International law lacks many of the standard features of domestic law. There are few legislative or judicial bodies with exclusive authority over particular jurisdictions or subject matters, the subjects regulated by international law typically must affirmatively consent to be bound by it, and supranational authorities with the power to coerce states to comply with international obligations are rare. How can a legal system with these features generate changes in state behavior? For many theories, the ability of international law to inform (...) and change individual preferences provides the answer. When voters care that treaty commitments be kept, or that international norms be honored, the theory goes, leaders are more likely to be able to make choices consistent with international obligations. Over the last decade, a literature has emerged testing these theories using surveys and experiments embedded in surveys. Multiple U.S. studies find that international law and international norm arguments shift public opinion in the direction of greater compliance by 4 to 20 percentage points. However, studies in foreign contexts are more mixed, with some backlash reported in countries in which international law is highly politicized. This Article describes the state of current knowledge about whether international law actually does change preferences, explains the limitations with existing research, and proposes avenues for future study. (shrink)

Sound-symbolism is the nonarbitrary link between the sound and meaning of a word. Japanese-speaking children performed better in a verb generalization task when they were taught novel sound-symbolic verbs, created based on existing Japanese sound-symbolic words, than novel nonsound-symbolic verbs (Imai, Kita, Nagumo, & Okada, 2008). A question remained as to whether the Japanese children had picked up regularities in the Japanese sound-symbolic lexicon or were sensitive to universal sound-symbolism. The present study aimed to provide support for the latter. In (...) a verb generalization task, English-speaking 3-year-olds were taught novel sound-symbolic verbs, created based on Japanese sound-symbolism, or novel nonsound-symbolic verbs. English-speaking children performed better with the sound-symbolic verbs, just like Japanese-speaking children. We concluded that children are sensitive to universal sound-symbolism and can utilize it in word learning and generalization, regardless of their native language. (shrink)

Regulations implemented by World Athletics (WA) require female athletes with differences of sexual development to suppress their blood testosterone levels in order to participate in certain women’s sporting competitions. These regulations have been justified by reference to fairness. In this paper, we reconstruct WA’s understanding of fairness, which requires a “level playing field” where no athlete should have a significant performance advantage based on factors other than talent, dedication, and hard work over an average athlete in their category. We demonstrate (...) that by placing regulations only on testosterone levels, while ignoring physical as well as socioeconomic advantages, WA consistently fails to meet its own definition of fairness. We then discuss several ways in which this definition could be met. Our analysis shows that a categorical system, in which athletes are divided into categories based on properties leading to significant performance advantages, is best suited for meeting WA’s definition of fairness. (shrink)

Hutto and Satne, Philosophia propose to redefine the problem of naturalizing semantic content as searching for the origin of content instead of attempting to reduce it to some natural phenomenon. The search is to proceed within the framework of Relaxed Naturalism and under the banner of teleosemiotics which places Ur-intentionality at the source of content. We support the proposed redefinition of the problem but object to the proposed solution. In particular, we call for adherence to Strict Naturalism and replace teleosemiotics (...) with autopoietic theory of living beings. Our argument for these adjustments stems from our analysis of the flagship properties of Ur-intentionality: specificity and directedness. We attempt to show that the first property is not unique to living systems and therefore poses a problem of where to place a demarcation line for the origin of content. We then argue that the second property is a feature ascribed to living systems, not their intrinsic part and therefore does not form a good foundation for the game of naturalizing content. In conclusion we suggest that autopoietic theory can not only provide a competitive explanation of the basic responding of pre-contentful organisms but also clarify why Ur-intentionality is attributed to them in such an intuitive manner. (shrink)

In this paper the authors seek to contribute to a new ontology of an embodied, desiring subject through an exploration of their own subjectivities and of the ways in which subjectivities are produced and transformed through affective attachments to place. Using the method of collective biography (Davies, Gannon 2006) and drawing on Deleuze and Guattari’s concepts of desire and territorialization they examine their affective responses and attachments to place: Australia and the Czech Republic. As a point of departure for their (...) analysis, the authors ask: What does it mean to be homesick for a place which is not one’s home? What does it mean to desire a place? What of the other place is inscribed in the body? In asking this, the authors show the extent to which place is a zone of immanence in which a continual play of de- and re-territorialization occurs. (shrink)

Cognitive and emotional processes are now known to be intertwined and thus the limbic system that underlies emotions is important for human brain evolution, including the evolution of circuits supporting language. The neural substrates of limbic functions, like motivation, attention, inhibition, evaluation, detection of emotional stimuli and others have changed over time. Even though no new, added structures are present in the human brain compared to nonhuman primates, evolution tweaks existing structural systems with possible functional implications. Empirical comparative neuroanatomical evidence (...) is presented here in support of such changes in the limbic system, including the amygdala and the orbitofrontal cortex. Given their possible functional significance, these alterations may further enable and enhance human interest and motivation to communicate beyond what is seen in other primates living in complex social groups. The argument here is that even though emotion processing is likely needed for increased social complexity independent of language, the reason why humans want to talk may be related in part to the enhancement of socioemotional processes resulting from the reorganization and rewiring of underlying neural systems some of which are interconnected to the language areas. Neurodevelopmental disorders in humans affecting both language and sociability fuel such arguments. (shrink)

This article discusses findings of a qualitative study on strategies of othering observed in anti-immigrant discourse, by analysing selected examples from the UK and Polish media, together with data collected from interviews with migrants. The purpose is to identify discursive strategies of othering, which aim to categorise, denigrate, oppress and ultimately reject the stigmatised or racialised ‘other’. We do not offer a systematic comparison of the data from the UK and Poland; instead, we are interested in what is common in (...) the discursive practices of these two countries/contexts. In using newspaper together with interview data, we are combining representation and experience in identifying not only strategies of othering, but also how these are perceived by and affect the othered individuals. The paper uses the following data: 40 newspaper articles – 20 from the UK and 20 from Poland, and 19 interviews – 12 from Poland and 7 from the UK. The analysis that follows identifies five shared strategies of othering: a) Stereotyping; b) Whiteness as the norm; c) Racialisation; d) Objectification; e) Wrongly Ascribed Ethnicity. We conclude with the research limitations and outlining possible next stages, such as working with a larger corpus, investigating frequency, or including other media genres. (shrink)

This paper, located in the traditions of Interactional Sociolinguistics (Gumperz 1982) and Social Constructionism (Berger and Luckmann 1966), explores code-switching and identity practices amongst British-born Greek-Cypriots. The speakers, members of a Greek-Cypriot youth organization, are fluent in English and (with varying levels of fluency) speak the Greek-Cypriot Dialect. Qualitative analyses of recordings of natural speech during youth community meetings and a social event show how a new ‘third space’ becomes reified through code-switching practices. By skillfully manipulating languages and styles, speakers (...) draw on Greek-Cypriot cultural resources to accomplish two inter-related things. First, by displaying knowledge of familiar Greek-Cypriot cultural frames, they establish themselves as different from mainstream British society and establish solidarity as an in-group. Secondly, by using these frames in non-serious contexts, and at times mocking cultural attitudes and stereotypes, they challenge and re-appropriate their inherited Greek-Cypriot identity, thereby constructing the identity of British-born Greek-Cypriot youth. (shrink)

Text seznamuje čtenáře s výukovou metodou nastavení problému, jeho řešení pomocí zavedení a aplikování teoretických pojmů, konceptovou analýzou vybraného díla a důslednou oporou o kontext a ko-text díla. Příklady vybírá ze soudobé scény výtvarného umění a jeho cílem je zdůvodněná interpretace díla. Opírá se o Goodmanovské termíny denotace, exemplifikace a exprese. Metaforickou exemplifikaci, expresi člení průhledem poznávacími perspektivami 1. a 3. osoby na prožitkovou a empatickou komponentu, opírá se tak o teorii artefiletiky. Otevírá a řeší tak problém vztahu relativních objektivních (...) daností díla, jeho intersubjektivně kotvené interpretace a subjektivně vnímaného prožitku z díla. Tvorbu chápe jako způsob poznání. (shrink)

Despite its historical focus on aberrant behavior, sexology barely dealt with sexual deviants in 1950s Czechoslovakia. Rather, sexologists treated only isolated instances of deviance. The rare cases that went to court appeared mostly because they hindered work or harmed the national economy. Two decades later, however, the situation was markedly different. Hundreds of men were labeled as sexual delinquents and sentenced for treatment in special sexological wards at psychiatric hospitals. They endangered society, so it was claimed, by being unwilling or (...) unable to conform to the family norm. The mode of subjection shifted from work to family. I analyse this change by using the tools of Gil Eyal’s sociology of expertise, which focuses on shifts in institutional matrices that bring forth new groups of agents creating new expert networks. I argue that sexology became profoundly institutionalized in the early 1970s, which brought the discipline closer to psychiatry and forensic science. New inpatient facilities were opened that could admit sentenced sexual deviants. Also, demographic changes accelerated in the 1960s, especially skyrocketing divorce rates and plummeting birth rates, which made it imperative for the government to focus on cementing the family. After the failed attempts of the Prague Spring in 1968, the new pro-Soviet government of communist Czechoslovakia did just that. During the time dubbed as ‘normalization’ by the new elites, anyone who strayed from the family norm was suspected of deviance. (shrink)

According to the beneficiary-pays principle, the involuntary beneficiaries of injustice ought to disgorge their unjustly obtained benefits in order to compensate the victims of injustice. The paper explores the effectiveness of the above principle in establishing a robust and unique normative connection between the rectificatory duties of the beneficiaries and the rectificatory rights of the victims of injustice. I discuss three accounts of the beneficiary-pays principle according to which the rectificatory duty of the beneficiaries towards the victims is grounded in (...) (a) their duty to oppose injustice and mitigate its effects, (b) their duty to give up benefits that are causally linked to an act of wrongdoing, or (c) their duty to not sustain wrongful harm against the victims. By criticizing these accounts, I intend to highlight the complexities of articulating a distinct rectificatory duty that applies uniquely to the beneficiaries of injustice qua beneficiaries. I conclude that, while it may seem complicated to defend the beneficiary-pays principle as an independent moral principle, it is more plausible to think of it as being derivative of more general principles such as the principle of fair play. (shrink)

Phenotypic plasticity is a crucial feature of aggressive cancer, providing the means for cancer progression. Stochastic changes in tumor cell transcriptional programs increase the chances of survival under any condition. I hypothesize that unstable chromatin permits stochastic transitions between transcriptional programs in aggressive cancers and supports non‐genetic heterogeneity of tumor cells as a basis for their adaptability. I present a mechanistic model for unstable chromatin which includes destabilized nucleosomes, mobile chromatin fibers and random enhancer‐promoter contacts, resulting in stochastic transcription. I (...) suggest potential markers for “unsettled” chromatin in tumors associated with poor prognosis. Although many of the characteristics of unstable chromatin have been described, they were mostly used to explain changes in the transcription of individual genes. I discuss approaches to evaluate the role of unstable chromatin in non‐genetic tumor cell heterogeneity and suggest using the degree of chromatin instability and transcriptional noise in tumor cells to predict cancer aggressiveness. (shrink)

The article takes the excavated cosmological texts as a basis for reinterpreting the relationship between cosmology, epistemology, and action in Warring States period thought, by focusing on the role of names in situatedness and self-actualization of being. It proposes to view the speculative and the practical concerns in terms of a dynamic union of the receptive and the creative within the onto-generative cycle. Building on Chung-ying Cheng’s onto-generative approach and Heidegger’s hermeneutics of Dasein in Sein und Zeit, the article identifies (...) names as the centre in which the receptive and the creative aspect of being come together. (shrink)

Growth mixture models are regularly applied in the behavioral and social sciences to identify unknown heterogeneous subpopulations that follow distinct developmental trajectories. Marcoulides and Trinchera recently proposed a mixture modeling approach that examines the presence of multiple latent classes by algorithmically grouping or clustering individuals who follow the same estimated growth trajectory based on an evaluation of individual case residuals. The purpose of this article was to conduct a simulation study that examines the performance of this new approach for determining (...) the number of classes in growth mixture models. The performance of the approach to correctly identify the number of classes is examined under a variety of longitudinal data design conditions. The findings demonstrated that the new approach was a very dependable indicator of classes across all the design conditions considered. (shrink)

In this essay, I propose that DNA‐binding anti‐cancer drugs work more via chromatin disruption than DNA damage. Success of long‐awaited drugs targeting cancer‐specific drivers is limited by the heterogeneity of tumors. Therefore, chemotherapy acting via universal targets (e.g., DNA) is still the mainstream treatment for cancer. Nevertheless, the problem with targeting DNA is insufficient efficacy due to high toxicity. I propose that this problem stems from the presumption that DNA damage is critical for the anti‐cancer activity of these drugs. DNA (...) in cells exists as chromatin, and many DNA‐targeting drugs alter chromatin structure by destabilizing nucleosomes and inducing histone eviction from chromatin. This effect has been largely ignored because DNA damage is seen as the major reason for anti‐cancer activity. I discuss how DNA‐binding molecules destabilize chromatin, why this effect is more toxic to tumoral than normal cells, and why cells die as a result of chromatin destabilization. (shrink)

In his Foundations of a General Theory of Manifolds, Georg Cantor praised Bernard Bolzano as a clear defender of actual infinity who had the courage to work with infinite numbers. At the same time, he sharply criticized the way Bolzano dealt with them. Cantor’s concept was based on the existence of a one-to-one correspondence, while Bolzano insisted on Euclid’s Axiom of the whole being greater than a part. Cantor’s set theory has eventually prevailed, and became a formal basis of contemporary (...) mathematics, while Bolzano’s approach is generally considered a step in the wrong direction. In the present paper, we demonstrate that a fragment of Bolzano’s theory of infinite quantities retaining the part-whole principle can be extended to a consistent mathematical structure. It can be interpreted in several possible ways. We obtain either a linearly ordered ring of finite and infinitely great quantities, or a partially ordered ring containing infinitely small, finite and infinitely great quantities. These structures can be used as a basis of the infinitesimal calculus similarly as in non-standard analysis, whether in its full version employing ultrafilters due to Abraham Robinson, or in the recent “cheap version” avoiding ultrafilters due to Terence Tao. (shrink)

The potential of surveillance practices to undermine the presumption of innocence is a growing concern amongst critics of surveillance. This paper attempts to assess the impact of surveillance on the presumption of innocence. It defends an account of the presumption of innocence as a protection against wrongful criminalisation against alternatives, and considers both the ways in which surveillance might undermine that protection and the—hitherto overlooked—ways in which it might promote it. It draws on empirical work on the causes of erroneous (...) convictions to suggest that surveillance can be used in ways that prevent innocent people being erroneously charged and convicted with crimes, by providing a source of exculpatory evidence for use in police investigations. It is argued that surveillance practices do not necessarily undermine the presumption of innocence but can be reformed in ways that both reduce the risk that they will cause wrongful criminalisation and increase their power to protect those already under suspicion. (shrink)

Sur l’île de Nissyros (Dodécanèse), lors de la fête patronale du 15 août en l’honneur de la Vierge Marie, les hommes choisissent, comme lieu d’activité, le centre du village et la préparation des grands festins. Ce sont les femmes qui, en adoptant un comportement pénitentiel, sont les médiatrices du religieux. Figures emblématiques de la fête, les niameritisses restent pendant neuf jours dans le monastère de la Vierge, où elles accomplissent quotidiennement des génuflexions devant son icône miraculeuse. Cet article examine la (...) manière dont chaque sexe forge son image et revendique sa part du sacré lors des festivités communautaires, ainsi que les pratiques dévotionnelles qui permettent aux femmes de s’approprier l’espace sacré du monastère et l’icône mariale qui y est révérée. (shrink)

Alternative set theory was created by the Czech mathematician Petr Vopěnka in 1979 as an alternative to Cantor’s set theory. Vopěnka criticised Cantor’s approach for its loss of correspondence with the real world. Alternative set theory can be partially axiomatised and regarded as a nonstandard theory of natural numbers. However, its intention is much wider. It attempts to retain a correspondence between mathematical notions and phenomena of the natural world. Through infinity, Vopěnka grasps the phenomena of vagueness. Infinite sets are (...) defined as sets containing proper semisets, i.e. vague parts of sets limited by the horizon. The new interpretation extends the field of applicability of mathematics and simultaneously indicates its limits. Compared to strict finitism and other attempts at a reduction of the infinite to the finite Vopěnka’s theory reverses the process: he models the finite in the infinite. (shrink)

The paper introduces the notion of size of countable sets, which preserves the Part-Whole Principle. The sizes of the natural and the rational numbers, their subsets, unions, and Cartesian products are algorithmically enumerable as sequences of natural numbers. The method is similar to that of Numerosity Theory, but in comparison it is motivated by Bolzano’s concept of infinite series, it is constructive because it does not use ultrafilters, and set sizes are uniquely determined. The results mostly agree, but some differ, (...) such as the size of rational numbers. However, set sizes are only partially, not linearly, ordered. Quid pro quo. (shrink)

The essay concerns the highly controversial pamphlet of Rosa Luxemburg The Russian Revolution, in which Luxemburg criticizes Lenin’s post-revolutionary policies, in particular his dissolution of the Constituent Assembly, an elected body. The essay reviews the history of the text’s publication and the intense debate, which continues to this day, over whether or not Luxemburg changed her mind on its central critique. At stake in the argument is not only Luxemburg’s evaluation of Lenin’s actions but also the correct weighting to be (...) given to the two components in the central Marxist–Leninist dialectic of revolution: spontaneity and consciousness. In elaborating this point the essay brings in examples from the writings of Lukács and Stalin, and also discusses the dialectic’s centrality in socialist realism. (shrink)

The past decade has seen extensive research carried out on the systematic causes of research misconduct. Simultaneously, less attention has been paid to the variation in academic misconduct between research fields, as most empirical studies focus on one particular discipline. We propose that academic discipline is one of several systematic factors that might contribute to academic misbehavior. Drawing on a neo-institutional approach, we argue that in the developing countries, the norm of textual originality has not drawn equal support across different (...) research fields depending on its level of internationalization. Using plagiarism detection software, we analyzed 2,405 doctoral dissertations randomly selected from all dissertations defended in Russia between 2007 and 2015. We measured the globalization of each academic discipline by calculating the share of publications indexed in the global citation database in relation to overall output. Our results showed that, with an average share of detected borrowings of over 19%, the incidence of plagiarism in Russia is remarkably higher than in Western countries. Overall, disciplines closely follow the pattern of higher globalization associated with a lower percentage of borrowed text. We also found that plagiarism is less prevalent at research-oriented institutions supporting global ethical standards. Our findings suggest that it might be misleading to measure the prevalence of academic misconduct in developing countries without paying attention to variations at the disciplinary level. (shrink)

V rámci tohoto příspěvku se pokusím zpochybnit dosavadní mainstreamovou interpretaci Leibnizovy metafyziky prostoru, jak ji představil v dopisech anglickému učenci Samuelu Clarkovi. Přestože bývá Leibnizova metafyzika prostoru právě na základě jeho korespondence s Clarkem obvykle považována za ostrý protipól metafyziky Clarkovy, respektive Newtonovy, v rámci tohoto příspěvku poukážu na to, že při zvážení Leibnizovy geometrie zvané „analysis situs“ se taková interpretace stává neudržitelnou. Leibnize nelze považovat za zastánce typicky relačního pojetí prostoru.

info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersion.

Constitutional law in the United States is, for most practical purposes, the product of ‘judicial review’, the power of judges to disallow policy choices made by other officials or institutions of government, ostensibly because those choices are prohibited by the Constitution. This extraordinary and unprecedented power, America's dubious contribution to the science of government, has made American judges the most powerful in the world, not only legislators but super-legislators, legislators with virtually the last word. Because lawmaking power divorced from popular (...) will is tyranny, most states have attempted to reconcile the lawmaking power of judges with representative self-government by subjecting all or some judges to some form of popular election. In all but four such states, judges, encouraged and supported by their fellow lawyers in the organized bar—would-be judges and beneficiaries of judicial power—have responded by adopting codes of judicial ethics that limit what candidates for election to judicial office are permitted to say. The effect is to undermine elections as a control on judicial power by limiting criticism of judicial activism, the misuse of judicial power. (shrink)

Resumo Autores como os físicos Léon Rosenfeld, Gerald Holton e Franco Selleri, bem como o filósofo Miguel Reale perceberam já que, no interior da mecânica quântica, o princípio da complementaridade de Niels Bohr pode ser aproximado á noção filosófica de dialéctica. Além de buscar contribuir para robustecer tal linha de interpretaoção do famoso principío bohriano, neste paper tentaremos compreender dialecticamente a relaoção de Louis de Broglie e a de desigualdade de Werner Heisenberg. Por fim, argumentaremos a favor de um enfoque (...) realista do principío em causa. (shrink)

This paper examines the relevance and importance of the large number of examples which Aristotle uses in his "Prior Analytics." In the first part of the paper three preliminary issues are raised: First, it investigates what counts as an example in Aristotle's syllogistic, and especially whether only examples expressed in concrete terms should be considered as examples or maybe also propositions and arguments with letters of the alphabet. The second issue concerns the kinds of examples Aristotle actually uses from everyday (...) life as well as from various scientific and philosophical forms of discourse; among these, it seems that biological examples, rather than mathematical ones, have a predominant place. Finally, I discuss what Aristotle himself has to say about the use of examples, and in particular about the similarity between the use of an example and the use of induction. The second part of the paper focusses on the functions of Aristotle's logical examples. It is of course obvious that some of the examples in the Prior Analytics are used to illustrate, and thus to clarify, a definition, a logical rule, a type of argument. However, I think that Aristotle's logical examples have another function, which is philosophically more interesting, namely as integral parts of the procedure of proving something. To support this claim, I analyse three passages from the "Prior Analytics" in which examples are used either in order to prove that something is not the case, i.e. as counter-examples, or in order to prove positively that it is possible for something to be the case. At the end, I argue that for such uses of examples Aristotle uses the notion of 'ekthesis', which seems to have a wider sense than usually suggested; that is to say, it is used to refer to any proof by means of an example, and not only for the procedure which Aristotle uses to reduce imperfect to perfect syllogisms. (shrink)

The article focuses on a method for collecting qualitative data. The method is the asynchronous email interview. The authors assess the advantages, challenges and best practices of the asynchronous email interview method. They base their assessment on the academic literature and their own experiences using this data collection method in qualitative research on women who had experienced perinatal loss. The asynchronous email interview will never fully replace traditional face-to-face interviews, but it could gain a solid position as a qualitative research (...) method thanks to its unique benefits. (shrink)

An incomplete truth -- Multiple truths -- Media practice or media bribery? conceptual and theoretical considerations and implications -- Dispelling the myths of the ethical significance and validity of the concept of cultural relativism and the need for cultural tolerance in combatting media bribery worldwide -- The global study of media transparency -- Professional communities against media bribery -- A normative theory of media bribery.