The Kingdom

This is a review of The Kingdom (2007)

Norm-Expressivism and the Frege-Geach Problem

How successful is Allan Gibbard’s attempt to solve the Frege-Geach problem for moral non-cognitivism? This author argues that Gibbard is on the right track with his formalism, but is missing an argument about inconsistency that matches the strength of truth-functional logic. The paper includes discussions of non-cognitivism, the Frege-Geach problem, a summary of Gibbard’s argumentation, and summaries of various strong criticisms of Gibbard’s efforts. The author emphasizes the weakness of relying on practical considerations when it comes to consistency between all possible normative moral judgments, yet supports Schroeder’s insight that might help to improve Gibbard’s reasoning

Evaluation of Dietary Supplementation with Antioxidants on Fertility Parameters in Stallions

The aim of the present study was to investigate whether dietary supplementation with antioxidants affects semen fertility parameters in New Zealand Standardbred stallions. Fourteen Standardbred stallions of varying fertility, from 3 studs located throughout New Zealand, were allocated to one of 3 treatments: minerals (Se, Cu, Zn, Mn) and vitamin E supplement, oil (canola) supplement and control (no supplement). The studs were provided with the supplements as aliquots to be added to each feed once per day. Stallions from one stud were fed a different basal diet from the other two studs. At least 3 semen samples were collected from each stallion and sent to Equibreed NZ Ltd, before, and after feeding the supplements for around 60 days. Spermatozoa fertility parameters evaluated included total motility, progressive motility, total progressive motility, morphology (normal, loose heads, head defects, mid-piece defects, tail defects), acrosome status (FITC-PNA), membrane integrity (hypo-osmotic swelling test), and concentration. These parameters were assessed at various times including 6-8h and 24h after collection of semen, and immediately and 30min after thawing, frozen semen. Blood levels of Se, Cu and Zn were measured before and after supplementation. Per cycle pregnancy data was also obtained from questionnaire responses from studs A and B at the end of the trial. This study demonstrates that there was a statistically significant effect of feeding oil as a dietary supplement on sperm motility at 24h after collection (longevity) and also on the per cycle pregnancy rates when treatment groups were combined. Consequently, we were able to elucidate a difference in the actions of mineral and vitamin E supplementation when compared with oil supplementation on fertility parameters measured in this trial. Other beneficial effects of antioxidant supplementation on sperm parameters were suggested from the results of the fourteen stallions on two separate diets, but were not found to be statistically significant

Geoengineering in a Climate of Uncertainty

Against the background of continuing inadequacy in global efforts to address climate change and apparent social and political inertia, ever greater interest is being generated in the idea that geoengineering may offer some solution to this problem. I do not take a position, here, on whether or not geoengineering could ever be morally justifiable. My goal in this paper is more modest – but also has broader implications. I aim to show that even if some form of geoengineering might be ethically acceptable in certain specific circumstances, lab-based research into such techniques could nevertheless have morally problematic consequences. I support this claim by explaining that our current state of uncertainty regarding how the impacts of geoengineering interventions could be geographically distributed may help to promote international agreement on fair rules for the governance of geoengineering. In these circumstances of scientific uncertainty, international actors also face uncertainty regarding who the winners and losers could be with respect to potential rules of geoengineering governance, thereby obstructing the pursuit of self-interest in the selection of such rules. Instead of a research first approach, then, we have reason to take a governance first approach – ensuring that fair international institutions to regulate geoengineering activities are established before further research is conducted into how the costs and benefits of such interventions could be distributed

Climate Change and the Moral Significance of Historical Injustice in Natural Resource Governance

In discussions about responsibility for climate change, it is often suggested that the historical use of natural resources is in some way relevant to our current attempts to address this problem fairly. In particular, both theorists and actors in the public realm have argued that historical high-emitters of greenhouse gases (GHGs) – or the beneficiaries of those emissions – are in possession of some form of debt, deriving from their overuse of a natural resource that should have been shared more equitably. These accounts of what might be termed ‘natural debt’ generally focus on one particular natural resource (global GHG sink capacity); invoke a principle of justice by which rights to consume this resource should have been allocated (most commonly, equal per capita shares); and then argue that historical violations of this principle give rise to certain rectificatory duties in the present (generally, duties on the part of those who have historically consumed an excessive amount of the world’s GHG sink capacity, or who have benefitted from such excess consumption, to offer some form of compensation to those who have not – such compensation usually taking the form of emission credits or cash). Though many seem to find it intuitively plausible that historical high-emissions have incurred some form of debt, significant challenges arise in rendering the concept of natural debt both coherent and defensible. Such problems are not, however, my focus in this piece. Instead, I here suggest that discussions about historical responsibility for climate change commonly fail to recognise certain other past injustices concerning natural resources that appear to hold contemporary relevance. In particular, I argue that it is not just the unequal consumption of global GHG sink capacity that may be of moral significance here; but also the way in which the world’s resources have more generally been governed

Who is responsible for the climate change problem?

According to the Polluter Pays Principle, excessive emitters of greenhouse gases have special obligations to remedy the problem of climate change, because they are the ones who have caused it. But what kind of problem is climate change? In this paper I argue that as a moral problem, climate change has a more complex causal structure than many proponents of the Polluter Pays Principle seem to recognize: it is a problem resulting from the interaction of anthropogenic climate effects with the underlying vulnerability and exposure of human communities and other things of value. This means that we should acknowledge more pathways by which human agency contributes to the climate problem and, accordingly, a different landscape of contribution-based remedial responsibilities

Reparations and egalitarianism

Some claim that a commitment to egalitarianism is in tension with support for reparations for historical injustice. This tension appears to arise insofar as egalitarianism is a forward-looking approach to justice: an approach that tells us what kind of world we should aim to build, where that world is not defined in terms of the decisions or actions of previous generations. Some have claimed that egalitarianism thereby renders reparations redundant (what I will refer to as the redundancy thesis). One popular option for egalitarians who aim to reject this thesis is to insist that historical injustices demand reparations when they have caused present-day inequality (the causal approach). A promising alternative, skilfully defended by Alasia Nuti in Injustice and the Reproduction of History, is to argue that historical injustices stand in need of repair when they are reproduced into the present-day, such that some past and present injustices are in fact the same injustice. In this paper, I assess these egalitarian responses to the redundancy thesis. I find that Nuti’s account is equipped to reject this thesis, but that the same lines of reply can be adopted by proponents of the causal approach. I suggest that both approaches therefore be viewed as potential ways to conceptualise the relationship between historical injustice and our present normative circumstances; and that in choosing between them, we should understand ourselves to be engaged in an ameliorative project – a project that is guided by, and designed to help us to achieve, our legitimate purposes