I’ve been correcting the typesetters’ proofs for Getting ‘Virtual’ Wrongs Right, which is basically an extended gripe at the way in which loose talk of ‘virtual murder’ and the like managed to migrate from tabloid headlines to ethics papers. (The final, typeset version will be paywalled somewhere; I’m more sanguine than usual about this aspect of academic publishing because most of the material to which the article directly reacts already lives behind the same paywall.) I don’t know what other ethicists will make of it, but hopefully it rings true to people who know their video games; bonus points if you understand the Easter Eggs in the main section headers.

In related news, I’ve dug up a couple of old book reviews which I did for Philosophical Writings while a postgrad. I’ve never considered them interesting enough for the philosophy page of the site, but they can’t be any more useful lurking on my hard drive than posted here:

• Review of Terence Cuneo’s The Normative Web: An Argument for Moral Realism ¹
• Review of Daniel C. Russell’s Practical Intelligence and the Virtues

1. Φ seems to be claiming copyright on the text despite my having no recollection of even verbally agreeing to assign it, so I hope the present editors will decline to object to my posting the final proof PDF. Cuneo, by the way, is not the painter of the same name who used to draw hidden mice in his paintings. ↩