Peter Hawke
Biographic Data
| ID | 5911315 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Peter Hawke |
| GIVEN NAMES | Peter |
| FAMILY NAME | Hawke |
| SIGNATURE | HAWKE P |
| AFFILIATIONS | Stanford University |
| ORCID | 0000-0002-6810-7918 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 9 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 1 |
| WORKS AS AUTHOR | 9 |
| WORKS AS EDITOR | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2017 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2025 |
| H-INDEX | 1 |
Fragmentation and expression
Fragmentation is a widely discussed thesis on the architecture of mental content, saying, roughly, that the content of an agent’s belief state is best understood as a set of information islands that are individually coherent and logically closed, but need not be jointly coherent and logically closed, nor uniformly accessible for guiding the agent’s actions across different deliberative contexts. Expressivism is a widely discussed thesis on the me…
Aboutness and universal generalization
We motivate and present a novel semantic theory for universal generalizations (‘every is a ’), contributing to a growing theoretical line that gives equal prominence to subject matter and truth conditions when modelling propositional content. Our proposed theory aligns with the presently dominant linguistic programme for capturing natural language quantifiers (the generalized quantifier framework) and demonstrably respects a package of influentia…
Truth, topicality, and transparency
When do two sentences say the same thing, that is, express the same content? We defend two-component (2C) semantics: the view that propositional contents comprise (at least) two irreducibly distinct constituents: (1) truth-conditions and (2) subject-matter. We contrast 2C with one-component (1C) semantics, focusing on the view that subject-matter is reducible to truth-conditions. We identify exponents of this view and argue in favor of 2C. An app…
Stable acceptance for mighty knowledge
Drawing on the puzzling behavior of ordinary knowledge ascriptions that embed an epistemic (im)possibility claim, we tentatively conclude that it is untenable to jointly endorse (i) an unfettered classical logic for epistemic language, (ii) the general veridicality of knowledge ascription, and (iii) an intuitive ‘negative transparency’ thesis that reduces knowledge of a simple negated ‘might’ claim to an epistemic claim without modal content. We …
Relevant Alternatives and Missed Clues
I construe Relevant Alternatives Theory (RAT) as an abstract combination of anti-skepticism and epistemic modesty, then re-evaluate the challenge posed to it by the missed clue counterexamples of Schaffer. The import of this challenge has been underestimated, as Schaffer’s specific argument invites distracting objections. I offer a novel formalization of RAT, accommodating a suitably wide class of concrete theories of knowledge. Then, I introduce…
Semantic expressivism for epistemic modals
Expressivists about epistemic modals deny that ‘Jane might be late’ canonically serves to express the speaker’s acceptance of a certain propositional content. Instead, they hold that it expresses a lack of acceptance (that Jane isn’t late). Prominent expressivists embrace pragmatic expressivism: the doxastic property expressed by a declarative is not helpfully identified with (any part of) that sentence’s compositional semantic value. Against thi…
Are Gettier cases disturbing
We examine a prominent naturalistic line on the method of cases (MoC), exemplified by Timothy Williamson and Edouard Machery: MoC is given a fallibilist and non-exceptionalist treatment, accommodating moderate modal skepticism. But Gettier cases are in dispute: Williamson takes them to induce substantive philosophical knowledge; Machery claims that the ambitious use of MoC should be abandoned entirely. We defend an intermediate position. We offer…
Informational dynamics of epistemic possibility modals
Can Modal Skepticism Defeat Humean Skepticism?
Can Modal Skepticism Defeat Humean Skepticism?
Informational dynamics of epistemic possibility modals
Semantic expressivism for epistemic modals
Expressivists about epistemic modals deny that ‘Jane might be late’ canonically serves to express the speaker’s acceptance of a certain propositional content. Instead, they hold that it expresses a lack of acceptance (that Jane isn’t late). Prominent expressivists embrace pragmatic expressivism: the doxastic property expressed by a declarative is not helpfully identified with (any part of) that sentence’s compositional semantic value. Against thi…
Are Gettier cases disturbing
We examine a prominent naturalistic line on the method of cases (MoC), exemplified by Timothy Williamson and Edouard Machery: MoC is given a fallibilist and non-exceptionalist treatment, accommodating moderate modal skepticism. But Gettier cases are in dispute: Williamson takes them to induce substantive philosophical knowledge; Machery claims that the ambitious use of MoC should be abandoned entirely. We defend an intermediate position. We offer…
Truth, topicality, and transparency
When do two sentences say the same thing, that is, express the same content? We defend two-component (2C) semantics: the view that propositional contents comprise (at least) two irreducibly distinct constituents: (1) truth-conditions and (2) subject-matter. We contrast 2C with one-component (1C) semantics, focusing on the view that subject-matter is reducible to truth-conditions. We identify exponents of this view and argue in favor of 2C. An app…
Stable acceptance for mighty knowledge
Drawing on the puzzling behavior of ordinary knowledge ascriptions that embed an epistemic (im)possibility claim, we tentatively conclude that it is untenable to jointly endorse (i) an unfettered classical logic for epistemic language, (ii) the general veridicality of knowledge ascription, and (iii) an intuitive ‘negative transparency’ thesis that reduces knowledge of a simple negated ‘might’ claim to an epistemic claim without modal content. We …
Relevant Alternatives and Missed Clues
I construe Relevant Alternatives Theory (RAT) as an abstract combination of anti-skepticism and epistemic modesty, then re-evaluate the challenge posed to it by the missed clue counterexamples of Schaffer. The import of this challenge has been underestimated, as Schaffer’s specific argument invites distracting objections. I offer a novel formalization of RAT, accommodating a suitably wide class of concrete theories of knowledge. Then, I introduce…
Fragmentation and expression
Fragmentation is a widely discussed thesis on the architecture of mental content, saying, roughly, that the content of an agent’s belief state is best understood as a set of information islands that are individually coherent and logically closed, but need not be jointly coherent and logically closed, nor uniformly accessible for guiding the agent’s actions across different deliberative contexts. Expressivism is a widely discussed thesis on the me…
Aboutness and universal generalization
We motivate and present a novel semantic theory for universal generalizations (‘every is a ’), contributing to a growing theoretical line that gives equal prominence to subject matter and truth conditions when modelling propositional content. Our proposed theory aligns with the presently dominant linguistic programme for capturing natural language quantifiers (the generalized quantifier framework) and demonstrably respects a package of influentia…
Epistemology (8 works) · Philosophy (8 works) · Computer Science (7 works) · Epistemology, Ethics, and Metaphysics (7 works) · Metaphysics (6 works) · Logic, Reasoning, and Knowledge (5 works) · Philosophy of language (5 works) · Programming language (5 works) · Linguistics (4 works) · Philosophy and Theoretical Science (4 works)