative algorithm for perturbing the arrangement of the network such that cells from the same population are increasingly likely to be adjacent to one another. We find that the global input strength, or network drive, necessary to transition the network from a state of quiescence to a state of synchronised and oscillatory activity decreases as network sortedness increases. Moreover, for weak coupling, we find that regimes of partial synchronisation and wave propagation arise, which depend both on network drive and network sortedness. We then demonstrate the utility of this algorithm for studying the distribution of heterogeneity in general networks, for which we use Watts–Strogatz networks as a case study. This work highlights the importance of heterogeneity in node dynamics in establishing collective rhythms in complex, excitable networks and has implications for a wide range of real-world systems that exhibit such heterogeneity.University of Birmingham Dynamic Investment FundEngineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC)Medical Research Council (MRC)Diabetes UKUKRIEuropean Union Horizon 202

Rational Moral Ignorance

Philosophy and Phenomenological Research, EarlyView

Immorality and Irrationality

Does immorality necessarily involve irrationality? The question is often taken to be among the deepest in moral philosophy. But apparently deep questions sometimes admit of deflationary answers. In this case we can make way for a deflationary answer by appealing to dualism about rationality, according to which there are two fundamentally distinct notions of rationality: structural rationality and substantive rationality. I have defended dualism elsewhere. Here, I’ll argue that it allows us to embrace a sensible – I will not say boring – moderate view about the relationship between immorality and irrationality: roughly, that immorality involves substantive irrationality, but not structural irrationality. I defend this moderate view, and argue that many of the arguments for less moderate views turn either on missing the distinction between substantive and structural rationality, or on misconstruing it

How Reasoning Aims at Truth

Many hold that theoretical reasoning aims at truth. In this paper, I ask what it is for reasoning to be thus aim-directed. Standard answers to this question explain reasoning’s aim-directedness in terms of intentions, dispositions, or rule-following. I argue that, while these views contain important insights, they are not satisfactory. As an alternative, I introduce and defend a novel account: reasoning aims at truth in virtue of being the exercise of a distinctive kind of cognitive power, one that, unlike ordinary dispositions, is capable of fully explaining its own exercises. I argue that this account is able to avoid the difficulties plaguing standard accounts of the relevant sort of mental teleology

Quantum oscillations of nitrogen atoms in uranium nitride

The vibrational excitations of crystalline solids corresponding to acoustic or optic one phonon modes appear as sharp features in measurements such as neutron spectroscopy. In contrast, many-phonon excitations generally produce a complicated, weak, and featureless response. Here we present time-of-flight neutron scattering measurements for the binary solid uranium nitride (UN), showing well-defined, equally-spaced, high energy vibrational modes in addition to the usual phonons. The spectrum is that of a single atom, isotropic quantum harmonic oscillator and characterizes independent motions of light nitrogen atoms, each found in an octahedral cage of heavy uranium atoms. This is an unexpected and beautiful experimental realization of one of the fundamental, exactly-solvable problems in quantum mechanics. There are also practical implications, as the oscillator modes must be accounted for in the design of generation IV nuclear reactors that plan to use UN as a fuel.Comment: 25 pages, 10 figures, submitted to Nature Communications, supplementary information adde

Band-theoretical prediction of magnetic anisotropy in uranium monochalcogenides

Magnetic anisotropy of uranium monochalcogenides, US, USe and UTe, is studied by means of fully-relativistic spin-polarized band structure calculations within the local spin-density approximation. It is found that the size of the magnetic anisotropy is fairly large (about 10 meV/unit formula), which is comparable with experiment. This strong anisotropy is discussed in view of a pseudo-gap formation, of which crucial ingredients are the exchange splitting of U 5f states and their hybridization with chalcogen p states (f-p hybridization). An anomalous trend in the anisotropy is found in the series (US>>USe<UTe) and interpreted in terms of competition between localization of the U 5f states and the f-p hybridization. It is the spin-orbit interaction on the chalcogen p states that plays an essential role in enlarging the strength of the f-p hybridization in UTe, leading to an anomalous systematic trend in the magnetic anisotropy.Comment: 4 pages, 5 figure