This paper applies basic concepts of Logic-Based Therapy (LBT) to the case of a person in recovery from drug and alcohol addiction after relapse. The paper has been written in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the online Practical Reasoning course taught by Dr. Elliot D. Cohen at Indian River State College.

This article considers the issue of opacity as a problem for socially consequential mechanisms of classification and ranking, such as spam filters, credit card fraud detection, search engines, news trends, market segmentation and advertising, insurance or loan qualification, and credit scoring. These mechanisms of classification all frequently rely on computational algorithms, and in many cases on machine learning algorithms to do this work. In this article, I draw a distinction between three forms of opacity: opacity as intentional corporate or state (...) secrecy, opacity as technical illiteracy, and an opacity that arises from the characteristics of machine learning algorithms and the scale required to apply them usefully. The analysis in this article gets inside the algorithms themselves. I cite existing literatures in computer science, known industry practices, and do some testing and manipulation of code as a form of lightweight code audit. I argue that recognizing the distinct forms of opacity that may be coming into play in a given application is a key to determining which of a variety of technical and non-technical solutions could help to prevent harm. (shrink)

New and experienced psychotherapists alike can find themselves overwhelmed by an ethical quandary where there doesn't seem to be an easy solution. This book presents positive ethics as a means to overcome such ethical challenges. The positive approach focuses on not just avoiding negative consequences, but reaching the best possible outcomes for both the psychotherapist and the client. The authors outline a clear decision-making process that is based on three practical strategies: the ethics acculturation model to help therapists incorporate personal (...) ethics into their professional roles, the quality enhancement model for dealing with high-risk patients who are potentially harmful, and ethical choice-making strategies to make the most ethical decision in a situation where two ethical principles conflict. Throughout the decision-making process, psychotherapists are encouraged to follow four basic guidelines: Focus on overarching ethical principles Consider intuitive, emotional, and other nonrational factors Accept that some problems have elusive solutions Solicit input from colleagues and consultation groups Numerous vignettes illustrate how to apply positive ethics to many different ethical challenges that psychotherapists will likely encounter in practice. (shrink)

ABSTRACTEmotional distractors can impair perception of subsequently presented targets, a phenomenon called emotion-induced blindness. Do emotional distractors lose their power to disrupt perception when appearing with increased frequency, perhaps due to desensitisation or enhanced recruitment of proactive control? Non-emotional tasks, such as the Stroop, have revealed that high frequency distractors or conflict lead to reduced interference, and distractor frequency appears to modulate attentional capture by emotional distractors in spatial attention tasks. But emotion-induced blindness is thought to reflect perceptual competition between (...) targets and emotional distractors, and it is unclear whether high frequency emotional stimuli cause less disruption at this relatively early stage of processing. In four experiments, participants searched streams of images for a rotated target image. A negative or neutral distractor appeared before the target, and their relative frequency was manipulated. Across all exper... (shrink)

This article illustrates how racial capitalism can enhance understandings of data, capital, and inequality through an in-depth study of digital platforms used for intervening in gender-based violence. Specifically, we examine an emergent sociotechnical strategy that uses software platforms and artificial intelligence chatbots to offer users emergency assistance, education, and a means to report and build evidence against perpetrators. Our analysis details how two reporting apps construct data to support institutionally legible narratives of violence, highlighting overlooked racialised dimensions of the data (...) capital generated through their use. We draw attention to how they reinforce property relations built on extraction and ownership, capital accumulation that reinforces benefits derived through data property relations and ownership, and the commodification of diversity and inclusion. Recognising these patterns are not unique to anti-violence apps, we reflect on how this example aids in understanding how racial capitalism becomes a constitutive element of digital platforms, which more generally extract information from users, rely on complex financial partnerships, and often sustain problematic relationships with the criminal legal system. We conclude with a discussion of how racial capitalism can advance scholarship at the intersections of data and power. (shrink)

This article analyses the ‘live’ virtual human in ABBA Voyage, the long-awaited concert reunion of the Swedish pop group ABBA, via Vilém Flusser’s concept of the digital apparition. It first argues for these virtual performers (dubbed ‘ABBA-tars’) to be understood as externalized computational codes which shift the grounds of ownership over and consent to the use of one’s likeness. They are also key to disproportionate and as yet unaccountable power held by technology companies. Secondly, ABBA Voyage’s presentation of ABBA as (...) their past selves places time in a capitalism of immateriality profiting from the protean temporality of bodies. This temporal discombobulation thwarts finitude and confounds time in meanings of life, death and growth. The article thus addresses urgent confrontations between actual and virtual humans placed in the same physical environment, and paves the way for thinking about how we are going to deal and live with their virtuality. (shrink)

Artificial Intelligence (AI), especially of the machine learning (ML) variety, is used by health care organizations to assist with a number of tasks, including diagnosing patients and optimizing operational workflows. AI products already proliferate the health care market, with usage increasing as the technology matures. Although AI may potentially revolutionize health care, the use of AI in health settings also leads to risks ranging from violating patient privacy to implementing a biased algorithm. This chapter begins with a broad overview of (...) health care AI and how it is currently used. We then adopt a “lifecycle” approach to discussing issues with health care AI. We start by discussing the legal and ethical issues pertaining to how data to build AI are gathered in health care settings, focusing on privacy. Next, we turn to issues in algorithm development, especially algorithmic bias. We then discuss AI deployment to treat patients, focusing on informed consent. Finally, we will discuss existing oversight mechanisms for health AI in the United States: liability and regulation. (shrink)

With the introduction of new information communication technologies, employers are increasingly engaging in social media screening, also known as cybervetting, as part of their hiring process. Our research, using an online survey with 482 participants, investigates young people’s concerns with their publicly available social media data being used in the context of job hiring. Grounded in stakeholder theory, we analyze the relationship between young people’s concerns with social media screening and their gender, job seeking status, privacy concerns, and social media (...) use. We find that young people are generally not comfortable with social media screening. A key finding of this research is that concern for privacy for public information on social media cannot be fully explained by some “traditional” variables in privacy research. The research extends stakeholder theory to identify how social media data ethics should be inextricably linked to organizational practices. The findings have theoretical implications for a rich conceptualization of stakeholders in an age of social media and practical implications for organizations engaging in cybervetting. (shrink)

During the early twentieth century, the Bermuda Biological Station for Research functioned as a multipurpose scientific site. Jointly founded by New York University, Harvard University, and the Bermuda Natural History Society, the BBSR created opportunities for a mostly US-based set of practitioners to study animal biology in the field. I argue that mixed gender field stations like the BBSR supported professional advancement in science, while also operating as important places for women and men to experiment with the social and cultural (...) work of identity formation, courtship and marriage, and social critique. Between 1903 and 1930, the BBSR functioned as a laboratory of domesticity, a temporary scientific household in British Bermuda where women and men interacted with established colonial ideologies about science, sex difference, and racial hierarchy in their public and private accounts of doing biology and socializing in the field. Viewing field stations as generative of multiple forms of labor offers a corrective to narratives within the history of biology, in which scientific practices are considered to be the principal forms of output produced by practitioners in the field. Understanding how women and men at the BBSR engaged with the politics of gender and race from the periphery of U.S. networks of biology suggests that we might view field stations as shaping not only academic science but also domestic life and fields as disparate as fiction and the law. (shrink)

BackgroundThe past 10 years have witnessed a significant growth in sharing of health data for secondary uses. Alongside this there has been growing interest in the public acceptability of data sharing and data linkage practices. Public acceptance is recognised as crucial for ensuring the legitimacy of current practices and systems of governance. Given the growing international interest in this area this systematic review and thematic synthesis represents a timely review of current evidence. It highlights the key factors influencing public responses (...) as well as important areas for further research.MethodsThis paper reports a systematic review and thematic synthesis of qualitative studies examining public attitudes towards the sharing or linkage of health data for research purposes. Twenty-five studies were included in the review. The included studies were conducted primarily in the UK and North America, with one study set in Japan, another in Sweden and one in multiple countries. The included studies were conducted between 1999 and 2013. The qualitative methods represented in the studies included focus groups, interviews, deliberative events, dialogue workshops and asynchronous online interviews.ResultsKey themes identified across the corpus of studies related to the conditions necessary for public support/acceptability, areas of public concern and implications for future research. The results identify a growing body of evidence pointing towards widespread general—though conditional—support for data linkage and data sharing for research purposes. Whilst a variety of concerns were raised in cases where participants perceived there to be actual or potential public benefits from research and had trust in the individuals or organisations conducting and/or overseeing data linkage/sharing, they were generally supportive. The studies also find current low levels of awareness about existing practices and uses of data.ConclusionsWhilst the results indicate widespread public support for data sharing and linkage for research purposes, a range of concerns exist. In order to ensure public support for future research uses of data greater awareness raising combined with opportunities for public engagement and deliberation are needed. This will be essential for ensuring the legitimacy of future health informatics research and avoiding further public controversy. (shrink)

Does the decision to relax by taking a drive rather than by taking a walk cause harm? In particular, do the additional carbon emissions caused by such a decision make anyone worse off? Recently several philosophers have argued that the answer is no, and on this basis have gone on to claim that act-consequentialism cannot provide a moral reason for individuals to voluntarily reduce their emissions. The reasoning typically consists of two steps. First, the effect of individual emissions on the (...) weather is miniscule: the planet’s meteorological system is so large, and the size of individual emissions so tiny, that whatever impact an individual emission has on the weather must be vanishingly small. Second, vanishingly small impacts aren’t morally relevant because no one could possibly tell the difference between such an impact occurring and it not occurring. In this paper, we show why both steps are mistaken, and hence why act-consequentialism implies that each of us has an individual obligation to do what we can to stop damaging the climate, including by refraining from, or perhaps by purchasing offsets against, our own individual luxury carbon emissions. (shrink)

Immer wieder in der Entwicklung des philosophischen und theologischen Denkens gab es Einzelne, die bestehende Ansichten radikal in Frage stellten. Manchmal wurden ihre Vorschläge angenommen und sie begründeten so eine neue Traditionslinie. Oft aber blieben sie Dissidenten und Ketzer, wurden verfolgt, verleugnet und nicht in die großen Verzeichnisse der seriösen Philosophen aufgenommen. Einzelne Ideen aus ihrem Werk wurden dann in einem neuen Kontext für das >offizielle Denken.

The article addresses the contributions psychoanalytic theory, particularly its concepts of transference and counter-transference, can make to our understanding of reflexivity in intercultural education (IE). After the introduction, the article is organized into three parts. The first part is a psychoanalytic discussion that focuses on the concepts of transference and counter-transference. The second part elaborates on the concepts of transference and counter-transference by presenting examples through existing studies in the fields of multicultural and IE and psychoanalysis to illuminate what it (...) would mean to psychoanalytically understand aspects of intercultural relations and reflexivity. In the third section, while contending that this article does not exclude other forms of reflexivity or delimit the danger of uncritically accepting the potentials for reflexivity, it offers the implications drawn from the discussions in the first and second sections by concluding that psychoanalysis is an area of inquiry that forces us to question how unconscious forces affect our interaction with students, the curriculum, and the meaning we give to teaching and learning experiences. The article concludes that reflexivity in IE can benefit from considering the effects of transference and counter-transference. (shrink)

Comparative pride—that is, pride in how one compares to others in some respect—is often thought to be warranted. In this paper, I argue that this common position is mistaken. The paper begins with an analysis of how things seem when a person feels pride. Pride, I claim, presents some aspect of the self with which one identifies as being worthy. Moreover, in some cases, it presents this aspect of the self as something one is responsible for. I then go on (...) to argue that when the focus of one's pride is comparative, things are never as pride makes them seem. The core problem is that if the performance in which one takes pride is really valuable, the fact that it is superior to the performance of others does nothing to contribute to that value. I conclude with a discussion of why so many are inclined to validate comparative pride and a response to those who claim that comparisons are essential to pride because they must be used to set standards of excellence. (shrink)

In this paper, I reconstruct Hobbes’ theory of self-love. I then examine Hume’s arguements that (i) self-love does not properly account for moral behavior and (ii) self-love is unnecessary for moral theory. I argue that Hobbesian self-love can account for both of Hume’s objections. Further, I use an analysis of Hobbes’ Deliberation to show, contra Hume, that self-love does not entail a lack of intention in moral action.

In the past 50 years, ethical concerns concerning human experimentation have arisen with the advancement of new medical research and technology. While the benefits of human experimentation are well known in the fields of biology, psychology, sociology, and medicine, the conditions of human subject research have been persistently controversial. This book discusses ethical perspectives, emerging developments and global challenged of patient rights. Topics include effective medical informed consent; rights to health and dental care; the ethics of HIV screening targeted to (...) the seriously mentally ill; and problems in ethics for medical publication. (shrink)

How cautious should regulators be? A standard answer is consequentialist: regulators should be just cautious enough to maximize expected social value. This paper charts the prospects of a nonconsequentialist - and more precautionary - alternative. More specifically, it argues that a contractualism focused on ex ante consent can motivate the following regulatory criterion: regulators should permit a socially beneficial risky activity only if no one can be expected to be made worse off by it. Broadly speaking, there are two strategies (...) regulators can use to help risky activities satisfy this criterion: regulators can mandate strict safety standards that protect those who would otherwise stand to lose, and they can require that some of the benefits of the activity be redirected to them. In developing these themes, the paper aims to provide a theoretical grounding for those who oppose using risk-cost-benefit analysis as the primary regulatory standard, and in particular, for advocates of the precautionary principle. (shrink)

This study empirically investigates the dismissal of U.S. CEOs following negative media coverage of environmental, social, and governance (ESG) practices. Extending related literature on the media, ESG, and CEO dismissal, I develop a theoretical framework that considers the media as an influential third party that forms and reflects public opinion about ESG issues. In this role, the media reduces information asymmetry by providing cues on their relative salience and prompting corporate directors to attribute firm-level ESG issues to the CEO, regardless (...) of their involvement in the misconduct. Findings confirm this framework and particularly suggest that coverage of issues in prominent media sources is more likely to result in CEO dismissal. Further, companies that have made public commitments to ESG oversight and those with stronger monitoring are more likely to dismiss the CEO following negative coverage of ESG issues. Overall, this study builds an understanding of how contemporary boards approach the uncertain CEO dismissal decision amidst media coverage of ESG- related misconduct and reflects a shifting norm towards ESG integration at the board-level. (shrink)

In this moment of rising nationalism worldwide, governments, civil society groups, transnational companies, and web users all complain of increasing regional fragmentation online. While prior work in this area has primarily focused on issues of government censorship and regulatory compliance, we use an inductive and qualitative approach to examine targeted blocking by corporate entities of entire regions motivated by concerns about fraud, abuse, and theft. Through participant-observation at relevant events and intensive interviews with experts, we document the quest by professionals (...) tasked with preserving online security to use new machine-learning based techniques to develop a “fairer” system to determine patterns of “good” and “bad” usage. However, we argue that without understanding the systematic social and political conditions that produce differential behaviors online, these systems may continue to embed unequal treatments, and troublingly may further disguise such discrimination behind more complex and less transparent automated assessment. In order to support this claim, we analyze how current forms of regional blocking incentivize users in blocked regions to behave in ways that are commonly flagged as problematic by dominant security and identification systems. To realize truly global, non-Eurocentric cybersecurity techniques would mean incorporating the ecosystems of service utilization developed by marginalized users rather than reasserting norms of an imagined user that casts aberrations as suspect. (shrink)

This article is an analysis of rumors about Internet scamming told by Internet café users in the West African capital city of Accra, Ghana. Rumors provided accounts of how the Internet can be effectively operated by young Ghanaians to realize ‘‘big gains’’ through foreign connections. Yet these accounts were contradicted by the less promising direct experiences users had at the computer interface. Rumors amplified evidence of wildly successful as well as especially harmful encounters with the Internet. Rather than simply transferring (...) information, through the telling of rumors, Internet users reclaimed a social stability that was disrupted by the presence of the Internet. These stories cast young Ghanaian Internet users as both good and effective in relation to the Internet. The study of accounts as they relate to the activities accounted for is an established area of interest in social theory. By considering how rumors function as accounts and how such interpretations of the technology are propagated among users, this analysis contributes to a broader understanding of user agency. (shrink)

Sexual harassment is often understood as a subjective notion that asks the woman if she has been victimized. This paper argues that we need not ask women if they are victims by conceptualizing sexual harassment as an objective notion that holds the perpetrator accountable for his actions. In making my case, I will apply an objective conception of sexual harassment to the U.S. Supreme Court case Meritor Savings Bank v. Vinson by drawing on the feminist view of sexual harassment given (...) by Anita Superson and the role of equality and autonomy as motivated by Ronald Dworkin and James Griffin, respectively. (shrink)

Music training is associated with enhanced executive function but little is known about the extent to which harmonic aspects of musical training are associated with components of executive function. In the current study, an array of cognitive tests associated with one or more components of executive function, was administered to young adult musicians and non-musicians. To investigate how harmonic aspects of musical training relate to executive function, a test of the ability to compose a four-part harmony was developed and administered (...) to musicians. We tested the working hypothesis that musicians would outperform non-musicians on measures of executive function, and that among musicians, the ability to harmonize would correlate positively with measures of executive function. Results indicate that musicians outperformed non-musicians on the Tower of London task, a measure of planning and problem-solving. Group differences were not detected on tasks more selective for inhibitory control, conflict resolution, or working memory. Among musicians, scores on the harmony assessment were positively correlated with performance of the Tower of London task. Taken together, the current results support a strong relationship between musicianship and planning and problem solving abilities, and indicate that the ability to harmonize is associated with components of executive function contributing to planning and problem solving. (shrink)

Envy of others' material possessions is a potent motivator of consumerism. This makes it a prudentially and morally hazardous emotional response. After outlining these hazards, I present an analysis of the emotion of envy. Envy, I argue, presents things in the following way: the envier lacks some good that her rival possesses; this difference between them is bad for the envier; this difference reflects poorly on the envier's worth; and this difference is undeserved. I then discuss the conditions under which (...) these presentations can be satisfied by differences in material possessions. My conclusion is that no difference in material possessions can simultaneously be all the ways envy presents it as being. Consequently, economic envy is systematically irrational: it is never a warranted response to the distribution of material wealth. Recognising this bolsters the prudential and moral case for reducing the degree to which we feel it and for resisting the inclinations it gives rise to when we do. (shrink)

Nonsense‐mediated RNA decay (NMD) represents an established quality control checkpoint for gene expression that protects cells from consequences of gene mutations and errors during RNA biogenesis that lead to premature termination during translation. Characterization of NMD‐sensitive transcriptomes has revealed, however, that NMD targets not only aberrant transcripts but also a broad array of mRNA isoforms expressed from many endogenous genes. NMD is thus emerging as a master regulator that drives both fine and coarse adjustments in steady‐state RNA levels in the (...) cell. Importantly, while NMD activity is subject to autoregulation as a means to maintain homeostasis, modulation of the pathway by external cues provides a means to reprogram gene expression and drive important biological processes. Finally, the unanticipated observation that transcripts predicted to lack protein‐coding capacity are also sensitive to this translation‐dependent surveillance mechanism implicates NMD in regulating RNA function in new and diverse ways. (shrink)

Religion, Metaphysik und Theologie sind durch das neuzeitliche Denken in besonderer Weise herausgefordert. Die Beiträge des Bandes befassen sich von verschiedenen Standpunkten aus mit der Spannung, die in Moderne und Postmoderne zwischen diesen Disziplinen entsteht.

This paper will explore the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights as an exemplar of political mythmaking, a genre of narrative designed to channel and thereby to quell social anxiety and to orient select groups toward desirable beliefs and practices. One of the Declaration’s most fundamental and forceful elements is its enshrinement of the “inherent dignity” of each member of the human family. Drawing upon contemporary theorizations of mythmaking and sacralization, this article will elucidate the manner in which inherent dignity (...) functions as the central item of sacredness within what we might call the “secular morality” of universal human rights. (shrink)

For many years, scholars have been moving away from the idea of a singular, secular, rationalistic, and mechanistic "Enlightenment project." Historian Peter Reill has been one of those at the forefront of this development, demonstrating the need for a broader and more varied understanding of eighteenth-century conceptions of nature. Life Forms in the Thinking of the Long Eighteenth Century is a unique reappraisal of Enlightenment thought on nature, biology, and the organic world that responds to Reill's work. The ten essays (...) included in the collection analyse the place of historicism, vitalism, and esotericism in the eighteenth century--three strands of thought rarely connected, but all of which are central to Reill's innovative work. Working across national and regional boundaries, they engage not only French and English but also Italian, Swiss, and German writers. (shrink)