The Non-Neutrality Thesis and What Designers Must Do

Our lives are saturated with technologies. These technologies range from the simple, such as clothing, to the complex, such as airplanes. They may be firmly established, such as the refrigerators found in most homes. They may be new, like cryptocurrencies which are much hyped but still niche. They may belong only in the future, like nuclear fusion power plants which are currently being researched. They may only be conceptual or not even conceived yet. Nonetheless, the conduct of human life is so deeply intertwined with technological artefacts that we barely notice, though if they suddenly vanished, we would be paralysed.

The proof of this is how our lives grind to a halt during a power outage. Things we take for granted to work, such as the television or the lights, cease to do so, and we turn to earlier technologies such as matches and candles to light our way. In this way, technology is integral to our way of life and its effect on the human condition is profound. This paper will consider the moral status of technology given its deep relation to the human condition. I will argue against the neutrality thesis, after which I will outline what more must designers of technologies do, given the moral status of technologies.

Justifying Knowledge: Coherentism vs Foundationalism

How do we justify our true beliefs so that they can become knowledge? The classical account of knowledge considers knowledge to be justified true belief (JTB): to have knowledge, one believes something that is true and can justify that belief. Post-Gettier, the three conditions of justification, truth and belief are considered necessary but not sufficient for knowledge.[1] The condition of truth belongs to the domain of metaphysics while the nature of belief is in the domain of the philosophy of mind. The condition of justification belongs to epistemology. Epistemological theories to justify true beliefs include infinitism, coherentism and foundationalism.[2] Given a true belief, such as ‘Brussels is the capital of Belgium,’ how can we justify it?

Kant’s Solution to Hume’s Problem

Kant aims to put metaphysics on a firm footing to make it a science in his Critique of Pure Reason. However, Hume’s attack on cause and effect suggests metaphysics is not possible. Hence Kant needs to solve the Humean challenge.

Walking Crosswise to Reality - A Zen Buddhist Perspective

If speaking of aims and achievement is appropriate, the aim of the practitioners of Buddhism is to achieve satori. Though considered an ineffable concept, satori has been explained or expressed as enlightenment, awakening, realisation, non-dependence[1] and liberation from suffering,[2] a complete reordering of the individual in his relation to the world.[3] According to Hakuin, “Buddha means ‘one who is awakened.’”[4] Various branches of Buddhism have their own methods for attaining satori, including deep study of the sutras and its commentaries, and meditation. Reacting against these traditions, the Rinzai school of Zen Buddhism presents a radical take on how satori can be gained. The Rinzai school is one of two major sects in Zen Buddhism in Japan. This paper will examine the ‘crazy’ practices of the Rinzai school, which aims to disrupt the minds of its adherents, sometimes literally shocking them into a sudden awakening.

What they do realise or are awakened to is that there is after all no-thing. They will then be able to see, experience and live the true reality beyond the phenomena that we are ordinarily confronted with. I will contrast this notion of true reality with Kant’s transcendental idealism, which definitively explains why it is not possible to go beyond the phenomenal realm to the noumenal, and why Rinzai Zen Buddhism’s radical shift might suggest a way to do so.

Are Intermediaries Needed in Cognition?

In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth,[1] the Bible tells us in the opening verse of the first book of Genesis, which narrates the literal genesis of the universe. In another book of the Bible, the Gospel of John, written thousands of years later to chronicle the epochal event of the Christian faith, the life of Jesus, a similar phrase was used, no less poetic and awe-inspiring but somewhat more opaque: In the beginning was the Word.[2] What was the relationship between God, his Son and the Word? Augustine of Hippo answers this question in De Trinitate. According to Panaccio, Augustine’s main idea is that in order to understand the Trinity, the human mind needs to be examined since human beings are made in God’s image,[3] and hence the “spiritual part of man must be the best image there is among all creatures of the Divine essence.”[4] For Augustine, the relation between God and his Son is like the relation of the mind and the mental word. The mental word is expressed externally by the spoken word, just like how the God is expressed to the world by an incarnation which is Jesus. [5]