Dissertations / Theses on the topic 'Objectivity'
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Conrad, Erich Charles. "Science and objectivity /." Diss., Connect to a 24 p. preview or request complete full text in PDF format. Access restricted to UC IP addresses, 2008. http://wwwlib.umi.com/cr/ucsd/fullcit?p3308928.
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Dennis, Robin. "Egocentricity and objectivity." Thesis, University of York, 2010. http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.542838.
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Barton, Jon. "Warrant and objectivity." Thesis, King's College London (University of London), 2007. http://sas-space.sas.ac.uk/1082/.
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Wright's 'Truth and Objectivity' seeks to systematise a variety of anti-realist positions. I argue that many objections to the system are avoided by transposing its talk of truth into talk of warrant. However, a problem remains about debates involving 'direction-of-fit'. Dummett introduced 'anti-realism’ as a philosophical view informed by mathematical intuitionism. Subsequently, the term has been associated with many debates, ancient and modern. 'Truth and Objectivity' proposes that truth admits of different characteristics; these various debates then concern which characteristics truth has, in a given area. This pluralism of truth is at odds with deflationism. I find fault with Wright's argument against deflationism. However, transmission of warrant across the Disquotational Schema suffices to ground Wright's proposal, which survives as a pluralism of classes of warrant. The two main debates concern whether truths are always knowable (Epistemic Constraint) and whether disagreements in an area must be down to some fault of one of those involved (Cognitive Command). I introduce Assertoric Constraint, relating to Epistemic Constraint, where truths cannot outstrip the availability of warrant for their assertion. I solve a structural problem by a comparison with a constitutive analysis of Moore's Paradox. The relativism of blameless disagreement is problematic. Wright's response invokes a sort of ignorance which he calls 'Quandary'. I criticise this before proposing an alternative. I agree with Wright that Dummett's original anti-realism does not belong among the positions which Wright seeks to systematise. However, two candidates show that the proposal suffers a weakness. Wright thinks Expressivism misguided, and implicitly rules out his earlier non-cognitivism about necessity. I argue that Expressivism has promise, and I endorse Wright’s Cautious Man argument for non-cognitivism about necessity; both involve play with 'direction-of-fit'. I conclude that this sort of anti-realist debate needs to be accommodated by the proposal.
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Martin, Wayne M. "Idealism and objectivity understanding Fichte's Jena project /." Stanford (Calif.) : Stanford University Press, 1997. http://catalogue.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/cb37080405t.
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Thornton, Tim. "Judgement, objectivity and practice : an investigation of the objectivity of empirical judgement." Thesis, University of Cambridge, 1994. http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.319883.
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Stavropoulos, Nicolas E. "Objectivity in legal interpretation." Thesis, University of Oxford, 1992. http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.334241.
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Taylor, Timothy Edwin. "Reasons, value and objectivity." Thesis, Birkbeck (University of London), 2007. http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.582527.
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This thesis explores the idea that value provides objective reasons for action. I argue in Chapter 1 that identifying reasons for action which are objective (defined in opposition to "perspectival"), and avoid narrow relativity to the interests of the agent, might contribute to a wider programme of establishing that there can be objectively right answers to live moral questions. Chapter 2 argues that there is good reason to pursue such a programme rather than embracing relativism or a more radical anti- objectivism. Chapter 3 argues that value, ofthe kind associated with making lives go well, generates reasons for action, and Chapter 4 assesses various candidate accounts of value. Chapter 5 proposes a subjective account which (unlike hedonism) allows states of the world as well as mental states to have value, but (unlike desire accounts) sees value as conferred by attitudes focused upon the present, not the future, arguing that a subjective account nevertheless allows us to regard value as objective in the required sense. Chapters 6 and 7 argue that, although value is essentially relative, talk about value- based reasons can avoid narrow relativity if we adopt an inclusive perspective. Where there are no conflicts of value, if something has value for someone, it has value "period". Chapter 8 argues that it should be possible in principle to resolve conflicts of value, and examines potential difficulties stemming from intemalism in the theory of motivation, concluding that these do not undermine my project. Chapter 9 concludes that my proposals establish that there is no fundamental reason to suppose that there cannot be objective answers to moral questions, and tell us something about what such answers should look like, whilst leaving further questions that would need to be addressed in seeking to fulfil the wider programme.
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Carter, Eric Kevin. "Objectivity, Language, and Communication." The Ohio State University, 2011. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1308311590.
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McKaiser, Eusebius. "In defence of moral objectivity." Thesis, Rhodes University, 2003. http://hdl.handle.net/10962/d1007599.
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This thesis examines the problem of moral objectivity, which is constituted by the ontological, epistemological and motivational challenges. It gradually develops an account of moral objectivity that has the dual function of dealing with the enemies of moral objectivity as well as giving a positive account of what moral objectivity is. It establishes these aims by arguing for the following theses. The first set of arguments show that relativist theories of ethics provide us with no forceful grounds for being sceptical about moral objectivity. The second set of arguments deepens the response to those who are sceptical about moral objectivity. It does so by showing in greater detail how rationality plays a substantive role in our practical deliberation, our notion of agency as well as our reactive attitudes. These arguments provide further reasons why we should have faith in the possibility of developing an adequate account of moral objectivity. The last set of arguments provides the positive account of moral objectivity. This positive account ends with the discussion of a paradigmatic moral fact that gives full expression (to the features of moral objectivity that have been articulated and defended.
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Brewer, Bill. "Objectivity, agency and self-location." Thesis, University of Oxford, 1989. http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.303509.
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Garner, Stephanie. "McDowell's oscillation, objectivity and rationality." Thesis, University of Oxford, 2010. http://ora.ox.ac.uk/objects/uuid:716edcdd-3b37-4b12-811c-cf7c3355a779.
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Mind and World is written in a Wittgensteinian spirit. It is a work whose aim is to address a specific philosophical discomfort. John McDowell diagnoses a tension between the urge for what he describes as 'minimal empiricism' and its apparent impossibility. Minimal empiricism is defined as the idea that constraint is exercised on our thought by the world through experience. In his view, minimal empiricism stands in tension with the fact that conceptually unstructured impressions can have no rational bearing on our beliefs and judgements. This tension forces an oscillation between two equally unattractive positions: the Myth of the Given and coherentism. McDowell's aim is to dissolve this apparent tension which he sees as resting on the more basic assumption of a dualism between reason and nature. Through his invocation of 'second nature' he aims to present a naturalised Platonism in which man's occupation of the space of reasons can be seen as an aspect of his animal nature, not as something essentially alien to us. The thesis starts by outlining McDowell's attempt to escape the oscillation he detects between the Myth of the Given and coherentism. In Chapter One, the content of Mind and World is briefly laid out. The underlying dualism of reason and nature on which the oscillation is said to rest is considered and the resources he employs in his attempt to escape it discussed. These resources include his metaphysical rejection of sideways-on accounts of understanding. The second chapter reinforces the first by isolating and defining a number of key concepts in McDowell's picture. The material discussed here is largely drawn from works other than Mind and World. Three key assumptions are isolated: the rejection of sideways-on accounts of understanding, the de re nature of singular thought and the fully conceptual nature of experience. These assumptions are shown to play a pivotal role in his philosophy by considering his work on Aristotle and Descartes. McDowell aims to provide a 'therapeutic dissolution' of the oscillation between the Myth of the Given and coherentism. In order to be successful it must meet (at least) three criteria which emerge from his writings. These criteria are discussed alongside attempts by other philosophers to escape the oscillation that McDowell detects. The third chapter develops, in broad outline, the argument of the thesis. Two lines of thought are traced from the three central elements of McDowell's view identified in the second chapter. The first stems from his rejection of sideways-on accounts of understanding, whilst the second arises from the object-dependence of singular thought. The picture in Mind and World incorporates what Julian Dodd has termed a 'modest identity theory of truth'. Put simply, an identity theory states that facts are true propositions, and the theory is modest if facts are taken to be composed of senses. McDowell himself explicitly accepts that his picture is committed to a modest identity theory, though its exact nature is unclear from his writings. McDowell's semantic externalism appears to provide an account in which singular senses are object-dependent. Thoughts are composed of these senses, and so are dependent on objects in the world for their content. One would expect that facts too (which are true possible thoughts) would be object-dependent. After all they are composed of object-dependent entities, namely senses. Such a position encourages the idea that objects are explanatorily independent of facts. In Kit Fine's terminology, propositions about objects 'ground' propositions about senses. However, this idea stands in tension with McDowell's rejection of sideways-on accounts of understanding. He claims that the world is composed of facts and that reality does not exist beyond the conceptual realm. Such a position suggests that objects exist only derivatively from their role in facts: "objects figure in the world by figuring in facts, which are true thinkables" [McDowell (1999a) p94. My italics]. In other words, that propositions about facts 'ground' propositions about objects. Since 'grounding' is an asymmetric notion, there is a tension in McDowell's picture which needs to be resolved. Chapter Four examines McDowell's Kantian account of objects. Objects are derived from facts. McDowell is not committed to a substantial semantic externalism in which, when we investigate whether our terms have a reference, we look at the world to see whether there is an object corresponding to our sense of the term. Instead, McDowell's semantic externalism is truistic: once a sense appears in a fact, no further questions can be asked about the reference of the term. The sense's figuring in a true possible thought ensures that there is a reference. There can be no sense without reference because objects are derived from facts (which are true possible thoughts). The conception of objects that McDowell offers, however, fails to sustain important common-sense realist intuitions. Looked at as an account of empirical objects (rather than formal objects, such as mathematical ones), there are deficiencies which can be brought out. His account can be challenged on the grounds that it is unable to allow that sapient and sentient environments have a common ontology. The discussion is framed as a dialogue between a common-sense realist and a McDowellian thinker. This provides for responses to the reasoning to be considered at every appropriate point. These responses are, in the end, not sufficient to allow his account to meet the realist intuitions. He has therefore failed to provide an account based on mere reminders of common-sense truisms. His account of objects is revisionary and must be either replaced or defended by positive arguments. The quietist's claim that only negative arguments are needed to defend his position is undermined once the position abandons common-sense realism. In Chapter Five the focus shifts back to the overall argument laid out in Chapter Three. It might be thought that McDowelPs particular conception of objects is a peripheral error. If this were the case, since his basic account has not been shown to abandon common-sense realism, his revisionary conception of objects could simply be dropped. This line of thought is countered. I present the arguments of two commentators to show the strength of my objection. Mark Sainsbury argues that McDowell should not maintain a substantial form of semantic externalism if he stands firm to his rejection of sideways-on accounts of understanding. Ruth Millikan argues that McDowelPs commitment to a substantial form of semantic externalism stands in tension with his account of sense, which is a central element in his rejection of sideways-on accounts of understanding. The tension which concerns these commentators needs to be addressed. The conception of objects considered in Chapter Four is required. It provides McDowell's explanation of how his rejection of sideways-on accounts of understanding is consistent with his semantic externalism. The final chapter concludes the argument of the thesis. It is shown that McDowell's theory (as it stands) fails to meet his therapeutic aspirations. In particular he has failed to meet two of the three therapeutic requirements attributed to him in Chapter Two. His conception of objects is revisionary and his picture does not avoid the appearance of an insurmountable problem in world-directed thoughts. Its failure to provide for common-sense realism means that he can no longer avail himself of the quietist strategy which disavows the need to provide positive arguments for its conclusions. Therapeutic dissatisfaction with his picture is the result. The argument of this thesis is then located within a broader philosophical landscape.
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Dickerson, A. B. "Kant on representation and objectivity /." Cambridge : Cambridge university press, 2004. http://catalogue.bnf.fr/ark:/12148/cb39088471t.
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Reilly, Elizabeth. "Objectivity and responsibility in moral education." Thesis, National Library of Canada = Bibliothèque nationale du Canada, 1998. http://www.collectionscanada.ca/obj/s4/f2/dsk2/ftp03/NQ27233.pdf.
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Avila-Canamares, Ignacio. "Egocentricity and objectivity in perceptual experience." Thesis, University of Warwick, 2008. http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.487812.
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Ellis, Robert Michael. "A Buddhist theory of moral objectivity." Thesis, Lancaster University, 2001. http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.289002.
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The book presents an argument for moral objectivity based on non-dualism, drawing on the Buddhist tradition but argued from first premises in relation to Western philosophical understandings of ethics. The first part consists of a critique both of the theoretical and practical shortcomings of views of ethics which rely on positive or negative metaphysical claims about the foundation for universal ethics or about its absence. The dualism underlying these two alternatives is understood in terms of a psychological model according to which the rational ego utilises metaphysical belief to separate itself from the remainder of the psyche and its associated alternative grounds of belief. Metaphysical beliefs are shown to be related to egoistic psychological dispositions through the use of philosophical, historical, and psychological evidence, and this account used as the basis of a criticism of all the main existing ethical theories in Western philosophy. In the second part a more positive account is provided of a non-dualistic Middle Way, which attempts to show that there is an alternative to the dualism revealed in Part 1. This Middle Way unites systematic metaphysical agnosticism in philosophy with moral practice that attempts to integrate the ego incrementally with the remainder of the psyche. Psychological integration thus becomes the basis of a new way of understanding moral (and other types of) objectivity without positive or negative metaphysical assumptions. To understand integration as a basis of ethics requires the systematic incrementalisation of the dualisms on which Western philosophy habitually relies, such as subject-object, fact-value, mind-body, and freewill-determinism. Without these dualistic prior assumptions, a balanced investigation can be made into all the conditions which influence our moral judgements. Personal and group virtue can be cultivated, and specificity of guidance on areas of moral judgement where we are ignorant imported by the balanced use of moral expertise. Supporting materials for this thesis are available on http://www.moralobjectivity.net and a published version is available on http://www.lulu.com/product/paperback/a-theory-of-moral-objectivity/15123628?showPreview .
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Botchkina, Ekaterin. "Issues in objectivity and mind-dependence." Thesis, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, 2016. http://hdl.handle.net/1721.1/107329.
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Thesis: Ph. D., Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Department of Linguistics and Philosophy, 2016.Cataloged from PDF version of thesis.
Includes bibliographical references (pages 90-93).
Reality and objectivity are often characterized in terms of independence from the mind: the first-pass idea is that what it takes for any particular subject matter to be real and objective is for facts about it to obtain independently of beliefs, linguistic practices, conceptual schemes, and so on. But if we take seriously the possibility that significant realms of reality, including social kinds, judgment-dependent properties, and mental phenomena themselves, stand in various dependence relations to the mental, then this first-pass characterization needs to be significantly revised. In this set of papers, I consider the special questions that metaphysically mind-dependent entities raise for issues of objectivity and realism. In Part 1, 1 substantiate the notion of metaphysical mind-dependence with a taxonomy of the various ways in which entities can stand in metaphysical relations of dependence to mental phenomena. In Part II, I address the question of realism and mind-dependence: I argue that while certain entities stand in relations of significant, direct, and essential dependence on mental activity, they are nevertheless fully real. In making the argument, I elaborate a distinction between enactive and essential dependence on mental phenomena, arguing that both kinds of dependence may obtain without impinging on an entity's reality. In Part III, I address the question of objectivity and mind-dependence: I argue that certain kinds of mind-dependence, in particular, dependence on judgments, have the effect of undermining the objectivity of the relevant domain. One consequence of the view I develop is that the objectivity of a subject matter can come apart from the reality of its associated entities; another is that objectivity is a feature that is relative, rather than absolute, and depends crucially on which perspectives are brought to bear for the purposes of evaluation.
by Ekaterina Botchkina.
Ph. D.
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Dracos, Marcos Gregorios. "Interpretation and objectivity in written contracts." Thesis, University of Cambridge, 2006. http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.614315.
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Ward, Laura Aline. "Objectivity in Feminist Philosophy of Science." Thesis, Virginia Tech, 2004. http://hdl.handle.net/10919/36098.
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Feminist philosophy of science has long been considered a fringe element of philosophy of science as a whole. A careful consideration of the treatment of the key concept of objectivity by such philosophical heavyweights as Thomas Kuhn and Karl Popper, followed by an analysis of the concept of objectivity with the work of such feminist philosophers of science as Donna Haraway, Lynn Hankinson Nelson, and Sandra Harding, reveals that feminist philosophers of science are not members of some fringe movement of philosophy of science, but rather are doing philosophical work which is both crucial and connected to the work of other, "mainstream" philosophers of science.Master of Arts
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James, Steven Michael. "Triangulation and the Problem of Objectivity." The Ohio State University, 2011. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1316500581.
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McKernan, John Francis. "Truth, objectivity and subjectivity in accounting." Thesis, Connect to e-thesis, 2001. http://theses.gla.ac.uk/970/.
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Thesis (Ph.D.) - University of Glasgow, 2001.Ph.D. thesis submitted to the Faculty of Social Sciences, University of Glasgow, 2001. Includes bibliographical references. Print version also available.
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Gullberg, Ebba. "Objects and objectivity : Alternatives to mathematical realism." Doctoral thesis, Umeå universitet, Institutionen för idé- och samhällsstudier, 2011. http://urn.kb.se/resolve?urn=urn:nbn:se:umu:diva-43692.
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This dissertation is centered around a set of apparently conflicting intuitions that we may have about mathematics. On the one hand, we are inclined to believe that the theorems of mathematics are true. Since many of these theorems are existence assertions, it seems that if we accept them as true, we also commit ourselves to the existence of mathematical objects. On the other hand, mathematical objects are usually thought of as abstract objects that are non-spatiotemporal and causally inert. This makes it difficult to understand how we can have knowledge of them and how they can have any relevance for our mathematical theories. I begin by characterizing a realist position in the philosophy of mathematics and discussing two of the most influential arguments for that kind of view. Next, after highlighting some of the difficulties that realism faces, I look at a few alternative approaches that attempt to account for our mathematical practice without making the assumption that there exist abstract mathematical entities. More specifically, I examine the fictionalist views developed by Hartry Field, Mark Balaguer, and Stephen Yablo, respectively. A common feature of these views is that they accept that mathematics interpreted at face value is committed to the existence of abstract objects. In order to avoid this commitment, they claim that mathematics, when taken at face value, is false. I argue that the fictionalist idea of mathematics as consisting of falsehoods is counter-intuitive and that we should aim for an account that can accommodate both the intuition that mathematics is true and the intuition that the causal inertness of abstract mathematical objects makes them irrelevant to mathematical practice and mathematical knowledge. The solution that I propose is based on Rudolf Carnap's distinction between an internal and an external perspective on existence. I argue that the most reasonable interpretation of the notions of mathematical truth and existence is that they are internal to mathematics and, hence, that mathematical truth cannot be used to draw the conclusion that mathematical objects exist in an external/ontological sense.
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Timotheatos, Angelos. "Universalizability as necessary for objectivity in morality." Thesis, National Library of Canada = Bibliothèque nationale du Canada, 1999. http://www.collectionscanada.ca/obj/s4/f2/dsk2/ftp01/MQ39057.pdf.
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James, Eric Peter. "Aspects of truth and objectivity in mathematics." Thesis, University of Oxford, 1990. http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.314976.
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McNulty, Lisa. "Objectivity, reasoning and interdisciplinary : making the links." Thesis, University of Kent, 2010. http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.633696.
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Both the production of knowledge and the product, knowledge itself, are social phenomena. This generally accepted fact is generally thought to require relativism, scepticism, and Kuhnian incommensurability, as well as casting serious doubt on the potential of our cognitive traditions to provide us with objective knowledge about an objective world. This thesis exposes and critiques the presuppositions about the nature of reasoning and objectivity which underlie these fears. Combining a Nietzschean, perspectivist account of objectivity with a conception of reasoning drawn from Lockean epistemology and pedagogy, I build a new account of cognitive optimality, dubbed 'Linkmaking'. The phrase deliberately encompasses several meanings. We 'make links' by noticing connections between objects in the world, by linking ideas together to form a theory or a curriculum; by forming social connections, and by developing interdisciplinary practices. I defend the view that we cannot fully address any of these kinds of Link without reference to all of the others. I further show that out best means to critically assess our cognitive groups is to evaluate the extent to which those groups encourage Linkmaking practices. The major potential challenge to Linkmaking is Kuhnian incommensurability. Having demonstrated the flaws inherent in Kuhn's account, this thesis defends the weaker, Doppeltian form of incommensurability, which grants us insight into the genuine problems which can occur in interdisciplinary research. We then see that the Strong Programme in the sociology of knowledge, inspired by the strong, relativistic version of the Kuhnian incommensurability thesis, has held sway among sociologists because they do not generally study interdisciplinary practices, which highlight scientists' (perspectivist) objectivity. Furthermore, social scientists who accept Kuhnian constructivism doubt their own potential for objectivity, presuming the presence of strong incommensurability where there is none. Undertaking Linkmaking practices both cures this illusion, and improves the cognitive optimality of the group.
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Rantsudu, Boitshwarelo. "Stance and objectivity in hard news reporting." Thesis, Cardiff University, 2018. http://orca.cf.ac.uk/119443/.
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This study examines the appearance of evaluative language and strategic adherence to the principle of objectivity in hard news reporting. While these concepts have traditionally been treated as distinct from each other, they are related. The study highlights a key relational tension between taking an evaluative stance and adhering to the requirement for objectivity. This relational tension is pointed out by Richardson (2007:87), who argues that news reporting is a value-laden process, and that journalists make language choices to express those values while remaining 'journalistically objective'. This demonstrates a two-sided tension that journalists strategically handle in news reporting. In this thesis, I examine this important aspect of the characteristics of hard news reporting, that is, how evaluative language and objectivity concurrently appear in the news. This is dealt with by considering 16 hard news articles from the Daily News and Mmegi. The news articles cover the 2011 nationwide public sector workers' strike in Botswana. In this study a combination of quantitative and qualitative approaches is used to compare how the two newspapers use evaluative language, and how they mitigate such evaluative language in order to remain objective. Four research questions are addressed in this study: 1. How frequent and varied is the use of evaluative language in the Daily News and Mmegi? 2. Given the legal requirement for press objectivity in Botswana, what strategies are used by the Daily News and Mmegi to mitigate such evaluative language? 3. Are there significant differences in the strategies employed by the two newspapers to use and mitigate evaluative language? 4. Can any differences in the strategies of evaluation and mitigation be related to the newspapers' political positioning or the nature of the event covered? Evidence from analysing comparable news articles indicates that, when studied within the context of hard news reporting, evaluation and objectivity are not mutually exclusive concepts, but that the variety of linguistic resources employed in news articles affords journalists success in expressing evaluative content while maintaining the objectivity ideal.
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Todd, Cain Samuel. "Objectivity, imagination, and value in aesthetic judgement." Thesis, University of Cambridge, 2003. http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.619823.
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Jacobz, Melville. "Objectivity, power and interests : a sociological analysis." Thesis, Stellenbosch : Stellenbosch University, 2001. http://hdl.handle.net/10019.1/52376.
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Thesis (MA)--Stellenbosch University, 2001.ENGLISH ABSTRACT: Discourse about the human world has, since Socrates, been structured around the assumption that one view of a given matter is better than competing views, and that argumentation, if carried out correctly and systematically, will favour the view which has the preponderance of reasons and evidence on its side. If this supposition were dropped, the nature of social scientific inquiry would change significantly. For many commentators in the social sciences the ineliminable interpretative dimension of social inquiry and the standpoint-bound character of interpretation lead to the conclusion that we have to abandon any notion of objective truth in the social sciences. The central question raised in this thesis is whether this abandonment is inevitable or even plausible. Is it plausible to conflate objectivity and truth? Is objectivity a possible characteristic of the individual researcher or a characteristic of the scientific research process? Does the cultural environment of the researcher impact on the validity of research findings? If science is a social phenomenon, are scientific beliefs different from other beliefs? How do the interests of the individual researcher or the formal organisation of scientific practice impact on the validity of findings? What role does power play in the shaping of knowledge? These are the questions that will be addressed in the following thesis. The methodology of Max Weber serves as a point of departure and divergences and similarities to the work of Weber are explored in the writings of Kuhn, the Edinburgh School, Latour, Foucault, Habermas, as well as contemporary postmodernist and feminist writers. The analysis of these various concepts and approaches is not presented chronologically, but rather as an exposition of the contributors of various commentators in the fields of both the sociology of science and knowledge, and the philosophy of science.
AFRIKAANSE OPSOMMING: Diskoers oor die menslike wêreld is, sedert Socrates, gestuktureer rondom die aanname dat een siening van 'n gegewe saak beter is as mededingende sienings, en dat argumentasie, indien korrek en sistematies uitgevoer, ten voordeel sal wees van die siening wat gesteun word deur die oormaat van redes en bewyse. As ons hierdie aanname sou laat vaar, sal die stand van sosiaal wetenskaplike ondersoek ingrypend verander. Vir menige kommentator in die sosiale wetenskappe lei die onafwendbare interpretatiewe dimensie van maatskaplike ondersoek, en die standpunt-gebonde aard van interpretasie, tot die gevolgtrekking dat ons enige opvatting van objektiwiteit in die sosiale wetenskappe moet laat vaar. Die kernvraag in hierdie tesis is of hierdie verskuiwing onvermydelik of selfs aanneemlik is. Is dit geldig om objektiwiteit en waarheid saam te snoer? Is objektiwiteit 'n moontlike eienskap van die individuele navorser, of 'n eienskap van die navorsingsproses? Watter impak het die kulturele omgewing van die navorser op die geldigheid van die navorsingsbevindinge? As wetenskap 'n sosiale fenomeen is, is wetenskaplike oortuigings enigsins anders as ander oortuigings? Watter impak het die belange van 'n individuele navorser, of die formele organsiasie van wetenskaplike praktyk, op die geldigheid van bevindings? Watter rol speel mag in die vorming en skepping van kennis? Hierdie is die vrae wat aangespreek word in dié tesis. Die metodologie van Max Weber dien as vertrekpunt, en ooreenkomste tot en afwykings van die sienings van Weber word ondersoek in die werk van Kuhn, die "Edinburgh School", Latour, Foucault, Habermas, sowel as kontemporêre postmoderne en feministiese skrywers. Die analise van hierdie verskeie konsepte en benaderings word nie kronologies aangebied nie, maar eerder as 'n uiteensetting van die bydraes van verskeie kommentators op die gebied van die sosiologie van die wetenskap en van kennis, sowel as die filosofie van wetenskap.
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Rosenkranz, Sven. "Objectivity and realism : meeting the manifestation challenge." Thesis, University of St Andrews, 1999. http://hdl.handle.net/10023/14685.
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The anti-realist maintains that all thoughts that we may entertain are thoughts whose truth-values we can in principle come to recognise. The realist refuses to make any such claim about the limits of our thinking. The anti-realist purports to arrive at her position on the basis of considerations which relate to the manifestability of understanding, i.e. the idea that grasp of thoughts must be manifested in linguistic abilities. Thus she argues against the realist that this requirement cannot be met unless truth is understood not to extend beyond what we can know. Turning the tables, I argue that it is the antirealist who cannot vindicate her position on these grounds. Some thoughts are apt for objective truth; their truth cannot be equated with their current assertibility. Our grasp of such thoughts is not yet manifested in our ability to assert or deny sentences. Once we have identified patterns of linguistic usage which display our grasp of such thoughts however, it transpires that there is no reason either to believe that their truth-values can in principle be recognised.
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Miller, Jean Anne. "Naturalism & Objectivity: Methods and Meta-methods." Diss., Virginia Tech, 2008. http://hdl.handle.net/10919/28329.
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The error statistical account provides a basic account of evidence and inference. Formally, the approach is a re-interpretation of standard frequentist (Fisherian, Neyman-Pearson) statistics. Informally, it gives an account of inductive inference based on arguing from error, an analog of frequentist statistics, which keeps the concept of error probabilities central to the evaluation of inferences and evidence. Error statistical work at present tends to remain distinct from other approaches of naturalism and social epistemology in philosophy of science and, more generally, Science and Technology Studies (STS). My goal is to employ the error statistical program in order to address a number of problems to approaches in philosophy of science, which fall under two broad headings: (1) naturalistic philosophy of science and (2) social epistemology. The naturalistic approaches that I am interested in looking at seek to provide us with an account of scientific and meta-scientific methodologies that will avoid extreme skepticism, relativism and subjectivity and claim to teach us something about scientific inferences and evidence produced by experiments (broadly construed). I argue that these accounts fail to identify a satisfactory program for achieving those goals and; moreover, to the extent that they succeed it is by latching on to the more general principles and arguments from error statistics. In sum, I will apply the basic ideas from error statistics and use them to examine (and improve upon) an area to which they have not yet been applied, namely in assessing and pushing forward these interdisciplinary pursuits involving naturalistic philosophies of science that appeal to cognitive science, psychology, the scientific record and a variety of social epistemologies.Ph. D.
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Haely, Karen Cordrick. "Objectivity in the feminist philosophy of science." Columbus, Ohio : Ohio State University, 2003. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc%5Fnum=osu1064415629.
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Thesis (Ph. D.)--Ohio State University, 2003.Title from first page of PDF file. Document formatted into pages; contains viii, 145 p.; also includes graphics. Includes abstract and vita. Advisor: Louise M. Antony, Dept. of Philosophy. Includes bibliographical references (p. 142-145).
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Geoffroy, William. "Advocacy vs. Objectivity in the Outdoor Press." Thesis, The University of Arizona, 1988. http://hdl.handle.net/10150/292202.
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Islam, Ferdosh. "Moral realism : a study in moral objectivity." Thesis, University of North Bengal, 2007. http://hdl.handle.net/123456789/78.
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Tingley, Edward. "Notes on the objectivity of meaning Gadamerian observations." Thesis, University of Ottawa (Canada), 1989. http://hdl.handle.net/10393/5900.
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Strickland, Susan. "Objectivity, perspectivity and difference : issues in feminist epistemology." Thesis, University of Hull, 1993. http://hydra.hull.ac.uk/resources/hull:8103.
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Logan, Benjamin A. "SELF-RESPECT AND OBJECTIVITY: A CRITIQUE OF RAWLS." UKnowledge, 2016. http://uknowledge.uky.edu/philosophy_etds/10.
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In A Theory of Justice, John Rawls names two conditions as necessary and sufficient for an agent to have self-respect. I argue that Rawls’s two conditions constitute an inadequate understanding of self-respect. Contrary to Rawls, I argue that self-respect requires moral desert, and that self-respect is a distinct concept from self-esteem.
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Bernardoni, Joseph. "Knowing nature without mirrors Thomas Kuhn's antirepresentationalist objectivity /." Diss., Connect to the thesis, 2009. http://hdl.handle.net/10066/3605.
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Westfall, R. H. "Objectivity in stratification, sampling and classification of vegetation." Pretoria : [s.n.], 2009. http://upetd.up.ac.za/thesis/available/etd-09032009-212008/.
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Mendelsohn, Joshua Aidan. "Objects, objectivity and idealism: Robert Brandom's analytic Hegelianism." Thesis, Department of Philosophy, 2011. http://hdl.handle.net/2123/7967.
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Langone, Kenny. "Journalistic Objectivity: Is Chasing Rainbows a Worthwhile Endeavor?" Thesis, The University of Arizona, 1989. http://hdl.handle.net/10150/292227.
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Vokey, Daniel James. "Reasons of the heart, moral objectivity and moral education." Thesis, National Library of Canada = Bibliothèque nationale du Canada, 1997. http://www.collectionscanada.ca/obj/s4/f2/dsk2/ftp02/NQ28076.pdf.
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Fellows, Jennifer Jill. "Making up knowers : objectivity and categories of epistemic subjects." Thesis, University of British Columbia, 2011. http://hdl.handle.net/2429/36898.
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The aim of this dissertation is simple: to defend the epistemic concept of objectivity as one that has done and continues to do good ethical and epistemic work for some communities. Because of this good work, I argue, in contrast to philosophers like Richard Rorty and Lorraine Code, that objectivity should not be removed from epistemic discourse—it is a valuable ideal to have. Relying on work from Lorraine Daston and Peter Galison, I will identify objectivity as a concept with a layered and changing history. There are multiple different conceptions of the concept of objectivity currently identified, and more new conceptions being suggested. So, when I claim that objectivity is a valuable ideal to hold, what I mean is that specific conceptions of the concept of objectivity have had ethical and epistemic virtues in their times and places, and there are current suggested conceptions of objectivity that also seem to have ethical and/or epistemic virtues. These virtues are a result of the effect that the role of objectivity as an ideal has on epistemic subjects who adopt it. I will defend objectivity as an ideal, not as an attainable epistemic perspective. I argue that all conceptions of objectivity share a structure that unifies them under the concept of objectivity. All conceptions of objectivity aim at overcoming something identified as problematically subjective (What this thing is will vary in given times and places). This recognition of the relationship between objectivity and subjectivity allows me to give an analysis of how different conceptions of objectivity yield different conceptions of the epistemic subject. Relying on work done by Ian Hacking, I will argue that the ideal of objectivity serves as a mechanism for making up knowers. Self-reflection and self-policing are at the heart of this method by which categories of knowers are created. Using the examples of the U.S. suffrage movement and Marine-Protected Areas, I will demonstrate that the ideal of objectivity obligates self-reflective persons which has been and continues to be both ethically and epistemically beneficial.
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Drayson, Hannah Elizabeth. "Gestalt biometrics and their applications : instrumentation, objectivity and poetics." Thesis, University of Plymouth, 2011. http://hdl.handle.net/10026.1/866.
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This thesis is about the relationship between human bodies and instrumental technologies that can be use to measure them. It adopts the position that instruments are technological structures that evoke and manifest particular phenomena of embodied life. However, through their history of association and use in the sciences and scientific medicine, instruments tend to be attached to a particular ontology, that of mechanical objectivity. Embarking from research into the artistic uses of physiological sensor technology in creative practices such as performance and installation art, this thesis asks whether it is possible to use instruments in a way that departs from their association with scientific objectivity. Drawing on philosophers who have developed an understanding of the relationship of instrumental technologies and human bodies as co-constructive, it explores how this model of con-construction might be understood to offer an alternative ontology for understanding the use of instruments in practices outside of science and scientific medicine. The project is therefore suggestive of degrees of freedom and flexibility that are open to exploitation by creative practices in the realm of instrumentation as an alternative to orthodox rationalisations of the value of scientific equipment as authentic, revealing and objective. The major contribution of the thesis is that transfers and synthesises arguments and evidence from the history and philosophy of sciences that serve to demonstrate how the instrumental measurement of human bodies can be considered to be a form of creative practice. It assembles a position based on the work of thinkers from a number of disciplines, particularly philosophy of science, technology, and the medical humanities. These offer examples of ontological frameworks within which the difference between the realm of the instrumental, material, biological, and the objective, and the phenomenal, meaningful and subjective, might be collapsed. Doing this, the thesis sheds light on how physical devices might enter into the interplay of making, mattering and objectifying the immaterial, a realm that it might be considered the role of artists to manifest. Drawing on contemporary, and secondary, accounts of the development of empirical testing in the medical sciences, the thesis agues for the recovery of a romantic account of human physiology, in which the imagination and meaning are active and embodied. It therefore offers to link the bodily and the instrumental through an extended-materialist account in which the physiological, rather than the psychological, is central. Developing a response to constructionist models of the body and instrumentation, the thesis concludes that a model of the poetic may be adopted as a method for understanding the opportunities and imperatives inherent in the avoidance of deterministic approaches to biosignalling technologies. In doing this, the thesis contributes particularly to the creative arts and technology research practices concerned with the use of body sensor technologies in humanistic applications. It complements the existing works by artists in this area that make use of instruments by assembling a number of theoretical readings and interpretations of how instruments work – among them the thermometer, lie detector, and automatograph – which illustrate the argument that that is possible to operate from a theoretical position within which instruments are both material, performative and symbolic.
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Kuklok, Allison Sara. "Conceptualism and Objectivity in Locke's Account of Natural Kinds." Thesis, Harvard University, 2013. http://dissertations.umi.com/gsas.harvard:11079.
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Locke's Essay Concerning Human Understanding is considered by many to be the locus classicus of a number of influential arguments for conventionalism, according to which there are no objective, privileged ways of classifying things in the natural world. In the dissertation I argue that Locke never meant to reject natural kinds. Still, the challenge is to explain how, within a metaphysics that explicitly denies mind-independent essences, we can make sense of a privileged, objective sorting of substances. I argue that we do so by looking to Locke's conception of God as divine architect of created substances.Philosophy
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Sonnemaker, Tyler. "Objectivity and the Role of Journalism in Democratic Societies." Scholarship @ Claremont, 2015. http://scholarship.claremont.edu/cmc_theses/1057.
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In this essay, I argue that the institution of journalism plays a vital role in informing citizens of a deliberative democratic society, and that to effectively fulfill this role, journalists must report the news objectively. I first examine the historical evolution of objectivity as it pertains to journalism. Then, I elaborate on some of the philosophical concepts that provide the foundation for objectivity. Next, I introduce John Rawls’ idea of public reason, which provides an improved understanding of the role of journalism within a democratic society. I claim from this that journalism must re-envision its role as guardian of the public political forum. Finally, I bring these various discussions together by drawing in the requirements that Stephen Ward lays out in his theory of pragmatic objectivity, and argue that these are necessary to help journalism legitimize its authority to safeguard this forum. In doing so, journalism can ensure both that citizens are objectively informed and that the public forum offers them a sphere in which they can effectively participate in the governance of their democracy.
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Kramer, Matthew Henry. "A critique of the ideal of objectivity : against Rhadamanthus." Thesis, University of Cambridge, 1988. http://ethos.bl.uk/OrderDetails.do?uin=uk.bl.ethos.306452.
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McFarland, Kathryn. "Feigning Objectivity: An Overlooked Conversational Strategy in Everyday Disputes." The Ohio State University, 2015. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu1426205479.
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Gabriel, Jay F. "Objectivity and Autonomy in the Newsroom: A Field Approach." Diss., Temple University Libraries, 2008. http://cdm16002.contentdm.oclc.org/cdm/ref/collection/p245801coll10/id/1167.
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AnthropologyPh.D.
This dissertation provides a better understanding of how journalists attain their personal and occupational identities. In particular, I examine the origins and meanings of journalistic objectivity as well as the professional autonomy that is specific to journalism. Journalists understand objectivity as a worldview, value, ideal, and impossibility. A central question that remains is why the term objectivity has become highly devalued in journalistic discourse in the past 30 years, a puzzling development considered in light of evidence that "objectivity" remains important in American journalism. I use Bourdieu's notion of field to explore anthropological ways of looking at objectivity, for instance, viewing it as a practice that distinguishes journalists from other professionals as knowledge workers. Applying notions of field to the journalistic field through anthropological methods and perspective permits the linkage of microlevel perspectives to macrolevel social phenomena. The dissertation demonstrates how qualitative research on individuals and newsroom organizations can be connected to the field of journalism in the United States. Additionally, it offers insight into why journalists continue to embrace objectivity, even as they acknowledge its deficiencies as a journalistic goal.
Temple University--Theses
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Palatnik, Nataliya. "Kant's Science of the Moral World and Moral Objectivity." Thesis, Harvard University, 2015. http://nrs.harvard.edu/urn-3:HUL.InstRepos:23845444.
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Kant’s Science of the Moral World and Moral Objectivity
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Critics of Kant's moral philosophy often object that it cannot account for moral requirements that are both genuinely objective and contentful. Notwithstanding the long history of this dispute, Kantians have been unable to put these objections to rest. I argue that we can answer these objections and fully understand Kantian moral objectivity only if we consider Kant’s moral philosophy in light of his methodological and architectonic concerns.
My dissertation takes up this task by providing a new account of Kant’s conception of moral theory as a philosophical science: Kant’s moral philosophy, I argue, appropriates the central features of the then revolutionary method of Newtonian natural science for the investigation of practical cognition. Just as Newtonian science begins with a priori (largely mathematical) principles and then gradually "comes down to" particular concrete physics, so too Kantian moral philosophy begins with general a priori moral principles that then gradually translate into a system of particular requirements. The objectivity of the content of our practical thought develops as the background conditions of moral deliberation become progressively more inter-subjectively justifiable. This progress is possible only through co-deliberation and collective action demanded by the duty to make morality fully efficacious in our shared social world, that is, the duty to promote the highest good.
My account highlights the attractiveness of Kant’s conception of the relationship between a priori and empirical aspects of practical thought, between theory and practice, and enables its systematic defense against objections by later German Idealists, particularly by Hegel. I argue that Hegel’s polemic against Kant's account of morality is fundamentally a disagreement about the nature of philosophical science and its method, and adjudicating between their views requires adjudicating the methodological dispute itself. I offer a systematic assessment of the methodological grounds of Hegel’s approach and of his critique of Kant’s moral philosophy. I argue that (1) Hegel’s approach does not, on the whole, present a viable alternative to Kant’s moral theory and (2) Hegel’s challenge can be met, but only by appealing to developmental or genetic aspects of Kant’s conception of moral objectivity grounded in his views on the proper method and form of a philosophical science. I show that these aspects of Kant’s thought, generally overlooked by commentators and Kantian theorists, are indispensable to his moral theory and provide a basis for a fruitful engagement with contemporary issues in moral philosophy, such as questions about the nature and role of imperfect duties.Philosophy
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Fagan, Melinda Bonnie. "Objectivity in practice integrative social epistemology of scientific inquiry /." [Bloomington, Ind.] : Indiana University, 2007. http://gateway.proquest.com/openurl?url_ver=Z39.88-2004&rft_val_fmt=info:ofi/fmt:kev:mtx:dissertation&res_dat=xri:pqdiss&rft_dat=xri:pqdiss:3274925.
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Thesis (Ph.D.)--Indiana University, Dept. of History and Philosophy of Science, 2007.Title from PDF t.p. (viewed Nov. 11, 2008). Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 68-07, Section: A, page: 2974. Adviser: Elisabeth A. Lloyd.
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McGrail, J. Patrick. "Sensationalism, narrativity and objectivity---modeling ongoing news story practice." Related electronic resource: Current Research at SU : database of SU dissertations, recent titles available full text, 2008. http://wwwlib.umi.com/cr/syr/main.
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