The articles that made it into the latest edition of Philosophers Annual have been announced.

[Robert Indiana, “The Ten Stages Number Sculpture Reflected”]

This volume—the 44th—covers the literature from 2024.

The selections are:

Rosalind Chaplin (UNC Chapel Hill), “Kant on the Conceptual Possibility of Actually Infinite Tota Synthetica,” from Kantian Review

Most interpreters hold that Kant rejects actually infinite tota synthetica as conceptually impossible. This view is attributed to Kant to relieve him of the charge that the first antinomy’s thesis argument presupposes transcendental idealism. I argue that important textual evidence speaks against this view, and Kant in fact affirms the conceptual possibility of actually infinite tota synthetica. While this means the first antinomy may not be decisive as an indirect argument for idealism, it gives us a better account of how our ideas of the unconditioned generate the antinomies, and it allows us to see important and often overlooked elements in Kant’s account of the infinite.

Nicholas DiBella (Carnegie Mellon), “Cantor, Choice, and Paradox,” from The Philosophical Review

This article proposes a revision of Cantor’s account of set size that understands comparisons of set size fundamentally in terms of surjections rather than injections. This revised account is equivalent to Cantor’s account if the axiom of choice is true, but its consequences differ from those of Cantor’s if the axiom of choice is false. This article argues that the revised account is an intuitive generalization of Cantor’s account, blocks paradoxes—most notably, that a set can be partitioned into a set that is bigger than it—that can arise from Cantor’s account if the axiom of choice is false, illuminates the debate over whether the axiom of choice is true, is a mathematically fruitful alternative to Cantor’s account, and sheds philosophical light on one of the oldest unsolved problems in set theory.

Caspar Jacobs (Leiden), “Comparativist Theories or Conspiracy Theories?” from The Journal of Philosophy

Although physical theories routinely posit absolute quantities, such as absolute position or intrinsic mass, it seems that only comparative quantities such as distance and mass ratio are observable. But even if there are in fact only distances and mass ratios, the success of absolutist theories means that the world looks just as if there are absolute positions and intrinsic masses. If comparativism is nevertheless true, there is a sense in which this is a cosmic conspiracy: the comparative quantities satisfy certain relations that only absolutism can explain. I show that such cosmic conspiracies are a pervasive feature of comparativist theories. The argument is structurally similar to the well-known No Miracles Argument for scientific realism. Just as anti-realism cannot explain the empirical adequacy of our theories in general, so comparativism cannot explain the empirical adequacy of absolutist theories in particular.

Fiona Leigh (University College London), “The Theory of Being and the Argument for Forms in Plato’s Sophist,” from Phronesis

This paper argues for two claims. First, that in the Sophist a metaphysical theory of being is constructed from the ground up, largely on the basis of a claim treated as an axiomatic principle, the ‘dunamis proposal’ (247d–e), which, I will argue, ought to be understood as Plato’s own definition of being. Second, once its core is in place, the theory is put to use to provide dialectical arguments against proponents of alternative metaphysical theories for the existence of various entities in the ontology. These include—notably—an argument for the existence of Forms.

Daniel Muñoz (UNC Chapel Hill), “Each Counts for One,” from Philosophical Studies

After 50 years of debate, the ethics of aggregation has reached a curious stalemate, with both sides arguing that only their theory treats people as equals. I argue that, on the issue of equality, both sides are wrong. From the premise that “each counts for one,” we cannot derive the conclusion that “more count for more” or its negation. The familiar arguments from equality to aggregation presuppose more than equality: the Kamm/Scanlon “Balancing Argument” rests on what social choice theorists call “(Positive) Responsiveness,” Kamm’s “Aggregation Argument” assumes that “equal” lives are fungible, and Hsieh et al. have it that spreading goods broadly best approximates equality. In each case, the crucial premise is not equality itself but a further idea that Taurek, I argue, can safely reject. I conclude with a conjecture: there is no theory–neutral argument that settles the question of whether the numbers count.

Dilip Ninan (Tufts), “An Expressivist Theory of Taste Predicates,” from Philosopher’s Imprint

Simple taste predications come with an acquaintance requirement: they require the speaker to have had a certain kind of first-hand experience with the object of predication. For example, if I tell you that the creme caramel is delicious, you would ordinarily assume that I have actually tasted the creme caramel and am not simply relying on the testimony of others. The present essay argues in favor of a ‘lightweight’ expressivist account of the acquaintance requirement. This account consists of a recursive semantics and an account of assertion; it is compatible with a number of different accounts of truth and content, including contextualism, relativism, and purer forms of expressivism. The principal argument in favor of this account is that it correctly predicts a wide range of data concerning how the acquaintance requirement interacts with Boolean connectives, generalized quantifiers, epistemic modals, and attitude verbs.

Ian Shane Peebles (Arizona State University), “Toward a Virtue-Based Account of Racism,” from Philosophical Studies

The resurgence in antiracist activism and education brought with it the need to better understand what racism is and how it operates in the production of racial injustice. Prevailing theories understand racism as fundamentally structural, essentially cognitive, and requiring political philosophical investigation over moral philosophical investigation. Such theories are useful within limits, but ultimately offer an inaccurate or incomplete view of racism. In what follows, I offer a virtue-based account of racism that begins its genesis story with individuals, yet acknowledges and attends to the reality and severity of institutional and structural racism; is essentially both cognitive and non-cognitive; and, prioritizes moral philosophical investigation. Throughout, I apply my theory of racism to various spheres of human experience and history to demonstrate its ability to accurately and comprehensively capture the relevant entities and phenomena implicated in racism. In improving our understanding of racism, I aim to generate more targeted and comprehensive reform that effectively mitigates racism and promotes human and societal flourishing.

Nick Riggle (University San Diego), “Aesthetic Value and the Practice of Aesthetic Valuing,” from The Philosophical Review

A theory of aesthetic value should explain what makes aesthetic value good. Current views about what makes aesthetic value good privilege the individual’s encounter with aesthetic value—listening to music, reading a novel, writing a poem, or viewing a painting. What makes aesthetic value good is its benefit to the individual appreciator. But engagement with aesthetic value is often a social, participatory matter: sharing and discussing aesthetic goods, imitating aesthetic agents, dancing, cooking, dining, or making music together. This article argues that we should understand aesthetic value in a way that centers these social forms of aesthetic engagement. To this end, the article argues that there is a social practice of aesthetic valuing, characterized as a participatory practice governed by the value of aesthetic community, which engages us in the social development of our capacities for discretionary valuing and volitional openness. Current theories of aesthetic value have trouble capturing the character of the practice of aesthetic valuing, and this motivates a novel communitarian theory of aesthetic value: aesthetic value is what is worthy of engagement in the social practice of aesthetic valuing.

Ezra Rubenstein (Berkeley), “Two Approaches to Metaphysical Explanation,” from Noûs

Explanatory metaphysics aspires to explain the less fundamental in terms of the more fundamental. But we should recognize two importantly different approaches to this task. According to the generation approach, more basic features of reality generate (or give rise to) less basic features. According to the reduction approach, less perspicuous ways of representing reality reduce to (or collapse into) more perspicuous ways of representing reality. The main goals of this paper are to present the core differences between the two approaches (§2), to demonstrate the distinction’s significance (§3), to provide some resources for adjudicating between the approaches (§4), and to argue that the project of explanatory metaphysics needs both (§5).

Daniel Wodak (University of Pennsylvania), “What Is the Point of Political Equality?” from The Philosophical Review

Political egalitarians hold that there is a distinct ideal of political equality, which defines and justifies democracy. So what is political equality? The orthodox view says it is equality of opportunity for political influence, not equality of political influence. The first goal of this article is to argue against this view about the nature of political equality. From 1962 to 1983, Australia’s First Nations citizens had the right to vote, but unlike other citizens they did not have the duty to vote. First Nations citizens were made politically unequal without being given any less opportunity for influence; the most plausible explanation for why they were made politically unequal is instead that they were made to exert less influence. The second goal is to use this challenge to illuminate the point of political equality. The orthodox view is typically undergirded by taking political equality to be concerned with some cosmic injustice that inheres in states of affairs, depending on the distribution of power. This is doubly mistaken. The point of political equality is deontic, not telic; and what it prescribes is not distributive, but relational. More specifically, the point of political equality is for the state to treat each citizen as an equal coauthor of the law. The overarching goal is to catalyze a more vigorous debate about political equality, akin to the long-standing debates about other dimensions of equality.

The editors of Philosopher’s Annual are Patrick Grim (Center for the Study of Complex Systems, University of Michigan; Logic & Formal Semantics, Philosophy, Stony Brook), and Gabrielle Kerbel, Lorenzo Manuali, and Sophia Wushanley (University of Michigan).

The nominating editors this year were: Jc Beall, Ned Block, Ben Bradley, Liam Kofi Bright, Lara Buchak, Tyler Burge, Victor Caston, David Chalmers, Andrew Chignell, Roger Crisp, Cian Dorr, Adam Elga, Iskra Fileva, Branden Fitelson, Graeme Forbes, Aaron Garrett, Michael Glanzberg, Alexander Guerrero, Alan Hajek, Ned Hall, Elizabeth Harman, Gary Hatfield, Benj Hellie, Christopher Hitchcock, Des Hogan, Simon Huttegger, Tom Kelly, Niko Kolodny, Jennifer Lackey, Marc Lange, Brian Leiter, Ernie Lepore, Neil Levy, Martin Lin, John Marenbon, Colin McLarty, Jeff McMahan, Shaun Nichols, Paul Noordhof, Graham Oddie, Rohit Parikh, Derk Pereboom, Richard Pettigrew, Duncan Pritchard, Theron Pummer, Greg Restall, Geoffrey Sayre-McCord, Barry Schein, Laura Schroeter, Ted Sider, Scott Soames, Roy Sorensen, Quayshawn Spencer, Katie Steele, Una Stojnik, Eric Swanson, Johan van Benthem, Mark van Roojen, Sergio Tenenbaum, Peter B. M. Vranas, Eric Watkins, Danielle Wenner, Gideon Yaffe, Jose Zalabardo, and Kevin Zollman.