Background Gerontechnologies are increasingly used in the care for older people. Many studies on their acceptability and ethical implications are conducted, but mainly from the perspective of principlism. This narrows our ethical gaze on the implications the use of these technologies have. Research question How do participants speak about the impact that gerontechnologies have on the different phases of care, and care as a process? What are the moral implications from an ethic of care perspective? Research design Secondary analysis of (...) semi-structure interviews, whose segments on specific technologies were analysed through reflexive thematic analysis. Participants and research context Sixty-seven Swiss stakeholders involved in the use of gerontechnologies, including professional caregivers, informal caregivers, and older persons themselves. Ethical considerations The research study was evaluated by the Ethics Commission of Northwest and Central Switzerland (EKNZ). All participants received an information document before the interview date detailing the purpose, procedure, and anonymization measures. After explaining the study during the agreed upon interview time and upon receiving their written informed consent, the interview process began. Findings/results Four themes are identified: Identifying care needs, Taking responsibility, Hands-on work, Responding to care. As part of these themes, many codes highlighting the ambivalent impact of gerontechnologies are created, ranging from ‘Expanded capacity for…identifying care needs’ to ‘Create new & (un)necessary…hands-on work’. The moral implications of these results from the care ethics perspective are discussed, through the ethical elements of: attentiveness, responsibility, competence, and responsiveness. Conclusions The moral implications of gerontechnologies on care phases from the care ethics perspective open up several questions on whether they actually help give care a central role in social life and provide more competent care. (shrink)

Logical form has always been a prime concern for philosophers belonging to the analytic tradition. For at least one century, the study of logical form has been widely adopted as a method of investigation, relying on its capacity to reveal the structure of thoughts or the constitution of facts. This book focuses on the very idea of logical form, which is directly relevant to any principled reflection on that method. Its central thesis is that there is no such thing as (...) a correct answer to the question of what is logical form: two significantly different notions of logical form are needed to fulfil two major theoretical roles that pertain respectively to logic and to semantics. This thesis has a negative and a positive side. The negative side is that a deeply rooted presumption about logical form turns out to be overly optimistic: there is no unique notion of logical form that can play both roles. The positive side is that the distinction between two notions of logical form, once properly spelled out, sheds light on some fundamental issues concerning the relation between logic and language. (shrink)

.This paper discusses Aristotle’s thesis and Boethius’ thesis, the most distinctive theorems of connexive logic. Its aim is to show that, although there is something plausible in Aristotle’s thesis and Boethius’ thesis, the intuitions that may be invoked to motivate them are consistent with any account of indicative conditionals that validates a suitably restricted version of them. In particular, these intuitions are consistent with the view that indicative conditionals are adequately formalized as strict conditionals.

Andrea Sangiacomo offers a new understanding of Spinoza's moral philosophy, how his views significantly evolved over time, and how he himself struggled during his career to develop a theory that could speak to human beings as they actually are--imperfect, passionate, and often not very rational.

Citizen science models of public participation in scientific research represent a growing area of opportunity for health and biomedical research, as well as new impetus for more collaborative forms of engagement in large-scale research. However, this also surfaces a variety of ethical issues that both fall outside of and build upon the standard human subjects concerns in bioethics. This article provides background on citizen science, examples of current projects in the field, and discussion of established and emerging ethical issues for (...) citizen science in health and biomedical research. (shrink)

The possibility of extraterrestrial intelligence (ETI) exists despite no observed evidence, and the risks and benefits of actively searching for ETI (Active SETI) have been debated. Active SETI has been criticized for potentially exposing humanity to existential risk, and a recent game-theoretical model highlights the Hobbesian trap that could occur following contact if mutual distrust leads to mutual destruction. We argue that observing a nearby ETI would suggest the existence of many unobserved ETI. This would expand the game and implies (...) that there may be a mechanism that prevents ETI from attacking us. As a result, the Hobbesian trap would be avoided if both parties assumed the other is not likely to attack. (shrink)

In the intriguing article The puzzle of the changing past, Barlassina and Del Prete argue that, if one grants a platitude about truth and accepts a simple story that they tell, one is forced to conclude that the past has changed. I will suggest that there is a coherent way to resist that conclusion. The platitude about truth is in fact a platitude, but the story is not exactly as they tell it.

According to a widespread view, a complete explanatory reduction of all aspects of the human mind to the electro-chemical functioning of the brain is at hand and will certainly produce vast and positive cultural, political and social consequences. However, notwithstanding the astonishing advances generated by the neurosciences in recent years for our understanding of the mechanisms and functions of the brain, the application of these findings to the specific but crucial issue of human agency can be considered a “pre-paradigmatic science” (...) (in Thomas Kuhn’s sense). This implies that the situation is, at the same time, intellectually stimulating and methodologically confused. More specifically—because of the lack of a solid, unitary and coherent methodological framework as to how to connect neurophysiology and agency—it frequently happens that tentative approaches, bold but very preliminary claims and even clearly flawed interpretations of experimental data are taken for granted. In this article some examples of such conceptual confusions and intellectual hubris will be presented, which derive from the most recent literature at the intersection between neurosciences, on the one hand, and philosophy, politics and social sciences, on the other hand. It will also be argued that, in some of these cases, hasty and over-ambitious conclusions may produce negative social and political consequences. The general upshot will be that very much has still to be clarified as to what and how neurosciences can tell us about human agency and that, in the meantime, intellectual and methodological caution is to be recommended. (shrink)

The paper discusses an objection, put forward by - among others - John McDowell, to Kripke’s Wittgenstein’s non-factualist and relativist view of semantic discourse. The objection goes roughly as follows: while it is usually possible to be a relativist about a given domain of discourse without being a relativist about anything else, relativism about semantic discourse entails global relativism, which in turn entails subjective idealism, which we can reasonably assume to be false. The paper’s first section sketches Kripke’s Wittgenstein’s ideas (...) about semantic discourse and gives a fully explicit formulation of the objection. The second section describes and briefly discusses the formal apparatus needed to evaluate the objection - which is basically equivalent to John MacFarlane’s recent development of David Kaplan’s classic semantic framework. Finally, the third section explains in detail why the objection fails. I show that even though relativism about semantic discourse does entail a form of global relativism, the relativism in question does not entail anything like Berkeleyan or Fichtean idealism. This particular kind of relativism holds that which character (in Kaplan’s sense) is associated to a given utterance depends on what MacFarlane calls “the context of assessment”. (shrink)

Current debates on collective intentionality focus on the cognitive capacities, attitudes, and mental states that enable individuals to take part in joint actions. It is typically assumed that collective intentionality is a capacity which is added to other, pre-existing, capacities of an individual and is exercised in cooperative activities like carrying a table or painting a house together. We call this the additive account because it portrays collective intentionality as a capacity that an individual possesses in addition to her capacity (...) for individual intentionality. We offer an alternative view according to which the primary entity to which collective intentionality has to be ascribed is not the human individual, but a “form of life.” As a feature of a form of life, collective intentionality is something more than the specific capacity exercised by an individual when she cooperates with others. Collective intentionality transforms all the capacities of the bearers of this specific form of life. We thus call our proposal the transformative account of collective intentionality. (shrink)

Perceptions of a firm’s stance on corporate social responsibility (CSR) are influenced by its corporate marketing efforts including branding, reputation building, and communications. The current research examines CSR from the consumer’s perspective, focusing on antecedents and consequences of perceived CSR. The findings strongly support the fact that particular cues, namely perceived financial performance and perceived quality of ethics statements, influence perceived CSR which in turn impacts perceptions of corporate reputation, consumer trust, and loyalty. Both consumer trust and loyalty were also (...) found to reduce the perceived risk that consumers experience in buying and using products. From these significant findings, we draw several conclusions and implications, including the importance of enhancing firm focus toward its ethical commitment and long-term reputation. (shrink)

Le rêve de l’histoire, faut-il le lier au marxisme et à l’utopie d’une société sans classe? Mais en quoi le rêve participe-t-il lui même au récit de l’histoire? Introduisant une citation de Proust sur « la lampe nocturne de Flaubert [qui] faisait aux mariniers l’effet d’un phare », la liasse K du livre des Passages remarque non sans ironie que « ce petit échantillon d’analyse matérialiste [serait] plus précieux que la plupart des choses qui existent en ce domaine ». Proust (...) et Flaubert plutô... (shrink)

In der Tugendlehre Kants findet die allgemeine ethische Orientierung, wie sie der Kategorische Imperativ ausdrückt, Anwendung auf die Bedingungen der menschlichen Existenz. Die vorliegende Untersuchung rekonstruiert den Kantischen Ansatz vor dem Hintergrund der gegenwärtigen, vor allem aristotelischen Tugendethik und löst dabei den Kantischen Tugendbegriff kritisch von seinen zeitbedingten Prägungen. Auf so erneuerter Grundlage wird eine transzendentalphilosophische Ethikkonzeption entfaltet, die den methodischen und inhaltlichen Einsichten der jüngeren Theorieentwicklung Rechnung trägt. Zu den Ergebnissen zählt die Bestimmung einzelner Tugenden, deren ethische Orientierung an (...) konkreten Strukturen unserer alltäglichen Praxis demonstriert wird. (shrink)

Modern zoos strive to educate visitors about zoo animals and their wild counterparts’ conservation needs while fostering appreciation for wildlife in general. This research review examines how zoos influence those who visit them. Much of the research to-date examines zoo visitors’ behaviors and perceptions in relation to specific exhibits, animals and/or programs. In general, visitors have more positive perceptions and behaviors about zoos, their animals and conservation initiatives the more they interact with animals, naturalistic exhibits, and zoo programming/staff. Furthermore, zoo (...) visitors are receptive to conservation messaging and initiatives at zoos, and are more likely to participate in on-site conservation opportunities as opposed to after their visits. The research also suggests that repeat visitors are even more inclined to seek out conservation efforts compared to those visiting zoos for the first time. While current research suggests that repeat-visitors are more likely to engage in conservation efforts, little is known about causal factors related to such findings, and almost no research exists to-date comparing the conservation efforts of visitors vs. non-visitors. This latter comparison will likely play a greater role in future zoo visitor research, since it poses one of the most important metrics for evaluating the specific effects visiting a zoo can have on people engaging in conservation efforts in general. (shrink)

Anecdotal evidence has long lamented the status of social studies in elementary classrooms as observed by preservice teachers. As standardized testing has risen for mathematics and language arts, social studies has been pushed aside. In the aftermath of accountability legislation such as No Child Left Behind, research indicates that social studies is less visible in elementary classrooms due to an instructional focus on tested content areas (e.g. math, language arts, reading). In this study, approximately 90 elementary preservice teachers enrolled in (...) a social studies methods course responded to a survey and indicated the frequency and quality of lessons they observed over the course of a single semester. Findings report that preservice elementary teachers witnessed few, if any, lessons in social studies in the elementary classroom. Implications for teacher education are discussed. (shrink)

This paper reviews the uneven history of the relationship between Anthropology and Cognitive Science over the past 30 years, from its promising beginnings, followed by a period of disaffection, on up to the current context, which may lay the groundwork for reconsidering what Anthropology and (the rest of) Cognitive Science have to offer each other. We think that this history has important lessons to teach and has implications for contemporary efforts to restore Anthropology to its proper place within Cognitive Science. (...) The recent upsurge of interest in the ways that thought may shape and be shaped by action, gesture, cultural experience, and language sets the stage for, but so far has not fully accomplished, the inclusion of Anthropology as an equal partner. (shrink)

The central contention of this article is that the classificatory scheme of contemporary affective science, with its traditional categories of emotion, anger, fear, and so on, is no longer suitable to the needs of affective science. Unlike psychological constructionists, who have urged the transition from a discrete to a dimensional approach in the study of affective phenomena, I argue that we can stick to a discrete approach as long as we accept that traditional emotion categories will have to be transformed (...) in order to do any scientific work. I conclude by articulating some general rules for turning traditional emotion categories into suitable scientific tools. (shrink)

Max Bense gilt als Vorreiter der Computerkunst und der Technikphilosophie und war ein engagierter Förderer von Kunst und Literatur, Promotor interdisziplinären Denkens und politischer Provokateur. Häufig ist es bei der Auseinandersetzung mit Bense jedoch bei diesen Etikettierungen geblieben. Der Sammelband nimmt daher eine konzertierte Neuaufnahme der Diskussion von Max Benses Arbeiten aus literaturwissenschaftlicher, philosophie- und wissenschaftshistorischer sowie aus medien- und ästhetiktheoretischer Perspektive vor. Er versammelt Beiträge zu Themenkomplexen wie der Semiotik, Technikphilosophie, experimentellen Poesie und Ästhetiktheorie, zu Benses lokalen und internationalen (...) Kontakten und Netzwerken sowie zu seinem publizistischen Verhalten im Nationalsozialismus und in der Nachkriegszeit. (shrink)

Die Denkfigur des ordo inversus, die seit der Antike in den verschiedensten Disziplinen epistemische Sicherheit garantierte, verliert in der Zeit um 1800 an Plausibilität. Es kommt zu einem Formen- und Funktionswandel, der in den Künsten wie auch in den Natur-und Geisteswissenschaften auf vielfältige Weise resonierte. Der ordo inversus bezeichnet eine zirkuläre Bewegung, die von einem Anfangs- zu einem Endpunkt fortschreitet und im Zurückkehren wieder mit dem Ausgangspunkt verbunden wird, häufig in Teilbewegungen aufgespalten, etwa progressio/regressio oder analysis/synthesis. Als Methodenkonzept spielt er (...) von der Antike über das Mittelalter und die Frühe Neuzeit bis weit ins 18. Jahrhundert hinein eine zentrale Rolle in Theologie, Logik, Naturphilosophie und Hermeneutik. Das Zerbrechen des ordo inversus provoziert eine Reihe von Restitutionsversuchen von so unterschiedlichen Autoren wie Goethe, Novalis und Jean Paul, aber auch bei Lambert, Kant, Fichte und Schleiermacher. Der Band beleuchtet diese Prozesse in komparativer und historischer Perspektive und eröffnet so einen instruktiven Einblick in die historische Epistemologie im Übergang zur "Moderne". (shrink)

A widely accepted claim about counterfactuals is that they differ from strict conditionals, that is, there is no adequate representation of them as sentences of the form   . To justify this claim, Stalnaker and Lewis have argued that some fallacious inferences would turn out valid if counterfactuals were so represented. However, their argument has a flaw, as it rests on a questionable assumption about the relation between surface grammar and logical form. Without that assumption, no consequence of the (...) alleged kind is obtained, hence the claim may be rejected. (shrink)

This case study chronicles the pedagogical decision making of one high school teacher, Mr. Diego de la Vega, a pseudonym, as he teaches about race and racism in his elective social studies class, Race, Gender, and Ethnicity. De la Vega draws upon his own racial biography and experiences with race/ism to engage with high school students around racialized content. A conceptual framework grounded in racial identity development theory is used. This snapshot of racial pedagogical decision making, or RPDM, features a (...) discussion of implications for social studies pedagogy to promote racial identity development in the classroom. (shrink)

This paper outlines a truth-conditional view of logical form, that is, a view according to which logical form is essentially a matter of truth-conditions. The main motivation for the view is a fact that seems crucial to logic. As _§_1 suggests, fundamental logical relations such as entailment or contradiction can formally be explained only if truth-conditions are formally represented.§2 spells out the view. _§_3 dwells on its anity with a conception of logical form that has been defended in the past. (...) _§§_4-6 draw attention to its impact on three major issues that concern, respectively, the extension of the domain of formal explanation, the semantics of tensed discourse, and the analysis of quantication. (shrink)

Most contemporary chemists consider quantum mechanics to be the foundational theory of their discipline, although few of the calculations that a strict reduction would seem to require have ever been produced. In this essay I discuss contemporary algebraic and diagrammatic representations of molecular systems derived from quantum mechanical models, specifically configuration interaction wavefunctions for ab initio calculations and molecular orbital energy diagrams. My aim is to suggest that recent dissatisfaction with reductive accounts of chemical theory may stem from both the (...) inability of standard accounts of reduction to incorporate the diverse forms of representation found in chemical practice and our philosophical predilection to analyze all connections between theories in terms of logical reduction. (shrink)

Hospital ethics committees (HECs) and ethicists generally describe themselves as engaged in four domains of practice: case consultation, research, education, and policy work. Despite the increasing attention to quality indicators, practice standards, and evaluation methods for the other domains, comparatively little is known or published about the policy work of HECs or ethicists. This article attempts to open the ?black box? of this health care ethics practice by providing two detailed case examples of ethics policy reviews. We also describe the (...) development and application of an evaluation strategy to assess the quality of ethics policy review work, and to enable continuous improvement of ethics policy review processes. Given the potential for policy work to impact entire patient populations and organizational systems, it is imperative that HECs and ethicists develop clearer roles, responsibilities, procedural standards, and evaluation methods to ensure the delivery of consistent, relevant, and high-quality ethics policy reviews. (shrink)

This is a book about food, philosophy, and intellectual property rights. Taken separately, these are three well-known subjects; but it is uncommon to consider them together. Delivering a rich field of disputes, the book is comprised of 50 case studies, organized around eight themes: images; genericity and descriptiveness; language traps; procedures; menus, recipes, and creativity; boundaries; biotech; and empowerment. The introductory chapter frames the selection of cases and encourages readers to look beyond them, envisaging new lenses to look at food (...) vis-à-vis intellectual property. The terrain encompassed is wide-ranging and reaches out to fine-grained aspects of food products, recipes, and cooking. Conceived for a wide scope of readers, the volume ultimately interrogates the links between food and cultural identity, bringing to the fore the ethical, political, aesthetic worth of culinary arts and gastronomic experiences. This accessible book will be of value to scholars, students, practitioners and others with interests in the areas of intellectual property, food law and food studies. (shrink)

That the maximization of quality-adjusted life years violates concerns for fairness is well known. One approach to face this issue is to elicit fairness preferences of the public empirically and to incorporate the corresponding equity weights into cost-utility analysis (CUA). It is thereby sought to encounter the objections by means of an axiological modification while leaving the value-maximizing framework of CUA intact. Based on the work of Lübbe (2005, 2009a, 2009b, 2010, forthcoming), this paper questions this strategy and scrutinizes the (...) concomitant assumptions concerning the nature of prioritization decisions. Empirical studies indicate that these premises are in fact unwarranted. People chose a certain resource allocation because they perceive it as a fair way to treat the persons concerned, not because it maximizes something valuable, and it is questionable if prioritization decision can be represented as value-maximizing choices at all. This reflection on the fundamental distinction between deontological and consequentialist reasoning bears general implications for the scope of ‘economic imperialism.’. (shrink)

All spaces are assumed to be separable and metrizable. Consider the following properties of a space X. X is Polish.For every countable crowded Q⊆X\documentclass[12pt]{minimal} \usepackage{amsmath} \usepackage{wasysym} \usepackage{amsfonts} \usepackage{amssymb} \usepackage{amsbsy} \usepackage{mathrsfs} \usepackage{upgreek} \setlength{\oddsidemargin}{-69pt} \begin{document}$${Q \subseteq X}$$\end{document} there exists a crowded Q′⊆Q\documentclass[12pt]{minimal} \usepackage{amsmath} \usepackage{wasysym} \usepackage{amsfonts} \usepackage{amssymb} \usepackage{amsbsy} \usepackage{mathrsfs} \usepackage{upgreek} \setlength{\oddsidemargin}{-69pt} \begin{document}$${Q'\subseteq Q}$$\end{document} with compact closure.Every closed subspace of X is either scattered or it contains a homeomorphic copy of 2ω\documentclass[12pt]{minimal} \usepackage{amsmath} \usepackage{wasysym} \usepackage{amsfonts} \usepackage{amssymb} \usepackage{amsbsy} \usepackage{mathrsfs} \usepackage{upgreek} \setlength{\oddsidemargin}{-69pt} \begin{document}$${2^\omega}$$\end{document}.Every closed subspace of X (...) is a Baire space. While is the well-known property of being completely Baire, properties and have been recently introduced by Kunen, Medini and Zdomskyy, who named them the Miller property and the Cantor-Bendixson property respectively. It turns out that the implications →→→\documentclass[12pt]{minimal} \usepackage{amsmath} \usepackage{wasysym} \usepackage{amsfonts} \usepackage{amssymb} \usepackage{amsbsy} \usepackage{mathrsfs} \usepackage{upgreek} \setlength{\oddsidemargin}{-69pt} \begin{document}$${ \rightarrow \rightarrow \rightarrow }$$\end{document} hold for every space X. Furthermore, it follows from a classical result of Hurewicz that all these implications are equivalences if X is coanalytic. Under the axiom of Projective Determinacy, this equivalence result extends to all projective spaces. We will complete the picture by giving a ZFC\documentclass[12pt]{minimal} \usepackage{amsmath} \usepackage{wasysym} \usepackage{amsfonts} \usepackage{amssymb} \usepackage{amsbsy} \usepackage{mathrsfs} \usepackage{upgreek} \setlength{\oddsidemargin}{-69pt} \begin{document}$${\sf ZFC}$$\end{document} counterexample and a consistent definable counterexample of lowest possible complexity to the implication ←\documentclass[12pt]{minimal} \usepackage{amsmath} \usepackage{wasysym} \usepackage{amsfonts} \usepackage{amssymb} \usepackage{amsbsy} \usepackage{mathrsfs} \usepackage{upgreek} \setlength{\oddsidemargin}{-69pt} \begin{document}$${ \leftarrow }$$\end{document} for i=1,2,3\documentclass[12pt]{minimal} \usepackage{amsmath} \usepackage{wasysym} \usepackage{amsfonts} \usepackage{amssymb} \usepackage{amsbsy} \usepackage{mathrsfs} \usepackage{upgreek} \setlength{\oddsidemargin}{-69pt} \begin{document}$${i = 1, 2, 3}$$\end{document}. For one of these counterexamples we will need a classical theorem of Martin and Solovay, of which we give a new proof, based on a result of Baldwin and Beaudoin. Finally, using a method of Fischer and Friedman, we will investigate how changing the value of the continuum affects the definability of these counterexamples. Along the way, we will show that every uncountable completely Baire space has size continuum. (shrink)

(2008). The discrimination of angry and fearful facial expressions in 7-month-old infants: An event-related potential study. Cognition & Emotion: Vol. 22, No. 1, pp. 134-146.

Though widely derided by popular psychologists and self-help writers as an emotionally toxic and destructive response, blame has many defenders among contemporary moral philosophers. Blaming wrongdoers has been thought to express deep commitment to moral values and norms, to be intimately bound up with practices of holding others responsible, and to be an important exercise of moral agency. In this paper I push against the grain of such defenses of blame just enough to articulate what seems right in the more (...) popular lines of critique. I distinguish between blame as a reactive attitude and blaming as a speech act, and argue that some disagreement over the value of blame can be explained by the fact that blaming, as a speech act, takes several distinct forms. Critiques of blame, I suggest, properly target what we might call judgmental or strongly verdictive blaming, the sort of blaming that passes judgment on the wrongdoer him- or herself, and treats him or her as deserving of the blamer’s hostile or “punishing” reactions. This kind of blaming, I argue, tends to foreclose engagement in further moral dialogue with wrongdoers, an effect that is particularly destructive in therapeutic contexts. In such contexts, it is often more appropriate—and more constructive—to hold others answerable without blaming them in the strongly verdictive sense. I argue, moreover, that strongly verdictive blame may be similarly destructive outside of straightforwardly therapeutic contexts, and I challenge the idea that there is in any case a sharp or clear dividing line between therapeutic and non-therapeutic responses to wrongdoers. Holding answerable in a non-judgmental mode is a response that may have a therapeutic dimension, but it nonetheless engages a wrongdoer as a moral peer and partner in moral dialogue. This account of non-judgmental answerability, I suggest, captures much of what moral philosophers have taken to be valuable about blame, while accommodating the insights of those who criticize its more toxic forms. (shrink)

Phenomenology has been defined by Husserl as “theory of the essences of pure phenomena,” yet the ontological status of essences in Husserlian phenomenology is far from a settled issue. The late Husserlian emphasis on genetic constitution and the historicity of the lifeworld is not immediately reconcilablewith the ‘unchangeable’ nature that is prima facie attributed to essences. However, the problem of the nature of ideality cannot be dropped from phenomenological accounts without jeopardizing the phenomenological enterprise as such. Through an immanent analysis (...) of Husserl’s meditation on essences a positive account of their ontological status is provided. Essences are interpreted as ontological thresholds, primordially rooted in our motivated confrontation with sensuous transcendence. Essences appear as emergent ontological features, which are not reducible to their particular realizations and which exhibit a fundamental continuity between consciousness and being. They manifest themselves as prospectively a priori (a precondition for further experiences), but retrospectively a posteriori (they are founded in experience). Finally, essences manifest the ‘co-essential’ nature of consciousness and sensuous transcendence: they are the way in which we are motivated and constitutively bound to articulate being, which in turn is apt to be thus articulated. (shrink)

A comparison of two groups of college students, at a public state university and a private religious school, yields the same results: undergraduates’ interpretations of recent business scandals make distinctions between public and private behavior. Students admire “family men” even when they are caught at fraud. The students’ interpretations illustrate a significant gap in ethical theories: the benefits of a group perspective for corporate citizenship versus individual family values. Most leadership theories, including stakeholder theories, do not address this disjunction. This (...) article describes the phenomenon and maps the ethics literature to locate the dynamic forces underlying the empirical and theoretical disconnections between leadership and ethics. (shrink)

We investigate the initial segments of the Medvedev lattice as Brouwer algebras, and study the propositional logics connected to them.

Chapter 14. Andrea Timár engages with literary representations of the experience of perpetrators of dehumanization. Her chapter focuses on perpetrators of dehumanization who do not violate laws of their society (i.e., they are not criminals) but exemplify what Simona Forti, inspired by Hannah Arendt, calls “the normality of evil.” Through the parallel examples of Dezső Kosztolányi’s Anna Édes (1926) and Doris Lessing’s The Grass is Singing (1950), Timár first explores a possible clash between criminals and perpetrators of dehumanization, showing (...) literature’s exceptional ability to reveal the gap between ethics and law. Second, she examines novels focalized through perpetrators and the difficult narrative empathy they provoke, arguing that only the critical reading of these novels can make one engage with the potential perpetrator in oneself. As case studies, Timár examines Daniel Defoe’s Robinson Crusoe (1719), which may potentially turn its reader into an accomplice in the process of dehumanization, and J.M. Coetzee’s Foe (1986), which puts on critical display the dehumanizing potentials of both aesthetic representation and sympathy as imaginative violence. Third, she reads Jonathan Littell’s The Kindly Ones [Les Bienveillantes, 2006], which can make the reader question, through the polyphony of the voice of its protagonist, the notions of narrative voice and readerly empathy, only to reveal that the difficulty involved in empathizing with perpetrator characters lies not so much in the characters’ being perpetrators, but rather in their being literary characters. Eventually, Timár briefly touches upon the problem of the aesthetic and the comic via Nabokov’s Lolita (1955) to ask whether one can avoid some necessarily dehumanizing aspects of humor. (shrink)