This dissertation has two primary aims. The first aim is to defend the position that the alternat... more This dissertation has two primary aims. The first aim is to defend the position that the alternative possibilities that are required for basic desert moral responsibility are incompatible with causal determinism. The second aim is to investigate such incompatibilist alternative possibilities, specifically in relation to manipulation, deliberation, and Molinist counterfactuals of freedom. In chapter 1, “Fischer’s Deterministic Frankfurt-Style Argument”, I examine John Martin Fischer’s deterministic Frankfurt-style argument against the principle of alternative possibilities (PAP). Fischer attempts to show that if causal determinism rules out an agent’s moral responsibility, it is not in virtue of its eliminating the agent’s alternative possibilities. I contend that, once we focus upon the distinction between entailment and explanation, the incompatibilist defender of PAP can successfully rebut Fischer’s argument. I argue for this claim while granting Fischer a number of assumptions th...
Virtue ethics is often understood as a rival to existing consequentialist, deontological, and con... more Virtue ethics is often understood as a rival to existing consequentialist, deontological, and contractualist views. But some have disputed the position that virtue ethics is a genuine normative ethical rival. This chapter aims to crystallize the nature of this dispute by providing criteria that determine the degree to which a normative ethical theory is complete, and then investigating virtue ethics through the lens of these criteria. In doing so, it’s argued that no existing account of virtue ethics is a complete normative ethical view that rivals existing consequentialist, deontological, and contractualist views. Moreover, it is argued that one of the most significant challenges facing virtue ethics consists in offering an account of the right-making features of actions, while remaining a distinctively virtue ethical view.
Short segments speaker clustering has significant importance both for diarization and application... more Short segments speaker clustering has significant importance both for diarization and applications such as short push-to-tatk (PTT) segments clustering. In this paper we present a new way to cluster speech segments by applying a stochastic vector quantization (VQ) with a cosine metric together with a speaker clustering quality estimator based on logistic regression. The VQ is performed on codebooks of different sizes, and the choice of the best clustering result is estimated using logistic regression. The algorithm is tested on a large range of speakers, between 2 to 60. The results are compared to those of the mean-shift clustering method, which was already tested for this task several times. The results are a bit below those of the cosine similarity measure-based mean-shift clustering. The advantage is in the run-time which is approximately 10 times faster.
This paper focuses on estimating the quality of a clustering process. In our case - the task is t... more This paper focuses on estimating the quality of a clustering process. In our case - the task is to cluster short speech segments that belong to different speakers. Moreover, speaker clustering quality may be well estimated on several clustering approaches if they all based on the same features. This is very important, as it allows us to use the same quality estimation system without retraining, and achieve reasonable results even when the clustering method is changed. We predict the system’s quality by applying a logistic regression estimator on a several statistical parameters of the clustering. In this paper, mean-shift clustering with either cosine or probabilistic linear discriminant analysis (PLDA) score as similarity measure, and stochastic vector quantization (VQ) with cosine distance were applied in order to cluster the short speaker segments represented by i-vectors. The quality of the clustering is measured using the average cluster purity (ACP), average speaker purity (AS...
The actualism/possibilism debate in ethics is about whether counterfactuals of freedom concerning... more The actualism/possibilism debate in ethics is about whether counterfactuals of freedom concerning what an agent would freely do if she were in certain circumstances even partly determine that agent’s obligations. This debate arose from an argument against the coherence of utilitarianism in the deontic logic literature. In this chapter, we first trace the historical origins of this debate and then examine actualism, possibilism, and securitism through the lens of consequentialism. After examining their respective benefits and drawbacks, we argue that, contrary to what has been assumed, actualism and securitism both succumb to the so-called nonratifiability problem. In making this argument, we develop this problem in detail and argue that it’s a much more serious problem than has been appreciated. We conclude by arguing that an alternative view, hybridism, is independently the most plausible position and best fits with the nature of consequentialism, partly in light of avoiding the no...
According to actualism, an agent ought to φ just in case what would happen if she were to φ is be... more According to actualism, an agent ought to φ just in case what would happen if she were to φ is better than what would happen if she were to ~φ. We argue that actualism makes a morally irrelevant distinction between certain counterfactuals, given that an agent sometimes has the same kind of control over their truth-value. We then offer a substantive revision to actualism that avoids this morally irrelevant distinction by focusing on a certain kind of control that is available to an agent. Finally, we show how this revised view has two additional advantages over actualism.
Recent experimental studies dispute the position that commonsense morality accepts ‘Ought’ Implie... more Recent experimental studies dispute the position that commonsense morality accepts ‘Ought’ Implies ‘Can’ (OIC), the view that, necessarily, if an agent ought to perform some action, then she can perform that action. This paper considers and supports explanations for the results of these studies on the hypothesis that OIC is intuitive and true.
According to deliberation compatibilism, rational deliberation is compatible with the belief that... more According to deliberation compatibilism, rational deliberation is compatible with the belief that one’s actions are causally determined by factors beyond one’s control. This paper offers a counterexample to recent accounts of rational deliberation that entail deliberation compatibilism. The counterexample involves a deliberator who believes that whichever action she performs will be the result of deterministic manipulation. It is further argued that there is no relevant difference between the purported counterexample and ordinary doxastic circumstances in which a determinist deliberates.
According to the Felix Culpa Theodicy (FCT), worlds containing atonement and incarnation are of s... more According to the Felix Culpa Theodicy (FCT), worlds containing atonement and incarnation are of such great value that God is justified in actualizing such a world, despite all of the moral evil that has accompanied it. Focusing upon Alvin Plantinga’s articulation of this theodicy, I argue against FCT on the basis of normative ethical considerations. On the one hand, the deontic status of at least some actions depends upon the consequences of those actions. On the other hand, the existence of atonement depends upon the deontic status of at least one action. Under certain circumstances, this two-way dependence yields a contradiction if atonement has the kind of value conferred upon it by FCT. I conclude by discussing some implications for Molinism and evidential arguments from moral evil.
To investigate the characteristics of vomiting in pediatric migraineurs and the relationship of v... more To investigate the characteristics of vomiting in pediatric migraineurs and the relationship of vomiting with other migraine-related parameters. The cohort included children and adolescents with migraine attending a headache clinic of a tertiary pediatric medical center from 2010 to 2016. Patients were identified by a retrospective database search. Data were collected from medical files. The presence of vomiting was associated with background and headache-related parameters. The study group included 453 patients, 210 boys (46.4%) and 243 girls (53.6%), of mean age 11.3 ± 3.7 years. Vomiting was reported by 161 patients (35.5%). On comparison of patients with and without vomiting, vomiting was found to be significantly associated with male gender (54% vs 42.1%, P < .018), younger age at migraine onset (8.0 ± 3. years vs 9.6 ± 3.7 years, P < .001), younger age at clinic admission (10.5 ± 3. years vs 11.6 ± 3.6 years, P = .002), higher rate of awakening headache (64.1% vs 38.7%, ...
The aim of the study was to investigate clinical features of headache associated with minor versu... more The aim of the study was to investigate clinical features of headache associated with minor versus moderate to severe traumatic brain injury and of posttraumatic versus primary headache in children and adolescents. Study group included 74 patients after mild (n = 60) or moderate to severe (n = 14) traumatic brain injury identified by retrospective review of the computerized files of a tertiary pediatric headache clinic. Forty patients (54%) had migraine-like headache, 23 (31.1%) tension-like headache, and 11 (14.9%) nonspecified headache. Fourteen patients (53.8%) had allodynia. In comparison with 174 control patients, the study group had a significantly lower proportion of patients with migraine-like headache and a higher proportion of male patients and patients with allodynia. There was no statistically significant correlation of any of the clinical parameters with the type or severity of the posttraumatic headache or rate of allodynia. The high rate of allodynia in the study grou...
The responses of different patients to the same drug may vary as a consequence of biologic, psych... more The responses of different patients to the same drug may vary as a consequence of biologic, psychosocial, and genetic differences. The aim of this study was to identify clinical factors associated with a response to pharmacologic treatment in pediatric patients with migraine. The medical files of patients with migraine attending the headache clinic of a tertiary pediatric medical center in 2010-2015 were reviewed. The children and parents (or only the parents if the child was very young) completed the International Headache Society-based questionnaire. Patients were treated with at least one of the following medications: propranolol, amitriptyline, topiramate. Response to treatment was rated as no change in migraine pattern (grade 1) or a decrease in migraine attack frequency per month by at least 50% (grade 2) or at least 75% (grade 3). The highest-grade response to any pharmacologic treatment was defined as the best clinical response. The study group included 248 patients of mean age 12.71 ± 3.04 years. A grade 3 best clinical response was significantly associated with a positive maternal history of migraine, younger age at treatment onset, lower frequency of headache attacks per month, postpubertal children had a significantly lower rate of grade 3 response than prepubertal children (P &lt; .05). Analysis of the association of overuse of medication and treatment response achieved a P value equal to .05. Several background and clinical factors are identified that may predispose children with migraine to respond better to pharmacologic treatment. Clinicians who see children with migraine in a pediatric headache clinic setting should consider these factors before initiating a treatment program.
The new dispositionalists defend the position that an agent in a deterministic Frankfurt-style ca... more The new dispositionalists defend the position that an agent in a deterministic Frankfurt-style case (FSC) has the ability to do otherwise, where that ability is the one at issue in the principle of alternative possibilities. Focusing specifically on Kadri Vihvelin's proposal, I argue against this position by showing that it is incompatible with the existence of structurally similar cases to FSCs in which a preemptive intervener bestows an agent with an ability.
This dissertation has two primary aims. The first aim is to defend the position that the alternat... more This dissertation has two primary aims. The first aim is to defend the position that the alternative possibilities that are required for basic desert moral responsibility are incompatible with causal determinism. The second aim is to investigate such incompatibilist alternative possibilities, specifically in relation to manipulation, deliberation, and Molinist counterfactuals of freedom. In chapter 1, “Fischer’s Deterministic Frankfurt-Style Argument”, I examine John Martin Fischer’s deterministic Frankfurt-style argument against the principle of alternative possibilities (PAP). Fischer attempts to show that if causal determinism rules out an agent’s moral responsibility, it is not in virtue of its eliminating the agent’s alternative possibilities. I contend that, once we focus upon the distinction between entailment and explanation, the incompatibilist defender of PAP can successfully rebut Fischer’s argument. I argue for this claim while granting Fischer a number of assumptions th...
Virtue ethics is often understood as a rival to existing consequentialist, deontological, and con... more Virtue ethics is often understood as a rival to existing consequentialist, deontological, and contractualist views. But some have disputed the position that virtue ethics is a genuine normative ethical rival. This chapter aims to crystallize the nature of this dispute by providing criteria that determine the degree to which a normative ethical theory is complete, and then investigating virtue ethics through the lens of these criteria. In doing so, it’s argued that no existing account of virtue ethics is a complete normative ethical view that rivals existing consequentialist, deontological, and contractualist views. Moreover, it is argued that one of the most significant challenges facing virtue ethics consists in offering an account of the right-making features of actions, while remaining a distinctively virtue ethical view.
Short segments speaker clustering has significant importance both for diarization and application... more Short segments speaker clustering has significant importance both for diarization and applications such as short push-to-tatk (PTT) segments clustering. In this paper we present a new way to cluster speech segments by applying a stochastic vector quantization (VQ) with a cosine metric together with a speaker clustering quality estimator based on logistic regression. The VQ is performed on codebooks of different sizes, and the choice of the best clustering result is estimated using logistic regression. The algorithm is tested on a large range of speakers, between 2 to 60. The results are compared to those of the mean-shift clustering method, which was already tested for this task several times. The results are a bit below those of the cosine similarity measure-based mean-shift clustering. The advantage is in the run-time which is approximately 10 times faster.
This paper focuses on estimating the quality of a clustering process. In our case - the task is t... more This paper focuses on estimating the quality of a clustering process. In our case - the task is to cluster short speech segments that belong to different speakers. Moreover, speaker clustering quality may be well estimated on several clustering approaches if they all based on the same features. This is very important, as it allows us to use the same quality estimation system without retraining, and achieve reasonable results even when the clustering method is changed. We predict the system’s quality by applying a logistic regression estimator on a several statistical parameters of the clustering. In this paper, mean-shift clustering with either cosine or probabilistic linear discriminant analysis (PLDA) score as similarity measure, and stochastic vector quantization (VQ) with cosine distance were applied in order to cluster the short speaker segments represented by i-vectors. The quality of the clustering is measured using the average cluster purity (ACP), average speaker purity (AS...
The actualism/possibilism debate in ethics is about whether counterfactuals of freedom concerning... more The actualism/possibilism debate in ethics is about whether counterfactuals of freedom concerning what an agent would freely do if she were in certain circumstances even partly determine that agent’s obligations. This debate arose from an argument against the coherence of utilitarianism in the deontic logic literature. In this chapter, we first trace the historical origins of this debate and then examine actualism, possibilism, and securitism through the lens of consequentialism. After examining their respective benefits and drawbacks, we argue that, contrary to what has been assumed, actualism and securitism both succumb to the so-called nonratifiability problem. In making this argument, we develop this problem in detail and argue that it’s a much more serious problem than has been appreciated. We conclude by arguing that an alternative view, hybridism, is independently the most plausible position and best fits with the nature of consequentialism, partly in light of avoiding the no...
According to actualism, an agent ought to φ just in case what would happen if she were to φ is be... more According to actualism, an agent ought to φ just in case what would happen if she were to φ is better than what would happen if she were to ~φ. We argue that actualism makes a morally irrelevant distinction between certain counterfactuals, given that an agent sometimes has the same kind of control over their truth-value. We then offer a substantive revision to actualism that avoids this morally irrelevant distinction by focusing on a certain kind of control that is available to an agent. Finally, we show how this revised view has two additional advantages over actualism.
Recent experimental studies dispute the position that commonsense morality accepts ‘Ought’ Implie... more Recent experimental studies dispute the position that commonsense morality accepts ‘Ought’ Implies ‘Can’ (OIC), the view that, necessarily, if an agent ought to perform some action, then she can perform that action. This paper considers and supports explanations for the results of these studies on the hypothesis that OIC is intuitive and true.
According to deliberation compatibilism, rational deliberation is compatible with the belief that... more According to deliberation compatibilism, rational deliberation is compatible with the belief that one’s actions are causally determined by factors beyond one’s control. This paper offers a counterexample to recent accounts of rational deliberation that entail deliberation compatibilism. The counterexample involves a deliberator who believes that whichever action she performs will be the result of deterministic manipulation. It is further argued that there is no relevant difference between the purported counterexample and ordinary doxastic circumstances in which a determinist deliberates.
According to the Felix Culpa Theodicy (FCT), worlds containing atonement and incarnation are of s... more According to the Felix Culpa Theodicy (FCT), worlds containing atonement and incarnation are of such great value that God is justified in actualizing such a world, despite all of the moral evil that has accompanied it. Focusing upon Alvin Plantinga’s articulation of this theodicy, I argue against FCT on the basis of normative ethical considerations. On the one hand, the deontic status of at least some actions depends upon the consequences of those actions. On the other hand, the existence of atonement depends upon the deontic status of at least one action. Under certain circumstances, this two-way dependence yields a contradiction if atonement has the kind of value conferred upon it by FCT. I conclude by discussing some implications for Molinism and evidential arguments from moral evil.
To investigate the characteristics of vomiting in pediatric migraineurs and the relationship of v... more To investigate the characteristics of vomiting in pediatric migraineurs and the relationship of vomiting with other migraine-related parameters. The cohort included children and adolescents with migraine attending a headache clinic of a tertiary pediatric medical center from 2010 to 2016. Patients were identified by a retrospective database search. Data were collected from medical files. The presence of vomiting was associated with background and headache-related parameters. The study group included 453 patients, 210 boys (46.4%) and 243 girls (53.6%), of mean age 11.3 ± 3.7 years. Vomiting was reported by 161 patients (35.5%). On comparison of patients with and without vomiting, vomiting was found to be significantly associated with male gender (54% vs 42.1%, P < .018), younger age at migraine onset (8.0 ± 3. years vs 9.6 ± 3.7 years, P < .001), younger age at clinic admission (10.5 ± 3. years vs 11.6 ± 3.6 years, P = .002), higher rate of awakening headache (64.1% vs 38.7%, ...
The aim of the study was to investigate clinical features of headache associated with minor versu... more The aim of the study was to investigate clinical features of headache associated with minor versus moderate to severe traumatic brain injury and of posttraumatic versus primary headache in children and adolescents. Study group included 74 patients after mild (n = 60) or moderate to severe (n = 14) traumatic brain injury identified by retrospective review of the computerized files of a tertiary pediatric headache clinic. Forty patients (54%) had migraine-like headache, 23 (31.1%) tension-like headache, and 11 (14.9%) nonspecified headache. Fourteen patients (53.8%) had allodynia. In comparison with 174 control patients, the study group had a significantly lower proportion of patients with migraine-like headache and a higher proportion of male patients and patients with allodynia. There was no statistically significant correlation of any of the clinical parameters with the type or severity of the posttraumatic headache or rate of allodynia. The high rate of allodynia in the study grou...
The responses of different patients to the same drug may vary as a consequence of biologic, psych... more The responses of different patients to the same drug may vary as a consequence of biologic, psychosocial, and genetic differences. The aim of this study was to identify clinical factors associated with a response to pharmacologic treatment in pediatric patients with migraine. The medical files of patients with migraine attending the headache clinic of a tertiary pediatric medical center in 2010-2015 were reviewed. The children and parents (or only the parents if the child was very young) completed the International Headache Society-based questionnaire. Patients were treated with at least one of the following medications: propranolol, amitriptyline, topiramate. Response to treatment was rated as no change in migraine pattern (grade 1) or a decrease in migraine attack frequency per month by at least 50% (grade 2) or at least 75% (grade 3). The highest-grade response to any pharmacologic treatment was defined as the best clinical response. The study group included 248 patients of mean age 12.71 ± 3.04 years. A grade 3 best clinical response was significantly associated with a positive maternal history of migraine, younger age at treatment onset, lower frequency of headache attacks per month, postpubertal children had a significantly lower rate of grade 3 response than prepubertal children (P &lt; .05). Analysis of the association of overuse of medication and treatment response achieved a P value equal to .05. Several background and clinical factors are identified that may predispose children with migraine to respond better to pharmacologic treatment. Clinicians who see children with migraine in a pediatric headache clinic setting should consider these factors before initiating a treatment program.
The new dispositionalists defend the position that an agent in a deterministic Frankfurt-style ca... more The new dispositionalists defend the position that an agent in a deterministic Frankfurt-style case (FSC) has the ability to do otherwise, where that ability is the one at issue in the principle of alternative possibilities. Focusing specifically on Kadri Vihvelin's proposal, I argue against this position by showing that it is incompatible with the existence of structurally similar cases to FSCs in which a preemptive intervener bestows an agent with an ability.
Uploads
Papers by Yishai Cohen