Browsing by Author "Williams, Brandon"

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    Toward a Funcational Apporach to Normative Reasons
    (2021-04-12) Williams, Brandon; Sher, George; Schroeder, Timothy
    A satisfactory analysis of normative reasons has evaded the field of metaethics for a long time. I argue that this is because of confusion at the conceptual level. Beginning with the debate between Reasons Internalists and Reasons Externalists, I develop an account of our concept of normative reasons that gives place to the functional role that those reasons have played in our acquisition of the concept. Assuming realism about reasons, I argue that their functional role is that of eliciting the basic normative experience in well-functioning agents. I call this experience “”. From this experience, we acquire the concepts of [to-be-done-ness] and [normative reason]. If our concept of a normative reason tracks anything in the real world, it must track the things that give rise to the basic normative experience. In the process of making this argument, I offer some admittedly speculative suggestions about how this experience of should be characterized and categorized among the range of human experiences. I also defend a weak form of empiricism that allows our normative concepts to be derived from this experience. Finally, I suggest that there are numerous pay-offs to adopting my functional account of normative reasons. Epistemologically, it explains how it is that we are able to apprehend the normative world. Metaphysically, it answers some long-standing metaethical questions as well as dissolves long-standing debates, including the one between the Reasons Internalists and Reasons Externalists.
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    Trust and privacy in the context of user-generated health data
    (Sage, 2017) Ostherr, Kirsten; Borodina, Svetlana; Bracken, Rachel Conrad; Lotterman, Charles; Storer, Eliot; Williams, Brandon
    This study identifies and explores evolving concepts of trust and privacy in the context of user-generated health data. We define “user-generated health data” as data captured through devices or software (whether purpose built or commercially available) and used outside of traditional clinical settings for tracking personal health data. The investigators conducted qualitative research through semistructured interviews (n = 32) with researchers, health technology start-up companies, and members of the general public to inquire why and how they interact with and understand the value of user-generated health data. We found significant results concerning new attitudes toward trust, privacy, and sharing of health data outside of clinical settings that conflict with regulations governing health data within clinical settings. Members of the general public expressed little concern about sharing health data with the companies that sold the devices or apps they used, and indicated that they rarely read the “terms and conditions” detailing how their data may be exploited by the company or third-party affiliates before consenting to them. In contrast, interviews with researchers revealed significant resistance among potential research participants to sharing their user-generated health data for purposes of scientific study. The widespread rhetoric of personalization and social sharing in “user-generated culture” appears to facilitate an understanding of user-generated health data that deemphasizes the risk of exploitation in favor of loosely defined benefits to individual and social well-being. We recommend clarification and greater transparency of regulations governing data sharing related to health.