Formal approaches to legal reasoning. This project aims to use formal epistemology to improve understanding of existing legal practices and to propose recommendations for improving the consistency and accuracy of legal proceedings. Since judges and juries rarely know all the relevant facts, they must make the best decision possible in the face of uncertainty. Formal epistemology employs probabilistic reasoning to advance understanding of how to form beliefs and make decisions in response to unce ....Formal approaches to legal reasoning. This project aims to use formal epistemology to improve understanding of existing legal practices and to propose recommendations for improving the consistency and accuracy of legal proceedings. Since judges and juries rarely know all the relevant facts, they must make the best decision possible in the face of uncertainty. Formal epistemology employs probabilistic reasoning to advance understanding of how to form beliefs and make decisions in response to uncertain evidence. The project has potential to influence the relevant policy and will result in improved legal reasoning and risk reduction in legal decision making.Read moreRead less
Conferring dignity in law and health care. This project aims to develop a new and more inclusive philosophical conception of dignity. It expects to generate an alternative to the exclusionary view that dignity is inherent since not all human beings possess the relevant inherent traits. The project will develop a conception of dignity as something conferred, and expects to show that such dignity can and should be conferred on all human beings. The expected outcome is a new understanding of the im ....Conferring dignity in law and health care. This project aims to develop a new and more inclusive philosophical conception of dignity. It expects to generate an alternative to the exclusionary view that dignity is inherent since not all human beings possess the relevant inherent traits. The project will develop a conception of dignity as something conferred, and expects to show that such dignity can and should be conferred on all human beings. The expected outcome is a new understanding of the importance of dignity in human rights law and in health care services. The intended benefits are better appreciation of the role of dignity in human rights, and guidance for health and aged care services on how they can promote the dignity of all of their clients.Read moreRead less
Significances of 'childhood' in postcolonial Australia. This project aims to investigate the rhetorical and political use of the figure of the Aboriginal child as a site of mediation in efforts to reconcile cultural tensions in Australia, particularly between Indigenous and non-Indigenous communities. Utilising an interdisciplinary critical analysis of concepts of childhood, the expected outcomes of the project include enhanced understanding of the specific character of injury inflicted upon Abo ....Significances of 'childhood' in postcolonial Australia. This project aims to investigate the rhetorical and political use of the figure of the Aboriginal child as a site of mediation in efforts to reconcile cultural tensions in Australia, particularly between Indigenous and non-Indigenous communities. Utilising an interdisciplinary critical analysis of concepts of childhood, the expected outcomes of the project include enhanced understanding of the specific character of injury inflicted upon Aboriginal communities through interventions targeting their children, such as their removal into out of home care. This should provide significant benefits to the contemporary social project of reconciliation, through increasing critical attention to the part of cultural misunderstanding in perpetuating Aboriginal disadvantage.Read moreRead less
A relational theory of procedural justice. This project aims to develop a relational theory of procedural justice, based on the quality of interactions between individuals and legal authorities. Just procedures maintain the public's trust in the legal system, but lawyers and philosophers have not studied what makes legal procedures morally justifiable. The project will use empirical studies about the public's understanding of procedural justice to enrich the normative analysis and demonstrate th ....A relational theory of procedural justice. This project aims to develop a relational theory of procedural justice, based on the quality of interactions between individuals and legal authorities. Just procedures maintain the public's trust in the legal system, but lawyers and philosophers have not studied what makes legal procedures morally justifiable. The project will use empirical studies about the public's understanding of procedural justice to enrich the normative analysis and demonstrate the value of the theory in the practical setting of tribunal proceedings. This research is expected to contribute to theoretical and practical debates about how to improve legal procedures.Read moreRead less
Discovery Early Career Researcher Award - Grant ID: DE230101136
Funder
Australian Research Council
Funding Amount
$428,416.00
Summary
Understanding Philosophical Progress. This project aims to develop the first unified account of progress in science and philosophy, by extending the noetic account of scientific progress into an account of philosophical progress. According to this account, progress consists in increased understanding, i.e., in grasping how something depends on, or fails to depend on, something else. Developing a unified account will shed light on the nature of intellectual progress quite generally, as well subst ....Understanding Philosophical Progress. This project aims to develop the first unified account of progress in science and philosophy, by extending the noetic account of scientific progress into an account of philosophical progress. According to this account, progress consists in increased understanding, i.e., in grasping how something depends on, or fails to depend on, something else. Developing a unified account will shed light on the nature of intellectual progress quite generally, as well substantially advancing meta-philosophical debates about (i) the prevalence of philosophical progress; (ii) whether, and the ways in which, expert disagreement would undermine progress; and (iii) which philosophical methodologies promote progress.Read moreRead less
A life in time. This project aims to explore the connection between theories of time and timelessness in metaphysics and physics, and our lived experience as agents. The story of our lives is one that unfolds through time; ever changing and updating as we add to the store of memories through which we understand our past selves, and our store of intentions, through which we shape our future selves. Yet there is disagreement about the nature of time: about what time is and whether, in fact, it rea ....A life in time. This project aims to explore the connection between theories of time and timelessness in metaphysics and physics, and our lived experience as agents. The story of our lives is one that unfolds through time; ever changing and updating as we add to the store of memories through which we understand our past selves, and our store of intentions, through which we shape our future selves. Yet there is disagreement about the nature of time: about what time is and whether, in fact, it really exists at all. The project will look to determine what structure the temporal dimension must have if it is to support agents like us, and whether, if there is no temporal dimension, as some physicists suggest, we can make any sense of our lived experience.Read moreRead less
Sceptical reasoning: its epistemological nature, limits, and worth. Philosophers usually take sceptical reasoning seriously — yet without agreeing on why this should be so — even when wishing not to be sceptics about people ever having knowledge. This project will uncover new problems in sceptical reasoning while offering new ideas as to how, even so, it could be epistemologically valuable.
Knowing the Nature of Knowledge. From Plato onwards, philosophers have tried to determine what it is to have knowledge. This project will uncover some factors that have impeded those philosophical efforts to understand knowledge's nature. The project will thus constitute a fundamental challenge to standard philosophical assumptions regarding how we could, if ever, know what knowledge is. A new conception of the nature of knowledge will be developed, by resurrecting an ancient but now-ignored con ....Knowing the Nature of Knowledge. From Plato onwards, philosophers have tried to determine what it is to have knowledge. This project will uncover some factors that have impeded those philosophical efforts to understand knowledge's nature. The project will thus constitute a fundamental challenge to standard philosophical assumptions regarding how we could, if ever, know what knowledge is. A new conception of the nature of knowledge will be developed, by resurrecting an ancient but now-ignored conception, and marrying it with contemporary technical sophistication. This new theory will be non-absolutist, admitting different grades of knowledge, even of a single fact. This will be a widely applicable theory.Read moreRead less
Taste and community: the cultural origins of personal experience. This project explores how artistic value and meaning are attributed to artworks and how cultural artefacts and imaginative constructs may be seen to motivate ethical or socially oriented behaviour. It investigates this theme through an innovative new medium, involving a website and imagery, through which the expertise of philosophers and artists can be brought to bear on a social problem. Its outcomes will include new understandi ....Taste and community: the cultural origins of personal experience. This project explores how artistic value and meaning are attributed to artworks and how cultural artefacts and imaginative constructs may be seen to motivate ethical or socially oriented behaviour. It investigates this theme through an innovative new medium, involving a website and imagery, through which the expertise of philosophers and artists can be brought to bear on a social problem. Its outcomes will include new understanding of the process of perceiving meaning and value as a response to cultural artefacts.Read moreRead less
Discovery Early Career Researcher Award - Grant ID: DE190100411
Funder
Australian Research Council
Funding Amount
$408,000.00
Summary
Social constructionism about race. This project aims to show that there are no races, only racialised groups. Race was once thought to be biologically real, a position which is increasingly rejected by specialists. Now race is commonly believed to be a social construct, which is often taken to mean that races are real social groups. This project aims to demonstrate that when race is defined socially it loses its conceptual and historical specificity, and that racial classification should be aban ....Social constructionism about race. This project aims to show that there are no races, only racialised groups. Race was once thought to be biologically real, a position which is increasingly rejected by specialists. Now race is commonly believed to be a social construct, which is often taken to mean that races are real social groups. This project aims to demonstrate that when race is defined socially it loses its conceptual and historical specificity, and that racial classification should be abandoned altogether. An expected outcome of the project is a scholarly and public shift away from racial classification. This project develops and defends the category of the racialised group as an alternative to one of history’s most misleading and dangerous ideas.Read moreRead less