In a pessimistic view, the world is a series of struggles and sufferings. The tribulations are inevitable to man’s life for he is in the world. Pandemic, poverty and corruption are the most prominent and prevailing faces of struggles in the world. It affects the individual’s lives deeply for it undercuts the experience of being alive and free. It weakens man’s appreciation of moments due to misery. The conflicts in the world holds man to appreciate moments for they are occupied (...) on their functionality. The world simply becomes a mechanical for the people lives like a machine where working is much important than reflecting. These problematic figures were paralleled to Gabriel Marcel’s concept of broken world. The paper tends to justify that the world is broken for the reason that first, its problems that could be seen in the contemporary world as pandemic, poverty and corruption. Second, man becomes alienated from himself for he ceases on living due to this problematic world. This paper also ventured to Gabriel Marcel’s concept of broken world which eventually paralleled to the mainstream problems in contemporary world. The author intended to present a pessimistic view about the world which he claimed to be mad and broken. (shrink)

This bibliographical study involved first the exploitation of four data-banks: Medline, CNRS, Bioethics and AIDS, with the following key words (in conjunction with AIDS): ethics, human rights, confidentiality, legislation, jurisprudence. A total of 412 references were listed between 1983 and the end of 1987. Examination of the quantitative increase of articles over these years shows that, while references to AIDS and/or HIV infection--referred to as 'AIDS' for brevity--increased by about one third per year, the number of papers treating ethical problems (...) linked to AIDS doubled each year. This increase makes it clear that these problems are important and pressing, that they are evolving rapidly and can be given no easy solution. After reading and analysis of accessible articles in readily comprehensible languages, the different themes can be classified in two categories: 1: Measures intended to protect society (starting with the most coercive); quarantine and isolation; discriminatory measures concerning specific groups; non-respect of the confidential nature of medical information; application of the penal code; screening; obligatory declaration and registration; testing of blood given by donors; vaccination and medical innovations, therapeutic assays; information, education. 2. Measures intended to protect the individual: fundamental rights of the patient: his/her right to confidentiality, to information and to treatment; civil rights: civil liberty, right to education, right to work, etc...; rights of the healthy individual: right of those in contact with the patients, safety of hospital staff, of those receiving blood-transfusions, etc... The legislation adopted in the various countries and the main opinions to be found in these articles are listed and analysed, and for each particular theme it is possible to refer to a list of the 232 most important articles. While the debate seems to concentrate on the conflict between the right of society to protect itself against the spread of infection and the 'civil' rights of the infected minorities, our conclusion tends to reduce this antagonism, showing that, particularly as far as the confidential nature of medical information is concerned, measures intended to protect the individual also protect society. (shrink)

The notion of “camouflage” offers a new way to articulate some central ideas of direct realism. Through a certain natural history, physical objects would be able to adopt as a “second skin” the qualitative appearances they have when they are perceived. This entails the rejection of the “things-having-effects-on-us” model for perception. The physical objects themselves would be crucially involved in the constitution of the intentionality of perception.

In two studies, we used the Ethics Position Questionnaire (EPQ) to investigate the relationship between individual differences in moral philosophy, involvement in the animal rights movement, and attitudes toward the treatment of animals. In the first, 600 animal rights activists attending a national demonstration and 266 nonactivist college students were given the EPQ. Analysis of the returns from 157 activists and 198 students indicated that the activists were more likely than the students to hold an "absolutist" moral orientation (high idealism, (...) low relativism). In the second study, 169 students were given the EPQ with a scale designed to measure attitudes toward the treatment of animals. Multiple regression showed that gender and the EPQ dimension of idealism were related to attitudes toward animal use. (shrink)

The major competing statistical paradigms share a common remarkable but unremarked thread: in many of their inferential applications, different probability interpretations are combined. How this plays out in different theories of inference depends on the type of question asked. We distinguish four question types: confirmation, evidence, decision, and prediction. We show that Bayesian confirmation theory mixes what are intuitively “subjective” and “objective” interpretations of probability, whereas the likelihood-based account of evidence melds three conceptions of what constitutes an “objective” probability.

With their comprehensive categorization of “ambivalence-related phenomena,” Moore et al. helpfully clarify and contextualize these decisional states as they arise in patient care. Given the...

The basic motivation behind this work is to tie together various computational complexity classes, whether over different domains such as the naturals or the reals, or whether defined in different manners, via function algebras (Real Recursive Functions) or via Turing Machines (Computable Analysis). We provide general tools for investigating these issues, using two techniques we call approximation and lifting. We use these methods to obtain two main theorems. First, we provide an alternative proof of the result from Campagnolo et al. (...) (J Complex 18:977–1000, 2002), which precisely relates the Kalmar elementary computable functions to a function algebra over the reals. Second, we build on that result to extend a result of Bournez and Hainry (Theor Comput Sci 348(2–3):130–147, 2005), which provided a function algebra for the ${\mathcal{C}}^2$ real elementary computable functions; our result does not require the restriction to ${\mathcal{C}}^2$ functions. In addition to the extension, we provide an alternative approach to the proof. Their proof involves simulating the operation of a Turing Machine using a function algebra. We avoid this simulation, using a technique we call lifting, which allows us to lift the classic result regarding the elementary computable functions to a result on the reals. The two new techniques bring a different perspective to these problems, and furthermore appear more easily applicable to other problems of this sort. (shrink)

THE CENTRALITY OF "SYMPATHY" to Adam Smith's Theory of Moral Sentiments points to the centrality of love in the book. While Smith delineates a somewhat unusual, technical sense of "sympathy", his actual use of the term frequently slips into its more ordinary sense of "compassion" or affectionate fellow feeling. This no doubt intentional equivocation on Smith's part helps suffuse the book with these themes, to the point that, without much exaggeration, one could say that the Theory of Moral Sentiments is (...) generally about love: our need for love and sympathy, love as friendship, self-love, the love of praise and praiseworthiness, the love of beauty. Even in the Wealth of Nations, our loves are thought to be very important in explaining our behavior. Smith is unusual among modern moral philosophers in according so central a place to love in this broad sense, although of course Christianity made love a central theme in reflection on ethical life, and philosophers such as Hutcheson made benevolence a key virtue in their ethical systems. However, it is not our purpose to examine Smith's critique of Hutcheson or indeed of any of his predecessors. Rather we aim in this paper to reflect on his treatment of this topic. We shall do so in part by means of comparisons with Aristotle and Plato, first with respect to friendship and then with respect to love generally. Smith's writing is replete with classical references, raising the issue of the degree to which his thought is "ancient" or "modern." Friendship is arguably the pinnacle of social relations for the ancients, and thus it provides us with a useful device for determining the degree to which Smith's thought embodies classical moral and philosophical principles. The subtlety of Smith's interweaving of traditions will become visible as we reflect not just on the ways Smith's thought exhibits classical conceptions of friendship and love, but also on the ways he departs from them. For in at least one important respect, love is a closed book from Smith's standpoint, and thus, as it turns out, also at odds with classical friendship. (shrink)

This paper finds out whether a higher degree matters in school performance, and in demonstrating leadership and core behavioral competencies among school heads. This was conducted to support the existing and future policies of the Department of Education and interested funders for the scholarship and advanced studies of school heads. Using a cross-sectional method, it involved 192 randomly selected participants. Data on school performance was obtained at the office of Surigao del Sur Division, while data on competencies were gathered through (...) the self-administered assessment tools developed by the Department of Education. These data were analyzed using descriptive statistics and analysis of variance. Results revealed that there was no significant difference in the school performance of school heads. This implies that the highest degree obtained is not a guarantee for better school performance. As found, those with doctorate degrees had a very high and consistent demonstration in all dimensions of leadership and core behavioral competencies. As unveiled, there were significant differences in the demonstrated competencies based on the highest educational qualifications. These imply that obtaining the highest degrees can allow school heads to acquire, develop, and demonstrate the competencies consistently better than their counterparts. Results have implications for DepEd officials, funders, and policy-makers. (shrink)

Culturally Responsive Teaching (CRT) weaves together rigor and relevance while it improves student achievement and engagement. The Philippine Department of Education implemented Indigenous People’s education to respond to the demands for culturally responsive teaching. Teacher education graduates are expected to articulate the rootedness of education in sociocultural contexts in creating a learning environment that recognizes respect, connectedness, choice, personal relevance, challenges, engagement, authenticity, and effectiveness. Practice teachers need relevant exposure and immersion to fully develop their competence in CRT. This scenario (...) necessitates attention to assessing the competence of 191 practice teachers in CRT, correlating their competence across dimensions, and verifying the role of gender and degree programs in competence development. This investigation provides evidence on the role of gender in competence development toward culturally responsive teaching. Such competence is vital in practice teachers, especially because they are exposed to learners with diverse backgrounds during their teaching internship. This evidence informs supervising instructors in molding practice teachers. (shrink)

Interpreting Figurative Meaning critically evaluates the recent empirical work from psycholinguistics and neuroscience examining the successes and difficulties associated with interpreting figurative language. There is now a huge, often contradictory literature on how people understand figures of speech. Gibbs and Colston argue that there may not be a single theory or model that adequately explains both the processes and products of figurative meaning experience. Experimental research may ultimately be unable to simply adjudicate between current models in psychology, linguistics and philosophy (...) of how figurative meaning is interpreted. Alternatively, the authors advance a broad theoretical framework, motivated by ideas from 'dynamical systems theory', that describes the multiple, interacting influences which shape people's experiences of figurative meaning in discourse. This book details past research and theory, offers a critical assessment of this work and sets the stage for a new vision of figurative experience in human life. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:The Keats Bicentennial u To commemorate the bicentennial of the death of John Keats, the Institute for Digital Archaeaology, in collaboration with the Keats Shelley Memorial Association, has commissioned a series of poems inspired by the poet’s life and works, including the following pieces by UK Poet Laureate, Simon Armitage and poet and performance artist, Scarlett Sabet. All of the commissioned poems will be available in a new anthology (...) entitled Avernus’ Springs to be published by the Acensious Press in 2022. Roger L. Michel, Jr. u arion 28.3 winter 2021... (shrink)

This paper is devoted to the study of some subvarieties of the variety Q of Q-Heyting algebras, that is, Heyting algebras with a quantifier. In particular, a deeper investigation is carried out in the variety Q subscript 3 of three-valued Q-Heyting algebras to show that the structure of the lattice of subvarieties of Q is far more complicated that the lattice of subvarieties of Heyting algebras. We determine the simple and subdirectly irreducible algebras in Q subscript 3 and we construct (...) the lattice of subvarieties lambda (Q subscript 3) of the variety Q subscript 3. (shrink)

This paper analyses the way in which discourse and argumentation may vary depending on participants’ educational level and gender. Men and women from three different educational levels (literacy, advanced level and university students) participated in discussion groups that debated about women and work, the sharing of housework and the way in which girls and boys are educated. The results showed important differences depending on participants’ educational level and gender. In general, the main differences were related to educational level, while gender (...) tended to interact with educational level, as a moderating factor. (shrink)

Much critical attention to the Dialectic of the Critique of Pure Reason is devoted to two related concerns. The first is Kant's skeptical attack on the claims of pure reason to epistemic authority, where the focus is on the paralogisms and the antinomies of pure reason. The second involves Kant's refutation of idealism. These two concerns are of course intimately connected with one another and there are various ways to express that interconnection. Perhaps most generally it can be said that (...) Kant's assessment of reason in these two contexts is negative: it argues for the limitation of reason's claim to unbridled application and views reason as a faculty whose native propensity to seek such employment must be checked. Reason, as it turns out, is the great metaphysical impostor, whose representations, the ideas, have no epistemic warrant whatsoever. For it is the essence of Kant's position in the Dialectic that metaphysical conundra cannot be solved so long as reason arrogates to itself a direct and unrestricted epistemic or cognitive role and that reason ought to forebear from assigning itself any such status. Such a self-restriction of reason is, additionally, transcendentally necessary because it is that very limitation, Kant argues, that constitutes transcendental critique. (shrink)

PLATO’S Protagoras is composed of three distinct frames. The outer frame consists in Socrates’ brief discussion with an unnamed companion. The remainder of the Protagoras is willingly narrated by Socrates to the companion, from memory of course, and apparently right after the main action. The inner frame consists in Socrates’ dialogue with Hippocrates. Roused before dawn by the impetuous young man, Socrates leads Hippocrates to reflect on the wisdom of his enthusiastic desire to study with Protagoras. This is a classic (...) and successful little example of Socratic dialogue. He then takes Hippocrates to meet Protagoras; the bulk of the dialogue—call it the innermost frame—consists in Socrates’ exchanges with Protagoras. Hippocrates does not utter a word in this part of the dialogue, though it is initiated at his request and seems undertaken by Socrates for his benefit. (shrink)

The Bayesian brain hypothesis, predictive processing, and variational free energy minimisation are typically used to describe perceptual processes based on accurate generative models of the world. However, generative models need not be veridical representations of the environment. We suggest that they can be used to describe sensorimotor relationships relevant for behaviour rather than precise accounts of the world.

Platons Nomoi standen lange zu Unrecht im Schatten seiner Politeia. Dennoch prasentiert der umfangreiche und schwer zu interpretierende Dialog die Einsichten und Innovationen seines reifen Staatsdenkens. Sie werden in dem Band von internationalen Platon-Experten erschlossen. Zu diesen Einsichten und Innovationen zahlt der Gedanke, dass Machtmissbrauch durch politische Institutionen verhindert werden kann, und dass den Gesetzen Vorreden bzw. Praambeln vorangestellt werden sollen, die zu ihrer Befolgung uberreden. Die versammelten Original-Beitrage behandeln die zentralen Themen des Dialogs wie die neue Mischverfassung, die politische (...) Theologie, den Gesetzesbegriff, das Verhaltnis von Tugend- und Gesetzeslehre, die Erziehung und Bildung sowie den Einfluss und die Wirkung des Dialogs in der Antike, der Neuzeit und der Gegenwart. Eine ausfuhrliche Einleitung fuhrt in das Werk und seine Wirkungsgeschichte ein und informiert den Leser uber die Themen und Thesen der versammelten Beitrage. (shrink)