But I was reminded of the incident later when I received a letter from an American woman in her forties who had been brought up Roman Catholic. At the age of seven, she told me, two unpleasant things happened to her. She was sexually abused by her parish priest in his car. And, around the same time, a little schoolfriend of hers, who had tragically died, went to hell because she was a Protestant. Or so my correspondent had been... Read more

My title is a mash-up of the titles of two well-known philosophy papers: Gregory Kavka’s “The Toxin Puzzle,” which I discussed earlier today here, and Saul Kripke’s “A Puzzle about Belief.” But my topic is all Kavka: extending Kavka’s Toxin Puzzle, which is about intentions, in a way that some remarks of Kavka’s at the end of his paper suggest: to cover beliefs.  So, suppose that, in accordance with an agreement you made earlier with him, our eccentric billionaire will... Read more

You are feeling extremely lucky. You have just been approached by an eccentric billionaire who has offered you the following deal. He places before you a vial of toxin that, if you drink it, will make you painfully ill for a day, but will not threaten your life or have any lasting effects. (Your spouse, a crack biochemist, confirms the properties of the toxin.) The billionaire will pay you one million dollars tomorrow morning if, at midnight tonight, you intend... Read more