Papers by Shaun Miller
This chapter presents a positive philosophy of male sexuality: one that is not rooted in so-calle... more This chapter presents a positive philosophy of male sexuality: one that is not rooted in so-called toxic masculinity and which is compatible with gender equality. I argue that, for such a sexuality to be possible, respect is the moral baseline. However, the status quo for male sexuality is shaped by white supremacy and heteronormativity. To resist these values, men must do more than merely cross some minimal moral threshold for permissible sex. Rather, they ought to develop a caring character so that they would want to seek out their own and their partner’s (robust) sexual fulfillment. Men ought actively to develop ways to increase pleasure for themselves and their partners.
With the cultural reckoning of the #MeToo movement, current conversations are largely revolving a... more With the cultural reckoning of the #MeToo movement, current conversations are largely revolving around how to give and receive consent properly. Sexual consent is based on the sexual choices and preferences of the people involved.
The common idea of love is a fusion of the individuals into one. The idea has permeated throughou... more The common idea of love is a fusion of the individuals into one. The idea has permeated throughout society so that it has now been taken for granted. Such an idea of fusion of two individuals is actually harmful rather than helpful. Starting with Sartre, he is the paradigmatic example of the traditional model of love going wrong. By taking the fusion model to its final culmination, love is impossible or—among other things— sadomasochistic. Beauvoir reads Sartre's view as a bad-faith version of love. She inserts her view by giving an account of the “woman in love” which is an example of a woman under Sartre's interpretation of love. Beauvoir states that authentic love can only happen if the individuals are equal. That way, love can have grounds for culmination and fusion. Irigaray looks at the fusion model as debunked. She sees what Sartre and Beauvoir assuming major things. Irigaray states that genuine love is based on the differences— particularly sexual differences—which S...
The Philosophers' Magazine
The Prindle Post, 2020
The COVID-19 pandemic is a worldwide phenomenon that has disrupted people's lives and the economy... more The COVID-19 pandemic is a worldwide phenomenon that has disrupted people's lives and the economy. Currently, the United States leads COVID cases in the world and as of this writing, the United States has the largest amount of confirmed deaths, and ranks eighth in deaths per capita due to the virus. There are a number of factors that might explain why the numbers are so high: the United States' failed leadership in tackling the virus back in December/January, the government's response to handling the crisis once the virus spread throughout the United States, states' opening up too early-and too quickly-in May and June, and people's unwillingness to take the pandemic seriously by not social distancing or wearing face masks. Let us focus on the last point. Why the unseriousness? As soon as the pandemic hit, conspiracy theories regarding the virus spread like-well, like the virus itself. Some are so fully convinced about a conspiracy theory that their beliefs may be incorrigible. Others seem only to doubt mask-wearing as a solution. Part of the unwillingness to wear face masks is due to the CDC and WHO having changed their positions about wearing masks as a preventative measure. From the beginning, the U.S. Surgeon General claimed that masks were ineffective, but now both the CDC and the WHO recommend wearing them. Why this reversal? We are facing a novel virus. Science, as an institution, works through confirming and disconfirming hypotheses. Scientists find evidence for a claim and it leads to their hypothesis being correct. As time goes on, scientists gather new evidence disconfirming their original hypothesis. And as time continues further, they gather more information and evidence and were too quick to disconfirm the hypothesis. Because this virus is so new, scientists are working with limited knowledge. There will inevitably be back-and-forth shifts on what works and what doesn't.
The Philosophy of Sex, Eighth Edition, 2022
This essay explains some basic concepts about BDSM, and it responds to two important objections t... more This essay explains some basic concepts about BDSM, and it responds to two important objections to it. The first is the psychological objection—that BDSM practitioners suffer from mental disorders—and the second is the ethical objection—that BDSM practitioners have morally compromised desires because of the kinds of activities they desire to participate in, especially ones that involve roles that dip into tortured oppressive histories (e.g., "rape" scenes, "master-and-slave" scenes). The paper argues that both objections fail, and, more specifically focusing on the ethical objection, argues that BDSM desires are psychologically, conceptually, and phenomenologically different from their seeming counterpart real-life desires that are truly ethically defective. Finally, the paper argues that BDSM practitioners, in having to always understand, explore, and justify their desires (especially to a majority that is hostile to them), have an interesting chance to lead rich, flourishing lives.
The journal of the Utah Academy of Sciences, Arts, and …, Jan 1, 2004
Teaching Documents by Shaun Miller
Is abortion morally permissible? Should we avoid the practice of genetic engineering? How shall w... more Is abortion morally permissible? Should we avoid the practice of genetic engineering? How shall we allocate scarce medical resources fairly? What does it mean to have informed consent for patients? These are some of the questions that we will consider this semester. Students will gain an appreciation for the major issues facing contemporary bioethics.
This course is a survey of ancient Greek philosophy, with an emphasis on Plato and Aristotle. Top... more This course is a survey of ancient Greek philosophy, with an emphasis on Plato and Aristotle. Topics will include: the fundamental nature of reality, how we know anything about it, wisdom, virtue, and human happiness. We will examine, discuss, and write about various issues found in key ancient Greek philosophical texts, ranging from the pre-Socratics, emphasizing on Plato and Aristotle, and concluding with the Epicureans and the Stoics. While we will discuss major issues in metaphysics and epistemology, the main thematic focus will be on issues in the ethical and political views of the ancient Greek philosophers. This course is in the history of philosophy. The primary aim in a history of philosophy course is not to solve philosophical problems. It is to understand the philosophy in the period of history. Course Format Although the course is primarily organized around readings and lectures, students are encouraged
The course is looking at how our society has become "modern" through the lens of ourselves and ou... more The course is looking at how our society has become "modern" through the lens of ourselves and our relationships with others, the government, institutions, religions, and science. We usually think of modernity as a way to distinguish ourselves from those who came before us historically. However, we must pay attention to this history to get a broader understanding. This seminar will embark on a broad tour through the recent five centuries of Western history. This broad tour will cover an array of literary, philosophical, and scientific texts to help address what it means to be modern. The topic we will cover will include rationalism, empiricism, the Enlightenment, (the lack of) religious beliefs, various political structures, existentialism, and the metaphysics of race and gender. While there will be occasional lectures, we will spend the vast majority of our time closely engaging with primary texts: one of our most important goals for the semester will be to strengthen our skills as readers and writers who engage deeply with the past in an effort to understand the present it produced. Course Format Although the course is primarily organized around readings and lectures, students are encouraged to ask questions and challenge ideas and there will be a number of opportunities for small group discussions as well as whole class discussions.
Course Description Since the advent of industrialization it has become clear that modern technolo... more Course Description Since the advent of industrialization it has become clear that modern technology is not simply tools and instruments, nor merely the application of scientific principles to human practice and production in fundamental ways. This course examines the nature and scope of technology with the aim of understanding its contemporary manifestations and their causes. Look at the technology around you now. Think of the role it has in your life. Think about how it makes you conceive of yourself, in body and identity. Think of the kinds of choices and actions it makes available to you. Ask yourself if the form of your rational thinking is shaped by our current technology. Think of the anxiety you feel when trying to keep your phone in your pocket for 50 minutes. Think of the anxiety you feel when the phone you bought last year can't compete with the one from this year, and that feeling of being left behind socially when the new popular and essential app is not compatible with your phone. How did we end up here? This course will start with a historical outlook of what people have said about technology and various responses to people in the past. These questions are: (1) What is technology? Can we define it? What is it made up of? (2) Is technology autonomous? Does it control us?
This course is designed to help students develop critical reasoning skills and improve their scie... more This course is designed to help students develop critical reasoning skills and improve their scientific literacy. We will develop techniques for understanding and critically evaluating some of the scientific information that is encountered in popular and professional media. There will be a significant emphasis on reasoning through case studies and an effort to employ as well as explain the informal logic used by scientists.
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Papers by Shaun Miller
Teaching Documents by Shaun Miller
The object of this paper is to respond to Irigaray’s critiques through a Sartrean lens. To the first critique, I argue that Sartre does want another subject, but through his metaphysics about the nature of consciousness—and not because of sexual difference—it is impossible. The subject is free and one cannot capture a freedom. Thus, the lover goes for the closest thing available: the body. This does not lead to objectification, but simply capturing the subject through means of an object.
To respond to Irigaray’s second critique, Irigaray makes the mistake that Sartre splits consciousness and the body. In fact, Sartre in general is accused of ignoring the “lived body,” the body as it figures in the everyday stream of life as opposed to the body as a physiological and biological object. However, Sartre does talk about the body as an expressive object, “the body-for-itself” as opposed to the “body-object.” This is how we can desire each other as human beings rather than a concrete split between consciousness and body. It is only in a sense that we desire the body of the other. What is desired is a conscious “living body” and not just a combined parts of the body. So Sartre is not denying the body. The for-itself is not something connected or inside the body. The body is not merely something that I control, but is the center of consciousness where consciousness projects its possibilities. Embodiment entails some intimate connection between consciousness and body. Thus, Sartre does have the concept of embodied consciousness that Irigaray thought was missing in Sartre’s phenomenology. With this, I do not encounter the Other as mere body or as merely an object, but as embodied consciousness with desire. This desire means that not only do I see the Other’s body, but it reveals my own body. Sexual desire is a desire for a body, to possess the Other as flesh, but not to possess the Other as a thing, as just pure in-itself. It is the desire for a particular body “with consciousness on the horizon.” In sexual encounters, we both want something mutual. The aim of desire is what we must do but we cannot do: see the other as both object and subject simultaneously, be both object and subject for the other. The freedom of the Other is always beyond my reach because a free subjectivity will never be captured.
Luce Irigaray is a philosopher that stands against the fusion model altogether. She will point out the mistakes that both the tradition and Sartre have fallen into and what they have been assuming. For both sides, they are assuming that love can only happen (1) under a unification of the individuals, (2) if the individuals are equal, and (3) under a pre-existing framework of having a family. In the end, Irigaray will conclude that love as a unification is possible, but one would not want that anyways because it just leads into Sartrean sadomasochism. In fact, one would not want love qua union at all. Genuine love for Irigaray means that the lovers must be different, and with that, I will bring in her concept of sexual difference and what it could mean for society if everyone followed the rubric of sexual difference.