The Monopoly Argument Against Conscientious Refusal in Health Care

Michael Robinson (Chapman University) and Jeffrey Byrnes (GVSU Philosophy)

Friday 9/18/26

Margaret Cavendish’s Windowless Bodies: how Cavendish explains perception through immanent causation alone

Nicholas Westberg (GVSU Philosophy)

Friday 9/25/26

Talk Abstract: This paper argues that the standard interpretation of Margaret Cavendish’s natural philosophy tames her commitments about causation. Scholars and interpreters have long recognized that in the case of locomotion, Cavendish thinks that each individual body is entirely responsible for moving itself. It is thus not uncommon to categorize her theory of locomotion in terms of immanent causation. However, current scholars maintain that she accounts for perception in terms of transeunt or external causation. On their reading, the object of any perceiver’s act of perception is an efficient cause of that perceptual state. Motivating this reading, it seems, is the worry that it would be philosophically problematic for the Englishwoman to accept an immanent-causal account of perception. Thus, there is a near consensus that while Cavendish adopts a radical view of locomotion according to which each body’s locomotions are entirely immanently or self-caused, she nonetheless accepts the commonsense and traditional philosophical view that acts of perception are transeuntly or externally caused. This view has so far gone uncontested.

This paper argues to the contrary that Margaret Cavendish thinks that acts of perception are entirely immanently caused. It will show that the Englishwoman makes the general claim that no changes can be accounted for in terms of external efficient causation. Moreover, it will demonstrate that she fastidiously adheres to this principle in her definitions and analyses of perception by propounding the claim that each perceiver is the sole agent involved in its perceptual states. Cavendishean bodies, to use Leibniz’s memorable phrase, lack any windows by which causal influence may be exerted. She thus beats Leibniz to this radical punch.

TBA

Ronald Loeffler (GVSU Philosophy)

Friday 11/6/26

William Apess: Indigenous Liberation Theology as a Response to Settler Colonialism

Audrey Brown (GVSU Philosophy)

Friday 11/13/26

Talk Abstract: When settler colonialism first arrived in North America, it came cloaked in the language of Christianity and western reasoning. Settlers came with the conviction of being God’s chosen people and the desire to transform the “New World” to reflect their metaphysical vision. Pre-existing Indigenous ontologies were disregarded in the name of natural reason and what was viewed as the inevitable march of “progress”. While Native peoples have been responding to settler colonialism since the beginning, these responses have taken many different approaches. While there is a long and documented history of Christianity being used as a tool of oppression against Native peoples, there are those who chose to embrace Christianity instead as a tool of liberation. This talk is an exploration of Indigenous liberation theology in the work of William Apess and the themes that emerged in the context of his historical period in the early 1800’s. Apess was Methodist minister and a member of the Pequot tribe. He was also one of the first Indigenous North Americans to publish multiple philosophical texts in English. By examining the body of his work, three key themes emerge for Apess: the intrinsic humanity of Native peoples, the incompatibility of Christian values and settler hypocrisy, and the inherent conviction that assimilation is not necessary for salvation.