Discretionary Time: A New Method of Cross-National Welfare Comparison Focusing on Freedom. Cross-national comparisons of welfare regimes and their gender divisions explore issues of income and employment. Those bring liberation of a sort, but they do not exhaust people's freedom and autonomy. This Project will explore how paid and unpaid labour responsibilities interact, impinging on people's discretionary time and thus autonomy. A new measure of 'discretionary time' will be developed and its ....Discretionary Time: A New Method of Cross-National Welfare Comparison Focusing on Freedom. Cross-national comparisons of welfare regimes and their gender divisions explore issues of income and employment. Those bring liberation of a sort, but they do not exhaust people's freedom and autonomy. This Project will explore how paid and unpaid labour responsibilities interact, impinging on people's discretionary time and thus autonomy. A new measure of 'discretionary time' will be developed and its usefulness for cross-national comparisons illustrated through analysis of time use data from Australia, Finland, Canada and Sweden. Different ways of targeting social assistance to the most time-pressured groups in society will be examined for policy lessons from abroad.
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The Language of Knowledge. Knowledge is central to our lives. The way we attribute knowledge to others governs whom we trust, how we reason, what we do, and whether we succeed. The significance of this project consists in a deeper understanding of our attributions of knowledge, situated within the context of questions. This project offers the benefits of quality foundational research in an interdisciplinary venue. It connects to a range of areas of National Research Priority including An Environ ....The Language of Knowledge. Knowledge is central to our lives. The way we attribute knowledge to others governs whom we trust, how we reason, what we do, and whether we succeed. The significance of this project consists in a deeper understanding of our attributions of knowledge, situated within the context of questions. This project offers the benefits of quality foundational research in an interdisciplinary venue. It connects to a range of areas of National Research Priority including An Environmentally Sustainable Australia, Promoting and Managing Good Health, and Frontier Technologies for Building and Transforming Australian Industries, insofar as all of these areas of National Research Priority are concerned with the acquisition and transfer of knowledge.Read moreRead less
The Objects of Probabilities. Probabilities impact almost every aspect of our lives. Actuaries calculate probabilities of property loss due to bushfires, while climatologists warn that such probabilities will increase alarmingly. Probabilities abound in engineering, medicine, the law, the sciences and social sciences, and much philosophy. Yet we lack a proper understanding of the kinds of things that receive probabilities: the objects of probabilities. This project will provide such understandin ....The Objects of Probabilities. Probabilities impact almost every aspect of our lives. Actuaries calculate probabilities of property loss due to bushfires, while climatologists warn that such probabilities will increase alarmingly. Probabilities abound in engineering, medicine, the law, the sciences and social sciences, and much philosophy. Yet we lack a proper understanding of the kinds of things that receive probabilities: the objects of probabilities. This project will provide such understanding. It will rethink the foundations of probability and decision theory, with potential ramifications for the philosophy, science, and public policy that are based on these theories. It thus aims to strengthen Australia's research profile and international standing in these areas.Read moreRead less
Epistemic Warrant: Transmission Failure, Basic Knowledge, and Entitlement. This Project will bring substantial intellectual, cultural, and economic benefits to the nation - not only by increasing research strength, contributing to research output and establishing an international research partnership, but also by deepening the relationship between the study of the mind and theory of knowledge as a traditional area within philosophy and thus helping to maintain the pivotal position of philosophy ....Epistemic Warrant: Transmission Failure, Basic Knowledge, and Entitlement. This Project will bring substantial intellectual, cultural, and economic benefits to the nation - not only by increasing research strength, contributing to research output and establishing an international research partnership, but also by deepening the relationship between the study of the mind and theory of knowledge as a traditional area within philosophy and thus helping to maintain the pivotal position of philosophy in our intellectual life. Students, early-career researchers and established philosophers will benefit from access to the intellectual and institutional resources of international partner universities and there will be substantial and quantifiable financial contributions by international universities and research agencies.Read moreRead less
The Mathematical and Philosophical Foundations of Probability. We find probability wherever we find uncertainty: virtually everywhere in our lives. Probability is essential to almost every technology. High-stakes decisions are routinely made on the basis of probability judgments and risk assessment-for example, in engineering, medicine, agriculture, environmental management, urban planning, public policy, public health, the law, and in our national defence. And some of those decisions have been ....The Mathematical and Philosophical Foundations of Probability. We find probability wherever we find uncertainty: virtually everywhere in our lives. Probability is essential to almost every technology. High-stakes decisions are routinely made on the basis of probability judgments and risk assessment-for example, in engineering, medicine, agriculture, environmental management, urban planning, public policy, public health, the law, and in our national defence. And some of those decisions have been made badly because of poor probability estimates-witness the 1986 space shuttle disaster. Our current methodologies for using probability are inadequate. This project will make an important contribution to the collective enterprise of enhancing our understanding of probability and its myriad applications.Read moreRead less
Reasons and Rationality. The project explains how we assess the truth and falsehood of everyday claims about what people have reason to do. It also explains what legitimizes our practice of praising and blaming people for their success and failure at doing what we think they have reason to do. In so doing it provides a foundation for both our ordinary practice of holding people responsible, and for the more institutionalised counterpart of this ordinary practice in the law.
The Formation and Development of Chinese Philosophy as an Academic Discipline in Twentieth Century China. It is in Australia's national interest to pay close attention to the orientation of intellectual and political currents in China and to how these currents are increasingly merging and interacting. This project will enhance our capacity to interpret and engage with our regional environment by contributing to a clearer understanding of the changing relationship between Chinese intellectual tra ....The Formation and Development of Chinese Philosophy as an Academic Discipline in Twentieth Century China. It is in Australia's national interest to pay close attention to the orientation of intellectual and political currents in China and to how these currents are increasingly merging and interacting. This project will enhance our capacity to interpret and engage with our regional environment by contributing to a clearer understanding of the changing relationship between Chinese intellectual traditions and cultural identity. A commitment to understanding what Chinese philosophy means to China's educated elite also demonstrates a willingness to foster dialogue and communication that is sensitive to the intellectual and cultural traditions which are a source of pride and identity for several of our major regional partners. Read moreRead less
Understanding phenomenal experience as a natural part of our world. The natural sciences?physics, chemistry and biology?provide compelling accounts of our world. They contain, however, no overt mention of mental states and in particular the mental states with a phenomenology: states like itches and colour experiences. The challenge for naturalists is locate these states within the naturalist picture. This project develops and draws on representationalist accounts of mind to explain how to locate ....Understanding phenomenal experience as a natural part of our world. The natural sciences?physics, chemistry and biology?provide compelling accounts of our world. They contain, however, no overt mention of mental states and in particular the mental states with a phenomenology: states like itches and colour experiences. The challenge for naturalists is locate these states within the naturalist picture. This project develops and draws on representationalist accounts of mind to explain how to locate mental states that have a phenomenology within the naturalist's picture. This will yield new perspectives on the mental lives of machines.Read moreRead less
Conscious Experience and the Hegemony of Representation. Many things make humans special but three stand out: the possession of a moral sense, rationality, and consciousness. This project aims to explain consciousness in a way fully comppatible with the aspirations of cognitive science to see humans as a natural part of the physical world.
Belief singular versus beliefs plural. Research on the brain and how it represents the environment has the potential to reconfigure our ordinary conceptions of belief and rationality. This project explores the impact of the changes and their implications.