Ce commentaire intégral des Conjectures de Nicolas de Cues manifeste toute la fécondité de l'oeuvre dans sa complexité. Il élucide l'art général des conjectures, en explore et approfondit les sources doctrinales (en particulier lulliennes) et scientifiques : optiques, mathématiques, biologiques et médicales... Il montre ainsi que la théorie cusaine de la connaissance constitue une hénologie des points de vue et met en évidence l'articulation du rapport entre la vérité, objet de toute recherche connaissante, et l'altérité, condition de tout être fini, (...) et notamment de l'homme. La vérité dans l'altérité se révèle alors comme condition de possibilité de tout ce qui est à partir de l'Un - ce qui constitue l'ordre de l'être - et comme condition de possibilité de toute pensée. Il s'agit, dès lors, de saisir la singularité de l'approche cusaine de la réflexion réciproque entre l'ordre de la pensée et l'ordre de l'être. Après avoir analysé le concept central de conjecture, entendu non comme une simple supposition, mais bien comme une connaissance inadéquate du vrai, la première partie déploie les principes de la nouvelle méthode, fondée sur l'analogie fondamentale entre mens humaine et mens divine. La découverte de ces principes nécessite l'exposition d'une théorie du nombre articulée à celle, d'inspiration proclusienne, des quatre unités (divine, intellectuelle, rationnelle et sensible). Cette première partie conduit à la mise en place de figures manuductrices, paradigmatiques pour notre connaissance. La seconde partie du commentaire explicite les exemples d'application de l'ars coniecturalis donnés par le Cusain en mathématiques, en philosophie naturelle et en anthropologie. Le lecteur découvrira ici comment les Conjectures engagent une philosophie de l'esprit et une philosophie critique, fondamentalement liées à une pensée de l'hétéronomie. (shrink)

In absence of effective pharmaceutical treatments, the individual's compliance with a series of behavioral recommendations provided by the public health authorities play a critical role in the control and prevention of SARS-CoV2 infection. However, we still do not know much about the rate and determinants of adoption of the recommended health behaviors. This paper examines the compliance with the main behavioral recommendations, and compares sociocultural, psychosocial, and social cognitive explanations for its variation in the French population. Based on the current (...) literature, these 3 categories of factors were identified as potential determinants of individual differences in the health preventive behaviors. The data used for these analyses are drawn from 2 cross-sectional studies conducted after the lockdown and before the peak of the COVID-19 epidemic in France. The participants were drawn from a larger internet consumer panel where recruitment was stratified to generate a socio-demographically representative sample of the French adult population. Overall, the results show a very high rate of compliance with the behavioral recommendations among the participants. A hierarchical regression analysis was then performed to assess the potential explanatory power of these approaches in complying with these recommendations by successively entering sociocultural factors, psychosocial factors, social cognitive factors in the model. Only the inclusion of the cognitive variables substantially increased the explained variance of the self-reported adoption of preventive behaviors, providing better support for the social cognitive than the sociocultural and psychosocial explanations. (shrink)

Animal production, especially pork production, is facing growing international criticism. The greatest concerns relate to the environment, the animals’ living conditions, and the occupational diseases. But human and animal conditions are rarely considered together. Yet the living conditions at work and the emotional bond that inevitably forms bring the farm workers and the animals to live very close, which leads to shared suffering. Suffering does spread from animals to human beings and can cause workers physical, mental, and also moral suffering, (...) which is all the more harmful due to the fact that it is concealed. The conceptual tools used to conceal suffering ( animal welfare, stress, pain) suggest that the industrial system can be improved, whereas for farmers it is by definition incompatible with animal husbandry. (shrink)

The question of whether problems with the social determinants of health that might impact decision-making justify denying eligibility for assisted dying has recently come to the fore in debates about the legalisation of assisted dying. For example, it was central to critiques of the 2021 amendments made to Canada’s assisted dying law. The question of whether changes to a country’s assisted dying legislation lead to descents down slippery slopes has also come to the fore—as it does any time a jurisdiction (...) changes its laws. We explore these two questions through the lens of Canada’s experience both to inform Canada’s ongoing discussions and because other countries will confront the same questions if they contemplate changing their assisted dying law. Canada’s Medical Assistance in Dying law has evolved through a journey from the courts to Parliament, back to the courts, and then back to Parliament. Along this journey the eligibility criteria, the procedural safeguards, and the monitoring regime have changed. In this article, we focus on the eligibility criteria. First, we explain the evolution of the law and what the eligibility criteria were at the various stops along the way. We then explore the ethical justifications for Canada’s new criteria by looking at two elements of the often-corrosive debate. First, we ask whether problems with the social determinants of health that might impact decision-making justify denying eligibility for assisted dying of decisionally capable people with mental illnesses and people with disabilities as their sole underlying medical conditions. Second, we ask whether Canada’s journey supports slippery slope arguments against permitting assisted dying. All data relevant to the study are included in the article. (shrink)

Jocelyn Maclure and Charles Taylor provide a clearly reasoned, articulate account of the two main principles of secularism—equal respect, and freedom of conscience—and argue that in our religiously diverse, politically interconnected world, secularism, properly understood, may offer the only path to religious and philosophical freedom.

Machine learning-based AI algorithms lack transparency. In this article, I offer an interpretation of AI’s explainability problem and highlight its ethical saliency. I try to make the case for the legal enforcement of a strong explainability requirement: human organizations which decide to automate decision-making should be legally obliged to demonstrate the capacity to explain and justify the algorithmic decisions that have an impact on the wellbeing, rights, and opportunities of those affected by the decisions. This legal duty can be derived (...) from the demands of Rawlsian public reason. In the second part of the paper, I try to show that the argument from the limitations of human cognition fails to get AI off the hook of public reason. Against a growing trend in AI ethics, my main argument is that the analogy between human minds and artificial neural networks fails because it suffers from an atomistic bias which makes it blind to the social and institutional dimension of human reasoning processes. I suggest that developing interpretive AI algorithms is not the only possible answer to the explainability problem; social and institutional answers are also available and in many cases more trustworthy than techno-scientific ones. (shrink)

Interpretations of Euripides’Heraclesoften focus on Theseus’ and Heracles’ cooperative social values in the final scene as a culmination of themes ofphilia. I argue that the relationship Theseus forges competes with Heracles’ attachment to his household,oikos, which is the central social relationship Euripides describes. The drama consistently develops Heracles as his household's leader by inviting the audience to compare Heracles with interim caretakers Megara and Amphitryon, and later through the protagonist's performance of emotional attachment before and after his madness. The closing (...) scene continues to reveal the value and vulnerability of household attachment by accentuating Heracles’ exclusion from the identity of human family member. This trajectory suggests a painful misalignment between Heracles’ experience in theoikosand the public position Theseus offers at Athens: of a semi-divine hero receiving public cult and honours. Euripides emphasizes this tension to distinguish the experience ofoikos-membership. (shrink)

In this paper, I offer a personal and professional narrative of how Canada went from prohibition to permission for medical assistance in dying. I describe the legal developments to date and flag what might be coming in the near future. I also offer some personal observations and reflections on the role and impact of bioethics and bioethicists, on what it was like to be a participant in Canada's law reform process, and on lessons that readers in other jurisdictions might take (...) from Canada's experience. (shrink)

Introduction: Previous findings that inattention and hyperactive/impulsive symptoms predict later peer problems have been mixed. Utilizing two culturally diverse samples with shared methodologies, we assessed the predictive power of dimensionally measured childhood IA and HI symptoms regarding adolescent peer relationships.Methods: A US-based, clinical sample of 228 girls with and without childhood diagnosed attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder was assessed and followed 5 years later. A Norwegian, population-based sample of 3,467 children was assessed and followed approximately 4 years later. Both investigations used parent and (...) teacher reports of ADHD symptoms and peer relations. Multivariate regression analyses examined the independent contributions of IA and HI symptoms to later peer problems, adjusting for baseline childhood peer problems. We also examined childhood sex as a potential moderator within the Norwegian sample.Results: Higher levels of childhood HI symptoms, but not IA symptoms, independently predicted adolescent peer problems in the all-female clinical sample. Conversely, higher levels of IA symptoms, but not HI symptoms, independently predicted preadolescent peer problems in the mixed-sex population sample. Results did not differ between informants. Associations between ADHD symptom dimensions and peer problems within the Norwegian sample were not moderated by child sex.Discussion: Differential associations between childhood hyperactive/impulsive and inattention symptoms and adolescent peer problems were found across two diverse samples using a shared methodology. Potential explanations for different findings in the clinical vs. population samples include symptom severity as well as age, sex, and cultural factors. We discuss implications for future research, including the importance of dimensional measures of ADHD-related symptoms and the need for shared methodologies across clinical and normative samples. (shrink)

This work argues for a moral consideration of animal work relations. Paying special attention to the livestock industry, the author challenges the zootechnical denigration of animals for increased productivity awhile championing the collaborative nature of work. For Porcher, work is not merely a means to production but a means of living together unity. This unique reconsideration of work envisions animals as co-laborers with humans, rather than overwrought tools for exploitative, and often lethal, employment. Readers will learn about the disjunction between (...) those focused on productivity and profit and those who favor a more ethical work environment for animals. Porcher's text also engages environmental and political debates concerning animal-human relations. (shrink)

Many researchers have identified a process they call ‘deskilling’, which they use to describe the daily experience of teachers who have been gradually losing control of their own labour within ‘low‐trust’ workplaces. Conversely, other scholars have found that under similar conditions, some teachers have their own ways of dealing with it which leads them towards a process of ‘reskilling’. This study is an attempt to explore the actual teachers’ perceptions towards their daily practice within the context of educational decentralization, a (...) neglected area of research which needs to be further discussed and explored. This paper uses data gathered from seven schools in Guangdong Province, China as a case study to show that educational decentralization in China not only results in teachers being deskilled because indirect control is still being maintained, but also provides a small number of teachers with a competitive working environment to reskill their pedagogical techniques and educational knowledge, and to pursue good practices in teaching under the pressure of competition. All in all, educational decentralization provides a context in which teachers can experience either deprofessionalization or reprofessionalization. (shrink)

Drawing on ethical principles of fairness and integrative social contracts theory, moral obligations of fair dealing exist between the firm and all shareholders. This study investigates empirically whether privileged investors of publicly traded firms engage in legal, but morally questionable, trading that at the expense of non-privileged institutional or atomistic investors. In this context, we define privilege as the access to material, nonpublic earnings surprise information. Our results show that the opportunity for procedural unfairness increases with the presence of privileged (...) investors. However, this procedural unfairness does not appear to lead to distributive unfairness even though the level of abnormal trading also increases with the presence of privileged investors. That is, our findings suggest that other shareholders are in fact better off from an outcome perspective given that the abnormal stock price returns upon the announcement of an earnings surprise are either more positive or less negative when the firm has a high proportion of privileged investors. We extract the important implications of our study for future research on the fairness of capital markets and information asymmetry amongst classes of investors, as well as for public policy. (shrink)

Although accountability lies at the heart of the “doing gender” perspective, it has received surprisingly little attention from gender scholars. In this article, I analyze the different ways that scholars have conceptualized accountability. I propose a synthesis of these various understandings, and demonstrate the utility of this conceptualization with examples from my research on feminist self-defense training. This analysis sheds light on both the workings of accountability and the process of change in gender expectations and practices. I conclude by considering (...) the implications of this reconceptualization of accountability. (shrink)

A groundbreaking study of how concepts of virtue and vice are used to deny American women full political rights.

Virtue and vice remain at the margins of feminist conceptual analysis although both establish a dualism that denies women full citizenship. To make this argument, this analysis explores the historical case of the Lowell mill girls – the first nearly all-female labour force in the United States between 1826 and 1850. Their public debate illustrates how virtue aligns some women with the economic and political status quo while society affiliates those who challenge its dominant beliefs with vice. This moral location (...) reveals the ‘virtues of vice’ or the political benefits that women may derive from vice which places them outside traditional moral and political discourse, enabling them to question existing moral paradigms, consider alternatives, and politically organize against the status quo. As such, the Lowell mill girl debate can inform contemporary feminist theory by raising serious questions about virtue and suggesting how vice opens up a critical space for ideological innovation, referred to here as a moral middle ground, that may result in a more democratic, feminist ethics. (shrink)

A study of how public service has changed in this new era of interconnectedness.

Dans notre monde radicalement artificialisé, seuls les animaux, en nous rappelant ce qu'a été la nature, nous permettront peut-être de nous souvenir de notre propre humanité. Mais saurons-nous vivre avec eux? Le voulons-nous encore? Car l'abattage de masse des animaux, considérés comme simples éléments des " productions animales ", leur inflige une terreur et une souffrance insoutenables, tout en désespérant les éleveurs. Et l'élevage, après 10 000 ans d'existence, est aujourd'hui souvent décrit comme une nuisance, pour l'environnement comme pour notre (...) santé. Une condamnation reposant sur une confusion entre " élevage " et " production animale ", dont il nous faut comprendre les enjeux. Qu'est-ce que l'élevage? Quelles différences entre " élevage " et " productions animales "? Quelle est la place de la mort clans le travail avec les animaux? Peut-on améliorer leur sort dans les systèmes industriels? Faut-il " libérer les animaux " comme le proposent certains philosophes? En répondant ici a ces questions, Jocelyne Porcher explique en quoi la capacité des hommes à coexister pacifiquement dépend de leur capacité à vivre en paix et dignement avec les animaux. Et pourquoi, dès lors, sauver l'élevage en évitant son assujettissement au système d'exploitation et de mise à mort industrielle pourrait être une des plus belles utopies du XXIe siècle. (shrink)

Golden parachutes are often viewed as a form of excessive compensation because they provide senior management with substantial payouts following an acquisition while other stakeholders are subjected to layoffs, disrupted business relationships and other negative externalities. Using a sample of S&P 500 firms, an economic and ethical justification for this type of contract is given. Golden parachutes ensure effective corporate governance that, in turn, preserve the firm's value for all stakeholders. Boards of directors enter into parachute agreements to protect recently (...) hired CEOs' human capital during periods of financial uncertainty and, thus, potential takeover activity. From an ethics viewpoint, golden parachutes are valuable to all stakeholders because they encourage merger or acquisition in lieu of bankruptcy. (shrink)

Phillips & Silverstein (P&S, 2003) have proposed that NMDA-receptor hypofunction is the central reason for impaired cognitive coordination and abnormal gestalt-like perceptual processing in schizophrenia. We suggest that this model may also be applicable to non-pathological (or normal) aging given the compelling evidence of NMDA-receptor involvement during the aging process that results in age-related change in higher-level perceptual performance. Given that such deficits are present in other neurological disorders such as autism, an argument for a systematic assessment of perceptual functioning (...) in these conditions may be posited. (shrink)

To date, ethics discussions about stem cell research overwhelmingly have centered on the morality and acceptability of using human embryonic stem cells. Governments in many jurisdictions have now answered these “first-level questions” and many have now begun to address ethical issues related to the donation of cells, gametes, or embryos for research. In this commentary, we move beyond these ethical concerns to discuss new themes that scientists on the forefront of NRM development anticipate, providing a preliminary framework for further discussion (...) between scientists and ethicists. Fostering strong partnerships between neuroscientists and ethicists that operate and collaborate within this evolving framework will maximize the translation of NRM discoveries on the brain into cures that are safe and address the needs of science and society. (shrink)

In a thought-provoking paper, Schuklenk and Smalling argue that no right to conscientious objection should be granted to medical professionals. First, they hold that it is impossible to assess either the truth of conscience-based claims or the sincerity of the objectors. Second, even a fettered right to conscientious refusal inevitably has adverse effects on the rights of patients. We argue that the main problem with their position is that it is not derived from a broader reflection on the meaning and (...) implications of freedom of conscience and reasonable accommodation. We point out that they collapse two related but distinct questions, that is, the subjective conception of freedom of conscience and the sincerity test. We note that they do not successfully show that the standard norm according to which exemption claims should not impose undue hardship on others is unworkable. We suggest that the main reason why arguments such as no one is forced to be a medical professional are flawed is that public norms should not constrain citizens to choose between two of their basic rights unless it is necessary. In fine, Schuklenk and Smalling, who see conscience claims as arbitrary dislikes, sell freedom of conscience short and forego any attempts at balancing the competing rights involved. We maintain the authors neglect that most of legal reasoning is contextual and that the blanket restriction of healthcare professionals' freedom of conscience is disproportionate. (shrink)

This study uses a sample of 242 European professional purchasers to examine the six characteristics of the decision-making process developed by Jones. The illustration mobilizes six original scenarios reproducing typical purchasing situations. Two versions of each scenario were used, one representing low moral intensity and the other showing high moral intensity. Two populations were sampled: one of 120 purchasers responding to the first version of the questionnaire and a second of 122 different purchasers responding to version two. Each version contained (...) three low-moral-intensity scenarios and three high-moral-intensity scenarios. The research also investigates two concepts suggested by Hannah et al. :663–685, 2011): examining the complexity of ethical decision-making through scenarios and microsocial professional ethical contexts. The findings reveal that neither traditional individual characteristics nor standard company characteristics have a real impact on two stages of Rest’s model. They also show that internal locus of control and a high microsocial ethical environment have a positive impact on purchaser awareness and intention to act ethically for four of the six dimensions: magnitude of consequences, social consensus, temporal immediacy, and concentration of effect. Moral intensity factors also have a positive impact on these four dimensions. The two other dimensions are not related to the independent variables. (shrink)

En quelques années, les tic ont transformé le rapport aux expériences de séparation. Dans cet article, l’auteur montre cependant que la possibilité pour les parents de contacter leurs enfants grâce aux outils de communication ne suffit pas à expliquer leur désir de maintenir le lien malgré la distance. En resituant leurs usages dans le contexte de la modernité tardive, il explique que cette tendance peut être comprise comme l’expression de la « mise en disponibilité du monde » que le sociologue (...) Hartmut Rosa décrit comme étant la caractéristique principale des sociétés contemporaines. Il apparaît alors que l’analyse de la « famille connectée » ne peut faire l’économie d’un examen des normes sociales qui traversent l’ensemble des sociétés, ce qui permet aussi d’éviter le piège d’imputer aux tic l’origine de comportements trouvant leur explication dans un contexte social plus général. (shrink)

In Canada there is a growing demand for human eggs for reproductive purposes and currently demand exceeds supply. This is not surprising, as egg production and retrieval is onerous. It requires considerable time, effort, and energy and carries with it significant physical and psychological risks. In very general terms, one cycle of egg production and retrieval involves an estimated total of 56 hours for interviews, counseling, and medical procedures. The screening carries risks of unanticipated findings with severe consequences for insurability. (...) The daily hormone injections can be painful and uncomfortable, causing cramping, abdominal pain, nausea, vomiting, bloating, mood changes, and irritability. (shrink)

In this article, the author argues that beliefs about vulnerability and dangerousness are central to conceptions of gender and are constructed and transmitted through conversation. Using data from 13 focus groups, the author demonstrates that ideas about gender and its relationship to vulnerability and danger are pervasive in talk about violence, and that this talk is further marked by ideas about age, race, social class, and sexual identity. These ideas are based, in part, on shared beliefs about human bodies, which (...) reinforce the perceived naturalness of these ideas. The article concludes with a discussion of the consequences of these ideas for the daily lives of women and men. (shrink)

Que se passe-t-il quand de l'eau et du vin se melangent? Comment les quatre elements simples du monde physique se melent-ils les uns aux autres pour former les choses qui nous entourent? La multitude des couleurs vient-elle aussi d'un melange de couleurs simples? Deux corps melanges sont-ils simplement juxtaposes a une echelle microscopique ou bien peuvent-ils se compenetrer de sorte qu'il y aurait deux corps dans le meme lieu? L'union de l'ame et du corps est-elle un melange? Telles sont quelques-unes (...) des questions etonnamment diverses que croise cette histoire du probleme du melange dans la philosophie grecque. Le recit propose ici suit trois lignes principales: la tradition peripateticienne, qui, d'Aristote a son commentateur Alexandre d'Aphrodise, elabore un modele de melange par mediation ou les ingredients de depart s'assimilent reciproquement pour s'unifier en un compose qualitativement intermediaire; la doctrine stoicienne de la mixtion de part en part, ou les ingredients se compenetrent jusqu'a devenir parfaitement coextensifs; le neoplatonisme et les transpositions qu'il opere a partir des modeles physiques precedents pour penser non seulement des relations entre corps mais aussi celle entre l'ame et le corps ou bien entre les realites incorporelles ou immaterielles de l'arriere-monde suprasensible. Fondee sur un vaste corpus de textes couvrant pres d'un millenaire d'histoire de la philosophie grecque, cette etude se veut aussi une proposition de methode: donner a lire les textes eux-memes et rester au plus pres de l'analyse des sources pour suivre parmi l'etonnant foisonnement des doctrines les developpements aussi divers qu'inattendus que la raison humaine, dans sa luxuriante imagination theorique, sait donner a la meme idee, fut-elle aussi courante et intuitive que celle de melange. (shrink)

In this paper, we provide as accurate a picture as possible of transnational trade in human eggs involving Canadians. We explain the legal status in Canada, and call for reform in the regulation, of such trade.

© The Author. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the Oxford Centre for Islamic Studies. All rights reserved. For Permissions, please email: [email protected] starting point of the book is the assessment of discrimination against Muslim immigrants in French society. The first part presents the results from several surveys that illustrate the negative opinions as well as the discriminatory practices against Muslim immigrants. The second part reviews the characteristics of Muslim immigrants that fuel the discrimination and negative opinions, mainly (...) their religious practices, their gender relations, and their poor competence with the French language.Although this kind of investigation is needed, it rests on two main ideological assumptions that severely weaken its relevance. First, why do the authors claim an investigation into Christian-heritage countries, when the focus is on France? The particularity of French laicity... (shrink)

This article investigates the experience of individual learners who have been allocated learning support in the further education system in England. The particular focus is on interviewees' constructions of their emotional and psychic experiences. Through the adoption of a psycho-social perspective, learners' tendency to 'idealise' their learning support workers is understood as a strategy for coping with the anxiety generated by a range of previous experiences. The implications for policy-makers are discussed.

ABSTRACT: This article investigates the experience of individual learners who have been allocated learning support in the further education system in England. The particular focus is on interviewees’ constructions of their emotional and psychic experiences. Through the adoption of a psycho-social perspective, learners’ tendency to ‘idealise’ their learning support workers is understood as a strategy for coping with the anxiety generated by a range of previous experiences. The implications for policy-makers are discussed.