Fabio Bacchini
I am a Professor of Logic and Philosophy of Science at the University of Sassari (Italy).
I studied at EHESS and CREA, Paris (1993-1995); BS in Philosophy of Science (“La Sapienza” University of Rome, 1996); MA in Bioethics (“La Sapienza” University of Rome, 1998); Ph.D. in Literature and Communication (University of Siena, 2001).
I have been a visiting professor at the Institut Jean Nicod, CNRS-EHESS-ENS, Paris (2013); a visiting scholar at the Department of Philosophy, Stanford University (2014); a Marie Curie Visiting Research Fellow at the University of Girona, Spain (2016-2017); a Visiting Fellow in the Logos Research Group in Analytic Philosophy, University of Barcelona, Spain (2016-2017).
I wrote on philosophy of mind, philosophy of science, nanoethics, bioethics, rational argumentation in ethics. My current research interests focus on philosophy of perception, philosophy of food, philosophy of architecture, and philosophy of race.
I studied at EHESS and CREA, Paris (1993-1995); BS in Philosophy of Science (“La Sapienza” University of Rome, 1996); MA in Bioethics (“La Sapienza” University of Rome, 1998); Ph.D. in Literature and Communication (University of Siena, 2001).
I have been a visiting professor at the Institut Jean Nicod, CNRS-EHESS-ENS, Paris (2013); a visiting scholar at the Department of Philosophy, Stanford University (2014); a Marie Curie Visiting Research Fellow at the University of Girona, Spain (2016-2017); a Visiting Fellow in the Logos Research Group in Analytic Philosophy, University of Barcelona, Spain (2016-2017).
I wrote on philosophy of mind, philosophy of science, nanoethics, bioethics, rational argumentation in ethics. My current research interests focus on philosophy of perception, philosophy of food, philosophy of architecture, and philosophy of race.
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I first show that this answer entails that some visual perceptions – i.e. those that are direct relation between us and an external material object that has visually changed, or ceased to exist, during the time lag – should also count as illusions and hallucinations, respectively.
I then examine the possible attempts by the naïve realist to tell such perceptions apart from illusions and hallucinations, and after showing the inadequacy of the answers relying on a mere counterfactual or causal criterion, I explain why the problem is solved by introducing a view of visual perception as temporally extended into the past of objects and, in particular, as consisting in the whole causal chain of events or states of affairs going from external material object x to subject S.
But this solution is not immune from defects for the naïve realist. I show that this view of perception raises a number of significant concerns, hence leaving the issue of the time lag problem still open for naïve realism.
A growing number of medical professionals in the US are saying that race should not be used in patient care, biomedical research, and medical education, and are advocating for their institutions to ban race from medical thinking, starting with automatic race correction in guidelines and algorithms. While we agree that most automatic race correction is grounded on conceptions of race tainted with scientific racism and pseudoscience and should therefore be eliminated, we also argue that we need to employ the concept of race critically and intensely in biomedical research, epidemiology, and even clinical medicine if we want to actively fight racism, address health inequalities, and avoid penalising disadvantaged groups.
Le posizioni No Tav e No Vax sono spesso equiparate perché entrambe accusabili di essere intollerabilmente egoistiche. Lo scopo di questo articolo è mostrare che, contrariamente alle apparenze, la loro vulnerabilità all’obiezione dell’egoismo è molto diversa. La posizione No Tav è prima facie sempre imputabile di egoismo, ma quando si va a supportare No Tav con argomentazioni specifiche, o l’accusa viene spazzata via, o (come nel sottocaso Nimby) si tratta di un egoismo moralmente legittimo. D’altra parte solo alcune forme che No Vax assume sono prima facie imputabili di egoismo, ma in questo caso non c’è redenzione morale che giunga dalla loro difesa argomentativa. Quanto alle forme di No Vax che non sono a priori accusabili di egoismo, esse diventano immorali, e in parte rilevante immorali perché egoistiche, proprio in virtù delle argomentazioni che vengono invocate per suffragarle.
This paper shows that it is not easy to justify the ban. Indeed, we take it morally right to let parents decide for their children under many circumstances, also when their choices are more bizarre and possibly more harmful than getting them a tattoo. A ban on tattoos would then require a ban on a very large part of parental discretion, which would produce a much more morally disgusting scenario than that we intended to prevent. Nor can we isolate a special class of suboptimal parental choices (including getting a tattoo) we only want to prohibit – for example, those which are an alternative to best options that are also omissions, or, those which irrevocably affect the child’s future life.
A more promising argumentative path to justify the ban, however, can be developed by considering the semiotic properties of a tattoo. By inscribing writing, a design or a symbol on their child’s skin, parents claim the right to speak for her throughout her life, not just during her childhood. But when the child will be a grown woman, her parents’ illocutionary acts will be taken as hers, thus condemning her to be continuously and unpleasantly misread.
Design/Methodology/Approach: The study investigates the causal pathways through which face recognition technology may reinforce the racial disproportion in enforcement; it also inquires whether it further discriminates black people by making them experience more racial discrimination, and self-identify more decisively as black - two conditions that are shown to be harmful in various respects.
Findings: This study shows that face recognition technology, as it is produced, implemented and used in Western societies, reinforces existing racial disparities in stop, investigation, arrest and incarceration rates due to racist prejudices, and even contributes to strengthen the unhealthy effects of racism on historically disadvantaged racial groups, like black people.
Practical implications: The findings hope to make law enforcement agencies and software companies aware that they must take adequate action against the racially discriminative effects of the use of face recognition technology.
Social implications: This paper highlights that no implementation of an allegedly racism-free biometric technology is safe from the risk of racially discriminating, simply because each implementation leans against our society, which is affected by racism in many persisting ways.
Originality/Value: While the ethical survey of biometric technologies is traditionally framed in the discourse of universal rights, this study explores an issue that has not been deeply scrutinised so far, that is, how face recognition technology differently affects distinct racial groups, and how it contributes to racial discrimination.
The papers brought together here are situated in the context of a discipline in transformation that seeks a fundamental approach to its own tools, logic and approaches. In this realm, the approaches of logic and epistemology help to define an alternate means of criticality not subjected to personalities or the specialist knowledge of individual philosophies. Rather the various articles attempt to demonstrate that such difference of background assumptions is a common human habit and that some of the techniques of analytic philosophy may help to leap these chasms. The hope is that this is a start of a larger conversation in architecture theory that has as of yet not begun.
For full issue see:
http://footprint.tudelft.nl/
I first show that this answer entails that some visual perceptions – i.e. those that are direct relation between us and an external material object that has visually changed, or ceased to exist, during the time lag – should also count as illusions and hallucinations, respectively.
I then examine the possible attempts by the naïve realist to tell such perceptions apart from illusions and hallucinations, and after showing the inadequacy of the answers relying on a mere counterfactual or causal criterion, I explain why the problem is solved by introducing a view of visual perception as temporally extended into the past of objects and, in particular, as consisting in the whole causal chain of events or states of affairs going from external material object x to subject S.
But this solution is not immune from defects for the naïve realist. I show that this view of perception raises a number of significant concerns, hence leaving the issue of the time lag problem still open for naïve realism.
A growing number of medical professionals in the US are saying that race should not be used in patient care, biomedical research, and medical education, and are advocating for their institutions to ban race from medical thinking, starting with automatic race correction in guidelines and algorithms. While we agree that most automatic race correction is grounded on conceptions of race tainted with scientific racism and pseudoscience and should therefore be eliminated, we also argue that we need to employ the concept of race critically and intensely in biomedical research, epidemiology, and even clinical medicine if we want to actively fight racism, address health inequalities, and avoid penalising disadvantaged groups.
Le posizioni No Tav e No Vax sono spesso equiparate perché entrambe accusabili di essere intollerabilmente egoistiche. Lo scopo di questo articolo è mostrare che, contrariamente alle apparenze, la loro vulnerabilità all’obiezione dell’egoismo è molto diversa. La posizione No Tav è prima facie sempre imputabile di egoismo, ma quando si va a supportare No Tav con argomentazioni specifiche, o l’accusa viene spazzata via, o (come nel sottocaso Nimby) si tratta di un egoismo moralmente legittimo. D’altra parte solo alcune forme che No Vax assume sono prima facie imputabili di egoismo, ma in questo caso non c’è redenzione morale che giunga dalla loro difesa argomentativa. Quanto alle forme di No Vax che non sono a priori accusabili di egoismo, esse diventano immorali, e in parte rilevante immorali perché egoistiche, proprio in virtù delle argomentazioni che vengono invocate per suffragarle.
This paper shows that it is not easy to justify the ban. Indeed, we take it morally right to let parents decide for their children under many circumstances, also when their choices are more bizarre and possibly more harmful than getting them a tattoo. A ban on tattoos would then require a ban on a very large part of parental discretion, which would produce a much more morally disgusting scenario than that we intended to prevent. Nor can we isolate a special class of suboptimal parental choices (including getting a tattoo) we only want to prohibit – for example, those which are an alternative to best options that are also omissions, or, those which irrevocably affect the child’s future life.
A more promising argumentative path to justify the ban, however, can be developed by considering the semiotic properties of a tattoo. By inscribing writing, a design or a symbol on their child’s skin, parents claim the right to speak for her throughout her life, not just during her childhood. But when the child will be a grown woman, her parents’ illocutionary acts will be taken as hers, thus condemning her to be continuously and unpleasantly misread.
Design/Methodology/Approach: The study investigates the causal pathways through which face recognition technology may reinforce the racial disproportion in enforcement; it also inquires whether it further discriminates black people by making them experience more racial discrimination, and self-identify more decisively as black - two conditions that are shown to be harmful in various respects.
Findings: This study shows that face recognition technology, as it is produced, implemented and used in Western societies, reinforces existing racial disparities in stop, investigation, arrest and incarceration rates due to racist prejudices, and even contributes to strengthen the unhealthy effects of racism on historically disadvantaged racial groups, like black people.
Practical implications: The findings hope to make law enforcement agencies and software companies aware that they must take adequate action against the racially discriminative effects of the use of face recognition technology.
Social implications: This paper highlights that no implementation of an allegedly racism-free biometric technology is safe from the risk of racially discriminating, simply because each implementation leans against our society, which is affected by racism in many persisting ways.
Originality/Value: While the ethical survey of biometric technologies is traditionally framed in the discourse of universal rights, this study explores an issue that has not been deeply scrutinised so far, that is, how face recognition technology differently affects distinct racial groups, and how it contributes to racial discrimination.
The papers brought together here are situated in the context of a discipline in transformation that seeks a fundamental approach to its own tools, logic and approaches. In this realm, the approaches of logic and epistemology help to define an alternate means of criticality not subjected to personalities or the specialist knowledge of individual philosophies. Rather the various articles attempt to demonstrate that such difference of background assumptions is a common human habit and that some of the techniques of analytic philosophy may help to leap these chasms. The hope is that this is a start of a larger conversation in architecture theory that has as of yet not begun.
For full issue see:
http://footprint.tudelft.nl/