This paper expands the definition of gray-marketing to include some ethically problematic marketing activities and techniques used in personal selling in China. Based on this, a conceptual model of gray-marketing for a particular type of selling in which both the sellers and the buyers exhibit problematic ethics in an exchange and the associated hypotheses are developed and tested. The findings show that, first, the respondents have different ethical evaluations of different marketing practices used in personal selling such as giving and (...) accepting gifts, buying and accepting meals, and offering and accepting kickbacks. Some of these practices may not be considered unethical. Second, in terms of ethical assessment, gray-marketing practiced by buying agents is more unacceptable than when practiced by sales agents. Third, a person's ethical evaluation of gray-marketing behavior, empathy for gray-marketing, and belief that gray-marketing has serious consequences, significantly affects his inclination to use gray-marketing. This paper concludes with a discussion of some possible applications of our research findings. (shrink)

Before there was the digital divide there was the analog divide– and universal service was the attempt to close that analogdivide. Universal service is becoming ever more complex in terms ofregulatory design as it becomes the digital divide. In order to evaluatethe promise of the next generation Internet with respect to the digitaldivide this work looks backwards as well as forwards in time. Byevaluating why previous universal service mechanisms failed andsucceeded this work identifies specific characteristics ofcommunications systems – in particular (...) in billing and managinguncertainty – and argues that these characteristics underliesuccess or failure in terms of technological ubiquity. Developing a setof characteristics of services rather than a set of services is afundamental break with the tradition of universal service. In fact, theimplications of our proposal is that basic characteristics in theoffering of the service rather than the absolute price are critical toclose the digital divide: certainty of total charge, ability to avoiddeposits or disconnection via best effort service, and payer-basedcontrol of all charges. While all of these principles sound obvious infact none of these hold in the telephony network. Universal service hasevolved from common carriage (serve all with no discrimination) to aright to basic services (100% penetration). Universal service isnow discussed as the digital divide, as the access to information asopposed to services becomes increasingly critical. However, we arediscussing in this paper access to the bits and the network rather thanaccess to the information (or intellectual property) once connected. Theprovision of universal service is seen as a technical problem only in thatthe technology costs money – universal service debates have longbeen the domain of economists. Yet the design of protocols has been thedomain of engineers, the building of systems the corporate domain, andthe discussion of equity the interest of ethicists. The design ofprotocols can define the parameters of the corporate decision-makers,the variables of the economist, and the questions for the ethicist. Thedesign decisions made at the fundamental levels can make communicationsequity more or less likely. In this work I focus on the design ofprotocols for the next generation Internet, protocols which willfundamentally change the best-effort nature of Internet services.Building on the economic and ethnographic work of others I argue thatthe effects of protocols adoption on universal service can be predictedto some degree. By examination of past and current technologies Iexamine a set of technical mechanisms to determine how such mechanismsmight harm or enhance universal service. I define each mechanism (e.g.denial of entry) and offer observations about each particularmechanism''s implicit pricing assumptions. I close with a discussion ofinterest to ethicists and regulators on evaluating communicationsprotocols with respect to universal access. Protocols for developingmultiple qualities of service for packet-switched networks have focusedon economic efficiency (e.g. Mackie-Mason, 1995; Choi, Stahl &Winston, 1997; Shapiro & Varian, 1998), billing to encouragewidespread adoption of network innovations (e.g. Xie & Sirbu, 1985)and billing in a manner consistent with the underlying network (e.g.Clark, 1996). Here we examine a set of protocols which include varyingquality of service mechanisms with respect to the compatibility of theprotocols with universal access. (shrink)

Social robots and their interactions with children are becoming increasingly sophisticated, with the emergence of child-robot relationships as a likely result. However, adequate measurement instruments that tap into concepts associated with child-robot relationship formation are scarce. We aimed to develop three measures that can be used to assess children’s closeness to, trust in, and perceived social support from, a social robot. We established the validity and reliability of these measures among 87 Dutch children aged 7 to 11 years old. Because (...) of their shortness, the measures can efficiently be applied by scholars aiming to gain insight into the general process of child-robot relationship formation and its specific sub-processes, that is, the emergence of closeness, trust, and perceived social support. (shrink)

We argue that Brandon and Carson's (1996) "The Indeterministic Character of Evolutionary Theory" fails to identify any indeterminism that would require evolutionary theory to be a statistical or probabilistic theory. Specifically, we argue that (1) their demonstration of a mechanism by which quantum indeterminism might "percolate up" to the biological level is irrelevant; (2) their argument that natural selection is indeterministic because it is inextricably connected with drift fails to join the issue with determinism; and (3) their view that experimental (...) methodology in botany assumes indeterminism is both false and incompatible with the commitment to discoverable causal mechanisms underlying biological processes. We remain convinced that the probabilism of the theory of evolution is epistemically, not ontologically, motivated. (shrink)

Social robots and their interactions with children are becoming increasingly sophisticated, with the emergence of child-robot relationships as a likely result. However, adequate measurement instruments that tap into concepts associated with child-robot relationship formation are scarce. We aimed to develop three measures that can be used to assess children’s closeness to, trust in, and perceived social support from, a social robot. We established the validity and reliability of these measures among 87 Dutch children aged 7 to 11 years old. Because (...) of their shortness, the measures can efficiently be applied by scholars aiming to gain insight into the general process of child-robot relationship formation and its specific sub-processes, that is, the emergence of closeness, trust, and perceived social support. (shrink)

It has been well documented that children perceive robots as social, mental, and moral others. Studies on child-robot interaction may encourage this perception of robots, first, by using a Wizard of Oz set-up and, second, by having robots engage in self-description. However, much remains unknown about the effects of transparent teleoperation and self-description on children’s perception of, and relationship formation with a robot. To address this research gap initially, we conducted an experimental study with a 2 × 2 between-subject design (...) in which 168 children aged 7–10 interacted with a Nao robot once. Transparency about the teleoperation procedure decreased children’s perceptions of the robot’s autonomy and anthropomorphism. Self-description reduced the degree to which children perceived the robot as being similar to themselves. Transparent teleoperation and self-description affected neither children’s perceptions of the robot’s animacy and social presence nor their closeness to and trust in the robot. (shrink)

We argue that the set of humanly known mathematical truths (at any given moment in human history) is finite and so recursive. But if so, then given various fundamental results in mathematical logic and the theory of computation (such as Craig’s in J Symb Log 18(1): 30–32(1953) theorem), the set of humanly known mathematical truths is axiomatizable. Furthermore, given Godel’s (Monash Math Phys 38: 173–198, 1931) First Incompleteness Theorem, then (at any given moment in human history) humanly known mathematics must (...) be either inconsistent or incomplete. Moreover, since humanly known mathematics is axiomatizable, it can be the output of a Turing machine. We then argue that any given mathematical claim that we could possibly know could be the output of a Turing machine, at least in principle. So the Lucas-Penrose (Lucas in Philosophy 36:112–127, 1961; Penrose, in The Emperor’s new mind. Oxford University Press, Oxford (1994)) argument cannot be sound. (shrink)

Focus on the evolutionary origins of musicality has been neglected relative to attention on language, so these new proposals are welcome stimulants. We argue for a broad comparative approach to understanding how the elements of musicality evolved, and against the use of overly simplistic evolutionary accounts.

In recent years, scholars have paid considerable attention to moderation in Montesquieu’s De l’esprit des lois. Still, little scholarship has considered how Montesquieu develops moderation as a concept and practice. In this article, I argue Montesquieu’s complementary defense of moderation and critique of despotism rely on immoderate argumentative practices of omission that enable him to reshape extant laudatory narratives of China and Japan. Through an analysis of Montesquieu’s primary texts on climate and commerce, I demonstrate that, absent these practices, Montesquieu’s (...) “Asian despotism” collapses, revealing the moderate natures of both countries. This conclusion is paradoxical insofar as we take seriously Montesquieu’s claim that De l’esprit des lois upholds the spirit of moderation as of paramount importance. Moreover, I argue that this analysis of Montesquieu’s paradoxical spirit brings to light under-examined dimensions of Montesquieu’s work and alerts political theorists to how different reading practices can recast his “moderate” reputation. (shrink)

People across the world seek out beautiful sounds in nature, such as a babbling brook or a nightingale song, for positive human experiences. However, it is unclear whether this positive aesthetic response is driven by a preference for the perceptual features typical of nature sounds versus a higher‐order association of nature with beauty. To test these hypotheses, participants provided aesthetic judgments for nature and urban soundscapes that varied on ease of recognition. Results demonstrated that the aesthetic preference for nature soundscapes (...) was eliminated for the sounds hardest to recognize, and moreover the relationship between aesthetic ratings and several measured acoustic features significantly changed as a function of recognition. In a follow‐up experiment, requiring participants to classify these difficult‐to‐identify sounds into nature or urban categories resulted in a robust preference for nature sounds and a relationship between aesthetic ratings and our measured acoustic features that was more typical of easy‐to‐identify sounds. This pattern of results was replicated with computer‐generated artificial noises, which acoustically shared properties with the nature and urban soundscapes but by definition did not come from these environments. Taken together, these results support the conclusion that the recognition of a sound as either natural or urban dynamically organizes the relationship between aesthetic preference and perceptual features and that these preferences are not inherent to the acoustic features. Implications for nature's role in cognitive and affective restoration are discussed. (shrink)

Virtue ethics is regarded as the key in search of moral excellence among corporations. Yet, there are limited works to empirically investigate what virtuous character morally good corporations is expected to exhibit in the course of business from the perspective of customers. To fill this gap, we argue that customers are to evaluate firm’s virtuous character using Confucian cardinal virtues (ren, yi, and li) and perceived virtuousness determines customer loyalty. We test this argument using a sample of 276 Hong Kong (...) Chinese. The result suggests that a corporation not only has to offer a good value and high quality to customers but also needs to develop and acquire virtuous character in retaining customer loyalty. Firm has to embrace ren, yi, and li as the primary business goal. In fact, they are not the means but the end in themselves. The continuous pursuit of these cardinal virtues at the firm level not only establishes proper corporate values but also enables a firm to act morally in the course of business. Such kind of firm is known as junzi corporation. (shrink)

The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic and resulting health and economic crisis has caused major disruptions in the functioning of food systems and revived the discussion on what forms balanced, effective and responsible crisis management. As part of its thought leadership and its social responsibility in times of crisis, WUR is uniquely placed to contribute to the scientific knowledge base and data collection mechanisms required for early recognition and rapid response. In addition, WUR takes on the challenge to generate timely insights into (...) the possible scenarios for the prevention of a crisis and during and after emergencies to enable our clients and stakeholders to make informed decisions. Lastly, WUR can provide a better understanding of the mechanisms of spillover, and tangible and practical tools to help reduce the risk of spillover events from occurring, prevent pathogen spread, or mitigate the impacts of a future pandemic. In its research institutes and university, WUR brings together expertise in human, animal, plant and environmental health, the global agri-food system, economics, social sciences, food safety and security, ethics, and policy. Here, in the knowledge that COVID-19 will not be the last pandemic, we present WUR’s ambition and capabilities towards an integrated global multi-stakeholder approach to the prevention and management of potentially pandemic diseases, across the four phases of crisis management; prevention, preparedness, response, and recovery and learning. (shrink)

Abstract: This working paper focuses on the question whether there is a therapeutic imperative that, in specific situations, would oblige us to perform genome editing at the germline level in the context of assisted reproduction. The answer to this central question is discussed primarily with reference to specific scenarios where preimplantation genetic diagnosis (PGD) does not represent an acceptable alternative to germline genome editing based on either medical, or ethical, or – from the perspective of the potential parents – moral (...) or religious grounds. This article deals with four different types of case constellations that result from these possible reasons against PGD as well as from the necessity or dispensability of a subsequent “control PGD.” These cases are discussed based on hypotheses concerning contextual factors and theoretical assumptions. In conclusion, we point out that if our assumptions are correct, there is probably no therapeutic imperative for genome editing at the germline level. We draw this rationale from the fact that germline interventions are likely not person-affecting. However, we caution the reader that our result is preliminary and needs to be more carefully examined in future work in light of the bioethical debate and potential objections. -/- // Abstract: Im Zentrum dieses Working Papers steht die Frage, ob es einen therapeutischen Imperativ geben kann, der uns, in bestimmten Situationen, verpflichten würde, eine Genomeditierung (genome editing) auf Keimbahnebene im Rahmen der assistierten Befruchtung vorzunehmen. Die Antwort auf diese zentrale Frage wird insbesondere mit Bezug auf Fälle diskutiert, in denen das Verfahren der Präimplantationsdiagnostik (PID) keine aus entweder medizinischen oder ethischen oder – aus Sicht der potentiellen Eltern – moralischen bzw. religiösen Gründen akzeptable Alternative zu einem Keimbahneingriff darstellt. Die möglichen Gründe gegen die PID sowie die Erforderlichkeit oder Verzichtbarkeit einer nachfolgenden «Kontroll-PID» ergeben vier verschiedene Fallkonstellationen, denen sich der Beitrag zuwendet. Auf Grundlage von Hypothesen zu kontextuellen Faktoren und theoretischen Annahmen diskutieren wir diese Fälle. Im Ergebnis verweisen wir darauf, dass es, wenn unsere Annahmen zutreffen, vermutlich keinen therapeutischen Imperativ zum genome editing auf Keimbahnebene gibt. Dies begründet sich daraus, dass der Keimbahneingriff vermutlich nicht als personenbezogen (person-affecting) zu bezeichnen ist. Wir weisen jedoch darauf hin, dass unser Ergebnis vorläufig ist und unter Berücksichtigung der bioethischen Debatte und möglicher Einwände genauer geprüft werden muss. -/- // Résumé: Ce Working Paper se concentre sur la question de l’existence d’un impératif thérapeutique qui, dans des situations spécifiques, nous obligerait à réaliser une édition du génome au niveau de la lignée germinale dans le cadre de la procréation assistée. Afin de répondre à cette question centrale nous développons quatre scénarios spécifiques dans lesquels le diagnostic préimplantatoire (DPI) ne représente pas une alternative acceptable à l’édition du génome germinal pour des raisons médicales, éthiques ou – du point de vue des futurs parents – morales ou religieuses. Cet article traite de quatre constellations différentes de cas résultant des raisons mises en avant pour s'opposer au DPI ainsi que de la nécessité ou de l’inutilité d’un ultérieur « DPI de contrôle » Ces cas sont discutés sur la base d’hypothèses portant sur les facteurs contextuels et sur les présupposés théoriques. En conclusion, nous soulignons que si nos hypothèses sont correctes, il n’y a probablement aucun impératif thérapeutique justifiant l’édition du génome au niveau de la lignée germinale. Nous arrivons à cette conclusion parce qu’une intervention au niveau de la lignée germinale n’est probablement pas susceptible d’affecter la personne. Cependant, nous mettons en garde le lecteur sur le fait que notre conclusion est préliminaire et qu’elle doit être examinée avec soin dans des futurs travaux instruits par le débat bioéthique et par les éventuelles objections. (shrink)

Scholars have long pointed to the power of music as a primary source in instruction for bringing past actors into sharper view and engender deeper connections with the past. By employing Dimitri Shostakovich's 7th Symphony, composed amidst the Nazi siege of Leningrad during the Second World War, we sought to explore, more precisely, the nature of how music, as a primary source, enhances the study of history among students. Through the formulation, execution, and assessment of a two-day lesson with students (...) in five secondary history classes, three of which listened to the symphony and two of which did not, we found that the incorporation of the symphony resulted in students’ enhanced empathetic understanding of the past. Implications include details regarding profound opportunities for, as well as challenges to, cultivating historical empathy through the use of music as a primary source. (shrink)

To better illuminate aspects of stress that are relevant to the moral domain, we present a definition and theoretical model of “moral stress.” Our definition posits that moral stress is a psychological state born of an individual’s uncertainty about his or her ability to fulfill relevant moral obligations. This definition assumes a self-and-others relational basis for moral stress. Accordingly, our model draws from a theory of the self (identity theory) and a theory of others (stakeholder theory) to suggest that this (...) uncertainty arises as a manager faces competing claims for limited resources from multiple stakeholders and/or across multiple role identities. We further propose that the extent to which the manager is attentive to the moral aspects of the claims (i.e., moral attentiveness) moderates these effects. We identify several consequences of managerial moral stress and discuss theoretical, empirical, and practical implications of our approach. Most importantly, we argue that this work paves an important path for considering stress through the lens of morality. (shrink)

This collection should be welcomed by anyone working on the subtle interplay between theories of perception, internalism and externalism about mental and linguistic content, and the linguistic expression of mental states. Many of these connections have been put into focus by John Searle, and his views are here subjected to careful scrutiny from a variety of directions. The contributions do not sum to a general discussion of Searle's contributions to the philosophy of mind and language. There is little or nothing (...) here on, for example, the Chinese rooms and Strong AI, or on his more recent work on social construction and rationality. Such absences are an inevitable consequence of the sheer number of influential theses Searle has advanced over the decades. Instead, the locus of discussion is the systematic perspective most clearly set out in his work , a fact that lends integrity to the volume.The book is divided into two main parts, with inevitable links across the divide. The first is concerned with the intentionality of mental states, and the second with the intentionality of linguistic acts. The first kind of intentionality is, according to Searle, intrinsic, while the second is inherited from the first, with linguistic conventions affording the derivation. The two kinds of intentionality parallel one another …. (shrink)

Several philosophers have recently claimed that if a proposition is cancellable from an uttered sentence then that proposition is not entailed by that uttered sentence. The claim should be a familiar one. It has become a standard device in the philosopher's tool-kit. I argue that this claim is false. There is a kind of entailment—which I call “modal entailment”—that is context-sensitive and, because of this, cancellable. So cancellability does not show that a proposition is not entailed by an uttered sentence. (...) I close the paper by describing an implication this has for a disagreement between J. L. Austin and Grice concerning the relation between felicity and truth. (shrink)

Este estudio se ocupa del control social del cuerpo y de la reconfiguración de la memoria popular en películas de horror a través de la perspectiva genealógica de Foucault, presentada en su libro Vigilar y Castigar, publicado hace 40 años. Por lo tanto, tomaremos, À l’interieur e Frontière (s), dos producciones de horror cinematográfico hechas por directores franceses, ambos publicados en 2007. La hipótesis principal es que las películas de terror se muestran como una nueva forma de vigilancia y control (...) social del cuerpo. Por otro lado, también puede recodificar la memoria popular apropiándose de acontecimientos polítcos y/o revolucionarios como en las películas comentadas por Foucault en la revista Cahiers de Cinéma en 1974 políticas, aunque no sean las películas de terror. (shrink)

1. ExpositionRichard Sharvy's ‘A more general theory of definite descriptions’ was published in 1980. Its aim was to replace Russell's paradigm by " a general theory of definite descriptions, of which definite mass descriptions, definite plural descriptions, and Russellian definite singular count descriptions are species. … We have an account of the generic ‘the’ along these same lines. " By now his theory has attained the status of a new paradigm. Even a casual trawl of the literature throws up over (...) a score of citations and endorsements, and no rebuttals of its central contention that the primary use of ‘the’ is to indicate totality . We shall argue that it is wrong for mass description, wrong for singular description, wrong for plural description and wrong for generic ‘the’. Sharvy would have approved: his obituary says that his car displayed the slogan ‘Subvert the Dominant Paradigm’.He follows Russell in treating descriptions as incomplete symbols, but nothing in his paper turns on this aspect of it, and we can bypass the issue by considering them in the context of complete sentences. Where Russell translates F into the predicate calculus as Formula Sharvy translates it as Formula Here ≤ is supposed to stand for some or other species of part of relation. His other governing idea is of a predicate's being cumulative. G is cumulative if any number of things that satisfy G have a sum, i.e. a least upper bound with respect to ≤ which also satisfies G. The meanings of ≤, sum and cumulativity vary according to the different kinds of description, which we take in the order in which Sharvy presents them. Meanwhile, we note that he originally defined ‘sum’ to mean simply the l.u.b. , but subsequently redefined …. (shrink)

More than perhaps any other major social theorist, Niklas Luhmann adopted a perspective on society at the opposite end of the atomistic-holistic spectrum to that of mainstream economics. While the position of mainstream economics is that society is nothing more than a collection of individuals, so that it can be understood simply in terms of those individuals and their interactions, Luhmann abstracts from individuals entirely, understanding social phenomena as being produced by society itself, with individuals playing a merely peripheral or (...) “enabling” role. This radical reconceptualization of society and the relation of the individual to society allowed Luhmann to build from the ground up a highly systematic theory of society which allows one to formulate economic and social questions in new ways, freed from preconceptions that are poorly grounded or simply wrong. After providing a brief overview of Luhmann’s general social theory, this article considers two questions for which Luhmann’s theory can produce a fresh point of view. The first concerns what is the nature of markets. According to Luhmann, markets are not a kind of system, but collections of observations--the observations of market participants of other market participants. The second concerns the old question of what is the appropriate degree of intervention in the economy. Mainstream economics approaches this problem through the distinction between markets and planning. According to Luhmann, this is a false dichotomy, since all economies have markets and planning. The real question is who should do the planning: private organizations or the state. The former operate on the basis of competition, that is, rivalry; the latter operates on the basis of cooperation. The problem with “socialist” or “centrally planned” economies was not that they were planned or centrally organized, since “free market” economies have planning and centralization too; it was that they relied solely on cooperation, with there being no space for competition. The paper concludes with some reflections on whether freemarket economies with minimal intervention by the state are any more sustainable than are “socialist” economies.Niklas Luhmann, peut-être plus que les autres auteurs en théorie sociale, a adopté une approche de la société qui est à l’opposé du spectre individualismeholisme des économistes orthodoxes. Alors que l’économie orthodoxe considère que la société n’est rien d’autre que la somme des individus et qu’elle ne peut être appréhendée qu’en termes d’individus et de leurs interactions, Luhmann fait totalement abstraction des individus et comprend les phénomènes sociaux comme étant produits par la société elle-même dans laquelle les individus jouent un rôle périphérique ou un rôle “d’habilitation”. Cette radicale reconceptualization de la société ainsi que la relation des individus à la société a permis à Luhmann de construire une théorie très méthodique de la société qui permet d’appréhender de façon différente les questions économiques et sociales, sans préreprésentations fragiles ou erronées. Après avoir donné un aperçu général de la théorie sociale de Luhmann, l’article considère deux questions pour lesquelles la théorie de Luhmann peut apporter un nouveau point de vue. La première traite de la nature des marchés. D’après Luhmann, les marchés ne sont pas une sorte de système mais des sommes d’observations faites par les participants au marché sur les autres participants. La seconde question concerne l’éternel problème du degré d’interventionnisme dans l’économie. Les économistes orthodoxes abordent cette question à travers la distinction entre les marchés et la planification. D’après Luhmann cette dichotomie est erronée dans la mesure où toutes les économies connaissent à la fois le marché et la planification. La véritable question est: Qui devrait planifier: les organisations privées ou l’Etat?. Les premières agissent sur la base de la concurrence, i.e de la rivalité; l’Etat agit sur la base de la coopération. Le problème avec les économies “socialistes” ou “centralement planifiées” n’est pas qu’elles sont planifiées ou qu’elles relèvent d’une organisation centralisée puisque les économies de “marché libre” connaissent aussi la planification et la centralisation. Le problème vient du fait qu’elles reposent uniquement sur la coopération et n’accordent pas de place à la concurrence. Le papier conclut en s’interrogeant sur l’idée selon laquelle les économies de libre marché avec une intervention étatique minimale sont plus viables que les économies “socialistes”. (shrink)

The authors show that in certain isolated tissues the mitotic processes continue during at least one hour. They are very strongly stimulated by heat and also by mitogenetic radiation. In the case of the cancer cells new mitoses are promoted in considerable number. A detailed analysis of both energy factors leads to the conclusion that they effect a disturbance of the unstable constellations of the elementary particles in the cell-body. Thus a certain degree of disorganisation of its plasma seems to (...) stimulate cell-division. This statement is, in the opinion of the authors a proof that cell-division is controlled by a ”field”, the trajectories of the elementary particles of the cell-body being a function of their coordinates relative to the cell-axes.Les auteurs démontrent que dans certains tissus survivants les mitoses continuent leur processus d'évolution durant au moins une heure. Par l'application de chaleur aussi bien que par l'irradiation mitogénétique on peut accélérer beaucoup le rhythme des mitoses en cours d'évolution et provoquer l'apparition d'un nombre considérable de nouvelles mitoses. L'analyse de l'action de ces deux facteurs d'énergie aboutit à la conclusion qu'il ne peut s'agir que d'un dérangement des constellations instables des éléments du corps cellulaire. On peut en déduire qu'un certain degré de désorganisation du plasme est favorable aux divisions cellulaires. En poursuivant et en développant cette conception, les auteurs arrivent à la conception du „champ cellulaire de division”, définissant les trajectoires des particules élémentaires comme fonction de ses coordonnés relativement aux axes des cellules. (shrink)

Partial order optimality theory is a conservative generalization of classical optimality theory that makes possible the modeling of free variation and quantitative regularities without any numerical parameters. Solving the ranking problem for PoOT has so far remained an outstanding problem: allowing for free variation, given a finite set of input/output pairs, i.e., a dataset, \ that a speaker S knows to be part of some language L, how can S learn the set of all grammars G under some constraint set (...) C compatible with \?. Here, allowing for free variation, given the set of all PoOT grammars GPoOT over a constraint set C, for an arbitrary \, I provide set-theoretic means for constructing the actual set G compatible with \. Specifically, I determine the set of all STRICT ORDERS of C that are compatible with \. As every strict total order is a strict order, our solution is applicable in both PoOT and COT, showing that the ranking problem in COT is a special instance of a more general one in PoOT. (shrink)

Jablonka & Lamb's (J&L's) extended evolutionary theory is more amenable to being applied to human cultural change than standard neo-Darwinian evolutionary theory. However, the authors are too quick to dismiss past evolutionary approaches to human culture. They also overlook a potential parallel between evolved genetic mechanisms that enhance evolvability and learned cognitive mechanisms that enhance learnability.

I argue for the importance of class-based analysis for analyzing the justice of migration policies. I contend that the abstract, liberal discourse of much writing on justice and immigration distorts our moral judgments. In contrast, I provide a class-based critique of the role of human capital in managed migration, drawing evidence from Canada’s Seasonal Agricultural Worker and Live-in Caregiver Programs. This reveals the domination and exploitation inherent in these migration policies and allows us to situate immigration in a broader framework (...) of global justice. (shrink)

L'article examine si une approche typiquement sciences info-com , et une approche typiquement psychologique , peuvent avoir des interfaces, des concepts partagés, des raisonnements communs ou encore des espaces de coopération. Cette réflexion s'appuie sur la présentation concrète de pratiques communicationnelles managériales, décrites, puis analysées successivement, par les deux approches théoriques. Les conclusions de l'article rejoignent les conclusions de Th. Kuhn: il s'agit de deux visions scientifiques qui n'ont rien en commun et qui se situent dans deux mondes « incommensurables (...) ». Les possibilités de dialogue qui existent doivent servir, non pas à trouver des «métissages» conceptuels, mais à alimenter une concurrence scientifique pour la finesse de la compréhension des phénomènes.This article examines the question of whether an approach typically grounded in information and communication sciences , and if a typically psychologistic approach , can have shared interfaces and concepts, common lines of reasoning and spaces of cooperation. This reflexion is backed up by a concrete presentation of management communicational practices which are described and then analysed using the two theoretical approaches. The conclusions of this article are along the same lines as Th. Kuhn conclusions: these are two scientific visions which are unsconnected and which are in two "unmeasurable" worlds. Any possibilities for dialogue must not be used to find conceptual "crossbreeding" but to foster scientific competition aimed at improveing the finesse of how we understanding phenomena. (shrink)

The diversity of topics discussed in this book reflects the breadth of Judith Jarvis Thomson's philosophical work. Throughout her long career at MIT, Thomson's straightforward approach and emphasis on problem-solving have shaped philosophy in significant ways. Some of the book's contributions discuss specific moral and political issues such as abortion, self-defense, the rights and obligations of prospective fathers, and political campaign finance. Other contributions concern the foundations of moral theory, focusing on hedonism, virtue ethics, the nature of nonconsequentialism, and the (...) objectivity of moral claims. Finally, contributions in metaphysics and epistemology discuss the existence of sets, the structures reflected in conditional statements, and the commitments of testimony. Contributors: Jonathan Bennett, Richard L. Cartwright, Joshua Cohen, N. Ann Davis, Catherine Z. Elgin, Gilbert Harman, Barbara Herman, Frances Myrna Kamm, Claudia Mills, T.M. Scanlon, Ernest Sosa. (shrink)

A term td is called a ternary deductive term for a variety of algebras V if the identity td≈r holds in V and ∈θ yields td≈td for any A∈V and any principal congruence θ on A. A connective f is called td-distributive if td)≈ f,…,td). If L is a propositional logic and V is a corresponding variety that has a TD term td, then any admissible in L rule, the premises of which contain only td-distributive operations, is derivable, and the (...) substitution r↦td is a projective L-unifier for any formula containing only td-distributive connectives. The above substitution is a generalization of the substitution introduced by T. Prucnal to prove structural completeness of the implication fragment of intuitionistic propositional logic. (shrink)

Este artigo busca adentrar pelas questões relacionadas à biopolítica do corpo, sobretudo, daquelas ligadas à estatização do biológico e do racismo do Estado, que aparecem nos trabalhos de Michel Foucault e que aqui evocamos para analisar o corpo enquanto objeto discursivo analisável dessa biopolítica em duas produções francesas de horror, - Frontière(s) e em À l’interieur – que exibem imagens dos tumultos de Outubro de 2005, acontecimento marcado pelos protestos contra a política de perseguição aos sans-papiers que vitimou três jovens (...) de origem africana. É a partir daí que retomaremos a discussão do “quem somos nós”, em Foucault, para refletir sobre o sujeito, a menoridade e a liberdade na estatização do corpo, um lugar da memória nacional. (shrink)

This paper has already been published in Higher Education Research & Development, Volume 38, 2018 - Issue 1: New Perspectives on Reading and Writing Across the Disciplines, p. 185-197. We thank the authors for the permission to republish it here.: Where and when do academics write and what are the feelings associated with it? Is the pressure to write a fulfilling process of joyful exploration, or is it stressful and wracked with self-doubt? Inspired by Henri Lefebvre's - Sciences de l'éducation (...) et de la formation – Nouvel article. (shrink)

Os corpos no cinema estão sob a ordem de um olhar soberano que nos diz para onde devemos olhar e como devemos fazer isso. É um olhar poderoso que tudo sabe e tudo pode. Um olhar que nos posiciona não como simples espectadores, mas como sujeitos. É a partir daí que buscamos compreender como se arquitetam o medo, ou seja, qual é a ordem do cinema de horror, tecido com a pena do medo? Nessa arquitetura, os corpos aparecem como lugares (...) para vigiar e punir em espaços utópicos e heterotópicos. Espaços de memórias. Espaços de poder vigiar e punir. Espaço onde se impõe uma posição de sujeito, um poder sobre o sujeito. Portanto, os corpos no cinema de horror são artefatos para uma arqueologia do medo, escrita pelo poder do horror sobre estes corpos. Daí nosso interesse por esses lugares. Para demonstrar essa arqueologia, utilizaremos dois filmes franceses, produzidos em 2007, Frontière(s) e À l’interieur como espaços de horror construídos para o medo pelas vias da utopia e heterotopias pensadas por Michel Foucault, filósofo do presente, do nosso presente para compreender como se arquitetam tal medo por meio de sua história arqueológica, prática de um espaço chamado Labedisco/UESB. (shrink)

Tout le film est toujours une microphysique du pouvoir, en potence, d’être étudier. Aujourd’hui l'augmentation des productions d'horreur et son public ont fait le film d'horreur une «contreculture» dominante, mais toujours sous l'effet négatif du pouvoir et du savoir qui disqualifient les discours, matérialisée dans ces films, ce qui les rend illégitime et exiler en soi espace filmique, transformée en un lieu adapté pour interdite et marquée par certaines pratiques discursives avec certains dispositifs d'exclusion. Paradoxalement, les types marginaux qui apparaissent (...) dans l'ordre de ces productions occupent les positions de sujets à exercer le pouvoir dans l'horreur et dans le même temps le renforcement de leur marginalité et de son objectivation. Ces aspects et les spécificités qui caractérisent les productions d'une part, nous ont amenés à identifier les pratiques de l'objectivation qui transforment corps dans les sujets dans l'horreur; d'autre part, de démontrer que ces films constituent une nouvelle technologie de contrôle social des corps, mais l'objectif principal de cette étude est d'analyser les relations de pouvoir à travers l'antagonisme des stratégies dans ce discours, qui est, pour savoir ce que cela signifie d'avoir un corps libre, nous examinons ce qui se passe sur le corps subjugué dans les films d'horreur, prenant l'archeogenealogie de Foucault comme base théorique. Cette questionhypothèse aurait un autre groupe: d'où pourrait faire une telle histoire? Nous supposons que dans les moments de crise, les films d'horreur ont beaucoup à prouver, donc nous avons opté pour un très similaire à celui qui Foucault a été invité par les experts de la revue Cahiers du cinéma pour discuter des conditions pour les productions cinématographiques comme Le Chagrin et la Pitié (1969), Portier de nuit (1974) et Lacombe Lucien (1974), quand on a regardé le déclin du gaullisme et l’ascention de Valéry Giscard d'Estaing , le vainqueur de la présidentielle de 1974, avec le soutien de l'ancien droit Tardieu et petainistes, anciens alliés de l'occupation du Führer Hitler de la France, entre 1940 à 1943. Maintenant, les conditions de production sont ceux qui marquent la fin des gouvernements socialistes de Mitterrand et Chirac, et le retour au pouvoir de la droite, à l'ascension politique de Nicolas Sarkozy. Au milieu de la crise économique de l'Union Européenne, flotte dans l'air la peur terrifiante de risque que l'arrivée de l'extrême droite au pouvoir. La présence croissante d'immigrants est aussi dans l'ordre d'une nouvelle crise de l'identité française. Ce sont les conditions de production de À l'intérieur, Frontière (s),Martyrs, Ils, La Meute, Captifs et Derrière les murs et, des films qui font partie de notre corpus. À la methodologie, nous développons les trois concepts opérationnels: le dispositif filmique de la mémoire, de la vérité et de l'objectivité pour traiter la mémoire populaire, recodé dans ces films et soi-disant perçu par nous comme l'un des principaux modes de contrôle des corps d’horreur; la notion d’intericonicité est encore utilisée pour indiquer des images qui renvoient à d'autres, mais tout en réalisant que chaque image a dans sa juxtaposition afin de utopies des hétérotopies. Donc, nous avons décidé de donner une nouvelle forme à cette notion, y compris l'utopique juxtaposés à des espaces hétérotopiques, sous l'influence de la discussion faite par Foucault dans le Corps utopique et Les hétérotopies. Keyword:Mémoire. Corps. Pouvoir. Discours politique. Film français d’horreur. (shrink)

The human enhancement debate has over the last few decades been concerned with ethical issues in methods for improving the physical, cognitive, or emotive states of individual people, and of the human species as a whole. Arguments in favour of enhancement defend it as a paradigm of rationality, presenting it as a clear-eyed, logical defence of what we stand to gain from transcending the typical limits of our species. If these arguments are correct, it appears that adults should in principle (...) be able to make rational and informed decisions about enhancing themselves. In this paper, however, we suggest that a rational and informed choice to enhance oneself may in some cases be impossible. Drawing on L. A. Paul’s work on ‘transformative experience’, we argue that some enhancements—such as certain moral or cognitive modifications—may give rise to unbridgeable epistemic gaps in key domains. Importantly, such gaps could prove to be not merely contingently unbridgeable due to a lack of information at a given moment, but radically unbridgeable, making someone in a non-enhanced state inherently unable to conceive of what it would be like to be enhanced in a particular way. Where this experience is key to understanding what values are being pursued by the enhancement itself, it may prove impossible for a person to be sufficiently informed, and to make a rational decision about whether or not to enhance herself. This poses a challenge for human enhancement proponents in general, and for transhumanists in particular. (shrink)

_Purpose._ The purpose of the article lies in studying the main socio-anthropological measurements of the problem of recognition represented primarily by the philosophy of recognition of Alex Honneth, which is actualized by the struggle of the Ukrainian people for their existence and national-cultural recognition. A consistent analysis of the communicative paradigm in contemporary philosophy led to the understanding of its transformation into the reality of the problem of recognition and the identification of the main forms of recognition in it, (...) which determine an individual’s perception of the social space as fair or unfair, where his dignity is disrespected. _Theoretical basis._ Turning to the works of Jurgen Habermas, Otfried Hoeffe, Ernst Tugendhat, Stefan Gosepath, and Thomas Rentsch made it possible to supplement the mainly procedural, theoretical-communicative way of philosophizing with a philosophical-anthropological, existential, contextual principle of awareness of recognition as a fundamental principle of justice and the understanding that the brutal, unjust destruction of the "living world" of a person and the state is synonymous with their physical destruction. The thesis of Francis Fukuyama about the relationship between the desire for recognition and human dignity inherent in human nature has acquired an important theoretical and methodological meaning. _Originality._ The article investigates the modern philosophical discourse of the problem of recognition in the socio-anthropological measurements, in the context of the relationship between recognition, the "living world" and justice, non-recognition, humiliation of human dignity, and injustice. And it was also found that the image of recognition represented by modern philosophical thought, as a horizon and condition of human existence, is based on the following components: justice, solidarity, dignity, and care. Exactly addressing the problem of recognition made it possible to answer the question about the anthropological-ontological, existential meaning of the desire of individuals, nations, and states for recognition and outline the ways of transforming recognition as a variant of "communicative utopia" into a real socio-cultural project. _Conclusions._ In contrast to justice, the theory of recognition comes from asymmetrical human relations, which, in the struggle for recognition, must become symmetrical. Although justice takes precedence over ethics of care and recognition, they are not actually in competition with each other, but belong to different but complementary dimensions of human existence. The perspective of philosophical understanding of the problem of recognition itself requires the deepening of its analysis with an existential-anthropological understanding rooted in a new, tragic life experience. Only under such conditions, it is possible to overcome the gap between often abstract philosophical reflections and real personal and social practices. (shrink)

The volume investigates the question of meaning of mystical phenomena and, conversely, queries the concept of "meaning" itself, via insights afforded by mystical experiences. The collection brings together researchers from such disparate fields as philosophy, psychology, history of religion, cognitive poetics, and semiotics, in an effort to ascertain the question of mysticism's meaning through pertinent, up-to-date multidisciplinarity. The discussion commences with Editor's Introduction that probes persistent questions of complexity as well as perplexity of mysticism and the reasons why problematizing mysticism (...) leads to even greater enigmas. One thread within the volume provides the contextual framework for continuing fascination of mysticism that includes a consideration of several historical traditions as well as personal accounts of mystical experiences: Two contributions showcase ancient Egyptian and ancient Israelite involvements with mystical alterations of consciousness and Christianity's origins being steeped in mystical praxis; and four essays highlight mysticism's formative presence in Chinese traditions and Tibetan Buddhism as well as medieval Judaism and Kabbalah mysticism. A second, more overarching strand within the volume is concerned with multidisciplinary investigations of the phenomenon of mysticism, including philosophical, psychological, cognitive, and semiotic analyses. To this effect, the volume explores the question of philosophy's relation to mysticism and vice versa, together with a Wittgensteinian nexus between mysticism, facticity, and truth; language mysticism and "supernormal meaning" engendered by certain mystical states; cognitive-poetic analysis of mystical poetry; and a semiotic scrutiny of some mystical experiences and their ineffability. Finally, the volume includes an assessment of the so-called New Age authors' contention of the convergence of scientific and mystical claims about reality. The above two tracks are appended with personal, contemporary accounts of mystical experiences, in the Prologue; and a futuristic envisioning, as a fictitious chronicle from the time-to-come, of life without things mystical, in the Postscript. The volume contains fourteen chapters; its international contributors are based in Canada, Israel, United Kingdom, and the United States. (shrink)

This essay presents an integrated account of Michael Wyschogrod's Zionism as a function of his broader theological anthropology, eschatology, and carnal interpretation of Israel's election. Against Leora Batnitzky, I show that Wyschogrod's Zionism, while definitively messianic, is decidedly not fanatical or fundamentalist. Against Meir Soloveichik, I show that Wyschogrod has maintained this non-fanatical messianism consistently throughout his career, and so his pacific political prescriptions are organically at one with his vigorous calls for Jewish sovereignty over the land.

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Toward Mindful Music Education:A Response To Bennett ReimerSandra L. StaufferIn her book Composing a Life, Mary Catherine Bateson reminds us to acknowledge our antecedents—those who have gone before in whatever way or whatever path.1 I believe we should also acknowledge our co-conspirators—those who have listened to us and wrestled with our ideas. Following Bateson, I wish to recognize the contributions of my teachers and my colleagues, particularly the members (...) of the doctoral seminar at Arizona State University. I am grateful for your contributions to the life of my mind and the words of this morning. For the record, I also want to say that Bennett Reimer is both antecedent and co-conspirator for everyone in this room, and we are indebted to him."The first task of philosophy involves learning to ask a good question," says Walter Feinberg in his essay on the philosophical scholar.2 Reimer asks us, "Who is philosophy of music education for?"—a provocative question indeed. He also gives us an answer: K-12 students.I agree, but not really. How can that be? Imagine this. A music teacher I know, Stephanie, was engaged with some first-grade children in singing songs and moving and reading rhythms. She turned to write on the white board. When she turned back to the children, one boy, Alex, was standing, perfectly still, on his head. What happened next? I will tell you in few minutes. Reimer says, "Philosophical issues are not disconnected to or incidental to musical experience. [End Page 135] They are foundational for musical experience, because one's values, beliefs, desires, preferences, and so forth, directly affect how one engages with music and what one gets from doing it." Abridging those two sentences at my own peril, Reimer appears to be saying that philosophical issues are foundational to musical experience.That idea works for me only if I am standing, figuratively and metaphorically, not literally, on my head. It seems to me that experience is the foundation of philosophy or, put another way, that one's philosophy derives from one's experiences; the richer the experiences, the richer the philosophy. A philosophy based on limited or weak experience is a limited or weak philosophy. This, however, is only surface-level logic for a deeper epistemological question—where does one's philosophy come from? If I take the Deweyan perspective that philosophy derives from experience, then surely I am obligated, in this forum, to define my terms—particularly "experience." It would be easy to say that experience means making music and listening to music, and surely it does. By experience, however, I mean not only these actions—the doing of music—but also thinking, or what Ellen Langer calls mindfulness.3 Langer describes mindful learning as having three characteristics: "the continuous creation of new categories; openness to new information; and an implicit awareness of more than one perspective."4 I like how Robert Duke articulates the same idea: "Teach things that are intellectually interesting and functionally valuable."5 Engage students not just in doing, but also in thinking—in mindful learning. Rich experience makes for rich philosophy. If we are talking about music education at all levels that is not only participatory, but also mindful, then I am all for it.Reimer asks a second question: how are we to accomplish the teaching of philosophy to K-12 students? I want to know what we are trying to accomplish. Are we trying to teach the content of philosophy or are we trying to help students develop their own abilities to think about their experiences as musicians, whether as listeners or as music makers, in whatever contexts they find themselves? The former seems to be a reification of philosophy in which I am not eager to engage most K-12 students. I hope we are aiming for the latter. If so, then our task is to provide rich and mindful experiences in every music setting. Our task is to model the disposition of a philosopher—one who asks questions, is curious, and is engaged in the life of the mind.This seems so obvious. Why aren't we doing it already? There... (shrink)

The Unknowable, arguably the greatest Russian philosophical work of the 20th century, was the culmination of S. L. Frank's intellectual and spiritual development, the boldest and most imaginative of all his writings, containing a synthesis of epistemology, ontology, social philosophy, religious philosophy, and personal spiritual experience.

Whilst previous observational studies have linked negative thought processes such as an external locus of control and holding negative cognitive styles with depression, the directionality of these associations and the potential role that these factors play in the transition to adulthood and parenthood has not yet been investigated. This study examined the association between locus of control and negative cognitive styles in adolescence and probable depression in young adulthood and whether parenthood moderated these associations. Using a UK prospective population-based birth (...) cohort study: the Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children, we examined the association between external locus of control and negative cognitive styles in adolescence with odds of depression in 4,301 young adults using logistic regression models unadjusted and adjusted for potential confounding factors. Interaction terms were employed to examine whether parenthood moderated these associations. Over 20% of young adults in our sample were at or above the clinical threshold indicating probable depression. For each standard deviation increase in external locus of control in adolescence, there was a 19% higher odds of having probable depression in young adulthood, after adjusting for various confounding factors including baseline mood and different demographic and life events variables. Similarly, for each SD increase in negative cognitive styles in adolescence, there was a 29% higher odds of having probable depression in the adjusted model. We found little evidence that parenthood status moderated the relationship between external locus of control or negative cognitive styles in adolescence and probable depression following adjustment for confounding factors. Effect estimates were comparable when performed in the complete case dataset. These findings suggest that having an external locus of control and holding negative cognitive styles in mid- to late adolescence is associated with an increased likelihood of probable depression in young adulthood. (shrink)

In Discourse Contextualism, Alex Silk defends a new contextualist account of expressions at the centre of recent debates over contextualism versus relativism, namely, gradable adjectives, taste predicates and epistemic and deontic modals ).1 1 The first part of the book, which lays out the view and shows how it explains the phenomena at issue in those debates, focuses on the case of epistemic modals. The second part of the book extends that account with Discourse Contextualist treatments of the remaining (...) expressions. Discourse Contextualism is truly impressive in its scope, fully engaging with the relevant literature in linguistics, philosophy of language and meta-ethics. It is clearly written, carefully argued and makes a very significant contribution to the literature on the debates over contextualism, relativism and expressivism. No short review could possibly do justice to Silk’s book in its entirety. Here, I focus on its most fleshed out case study, that of epistemic modals. But the whole book will be required reading for anyone engaged in any of these debates. (shrink)