Browsing by Thesis Department "Philosophy (MU)"
Now showing items 1-20 of 84
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Absences as causes : a defense of negative causation
(University of Missouri--Columbia, 2010)In this dissertation, I confront the issue of negative causation, (i.e., causation by or of absences). I investigate the causal status of absences with regard to particular philosophical concerns and argue that absences ... -
Amoralists, inverted commas, and the puzzle of moral internalism : an essay in experimental metaethics
(University of Missouri--Columbia, 2016)The central question addressed in this dissertation is whether one must have some degree of motivation to comply with their moral evaluation in order to count as genuinely making a sincere moral judgment. Those that view ... -
An analysis of the State
(University of Missouri--Columbia, 2008)What the state is remains far from clear in political philosophy. However, the state is also a key concept at work in many discussions in political philosophy. For example, there is a debate about anarchism, the question ... -
Aristotle on happiness : a comparison with Confucius
(University of Missouri--Columbia, 2006)In the Nicomachean Ethics, Aristotle defines the highest good for humankind in terms of happiness. The nature of happiness includes intellectual activity, virtuous activity, and friendship; and certain external goods are ... -
Attending to our work : a framework for understanding and evaluating the division of labor
(University of Missouri--Columbia, 2009)The division of labor is a pervasive and long-standing feature of human life. Yet there is little consensus--either in philosophy or in other disciplines--regarding its status. Using a contemporary evaluation provided by ... -
Authoritatively speaking : a speech pragmatic analysis of authority and power
(University of Missouri--Columbia, 2021)A speaker needs authority to perform some speech acts, such as giving orders. A paradigm example of this is when a manager orders their employee to take out the trash; ordinarily, these words will give the employee a ... -
Born she is the divine Christ child : female figurations of Christ in Black Atlantic literature, theatre, and cinema
(University of Missouri--Columbia, 2017)In order to support and justify the slave trade and the colonial enterprise, Western powers relied heavily on distorted interpretations of Christian scriptures to justify the oppression of black communities in Africa and ... -
Bounded rationality in games of strategy
(University of Missouri--Columbia, 2011)[ACCESS RESTRICTED TO THE UNIVERSITY OF MISSOURI AT REQUEST OF AUTHOR.] Traditional game theory predicts behavior contrary to how real people actually behave. And what traditional game theory prescribes as the rational ... -
Choice, ownership and responsibility
(University of Missouri--Columbia, 2012)My dissertation is to answer these two questions: "Does moral responsibility require choice?" and "If not, what does it require?" Classic accounts of moral responsibility, such as libertarian accounts, assume a volition ... -
Citizenship goes to the dogs
(University of Missouri--Columbia, 2020)The conclusion I defend is that "domestic animals" have a moral claim to what I refer to as "basic citizenship rights," and that they do so for the same reason that "non-autonomous humans" do. I define each of these key ... -
Clarifying relational egalitarianism
(University of Missouri--Columbia, 2018)[ACCESS RESTRICTED TO THE UNIVERSITY OF MISSOURI SYSTEM AT AUTHOR'S REQUEST.] I clarify the nature of relational egalitarianism, a theory in political philosophy that concerns equality. Relational egalitarians understand ... -
Compensation as the moral foundation of Jus Post Bellum
(University of Missouri--Columbia, 2015)Given how much harm can be done after the fighting part of wars end, and given recent failures to secure lasting peace after conflicts (e.g. in Afghanistan and Iraq), developing an account of the conditions of a just peace, ... -
The confusion of natural selection
(University of Missouri--Columbia, 2024)This dissertation is divided into four parts: an introduction and three papers. The introduction offers a concise overview of natural selection and elucidates how the three papers are interconnected within this dissertation. ... -
Conscience : toward the mechanism of morality
(University of Missouri--Columbia, 2006)Conscience is frequently cited and yet its mechanism is not understood. Conscience is most familiar as a voice protesting against actions which compromise personal integrity. Persons also cite conscience as that which ... -
The consciousness of visual experience
(University of Missouri--Columbia, 2018)[ACCESS RESTRICTED TO THE UNIVERSITY OF MISSOURI SYSTEM AT AUTHOR'S REQUEST.] "This monograph mainly concerns two distinctive features of visual experience. First, visual experience has its own phenomenal dimension. Following ... -
Contrastive knowledge how
(University of Missouri--Columbia, 2024)Classical empiricists are notorious for claiming that knowledge-how is a complex disposition or ability that is directly exhibited in action. This dissertation evaluates that claim against the background of contemporary ... -
Could gender be an attribute of God?
(University of Missouri--Columbia, 2024)This thesis examines whether gender can be considered an attribute of God, examining Biblical depictions of God in masculine terms alongside modern egalitarian concerns within the context of Abrahamic religious traditions, ... -
Critical pluralism : a new approach to religious diversity
(University of Missouri--Columbia, 2007)The world's religions provide a wide range of competing religious claims. The problem of religious diversity is that, while many of these claims are inconsistent with one another, they often seem to rest on roughly equal ... -
Defending an indirect normativity of belief
(University of Missouri--Columbia, 2019)In this dissertation, I seek to answer the following questions: is there such a thing as deontic epistemic normativity -- obligations, permissions, and prohibitions to act in a certain way based on epistemic grounds -- and ... -
Defending states and protecting individuals : a critical examination of the principle of nonintervention
(University of Missouri--Columbia, 2016)It is widely accepted that individuals have rights. It is also widely accepted (though less so) that states have rights, including a right against intervention. Yet, sometimes the rights of individuals become threatened ...