Martijn Boot
I am an assistant professor at University College Groningen.
My teaching and research interests are in political philosophy and ethics.
My research started at the London School of Economics. After the LSE I went to Balliol College, University of Oxford, where I obtained my doctorate in political philosophy (supervisors: G. A. Cohen and Joseph Raz).
I worked on postdoctoral research projects at the University of Chicago (with Martha Nussbaum) and the Erasmus University Rotterdam.
Before coming to Groningen I was an associate professor in the School of Political Science and Economics at Waseda University in Tokyo, Japan.
In 2017 I published my book, entitled ‘Incommensurability and Its Implications for Practical Reasoning, Ethics and Justice'.
Examples of research interests: implications of value-pluralism for (theories of) justice, the free will debate, moral responsibility, ethical dilemmas, global justice, the importance of integration of the three disciplines philosophy (particularly ethics), politics (especially public decision-making) and economics.
My teaching and research interests are in political philosophy and ethics.
My research started at the London School of Economics. After the LSE I went to Balliol College, University of Oxford, where I obtained my doctorate in political philosophy (supervisors: G. A. Cohen and Joseph Raz).
I worked on postdoctoral research projects at the University of Chicago (with Martha Nussbaum) and the Erasmus University Rotterdam.
Before coming to Groningen I was an associate professor in the School of Political Science and Economics at Waseda University in Tokyo, Japan.
In 2017 I published my book, entitled ‘Incommensurability and Its Implications for Practical Reasoning, Ethics and Justice'.
Examples of research interests: implications of value-pluralism for (theories of) justice, the free will debate, moral responsibility, ethical dilemmas, global justice, the importance of integration of the three disciplines philosophy (particularly ethics), politics (especially public decision-making) and economics.
less
Related Authors
Interests
Uploads
Books by Martijn Boot
The original thesis of this book sheds new light on aspects of incommensurability and its implications for public decision-making, ethics and justice. Martijn Boot analyzes a number of previously ignored or unrecognized concepts, such as ‘incomplete comparability’, ‘incompletely justified choice’, ‘indeterminateness’ and ‘ethical deficit’ – concepts that are essential for comprehending problems of incommensurability.
Apart from problematic implications, incommensurability has also favourable consequences. It creates room for autonomous rational choices that are not dictated by reason. Besides, insight into incommensurability promotes recognition of different possible rankings of universally valid but sometimes conflicting human values.
This book avoids unnecessary technical language and is accessible not only for specialists but for a large audience of philosophers, ethicists, political theorists, economists, lawyers and interested persons without specialized knowledge.
Reviews
This book is a rigorous treatment of a major question: Can there be rational decisions between options having incommensurable values? Challenging the view that incommensurability does not preclude rational choice, Boot details obstacles to choices between incommensurables and indicates how practical reasoning should accommodate them. In doing this he says much of value about justice, healthcare, punishment, and other major topics.
-- Robert Audi, John A. O'Brien Professor of Philosophy, University of Notre Dame
It is hard to think of a more important practical question than whether there are irresoluble conflicts between values. Philosophers in recent years have made major advances in clarifying that question and developing answers to it, but their work is often technical. Martijn Boot is technically adept, but in this highly significant book makes his arguments in clear and engaging prose. He brings out the implications of incommensurability in various areas, as well as taking the debate forward on several fronts.
-- Roger Crisp, Professor of Moral Philosophy, St Anne's College, Oxford
Book chapters by Martijn Boot
Papers by Martijn Boot
If these conflicts occur many philosophers believe we should weigh the relevant demands of justice against each other or against other important human values. However, under particular conditions, incommensurability of the relevant plural values prevents the assignment or determination of objective and impartial weights. In those cases an impartial or objective ranking or right balance do not exist.
People may recognize the same universally valid human values, principles of justice and human rights. A consensus on all important questions of justice is nevertheless unlikely, due to the problem that there seems to be no right or single right and determinate balance and ranking of these plural and universally valid but sometimes conflicting values and ethical demands.
For the full text, go to: http://ndpr.nd.edu/news/67424-our-fate-essays-on-god-and-free-will/
After the nuclear disaster with the Fukushima nuclear power plant the advice, given by some authorities, to leave Tokyo was largely based on the former two factors: ignorance and insufficient information. By contrast, the uncertainty and disagreement amongst experts about the size of the area to be evacuated was mainly caused by the latter two factors: inconclusiveness and indeterminability.
Inconclusiveness concerns the question whether moderately elevated radiation levels cause real and significant health risks that require drastic measures.
Indeterminability concerns the problem of rationally weighing disparate benefits and costs of the preventive measures, to wit, expected health benefits versus the costs and burdens of mass evacuation.
The International Commission on Radiological Protection (ICRP) recommends that no measures should be taken unless they produce a positive net benefit.
Exposure to moderately increased levels of radiation may increase the risk of fatal cancer in the future, while mass evacuation has burdensome and disruptive consequences for the society and for the persons who have to leave their residential and/or working area for a long time.
Ordering of mass evacuation seems rationally and ethically justified only if the expected future benefits outweigh the present and future burdens. Small or uncertain future health benefit may be outweighed by large costs and burdens of mass evacuation.
Because we have to take into consideration not only public but also individual costs and benefits, it is important to take into account the personal absolute increase in health risk of elevated radiation in addition to relative risk.
Unlike relative risk, absolute risk reveals the individual chance of getting a radiation-based disease. The increase in absolute risk – that is, the difference between the chances of getting the disease with and without the exposure to the increased level of radiation – is a useful measure to reveal the personal chance of health benefit from evacuation. This personal benefit must be balanced against the personal costs and burdens.
The key question is which levels of radiation absorption and health risks outweigh the burdens of mass evacuation. There seems consensus amongst experts about the justification of mass evacuation in cases of expected individual radiation absorption > 500 mSv over a year. Similarly, experts agree that expected extra radiation absorption < 10 mSv does not justify mass evacuation. But between these two extremes there is a wide range of 50-fold increasing radiation levels in which it is not clear whether the personal and public benefits from mass evacuation outweigh the personal and public costs. This may partly explain why experts and authorities gave conflicting advice about the radius of the area around the Fukushima nuclear power plant within which people had to be evacuated.
The uncertainty about the right thing to do with respect to a wide range of moderately elevated levels of radiation seems to be caused not only by inconclusiveness but also by indeterminability, that is, impossibility of determinately weighing disparate costs and benefits.
Keywords:
Asymmetry argument – causal fallacy – cause and reason – contingent belief – efficient cause – epistemic peer – equal weight view – hermeneutic circle – rational belief
Acknowledgment
I thank G.A. Cohen for his comment on an earlier versions of this paper.
Ruth Chang, by contrast, tries to show that many cases of putative incomparability are instead cases of parity - a fourth value relation of comparability, in addition to the three standard value relations 'better than', 'worse than' and 'equally good as'. It follows, she argues, that many choice situations in which rationally justified choice seems precluded are in fact situations within the reach of practical reason.
This article has three aims: (1) it challenges Chang's argument for the possibility of parity; (2) it demonstrates that, even if parity would exist, its problematic implications for practical reason would not differ from those of Raz's incomparability; (3) it discusses the underlying cause of hard cases of comparison: the fact that none of the three standard value relations applies ('3NT'). It will be shown that the problematic implications for the rational justification of the choice are due to 3NT itself, irrespective of whether 3NT is explained as incomparability or parity.
Keywords: Parity, Incomparability, Rationally justified choice
The original thesis of this book sheds new light on aspects of incommensurability and its implications for public decision-making, ethics and justice. Martijn Boot analyzes a number of previously ignored or unrecognized concepts, such as ‘incomplete comparability’, ‘incompletely justified choice’, ‘indeterminateness’ and ‘ethical deficit’ – concepts that are essential for comprehending problems of incommensurability.
Apart from problematic implications, incommensurability has also favourable consequences. It creates room for autonomous rational choices that are not dictated by reason. Besides, insight into incommensurability promotes recognition of different possible rankings of universally valid but sometimes conflicting human values.
This book avoids unnecessary technical language and is accessible not only for specialists but for a large audience of philosophers, ethicists, political theorists, economists, lawyers and interested persons without specialized knowledge.
Reviews
This book is a rigorous treatment of a major question: Can there be rational decisions between options having incommensurable values? Challenging the view that incommensurability does not preclude rational choice, Boot details obstacles to choices between incommensurables and indicates how practical reasoning should accommodate them. In doing this he says much of value about justice, healthcare, punishment, and other major topics.
-- Robert Audi, John A. O'Brien Professor of Philosophy, University of Notre Dame
It is hard to think of a more important practical question than whether there are irresoluble conflicts between values. Philosophers in recent years have made major advances in clarifying that question and developing answers to it, but their work is often technical. Martijn Boot is technically adept, but in this highly significant book makes his arguments in clear and engaging prose. He brings out the implications of incommensurability in various areas, as well as taking the debate forward on several fronts.
-- Roger Crisp, Professor of Moral Philosophy, St Anne's College, Oxford
If these conflicts occur many philosophers believe we should weigh the relevant demands of justice against each other or against other important human values. However, under particular conditions, incommensurability of the relevant plural values prevents the assignment or determination of objective and impartial weights. In those cases an impartial or objective ranking or right balance do not exist.
People may recognize the same universally valid human values, principles of justice and human rights. A consensus on all important questions of justice is nevertheless unlikely, due to the problem that there seems to be no right or single right and determinate balance and ranking of these plural and universally valid but sometimes conflicting values and ethical demands.
For the full text, go to: http://ndpr.nd.edu/news/67424-our-fate-essays-on-god-and-free-will/
After the nuclear disaster with the Fukushima nuclear power plant the advice, given by some authorities, to leave Tokyo was largely based on the former two factors: ignorance and insufficient information. By contrast, the uncertainty and disagreement amongst experts about the size of the area to be evacuated was mainly caused by the latter two factors: inconclusiveness and indeterminability.
Inconclusiveness concerns the question whether moderately elevated radiation levels cause real and significant health risks that require drastic measures.
Indeterminability concerns the problem of rationally weighing disparate benefits and costs of the preventive measures, to wit, expected health benefits versus the costs and burdens of mass evacuation.
The International Commission on Radiological Protection (ICRP) recommends that no measures should be taken unless they produce a positive net benefit.
Exposure to moderately increased levels of radiation may increase the risk of fatal cancer in the future, while mass evacuation has burdensome and disruptive consequences for the society and for the persons who have to leave their residential and/or working area for a long time.
Ordering of mass evacuation seems rationally and ethically justified only if the expected future benefits outweigh the present and future burdens. Small or uncertain future health benefit may be outweighed by large costs and burdens of mass evacuation.
Because we have to take into consideration not only public but also individual costs and benefits, it is important to take into account the personal absolute increase in health risk of elevated radiation in addition to relative risk.
Unlike relative risk, absolute risk reveals the individual chance of getting a radiation-based disease. The increase in absolute risk – that is, the difference between the chances of getting the disease with and without the exposure to the increased level of radiation – is a useful measure to reveal the personal chance of health benefit from evacuation. This personal benefit must be balanced against the personal costs and burdens.
The key question is which levels of radiation absorption and health risks outweigh the burdens of mass evacuation. There seems consensus amongst experts about the justification of mass evacuation in cases of expected individual radiation absorption > 500 mSv over a year. Similarly, experts agree that expected extra radiation absorption < 10 mSv does not justify mass evacuation. But between these two extremes there is a wide range of 50-fold increasing radiation levels in which it is not clear whether the personal and public benefits from mass evacuation outweigh the personal and public costs. This may partly explain why experts and authorities gave conflicting advice about the radius of the area around the Fukushima nuclear power plant within which people had to be evacuated.
The uncertainty about the right thing to do with respect to a wide range of moderately elevated levels of radiation seems to be caused not only by inconclusiveness but also by indeterminability, that is, impossibility of determinately weighing disparate costs and benefits.
Keywords:
Asymmetry argument – causal fallacy – cause and reason – contingent belief – efficient cause – epistemic peer – equal weight view – hermeneutic circle – rational belief
Acknowledgment
I thank G.A. Cohen for his comment on an earlier versions of this paper.
Ruth Chang, by contrast, tries to show that many cases of putative incomparability are instead cases of parity - a fourth value relation of comparability, in addition to the three standard value relations 'better than', 'worse than' and 'equally good as'. It follows, she argues, that many choice situations in which rationally justified choice seems precluded are in fact situations within the reach of practical reason.
This article has three aims: (1) it challenges Chang's argument for the possibility of parity; (2) it demonstrates that, even if parity would exist, its problematic implications for practical reason would not differ from those of Raz's incomparability; (3) it discusses the underlying cause of hard cases of comparison: the fact that none of the three standard value relations applies ('3NT'). It will be shown that the problematic implications for the rational justification of the choice are due to 3NT itself, irrespective of whether 3NT is explained as incomparability or parity.
Keywords: Parity, Incomparability, Rationally justified choice