Conference Presentations by Michael Hastings
"Title: The Observance of Human Rights and the Bounds of State Sovereignty
In especially the l... more "Title: The Observance of Human Rights and the Bounds of State Sovereignty
In especially the last twenty years, there have been several notable atrocities that highlight the ambiguity of the line between respecting state sovereignty and the justification of international humanitarian intervention. The point of this work is to clarify why state sovereignty is valuable and how the observation of basic human rights can set a limit to state sovereignty. The use of human rights to set a limit to state sovereignty is certainly an intuitive conception, but the ambiguities surrounding the notions of both human rights and state sovereignty make cogent arguments in defence of this intuitive idea quite difficult. This work seeks to clarify why exactly basic human rights can be used to delineate between state directives that are within the bounds of state sovereignty and state directives that exceed it"
Title: The Political Uses of Collective Intentionality
From the formation of flash mobs to all... more Title: The Political Uses of Collective Intentionality
From the formation of flash mobs to all-out wars between nation states to massive scale natural disaster relief efforts, there are social forces bearing incredible power in the way humans interact, form coalitions, and cooperate to bring about the institutions of society. The underlying similarity in many of these instances of cooperation is a particular way of mentally representing a cooperative goal: collective intentionality. If this representative capacity can be actively directed and used by governments, it would have astonishing potential for shaping the political world. This work uses the ample framework of terminology provided by John Searle’s theory of intentional action to discuss the theory of collective intentionality in detail. It first present his theory of intentional action, then demonstrates the vast spectrum of ways collective intentionality can be applied to politics by preseting one purely theoretical and one practical use of collective intentionality. The first uses collective intentionality in a theoretical government as a completely unprecedented form of political legitimacy. The second use of collective intentionality I will discuss is implementing structural revisions to the legislative process of the United States in order to create a political environment where the legislature can use collective intentionality to better reflect public opinion.
Papers by Michael Hastings
The point of this work is to inquire what it would take to justify the consistent enforcement of ... more The point of this work is to inquire what it would take to justify the consistent enforcement of human rights. Section 1 shows why the current practice of human rights is problematic from a justificatory standpoint, hence motivating the discussion of what it would take to justify the consistent enforcement of human rights in Section 2. Subsection 1.1 briefly clarifies what it means to consistently enforce human rights. Subsection 1.2 explains the current practice of human rights as a collection of ‘manifesto rights’ that are not internationally enforced. Subsection 1.3 argues that the current practice is problematic because it cannot justify the enforcement of human rights in any (let alone a consistent) capacity. Section 2 enters a discussion about what it would take, given the problematic status quo, to justify the consistent enforcement of human rights. This discussion engages three necessary questions that must be asked of any attempt to justify the enforcement of particular human rights.
Saul Kripke’s controversial argument in the third lecture of Naming and Necessity concludes that ... more Saul Kripke’s controversial argument in the third lecture of Naming and Necessity concludes that mental states are not identical to brain states. This argument, however, is susceptible to objections concerning the entailment of possibility by conceivability. One objection of this category to Kripke’s dualistic conclusion comes from a paper by Brian Loar addressing David Chalmers. There initially appears to be a way around this objection, however, if the need for Kripke’s argument to rely on possible worlds for its validity is eliminated; that is, if the argument is rephrased so it only refers to phenomena in the actual world. To do this, Kripke’s argument can be restated in terms of Chalmers’ notions of primary conceivability and primary possibility. The problem is that this restated argument would also need a conception of primary necessity to be valid, and this will prove to be impossible. Thus, Kripke’s argument cannot feasibly answer Loar’s objection by limiting its predicates and operators to those that only refer to states of affairs in the actual world.
The point of this work is to help address the detrimental proliferation of human rights by answer... more The point of this work is to help address the detrimental proliferation of human rights by answering a deceptively simple question: what ought human rights do for right-holders? One way to answer this question, and consequently provide a way to restrict questionable human rights, is to use a larger theory of rights as an analytic framework for human rights. Human rights are a specialised category of rights that are held solely in virtue of the right-holder being human. When we set this category of rights within an analytic framework of a larger general theory of rights, it serves to define a single (or a clear, limited set of) function(s) for human rights. This allows us to rule out various problematic human rights within international legislation that don’t share this function. There are two main theories of rights that can serve as a restrictive analytic framework for human rights: the will theory and the interest theory. A conception of human rights framed within the interest theory (referred to as an interest theory conception of human rights) is the preferable to a conception of human rights framed within the will theory for the purpose of restricting the problematic proliferation of human rights.
There are many reasons for the inefficacy of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, but perha... more There are many reasons for the inefficacy of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, but perhaps the most pertinent explanation is the Declaration is rather ambiguous in its codification of various rights. Furthermore, several of the rights afforded by the Declaration have a logically untenable wording. The goal of this work is not to argue for or provide a list of specific rights to be included in a revised Declaration, but to evaluate the logical form of the rights already listed within the Declaration and to propose how the document could be made logically effectual.
In order to develop a basic understanding of Chinese government, it is of the utmost importance t... more In order to develop a basic understanding of Chinese government, it is of the utmost importance to understand the intellectual history upon which it is based. Viewing the Chinese political climate without this understanding is all but certain to lead to misunderstanding and perhaps dangerous assumptions about the government’s intent. The purpose of this work is not to justify the actions of the Chinese government in any particular situation, but to help give a sense of the vast difference in worldview and corresponding differences in conceptions of political legitimacy between China and the West.
In especially the last twenty years, there have been several notable atrocities that highlight th... more In especially the last twenty years, there have been several notable atrocities that highlight the ambiguity of the line between respecting state sovereignty and the justification of international humanitarian intervention. The point of this work is to clarify why state sovereignty is valuable and how the observation of basic human rights can set a limit to state sovereignty. The use of human rights to set a limit to state sovereignty is certainly an intuitive conception, but the ambiguities surrounding the notions of both human rights and state sovereignty make cogent arguments in defence of this intuitive idea quite difficult. Clarification is needed as to why exactly basic human rights can be used to delineate between state directives that are within the bounds of state sovereignty and state directives that exceed it.
This work is an attempt to draw a clear distinction between rational and irrational actions. In o... more This work is an attempt to draw a clear distinction between rational and irrational actions. In order to do this, it will rely on John Searle’s theory of intentional action, rational deliberation, and the Background. It argues that all humans share some fundamental dispositions to act in a certain way, and it is upon the basis of these dispositions that we can deem actions rational or irrational.
From the formation of flash mobs to all-out wars between nation states to massive scale natural d... more From the formation of flash mobs to all-out wars between nation states to massive scale natural disaster relief efforts, there are social forces bearing incredible power in the way humans interact, form coalitions, and cooperate to bring about the institutions of society. The underlying similarity in many of these instances of cooperation is a particular way of mentally representing a cooperative goal: collective intentionality. If this representative capacity can be actively directed and used by governments, it would have astonishing potential for shaping the political world. This work uses the ample framework of terminology provided by John Searle’s theory of intentional action to discuss the theory of collective intentionality in detail. It first present his theory of intentional action, then demonstrates the vast spectrum of ways collective intentionality can be applied to politics by preseting one purely theoretical and one practical use of collective intentionality. The first uses collective intentionality in a theoretical government as a completely unprecedented form of political legitimacy. The second use of collective intentionality I will discuss is implementing structural revisions to the legislative process of the United States in order to create a political environment where the legislature can use collective intentionality to better reflect public opinion.
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Conference Presentations by Michael Hastings
In especially the last twenty years, there have been several notable atrocities that highlight the ambiguity of the line between respecting state sovereignty and the justification of international humanitarian intervention. The point of this work is to clarify why state sovereignty is valuable and how the observation of basic human rights can set a limit to state sovereignty. The use of human rights to set a limit to state sovereignty is certainly an intuitive conception, but the ambiguities surrounding the notions of both human rights and state sovereignty make cogent arguments in defence of this intuitive idea quite difficult. This work seeks to clarify why exactly basic human rights can be used to delineate between state directives that are within the bounds of state sovereignty and state directives that exceed it"
From the formation of flash mobs to all-out wars between nation states to massive scale natural disaster relief efforts, there are social forces bearing incredible power in the way humans interact, form coalitions, and cooperate to bring about the institutions of society. The underlying similarity in many of these instances of cooperation is a particular way of mentally representing a cooperative goal: collective intentionality. If this representative capacity can be actively directed and used by governments, it would have astonishing potential for shaping the political world. This work uses the ample framework of terminology provided by John Searle’s theory of intentional action to discuss the theory of collective intentionality in detail. It first present his theory of intentional action, then demonstrates the vast spectrum of ways collective intentionality can be applied to politics by preseting one purely theoretical and one practical use of collective intentionality. The first uses collective intentionality in a theoretical government as a completely unprecedented form of political legitimacy. The second use of collective intentionality I will discuss is implementing structural revisions to the legislative process of the United States in order to create a political environment where the legislature can use collective intentionality to better reflect public opinion.
Papers by Michael Hastings
In especially the last twenty years, there have been several notable atrocities that highlight the ambiguity of the line between respecting state sovereignty and the justification of international humanitarian intervention. The point of this work is to clarify why state sovereignty is valuable and how the observation of basic human rights can set a limit to state sovereignty. The use of human rights to set a limit to state sovereignty is certainly an intuitive conception, but the ambiguities surrounding the notions of both human rights and state sovereignty make cogent arguments in defence of this intuitive idea quite difficult. This work seeks to clarify why exactly basic human rights can be used to delineate between state directives that are within the bounds of state sovereignty and state directives that exceed it"
From the formation of flash mobs to all-out wars between nation states to massive scale natural disaster relief efforts, there are social forces bearing incredible power in the way humans interact, form coalitions, and cooperate to bring about the institutions of society. The underlying similarity in many of these instances of cooperation is a particular way of mentally representing a cooperative goal: collective intentionality. If this representative capacity can be actively directed and used by governments, it would have astonishing potential for shaping the political world. This work uses the ample framework of terminology provided by John Searle’s theory of intentional action to discuss the theory of collective intentionality in detail. It first present his theory of intentional action, then demonstrates the vast spectrum of ways collective intentionality can be applied to politics by preseting one purely theoretical and one practical use of collective intentionality. The first uses collective intentionality in a theoretical government as a completely unprecedented form of political legitimacy. The second use of collective intentionality I will discuss is implementing structural revisions to the legislative process of the United States in order to create a political environment where the legislature can use collective intentionality to better reflect public opinion.