Browsing Philosophy by Title
Now showing items 95-114 of 134
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Politics, Principles and Pluralism: On why liberalism must be inconsistent if correct
(University of Waterloo, 2014-10-24)In this dissertation, the author argues that constructivist foundations of political liberalism require a rarely recognized sort of pluralism—not only the familiar pluralism between ideas about how we ought to live that ... -
Practical Reasoning and Rationality
(University of Waterloo, 2009-04-30)Theories of practical reasoning and rationality have been expounded at least as far back as the Greeks. Beginning with several historical perspectives, I attempt to answer the descriptive and normative questions of practical ... -
The Pregnant Self
(University of Waterloo, 2009-10-02)Pregnancy, a human phenomenon experienced throughout the world and throughout history, has been largely ignored by the philosophical community. A preference for the abnormal and the extraordinary has left this common yet ... -
A Preservationist Approach to Relevant Logic
(University of Waterloo, 2014-08-29)The semantics I develop extend an approach to logic called preservationism. The preservationist approach to logic interprets non-classical consequence relations as preserving something other than truth. I specifically ... -
Private Property Rights: An Indispensable Moral Foundation of Society
(University of Waterloo, 2014-09-05)The philosophic justifications of private property reach back to the ancient world. Aristotle regarded secure possessions as necessary for successful social functioning, and Cicero understood government’s function to be ... -
Professional Ethics for Economists: A Reflection on DeMartino's Oath
(University of Waterloo, 2024-02-16)Economists and the discipline of economics occupy positions of immense institutional and intellectual authority in the world today. Decisions made based on the advice and expertise of economists influence the lives of ... -
Psychological and Phenomenological Perspectives on the Hard Problem of Consciousness
(University of Waterloo, 2017-01-19)In reexamining the hard problem of consciousness through the history of the concept of mind, I argue that psychologists, cognitive scientists, and analytic philosophers of mind should return to the first-person perspective ... -
Quantum Field Theory: Motivating the Axiom of Microcausality
(University of Waterloo, 2012-09-19)Axiomatic quantum field theory is one approach to the project of merging the special theory of relativity with that of ordinary quantum mechanics. The project begins with the postulation of a set of axioms. Axioms should ... -
Rationality and Group Decision-Making in Practical Healthcare
(University of Waterloo, 2006)In this paper, a view of non-compliance in practical healthcare is provided that identifies certain non-compliant behaviours as rational. This view of rational non-compliance is used to update a current form of doctor ... -
A Realist Critique of Structural Empiricism
(University of Waterloo, 2009-11-04)In his latest work, Scientific Representation: Paradoxes of Perspective, Bas van Fraassen has argued for a position he describes as empiricist structuralism. This position embraces a structuralist view of science which ... -
Reasonable Assertions: On Norms of Assertion and Why You Don't Need to Know What You're Talking About
(University of Waterloo, 2012-04-17)There’s a widespread conviction in the norms of assertion literature that an agent’s asserting something false merits criticism. As Williamson puts it, asserting something false is likened to cheating at the game of ... -
Reducing the Emergence of the Gaps: Computation for Weak Emergence
(University of Waterloo, 2014-09-29)This thesis contributes to the growing literature surrounding the importance of weak emergence by showing it can account for more phenomena than originally conceived via the use of computational reduction. Weak emergence ... -
Reference and Reinterpretation
(University of Waterloo, 2007-10-02)Reference is the relation held to obtain between an expression and what a speaker or thinker intends the expression to represent. Reference is a component of interpretation, the process of giving terms, sentences, and ... -
Renaturalizing the Individual with Borderline Personality Disorder
(University of Waterloo, 2013-05-24)Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD) is among the most troubling Personality Disorders. Individuals with the disorder have exaggerated fears of abandonment, distorted self-identity and problems in interpersonal relationships, ... -
Rigid Designation, the Modal Argument, and the Nominal Description Theory
(University of Waterloo, 2005)In this thesis, I describe and evaluate two recent accounts of naming. These accounts are motivated by Kripke?s response to Russell?s Description Theory of Names (DTN). Particularly, I consider Kripke?s Modal Argument ... -
The Role of Concrete Models in the Revolution in Superconductivity
(University of Waterloo, 2015-10-13)The distinction between the abstract and the concrete is useful in understanding the way in which theories relate to phenomenon, respectively, or vice versa. The connection between theory and the actual workings of ... -
Semiosis and the Crisis of Meaning: Continuity and Play in Peirce and Derrida
(University of Waterloo, 2019-09-17)Semiosis and the Crisis of Meaning addresses the difference between continuity and play in Charles Peirce’s and Jacques Derrida’s theory of signs. The main aim is to offer a reply to Derrida’s reading of Peirce in Of ... -
The Sense of Self and Sensorimotor Functions
(University of Waterloo, 2018-03-28)This thesis investigates whether biological sex and motor function have a role in the visual representation of the self. The principal contribution is a new virtual reality experiment that systematically varied an avatar’s ... -
Sentimentalism, Affective Response, and the Justification of Normative Moral Judgments
(University of Waterloo, 2006)Sentimentalism as an ethical view makes a particular claim about moral judgment: to judge that something is right/wrong is to have a sentiment/emotion of approbation/disapprobation, or some kind of positive/negative feeling, ... -
Sex, Dementia, and Consent
(University of Waterloo, 2018-08-01)Sex and dementia is becoming an increasingly important topic in applied ethics. By the year 2030, more than 74.7 million people are expected to be diagnosed with dementia worldwide; many of these people may want to engage ...