Purpose – The aim of this paper is to lay out some of the more complex issues arising in the area of publication ethics. The impact of electronic publishing and electronic information is a main focus of the paper. Design/methodology/approach – The paper draws in particular upon the work of the Committee on Publication Ethics including illustrative cases discussed at the forum, guidelines and discussion documents. Findings – Three areas are highlighted to stimulate discussion around challenges of publication ethics in (...) the digital era. These are the role of the internet in facilitating misconduct, the issue of confidentiality in publishing and how incentives in research assessments drive author behavior. Originality/value – The paper brings together a variety of issues discussed under the broader umbrella of electronic information and new technologies in publishing. (shrink)

BackgroundSex and gender differences are often overlooked in research design, study implementation and scientific reporting, as well as in general science communication. This oversight limits the generalizability of research findings and their applicability to clinical practice, in particular for women but also for men. This article describes the rationale for an international set of guidelines to encourage a more systematic approach to the reporting of sex and gender in research across disciplines.MethodsA panel of 13 experts representing nine countries developed the (...) guidelines through a series of teleconferences, conference presentations and a 2-day workshop. An internet survey of 716 journal editors, scientists and other members of the international publishing community was conducted as well as a literature search on sex and gender policies in scientific publishing.ResultsThe Sex and Gender Equity in Research (SAGER) guidelines are a comprehensive procedure for reporting of sex and gender information in study design, data analyses, results and interpretation of findings.ConclusionsThe SAGER guidelines are designed primarily to guide authors in preparing their manuscripts, but they are also useful for editors, as gatekeepers of science, to integrate assessment of sex and gender into all manuscripts as an integral part of the editorial process. (shrink)

Purpose – This paper aims to reflect on the area of publication ethics as related to scholarship responding to Curno’s invited paper, “Challenges to ethical publishing in the digital era”. Design/methodology/approach – This viewpoint draws up the rich experience of the author over an extended academic career. The constructed view blends empiricism and literary sources to develop justified position. Findings – There is resonance with Curno’s view. However, a counter position regarding the effect of the Internet on plagiarism (...) is offered. Opinion is given which extends across disciplines rather than remaining in the confines of science and technology. Originality/value – The response to Curno’s paper provides some alternative views and suggests directions in which the landscape of concern might be extended. (shrink)

How should physical entities be characterized? Physicalists, who have most to do with the notion, usually characterize the physical by reference to two components: 1. The physical entities are the entities treated by fundamental physics with the proviso that 2. Physical entities are not fundamentally mental (that is, do not individually possess or bestow mentality) Here I explore the extent to which the appeals to fundamental physics and to the NFM (“no fundamental mentality”) constraint are appropriate for characterizing the physical, (...) especially for purposes of formulating physicalism. Ultimately, I motivate and defend a version of an account incorporating both components: The physics-based NFM account: An entity existing at a world w is physical iff (i) it is treated, approximately accurately, by current or future (in the limit of inquiry, ideal) versions of fundamental physics at w, and (ii) it is not fundamentally mental (that is, does not individually either possess or bestow mentality). (shrink)

Self-control is integral to successful human agency. Without it we cannot extend our agency across time and secure central social, moral, and personal goods. But self-control is not a unitary capacity. In the first part of this paper we provide a taxonomy of self-control and trace its connections to agency and the self. In part two, we turn our attention to the external conditions that support successful agency and the exercise of self-control. We argue that what we call moral security (...) is a critical foundation for agency. Parts three and four explore what happens to agency when moral security is lacking, as in the case of those subject to racism, and those living in poverty. The disadvantages suffered by those who are poor, in a racial minority or other oppressed group, or suffering mental illness or addiction, are often attributed to a lack of individual self-control or personal responsibility. In particular, members of these groups are often seen as irresponsibly focused on short-term pleasures over long-term good, a view underwritten by particular psychological theories of self-control. We explore how narratives about racism and poverty undermine moral security, and limit and distort the possibility of synchronic and diachronic self-control. Where moral security is undermined, the connection between self-control and diachronic goods often fails to obtain and agency contracts accordingly. We close with some preliminary reflections on the implications for responsibility. (shrink)

The aim of this study is to provide a discussion on the definitions and conceptual dimensions of Responsible Research and Innovation based on findings from the literature. In the study, the outcomes of a literature review of 235 RRI-related articles were presented. The articles were selected from the EBSCO and Google Scholar databases regarding the definitions and dimensions of RRI. The results of the study indicated that while administrative definitions were widely quoted in the reviewed literature, they were not substantially (...) further elaborated. Academic definitions were mostly derived from the institutional definitions; however, more empirical studies should be conducted in order to give a broader empirical basis to the development of the concept. In the current study, four distinct conceptual dimensions of RRI that appeared in the reviewed literature were brought out: inclusion, anticipation, responsiveness and reflexivity. Two emerging conceptual dimensions were also added: sustainability and care. (shrink)

In the Critique of Judgment, Kant claims that genius is a talent for art, but not for science. Despite his restriction of genius to the domain of fine art, several recent interpreters have suggested that genius has a role to play in Kant’s account of cognition in general and scientific practice in particular. In this paper, I explore Kant’s reasons for excluding genius from science as well as the reasons that one might nevertheless be tempted to think that his account (...) allows room for the scientific genius. I then argue that Kant’s concerns are not only epistemic, but also moral, and together, they give us good reason for resisting the veneration of genius. (shrink)

ZusammenfassungIn der Deutschschweizer massenmedialen Debatte zur Weigerung zweier Schüler in der Gemeinde Therwil, ihrer Lehrerin die Hand zu schütteln, wird häufig der Kulturbegriff verwendet. Der vorliegende Beitrag analysiert, wie „Kultur“ als wissensstrukturierende Kategorie in der Konstituierung der Gruppenzugehörigkeiten zur Schweizer Mehrheitsgesellschaft und zur muslimischen Minderheit zum Tragen gekommen ist. Basierend auf dem Konzept der „Kulturalisierung“ untersucht die qualitative Medienanalyse die verschiedenen „Spielarten der Kulturalisierung“ (Teczan 2011), die in der Debatte um den Fall Therwil verwendet wurden. Die Ergebnisse zeigen, dass „Kultur“ (...) in Beziehung zu geografischer Herkunft, religiöser Zugehörigkeit und spezifischen Wertvorstellungen gesetzt wurde. Gleichzeitig kann die Verknüpfung dieser Ideen mit Vorstellungen „kulturspezifischer“ Geschlechterverhältnisse und angenommenen Einstellungen zur Geschlechtergerechtigkeit und sexuellen Liberalisierung beobachtet werden. (shrink)

Zusammenfassung Hintergrund Stigmatisierung hat einen erheblichen Einfluss auf die Gesundheit verschiedener gesellschaftlicher Gruppen und trägt zu Ungleichheiten im Gesundheitswesen bei. Sexarbeit ist mit erheblichem sozialem Stigma verbunden, das sich nachteilig auf den Zugang von Sexarbeiter*innen zur Gesundheitsversorgung auswirkt. Die vorliegende explorative Studie gibt erste Einblicke in die Sichtweisen von Sexarbeiter*innen und Berater*innen in Deutschland auf den Zugang, die Bedürfnisse und die Barrieren von Sexarbeiter*innen in Bezug auf die Gesundheitsversorgung. Dabei lag der Fokus auf einem etablierten Netzwerk von Gesundheitsangeboten für Sexarbeiter*innen (...) in Bochum. Methoden Leitfadengestützte Interviews wurden mit 4 Berater*innen durchgeführt, die soziale und medizinische Beratung für Sexarbeiter*innen anbieten, sowie mit 3 Sexarbeiter*innen, die diese Angebote nutzen. Die Interviews wurden mittels qualitativer Inhaltsanalyse nach Kuckartz ausgewertet. Ergebnisse Es zeigten sich verschiedene Hürden bei der Inanspruchnahme von Gesundheitsversorgung, insbesondere aufgrund unzureichender Krankenversicherung oder fehlendem Wissen über den eigenen Krankenversicherungsstatus, Sprachbarrieren, Bürokratie, Mobilität und Diskriminierung in der Gesundheitsversorgung. Diskriminierung aufgrund von Sexarbeit überschnitt sich mit anderen Diskriminierungsformen, wie beispielsweise antislawischem Rassismus oder der Stigmatisierung von Schwangerschaftsabbrüchen. Spezifische Bedürfnisse und Barrieren wurden hinsichtlich psychischer Gesundheit angegeben, die sich als wichtiges Thema für Sexarbeiter*innen erwies. Die bestehenden kostenlosen, anonymen und zugänglichen Angebote für Sexarbeiter*innen, insbesondere aufsuchende Angebote, wurden als hilfreich beschrieben. Sexarbeiter*innen und Berater*innen wiesen auf einen Mangel an Angeboten für unterschiedliche Bedürfnisse von Sexarbeiter*innen hin, die über Tests auf sexuell übertragbare Infektionen und deren Behandlung hinausgehen, z. B. im Bereich der psychischen Gesundheit. Schlussfolgerung Nach wie vor bestehen Barrieren für den Zugang zur Gesundheitsversorgung, von denen viele besonders Sexarbeiter*innen mit Migrationsgeschichten aus osteuropäischen Ländern betreffen. Die Studie zeigt, dass die Etablierung antidiskriminierender Gesundheitsangebote für Sexarbeiter*innen notwendig ist. Bei der Entwicklung solcher Angebote sollten die Perspektiven von Sexarbeiter*innen eine zentrale Rolle einnehmen. (shrink)

Presents some of the latest research in Frame Semantics, including work in computational lexicography as developed within the FrameNet project.

Menschen mit psychischer Erkrankung sterben statistisch gesehen früher als die Allgemeinbevölkerung. Ein Grund hierfür ist, dass sie eine schlechtere somatische Gesundheitsversorgung erhalten. Wir argumentieren, dass ableistische Netzwerke sozialer Bedeutung zu einer Abwertung der epistemischen Kompetenz von Menschen mit psychischer Erkrankung führen. Diese Abwertung kann mit dem Konzept der testimonialen Ungerechtigkeit erfasst werden. Testimoniale Ungerechtigkeit bezeichnet das ungerechtfertigte Herabstufen der Glaubwürdigkeit einer*s Sprecher*in aufgrund eines Vorurteils gegen ihre*seine soziale Identität. Wir analysieren ethische und epistemische Folgen testimonialer Ungerechtigkeit als wichtige Ursachen der (...) schlechteren Gesundheitsversorgung von Menschen mit psychischer Erkrankung. Testimoniale Ungerechtigkeit kann zu medizinischen Behandlungsfehlern führen und für Betroffene schwerwiegende gesundheitliche Folgen nach sich ziehen. Zudem kann sie zu einem Vertrauensverlust von Menschen mit psychischer Erkrankung in das Gesundheitssystem führen. Daher trägt testimoniale Ungerechtigkeit zur strukturellen Diskriminierung von Menschen mit psychischer Erkrankung bei. Vor diesem Hintergrund diskutieren wir, wie die somatische Gesundheitsversorgung unter ethischen Gesichtspunkten verbessert werden kann. (shrink)

In mental health ethics, it is generally assumed that coercive measures are sometimes justified when persons with mental illness endanger themselves or others. Coercive measures are regarded as ethically justified only when certain criteria are fulfilled: for example, the intervention must be proportional in relation to the potential harm. In this paper, we demonstrate shortcomings of this established ethical framework in cases where people with mental illness experience structural racism. By drawing on a case example from mental healthcare, we first (...) demonstrate that biases in assessing whether the coercive intervention is proportional are likely, for example, due to an overestimation of dangerousness. We then show that even if proportionality is assessed correctly, and the specific coercive intervention would thus be regarded as ethically justified according to the standard framework, coercion may still be ethically problematic. This is because the standard framework does not consider how situations in which coercive measures are applied arise. If structural racism causally contributes to such situations, the use of coercion can compound the prior injustice of racist discrimination. We conclude that the ethical analysis of coercion in mental healthcare should consider the possibility of discriminatory biases and practices and systematically take the influence of structural discrimination into account. (shrink)

Some claim that Non-reductive Physicalism is an unstable position, on grounds that NRP either collapses into reductive physicalism, or expands into emergentism of a robust or ‘strong’ variety. I argue that this claim is unfounded, by attention to the notion of a degree of freedom—roughly, an independent parameter needed to characterize an entity as being in a state functionally relevant to its law-governed properties and behavior. I start by distinguishing three relations that may hold between the degrees of freedom needed (...) to characterize certain special science entities, and those needed to characterize their composing physical entities; these correspond to what I call ‘reductions’, ‘restrictions’, and ‘eliminations’ in degrees of freedom. I then argue that eliminations in degrees of freedom, in particular—when strictly fewer degrees of freedom are required to characterize certain special science entities than are required to characterize their composing physical entities—provide a basis for making sense of how certain special science entities can be both physically acceptable and ontologically irreducible to physical entities. (shrink)

Arguably no concept is more fundamental to science than that of causality, for investigations into cases of existence, persistence, and change in the natural world are largely investigations into the causes of these phenomena. Yet the metaphysics and epistemology of causality remain unclear. For example, the ontological categories of the causal relata have been taken to be objects (Hume 1739), events (Davidson 1967), properties (Armstrong 1978), processes (Salmon 1984), variables (Hitchcock 1993), and facts (Mellor 1995). (For convenience, causes and effects (...) will usually be understood as events in what follows.) Complicating matters, causal relations may be singular (Socrates’s drinking hemlock caused Socrates’s death) or general (Drinking hemlock causes death); hence the relata might be tokens (e.g., instances of properties) or types (e.g., types of events) of the category in question. Other questions up for grabs are: Are singular causes metaphysically and/or epistemologically prior to general causes or vice versa (or neither)? What grounds the intuitive asymmetry of the causal relation? Are macro-causal relations reducible to micro-causal relations? And perhaps most importantly: Are causal facts (e.g., the holding of causal relations) reducible to non-causal facts (e.g., the holding of certain spatiotemporal relations)? (shrink)

Zusammenfassung Im internationalen Diskurs sind feministische Perspektiven auf die Medizinethik bereits etabliert. Demgegenüber scheinen diese bislang nur vereinzelt in den deutschsprachigen medizinethischen Diskurs eingebracht zu werden. In diesem Artikel untersuchen wir, welche feministischen Perspektiven im deutschsprachigen medizinethischen Diskurs vertreten sind, und schlagen weitere Ansätze für eine feministische Medizinethik vor. Zu diesem Zweck zeichnen wir mittels einer systematisierten Literaturrecherche feministische Perspektiven im deutschsprachigen medizinethischen Diskurs seit der Etablierung der Medizinethik als eigenständiger institutionalisierter Disziplin nach. Wir analysieren, welche Themen bereits innerhalb der (...) Medizinethik aus einer feministischen Perspektive untersucht worden sind, und identifizieren Leerstellen. Basierend auf der Literaturrecherche, unseren eigenen Vorarbeiten sowie der Zusammenarbeit in der Arbeitsgruppe in der Akademie für Ethik in der Medizin „Feministische Perspektiven in der Bio- und Medizinethik“ stellen wir drei Thesen vor, die aus unserer Sicht einer Weiterentwicklung des deutschsprachigen medizinethischen Diskurses dienen können. Die erste These bezieht sich auf die Ziele feministischer Medizinethiken und besagt, dass diese (epistemische) Gerechtigkeit anstreben. Die zweite These stellt zentrale Eigenschaften von feministischen Medizinethiken als kritisch und kontext-sensibel heraus. In der dritten These diskutieren wir Intersektionalität und Postkolonialismus als theoretische Ansätze, die zu einer epistemisch gerechten, kritischen und kontext-sensiblen Medizinethik beitragen können. Wir argumentieren, dass feministische Perspektiven grundständig verankert werden sollten. Der Artikel schließt mit einem Ausblick auf die Arbeit der im letzten Jahr gegründeten Arbeitsgruppe in der Akademie für Ethik in der Medizin „Feministische Perspektiven in der Bio- und Medizinethik“. (shrink)

Definition of the problemFeminist approaches to medical ethics are well established in international discourses. By contrast, in the German-speaking medical ethical discourse, they still seem to be rather marginal. In this article, we analyze which feminist perspectives are prominent in German medical ethics and suggest new approaches.ArgumentsWe present our results from a systematized review of the literature, in which we identify existing feminist approaches within the German-speaking medical ethics discourse as well as research gaps. Based on the review, our preliminary (...) research and discussions in the working group “Feminist perspectives in bio and medical ethics”, we defend three hypotheses aimed at advancing the German feminist medical ethical discourse. We posit that (1) feminist medical ethics aim at (epistemic) justice, (2) feminist medical ethics are critical and context-sensitive, and (3) intersectional and postcolonial approaches within feminist medical ethics may contribute to epistemically just, critical, and context-sensitive medical ethics.ConclusionWe argue that feminist perspectives should be implemented as a fundamental perspective in medical ethics because they can bring together key dimensions such as epistemically just, critical, context-sensitive, intersectional, and postcolonial thinking. (shrink)

(Note: the posted version of this paper is undergoing non-trivial revision; an updated version will be posted in June 2024.) Is there a need for a distinctively diachronic conception of metaphysical emergence? Here I argue to the contrary. In the main, my strategy consists in considering a representative sample of accounts of purportedly diachronic metaphysical emergence, and arguing that in each case, the purportedly diachronic emergence at issue either can (and should) be subsumed under a broadly synchronic account of metaphysical (...) emergence, or else is better seen as simply a case of causation. In addition, I consider and argue against the suggestion that 'in-principle unpredictability' accounts of diachronic emergence support there being distinctively diachronic metaphysical emergence. (shrink)

Alexander of Aphrodisias's commentary (about AD 200) is the earliest extant commentary on Aristotle's Metaphysics, and it is the most valuable indirect witness to the Metaphysics text and its transmission. Mirjam Kotwick's study is a systematic investigation into the version of the Metaphysics that Alexander used when writing his commentary, and into the various ways his text, his commentary, and the texts transmitted through our manuscripts relate to one another. Through a careful analysis of lemmata, quotations, and Alexander's discussion (...) of Aristotle's argument Kotwick shows how to uncover and partly reconstruct a Metaphysics version from the second century AD. Kotwick then uses this version for improving the text that came down to us by the direct manuscript tradition and for finding solutions to some of the puzzles in this tradition. Through a side-by-side examination of Alexander's text, his interpretation of Aristotle's thought, and the directly transmitted versions of the Metaphysics, Kotwick reveals how Alexander's commentary may have influenced the text of our manuscripts at different stages of the transmission process. This study is the first book-length examination of a commentary as a witness to an ancient philosophical text. This blend of textual criticism and philosophical analysis both expands on existing methodologies in classical scholarship and develops new ones. (shrink)

Until recently, moral case deliberation (MCD) sessions have mostly been facilitated by external experts, mainly professional ethicists. We have developed a train the facilitator programme for healthcare professionals aimed at providing them with the competences needed for being an MCD facilitator. In this paper, we present the first results of a study in which we evaluated the programme. We used a mixed methods design. One hundred and twenty trained healthcare professionals and five trainers from 16 training groups working in different (...) healthcare organisations throughout the Netherlands were included. After completion of the programme, participants feel sufficiently confident and equipped to facilitate an MCD session. Feeling competent does not mean that participants have no doubts or questions left. Rather, they are aware of their limitations and see the need for continuous learning. According to the respondents, the actual exercise of facilitating MCD during and in between the training sessions contributed most to the development of competences necessary for being an MCD facilitator. Respondents without prior experience of participating in MCD sessions felt less competent after the training than those who had participated in MCD sessions before. Self-attributed competence varied between participants with different professional backgrounds. (shrink)

In this article, I apply the concept of solidarity to collective knowledge practices in healthcare. Generally, solidarity acknowledges that people are dependent on each other in many respects, and it captures those support practices that people engage in out of concern for others in whom they recognise a relevant similarity. Drawing on the rich literature on solidarity in bioethics and beyond, this article specifically discusses the role that epistemic solidarity can play in healthcare. It thus focuses, in particular, on solidarity’s (...) relationship with justice and injustice. In this regard, it is argued (1) that justice and solidarity are two equally important and complementary values that should both be considered in healthcare practices and institutions and (2) that solidarity often arises in unjust situations and can be a means to bring about justice. I transfer these ‘general’ insights about solidarity to knowledge practices in healthcare and link them to the discussion about epistemic injustices in healthcare and how to overcome them. I argue that epistemic solidarity can play an important role in overcoming epistemic injustices as well as—and independently from its contribution to justice—in knowledge production in medicine more generally. To demonstrate how epistemic solidarity can add to our understanding of collective knowledge practices, I discuss two examples: patients sharing their medical data for research purposes and healthcare professionals’ engagement with patients to better understand their afflictions. (shrink)

Liberal democracies who perpetrate torture represent an apparent paradox: a flagrant violation of human rights by states supposedly dedicated to protecting human rights. In liberal democracies, the political, social, and legal narratives used to justify torture portray torture as an individual act motivated by important moral values. This individualized torture narrative then shapes the moral framework through which the public, policy-makers, and individual torturers view torture, and masks the institutional nature of torture perpetration. It is this interaction between an individualized (...) torture narrative and the moral framework of torture that distinguishes democratic perpetrators (Critchell et al. 2017, 9-10) from nondemocratic perpetrators of torture. Yet, the implementation of a torture program in a democratic state is remarkably similar to the implementation of a torture program in a nondemocratic state. In both cases, torture is an institutionalized practice given moral and political meaning through broad social and political narratives. This chapter uses the post-9/11 US torture program as a case study of a democratic perpetrator in order to explore the interaction between democratic narratives of torture, state implementation of torture, and the moral psychology of individual torturers. This permits a way of thinking about torture perpetration that goes beyond a myopic focus on torture as individual act to understand the interaction and mutual reinforcement of different forms of torture perpetration. This analysis also offers a starting point from which to consider how to resist and oppose torture narratives that sustain democratic tortue, a question I explore in the conclusion of this chapter. (shrink)

Was passiert mit Universalsemantiken wie der Ästhetik oder der Ethik um 1900, als die deutsche Gesellschaft den Umbruch von einer stratifiktorischen hin zu einer funktionalen Differenzierungsform vollzieht? Die Studie diskutiert anhand von Ästhetiken damaliger Denkrichtungen die Denkfiguren, auf denen sich der Universalanspruch ästhetisch-moralischer Kommunikation aufbaut. Am Beispiel der Debatte um Schmutz und Schund zeigt sie, wie die meisten Diskutanten die >Rede über Kunst.

A number of examples of studies from the field ‘The Philosophy of Mathematical Practice’ (PMP) are given. To characterise this new field, three different strands are identified: an agent-based, a historical, and an epistemological PMP. These differ in how they understand ‘practice’ and which assumptions lie at the core of their investigations. In the last part a general framework, capturing some overall structure of the field, is proposed.

William Henry Fox Talbot (1800-1877) ist vor allem als Erfinder der Fotografie bekannt. Basierend auf umfassenden neuen Quellen wird hier erstmals Talbots Erfindung im Hinblick auf sein Gesamtoeuvre untersucht. Dies ermöglicht neue Interpretationen seiner Fotografien, die die Autorin primär als Hilfsmittel für seine vielfältigen wissenschaftlichen Interessen und somit als Teil eines größeren epistemischen Gedankengebildes versteht.

Debates about terrorism and technology often focus on the potential uses of technology by non-state terrorist actors and by states as forms of counterterrorism. Yet, little has been written about how technology shapes how we think about terrorism. In this chapter I argue that technology, and the language we use to talk about technology, constrains and shapes our understanding of the nature, scope, and impact of terrorism, particularly in relation to state terrorism. After exploring the ways in which technology shapes (...) moral thinking, I use two case studies to demonstrate how technology simultaneously hides and enables terroristic forms of state violence: police control technologies and Unmanned Aerial Vehicles (UAVs), or drones. In both these cases, I argue that features of these technologies, combined with a narrative of precision and efficiency, serves to mask the terroristic nature of the violence that these practices inflict and reinforces the moral exclusion of those against whom these technologies are deployed. In conclusion, I propose that identifying acts of terrorism requires a focus on the impact of technologies of violence (whether they are “high tech” or not) on those most affected, regardless of whether users of these technologies conceive of their actions as terroristic. (shrink)

(Note: this is the lead article in a forthcoming issue of _Australasian Philosophical Review_ edited by Dana Goswick, with invited comments by Karen Bennett, Ricki Bliss, Jonathan Schaffer, Alexander Skiles. In June 2024 there will be an open call for other commentators; please contact Dana or Jessica if you are interested.) A wide range of scientific, religious/cosmological, and philosophical views presuppose that there is what I call `metaphysical structure', whereby (i) some goings-on in a given domain D are (absolutely (...) or comparatively) fundamental; and (ii) (comparatively) non-fundamental goings-on in D metaphysically depend on (absolutely or comparatively) fundamental goings-on in D. Such presuppositions motivate two broadly metametaphysical questions: (i) what makes it the case that some goings-on in a domain D are (absolutely or comparatively) fundamental? and (ii) what makes it the case that (comparatively) non-fundamental goings-on in a domain D metaphysically depend on (absolutely or comparatively) fundamental goings-on in D? Here I advance my preferred 'Fundamentality First' package deal approach to metaphysical structure, which couples a primitivist approach to fundamentality with a pluralist approach to metaphysical dependence. (shrink)

Increased technological and pharmacological interventions in patient care when patient outcomes are uncertain have been linked to the escalation in moral and ethical dilemmas experienced by health care providers in acute care settings. Health care research has shown that facilities that are able to attract and retain nursing staff in a competitive environment and provide high quality care have the capacity for nurses to process and resolve moral and ethical dilemmas. This article reports on the findings of a systematic review (...) of the empirical literature (1980 — February 2007) on the effects of unresolved moral distress and poor ethical climate on nurse turnover. Articles were sought to answer the review question: Does unresolved moral distress and a poor organizational ethical climate increase nurse turnover? Nine articles met the criteria of the review process. Although the prevailing sentiment was that poor ethical climate and moral distress caused staff turnover, definitive answers to the review question remain elusive because there are limited data that confidently support this statement. (shrink)

Madole & Harden argue that the Mendelian reshuffling of genes and genomes is analogous to randomised controlled trials. We are not convinced by their arguments. First, their recipe for meeting the demands on randomised experiments is inherently inconsistent. Second, disequilibrium across chromosomes conflicts with their assumption of statistical independence. Third, the genome-wide association study (GWAS) method has many pitfalls, including low repeatability.

Smartphone apps might offer a low-threshold approach to the detection of mental health conditions, such as depression. Based on the gathering of ‘passive data,’ some apps generate a user’s ‘digital phenotype,’ compare it to those of users with clinically confirmed depression and issue a warning if a depressive episode is likely. These apps can, thus, serve as epistemic tools for affected users. From an ethical perspective, it is crucial to consider epistemic injustice to promote socially responsible innovations within digital mental (...) healthcare. In cases of epistemic injustice, people are wronged specifically as epistemic agents, i.e., agents of the production and distribution of knowledge. We suggest that epistemic agency relies on different resource- and uptake-related preconditions which can be impacted by the functionality of passive self-tracking apps. We consider how this can lead to different forms of epistemic injustice (testimonial, hermeneutical, and contributory injustice) and analyze the influence of the apps’ use on epistemic practices on an individual level, in mental healthcare settings, and on the structural level. (shrink)

Assertion is a fundamental feature of language. This volume will be the place to look for anyone interested in current work on the topic.

Technologies to rapidly alert people when they have been in contact with someone carrying the coronavirus SARS-CoV-2 are part of a strategy to bring the pandemic under control. Currently, at least 47 contact-tracing apps are available globally. They are already in use in Australia, South Korea and Singapore, for instance. And many other governments are testing or considering them. Here we set out 16 questions to assess whether — and to what extent — a contact-tracing app is ethically justifiable.

Research groups around the world are currently busy trying to invent new life in the laboratory, looking for extraterrestrial life, or making machines increasingly more life-like. In the case of astrobiology, any newly discovered life would likely be very old, but when discovered it would be new to us. In the case of synthetic organic life or life-like machines, humans will have invented life that did not exist before. Together, these endeavors amount to what we call the emerging plurality of (...) lives because we see a future where we are surrounded by, and interact with, life of many different origins, as well as entities that we have not traditionally seen as being alive. In the future these entities will likely possess properties that we so far have only associated with living beings, thereby transcending and perhaps blurring the borders between life and non-life. (shrink)

Jessica Flanigan defends patients' rights of self-medication on the grounds that same moral reasons against medical paternalism in clinical contexts are also reasons against paternalistic pharmaceutical policies, including prohibitive approval processes and prescription requirements.

The debate about the ethical implications of Artificial Intelligence dates from the 1960s :741–742, 1960; Wiener in Cybernetics: or control and communication in the animal and the machine, MIT Press, New York, 1961). However, in recent years symbolic AI has been complemented and sometimes replaced by Neural Networks and Machine Learning techniques. This has vastly increased its potential utility and impact on society, with the consequence that the ethical debate has gone mainstream. Such a debate has primarily focused on principles—the (...) ‘what’ of AI ethics —rather than on practices, the ‘how.’ Awareness of the potential issues is increasing at a fast rate, but the AI community’s ability to take action to mitigate the associated risks is still at its infancy. Our intention in presenting this research is to contribute to closing the gap between principles and practices by constructing a typology that may help practically-minded developers apply ethics at each stage of the Machine Learning development pipeline, and to signal to researchers where further work is needed. The focus is exclusively on Machine Learning, but it is hoped that the results of this research may be easily applicable to other branches of AI. The article outlines the research method for creating this typology, the initial findings, and provides a summary of future research needs. (shrink)

Pt. I. The apparent good. Evaluative cognition -- Perceiving the good -- Phantasia and the apparent good -- pt. II. The apparent good and non-rational motivation. Passions and the apparent good -- Akrasia and the apparent good -- pt. III. The apparent good and rational motivation. Phantasia and deliberation -- Happiness, virtue, and the apparent good -- Practical induction -- Conclusion : Aristotle's practical empiricism.

This paper explores the complex relationship between the meaning of predicates and the morphosyntactic expression of their arguments, as manifested in the swarm-class alternations in Czech. One way of getting at the nature of the alternations is to take a frame-semantic approach, which allows us to introduce the notion of scene as an important factor in linking relationships. It is proposed that linking patterns are organized in a network of generalized scene types, each of which represents a particular role configuration (...) structured in such a way that one of its roles can be singled out as the vantage point from which that event type is conventionally presented in a particular diathesis; the analysis argues for the notion of viewpoint as an event-structuring concept (distinct from discourse-based topicness) that is directly reflected in certain conventionalized linking patterns. The results of the investigation show that what may appear to be hard-to-predict variations in subject selection can be treated as instances of regular linking relations. (shrink)

In diesem Artikel diskutiere ich zwei Herausforderungen für Serene J. Khaders Vorschlag einer transnationalen anti-imperialistischen feministischen Ethik. Die erste Herausforderung ist methodologischer Art und wirft die Frage auf, welche epistemischen und politischen Faktoren für Khaders nicht-idealer Theoriebildung eine Rolle spielen. Die zweite Herausforderung stellt sich mit Blick auf die Frage, wie stark Widerstand gegen sexistische Unterdrückung als Grundlage für transnationalen Feminismus tatsächlich ist. In diesem Zusammenhang diskutiere ich außerdem die Frage nach der Beziehung zwischen sexistischer Unterdrückung und Kapitalismus.

Bilateral investment treaties constitute an important instrument to facilitate global investment. Recent discussions in political theory have highlighted several normative concerns raised by bilateral investment treaties. One worry is that investment treaties undermine national self‐determination as they grant investors far‐reaching protections that can be legally enforced. Another worry is that the benefits and burdens entailed in bilateral investment treaties are distributed unfairly in a way that benefits investors at the expense of states and disadvantaged groups within states. Instead of critiquing (...) bilateral investment treaties from a perspective of global (distributive) justice, in this article I develop a class‐based critique. This involves a twofold departure. First, the article shifts the focus from distributions to the power relations that are built into the global capitalist economy and that come into sharp relief in the practice of global investment. Second, rather than focusing on the relation between states and investors, I claim that in a class‐based critique the relation between workers and investors should take centre stage. I argue that bilateral investment treaties are effectively an instrument of class domination, insofar as they reproduce and increase the power of transnational corporations while at the same time decreasing the power of workers. (shrink)