This article seeks, first, to show that much of the existing normative work on argument from expert opinion (AEO) is problematic for failing to be properly informed by empirical findings on expert performance. Second, it seeks to show how, with the analytic tool of Bayesian reasoning, the problem diagnosed can be remedied to circumvent some of the problems facing the scheme-based treatment of AEOs. To establish the first contention, we will illustrate how empirical studies on factors conditioning expert reliability can (...) be drawn upon to re-construct. Walton’s critical questions matching the scheme of AEOs. To establish the second contention, we will illustrate how Walton’s re-constructed set of critical questions can be formalized within a Bayesian network. Finally, we will highlight how the specific ways in which the Bayesian framework we propose is both continuous with and distinct from the models of source reliability put forward by theorists like Bovens and Hartmann (2003). (shrink)

本文旨在初步探索「限肉令」作為應對傳染病大流行和由工廠化畜牧業帶來的其他威脅的預防措施的正當性。「限肉令」並非指全面禁肉，而是以法律限制市民的人均肉品消耗量在滿足基本營養需求的範圍內。本文採用的進路是 緩解一些可能阻礙對此提案進行更宏觀、理性的思考的潛在心理拘繫。此進路參考了傅柯「日常經驗」(everyday experience) 的分析，和佛家倫理學回應全球環境倫理問題的策略。我們先以香港社會為主要案例研究，檢視形成「肉是必需的」一想法和嗜肉情結的社會模式。接著我們引入葷食心理學研究，討論嗜肉情結如何成為正面考慮「限肉令」的障 礙。我們也嘗試回應一些反對此提案的理由，包括來自自由主義 (Liberalism)的批評。 -/- This article explores the preliminary justifiability of meat restriction order as a preventive measure to the risks of pandemic and other forms of harm posed by factory farming. A meat restriction order seeks to limit citizens’ meat consumption at the level of meeting individuals’ basic nutrient needs. This article aims to loosen some potential psychological hooks that prevent a more expansive, rational deliberation of the proposal. Inspired by Michel Foucault’s analysis of “everyday experience” and the (...) Buddhist responses to global environmental issues, we investigate the social patterns that account for the formation of people’s meat commitment, using Hong Kong society as a major case study. With reference to scientific studies of meat-eaters’ psychology, we discuss how the meat commitment becomes a barrier for society to positively consider the justifiability of the proposal. We will also address a number of objections to our proposal, including those from liberalism. (shrink)

Humans hunt and kill many different species of animals, but whales are our biggest prey. In the North Atlantic, a male long-fi nned pilot whale (Globiceph- ala melaena), a large relative of the dolphins, can grow as large as 6.5 meters and weigh as much as 2.5 tons. As whales go, these are not particularly large, but there are more than 750,000 pilot whales in the North Atlantic, traveling in groups, “pods,” that range from just a few individuals to a (...) thousand or more. Each pod is led by an individual known as the “pilot,” who appears to set the course of travel for the rest of the group. This pilot is both an asset and a weakness to the pod. The average pilot whale will yield about a half ton of meat and blubber, and North Atlantic societies including Ireland, Iceland, and the Shetlands used to manipulate the pilot to drive the entire pod ashore. In the Faroe Islands, a group of 18 grassy rocks due north of Scotland, pilot whale hunts have continued for the last 1200 years, at least. The permanent residents of these islands, the Faroese, previously killed an average of 900 whales each year, yielding about 500 tons of meat and fat that was consumed by local residents. Hunts have declined in recent years. From 2001 to 2005, about 3400 whales were killed, yielding about 890 metric tons of blubber and 990 metric tons of meat. The whale kill, or grindadráp in the Faroese language, begins when a fi shing boat spots a pod close enough to a suitable shore, on a suitably clear day. A single boat, or even a small group of fi shermen, is not suffi cient to trap a.. (shrink)

This study investigates and compares the impact of spiritual leadership on organizational citizenship behavior in finance and retail service industries to determine the possibility of generalizing and applying spiritual leadership to other industries. This study used multi-sample analysis of structural equation modeling. The results show that values, attitudes, and behaviors of leaders have positive effects on meaning/calling and membership of the employees, and further facilitate employees to perform excellent organizational citizenship behaviors, including the altruism of assisting colleagues and the responsible (...) conscientiousness toward organization. The effect of altruism toward colleagues is especially stronger. Finally, the effect of leaders’ values, attitudes, and behaviors on the spiritual survival of employees is stronger in retail than that in finance. (shrink)

Cancers rely on multiple, heterogeneous processes at different scales, pertaining to many biomedical fields. Therefore, understanding cancer is necessarily an interdisciplinary task that requires placing specialised experimental and clinical research into a broader conceptual, theoretical, and methodological framework. Without such a framework, oncology will collect piecemeal results, with scant dialogue between the different scientific communities studying cancer. We argue that one important way forward in service of a more successful dialogue is through greater integration of applied sciences (experimental and clinical) (...) with conceptual and theoretical approaches, informed by philosophical methods. By way of illustration, we explore six central themes: (i) the role of mutations in cancer; (ii) the clonal evolution of cancer cells; (iii) the relationship between cancer and multicellularity; (iv) the tumour microenvironment; (v) the immune system; and (vi) stem cells. In each case, we examine open questions in the scientific literature through a philosophical methodology and show the benefit of such a synergy for the scientific and medical understanding of cancer. (shrink)

With the increasing degrees A.I.s and machines are applied across different social contexts, the need for implementing ethics in A.I.s is pressing. In this paper, we argue for a pluralist hybrid model for the implementation of moral A.I.s. We first survey current approaches to moral A.I.s and their inherent limitations. Then we propose the pluralist hybrid approach and show how these limitations of moral A.I.s can be partly alleviated by the pluralist hybrid approach. The core ethical decision-making capacity of an (...) A.I. based on the pluralist hybrid approach consists of two systems. The first is a deterministic algorithm system that incorporates different moral rules for making explicit moral decisions. The second is a machine learning system that calculates the value of the variables required by the application of moral principles. The pluralist hybrid system is better than the existing proposals as (i) it better addresses the moral disagreement problem of the top-down approach by including different moral principles, while (ii) it reduces the opacity of ethical decision-making compared with a bottom-up system by implementing explicit moral principles for moral decision making. (shrink)

Contemporary health care often lacks generosity of spirit, even when treatment is most efficient. Too many patients are left unhappy with how they are treated, and too many medical professionals feel estranged from the calling that drew them to medicine. Arthur W. Frank tells the stories of ill people, doctors, and nurses who are restoring generosity to medicine--generosity toward others and to themselves. The Renewal of Generosity evokes medicine as the face-to-face encounter that comes before and after diagnostics, pharmaceuticals, (...) and surgeries. Frank calls upon the Roman emperor Marcus Aurelius, philosopher Emmanuel Levinas, and literary critic Mikhail Bakhtin to reflect on stories of ill people, doctors, and nurses who transform demoralized medicine into caring relationships. He presents their stories as a source of consolation for both ill and professional alike and as an impetus to changing medical systems. Frank shows how generosity is being renewed through dialogue that is more than the exchange of information. Dialogue is an ethic and an ideal for people on both sides of the medical encounter who want to offer more to those they meet and who want their own lives enriched in the process. The Renewal of Generosity views illness and medical work with grace and compassion, making an invaluable contribution to expanding our vision of suffering and healing. (shrink)

This book contains an introduction to symbolic logic and a thorough discussion of mechanical theorem proving and its applications. The book consists of three major parts. Chapters 2 and 3 constitute an introduction to symbolic logic. Chapters 4–9 introduce several techniques in mechanical theorem proving, and Chapters 10 an 11 show how theorem proving can be applied to various areas such as question answering, problem solving, program analysis, and program synthesis.

Humanitarian assistance in conflicts sometimes undermines local coping strategies, reinforces wartime economies, and strengthens the existing power structures. This article argues that some victims of conflicts are made extremely vulnerable and uniquely dependent on humanitarian agencies. In this case, humanitarian agencies have a distinct obligation to assist them. This article considers one novel account that justifies the continued provision of aid to victims of conflicts and rejects the widespread view that aid should be withdrawn to avoid its negative impact. This (...) article presents the “Distinct Dependence Argument” to address the aid dependency predicament in conflicts. It explores the degree of vulnerability and dependence of victims of conflicts and evaluates humanitarian agencies’ causal responsibility in causing such vulnerability and dependency. (shrink)

BackgroundIn its 2015 decision in Montgomery v. Lanarkshire Health Board, the Supreme Court of the United Kingdom overruled the long-standing, paternalistic prudent doctor standard of care in favour of a new reasonable patient standard which obligates doctors to make their patients aware of all material risks of the recommended treatment and of any reasonable alternative treatment. This landmark judgment has been of interest to the rest of the common law world. A judicial trend of invoking Montgomery to impose more stringent (...) requirements on doctors is discernible in subsequent decisions since then.Main bodyIn this narrative review, without questioning the idea that properly informed patients should play a more active role in procedures affecting their own health in furtherance of their autonomy, safety, and consumer rights, we identify and analyse, with the aid of realistic clinical thought experiments, three practical conundrums that the Montgomery standard may inflict on the daily work of doctors, unfairly exposing them to arbitrary legal risks.ConclusionsThese conundrums pertain to the ascertainment of the risks that must be disclosed to the patient under the test of ‘materiality’; the legal uncertainty as to the scope of the exceptions; and the actual ability of doctors to cope with the pressures of time. These conundrums offer ripe opportunities to rethink the proper role of judicially developed medical law in modern health care practice. (shrink)

This book uses a critical lens to discuss live stream uses and misuses, as well as the impacts of live streaming on various fields. In the landscape of the historical evolution of communication technologies, this volume opens up a new space for discussing legal and ethical issues associated with the use of live streaming.

Emotion theorists have long held that a fundamental characteristic of an emotion is how its constituent processes change and interact over time. Assessing these temporal dynamics of emotion in the brain is critical for understanding the neural representation of emotions as well as advancing theories of emotional processing. We review the neuroimaging research on three temporal dynamic features of emotion: time of onset, duration, and resurgence and show how assessing these temporal dynamics in the brain have led to improved understanding (...) of the structure and function of emotional processes such as revealing which appraisals come first, how emotional processing endures both explicitly and implicitly, and that the resurgence of emotional processing may consist of either single or multiple processes. (shrink)

But Findlay's remark, like so much that has been written on the subject of time in the present century, was provoked in the first place by McTaggart's ...

Our study considers the governance, ethics and operational challenges associated with the acquisition, manipulation and commodification of ‘big data’ in the financial services sector. To the best of our knowledge, there are no published studies describing empirical research undertaken within companies in this sector to understand how they are responding to such challenges: our field-based research is a significant initial contribution in this respect. We describe the results of a micro-ethnographic study undertaken in a small-to-medium-sized company developing disruptive, technology-related platforms (...) and services in the banking and retail sectors based on big data and associated analytics: these are used to derive commercially valuable insights from personal customer data in exchange for cash back and targeted rewards. The company was found to employ a multi-level innovation governance approach, underpinned by an ethical strategy based on a principle of mutual benefit. Opt-in and informed consent for using data for specific purposes was supported by principles of data minimisation and anonymisation, with unrestricted use of secondary, anonymised and aggregated data to develop insights. Governance, which included contextual data protection legislation, payment-card industry data usage standards and internal corporate controls, presented as bespoke organisational practices relating to data security and privacy. These in total set the governance and ethics frame for big data innovation at the company within which it has had to be both adaptive and responsive under conditions of normative and regulatory uncertainty. (shrink)

?Information? has been postulated by the Daoist theory of Qi-energy fields system to be encoded and inherent in the Qi-energy complex (Qi) since the beginning of time. This became the origin of intelligence when it was passed onto humankind. This abstract entity is extended as a concept of ?quantum information/intelligence? (QI) when correlated with quantum physics. Human psychic power, spread over interconnected biological to cosmic spatial fields, would constitute a new Fifth Dimension, woven into the fabric of space and time. (...) This would create a psycho-bionomic model of the universe. (shrink)

This study aims to explore if local responsiveness pressure and subsidiary resources influence green management adoption of overseas subsidiaries, and to investigate the relationships between the level of green management adoption and performance. The 101 effective samples were collected from 583 Taiwanese firms, which are listed in the top 1000 manufactory firms and have invested in China. Though structural equation model analysis' empirical results indicate that local responsiveness pressure and subsidiary resources both have positive effects on the level of green (...) management adoption of the subsidiary. This study also suggests that the level of green management adoption is positively related to the subsidiary's performance. (shrink)

We live in the Age of Big Data. In medicine, artificial intelligence and machine learning algorithms, fueled by big data, promise to change how physicians make diagnoses, determine prognoses, and develop new treatments. An exponential rise in articles on these topics is seen in the medical literature. Recent applications range from the use of deep learning neural networks to diagnose diabetic retinopathy and skin cancer from image databases, to the use of various machine learning algorithms for prognostication in cancer and (...) cardiovascular disease. Many factors are driving the adoption of AI in health care, from... (shrink)

The intent of this book focuses on Australia’s First Nations truth, voice, recognition, diversity, and respect. Hope O’Chin explains that knowledge about Australian First Nations culture and learning can be seen through new conceptual lens, which she refers to as an Ontology of Dreaming Hope for Australians. The book proposes to move from ontological propositions embedded in pedagogies and methodologies that center on the relevance of Indigenous epistemes and ways of doing. O’Chin offers a conceptual framing for engaging (...) with Indigenous peoples, and forming communities of belongingness and relationality. She offers suggestions for ways in which art and education can act as ‘healing’ and a way forward towards a more inclusive civil society. Reflexive practice, ethnographic principles, and action research is described in a way that methodologies provide an understanding of a sense of Belonging. O'Chin argues that theoretical research, art, and educational practice can add to the value of determining a strategy of Indigenous art investment within Australia, and to address how art and education can be used to validate contemporary expression of Aboriginality within contemporary Australian society. Ultimately, the book is about Indigenous strengths and what Indigenous ways of being, knowing and doing can offer, and how one might go about honouring and working in this way respectfully. (shrink)

Surveys and extens work that has been done in the past two years on 'tense logic' and is a sequel to the author's book, Time and Modality.

Mismatch negativity is the electroencephalographic waveform obtained by subtracting event-related potential responses evoked by unexpected deviant stimuli from responses evoked by expected standard stimuli. While the MMN is thought to reflect an unexpected change in an ongoing, predictable stimulus, it is unknown whether MMN responses evoked by changes in different stimulus features have different magnitudes, latencies, and topographies. The present study aimed to investigate whether MMN responses differ depending on whether sudden stimulus change occur in pitch, duration, location or vowel (...) identity, respectively. To calculate ERPs to standard and deviant stimuli, EEG signals were recorded in normal-hearing participants who listened to roving oddball sequences of artificial syllables. In the roving paradigm, any given stimulus is repeated several times to form a standard, and then suddenly replaced with a deviant stimulus which differs from the standard. Here, deviants differed from preceding standards along one of four features. The feature levels were individually chosen to match behavioral discrimination performance. We identified neural activity evoked by unexpected violations along all four acoustic dimensions. Evoked responses to deviant stimuli increased in amplitude relative to the responses to standard stimuli. A univariate analysis yielded no significant differences between MMN responses following violations of different features. However, in a multivariate analysis, acoustic features could be decoded from the topography of mismatch responses, although at later latencies than those typical for MMN. These results support the notion that deviant feature detection may be subserved by a different process than general mismatch detection. (shrink)

The authority of the social : a pragmatic ethos of enquiry -- Rorty and continental political thought : ontology, naturalism and history -- Theorizing after foundations : ontology, language, and heidegger -- Reconstructing naturalism : pragmatic or ontological? -- History and modernity : self-assertion and critical reflexivity -- Rorty's insights for contemporary political theory : pragmatic socio- -- Political criticism -- Pragmatic political thinking : Rorty in contemporary critical social theory -- Rorty and political theory : how pragmatism constrains and (...) enables political -- Thinking. (shrink)

Divided into two parts, the first concentrates on the logical properties of propositions, their relation to facts and sentences, and the parallel objects of commands and questions. The second part examines theories of intentionality and discusses the relationship between different theories of naming and different accounts of belief.

Charles Taylor is one of the most distinctive figures in the landscape of contemporary philosophy. His ability to contribute to philosophical conversations across a wide spectrum of ideas is especially impressive in a time of increasing specialization. These areas include moral theory, theories of subjectivity, political theory, epistemology, hermeneutics, philosophy of mind, philosophy of language and aesthetics. Most recently, Taylor has branched into the study of religion. Written by a team of international authorities, this collection will be read primarily by (...) students and academic professionals in philosophy, political science, and religious studies, and will also appeal to a broad swathe of professionals across the humanities and social sciences. Ruth Abbey is Senior Lecturer in Political Theory at University of Kent at Canterbury. She has published numerous articles and is author of Nietzsche's Middle Period (Oxford University Press, 2000) and Philosophy Now: Charles Taylor (Princeton University Press, 2000). (shrink)

The relationship between formal logic and general philosophy is discussed under headings such as A Re-examination of Our Tense-Logical Postulates, Modal Logic in the Style of Frege, and Intentional Logic and Indeterminism.

Literature on ethical behavior has paid little attention to the mechanism between macro-environmental variables and environmental performance. This study aims at constructing a model to examine the relationships which link cultural values, population growth, economic development, and environmental performance by incorporating the mediating role of education. The multiple linear regression model was employed to test the hypotheses on a 3-year-pooled sample of 51 countries. Empirical results conclude that national culture, economic development, and population growth would significantly influence environmental performance directly. (...) In addition, through the mediating effect of education, population growth and national culture would significantly affect environmental performance indirectly. These findings provide theoretical and managerial implications for constructing the mechanism of cultural values and ethical behavior in general and environmental management in particular. (shrink)

In the division between analytic and continental thought, pragmatism has often been cast as a middle way. Fundamentally critical of each, it also shares resonances with both of these traditions. However, while this observation is common, remarkably little has been done to examine its truth in contemporary political thought. Drawing on recent trends in political theory, including ‘New Realism’, critical genealogical methods and a surge in pragmatic approaches, this article identifies an emerging situated turn in political thought. Emerging from several (...) major traditions in contemporary political thinking, this trend has pragmatic themes at its centre. Having identified this as a fertile opportunity for inter-methodological work across the analytic/continental divide, it then turns to the late work of Richard Rorty in order to expose his productive framework for such cross-border exchanges. Arguing for its fundamentally democratic and pluralistic nature, this analysis also exposes this framework’s weaknesses before illustrating how recent methodological exchanges between genealogy and pragmatism rectify these deficiencies while providing a viable model for future work across traditional philosophical boundaries. (shrink)

This study empirically examined the effects of ethical leadership and ethical climate on employee ethical behavior in the international port context using survey data collected from 128 respondents who worked in Taiwan International Ports Corporation in Taiwan. Research hypotheses were formulated from the previous literature and tested using structural equation modeling. Results indicated that ethical leadership had a significant impact on ethical climate and the ethical behavior of TIPC employees. Ethical climate was found to be positively associated with employee ethical (...) behavior. The theoretical and practical implications of the research findings are discussed. (shrink)