A model for the quantum measurement of the electronic current in a Josephson junction is presented and analyzed. The model is similar to a Stern-Gerlach apparatus, relying on the deflection of a spin-polarized particle beam by the magnetic field created by the Josephson current. The aim is (1) to explore, with the help of a simple model, some general ideas about the nature of the information which can be obtained by measurements upon a quantum system and (2) to find new (...) approaches for obtaining information about the nature of the states of a macroscopic quantum system. In the case of sufficiently strong coupling between the system and the apparatus, we find that the model provides in principle a standard ideal measurement of the value of the instantaneous Josephson current. In the case of weak coupling, where the measurement is not ideal, we show that the scattering of neutrons from a junction can in principle be used to measure the average value of the Josephson current, thereby allowing an experimental distinction to be made between an eigenstate of relative phase and one of relative Cooper pair number. The possibility of the latter type of measurement suggests an experimental approach to answer a question of fundamental interest, namely whether two isolated superconductors (or superfluids) possess a definite relative phase or a definite relative number of superconducting (or super/lowing) particles. (shrink)

Important ideas that helped shape 20th-century thought--ideas which continue to hold great significance for anyone interested in the social world--are made ...

Is the nature of law to be formal procedure or to embody substantive value? This work deals with the traditional conflict in legal philosophy between positivistic and anti-positivistic theories of law. It examines the conflict with respect to seven central issues in legal philosophy--law as a reason for action, law and authority, the internal point of view to law, the acceptance of law, discretion and principle, interpretation and semantics, and law and the common good. This work argues that although this (...) conflict cannot be resolved, the true nature of law is revealed--not obscured--by this perennial situation. (shrink)

As more criminals are imprisoned, other individuals change their behavior to replace them, as predicted by the theory of strategic behavior. The physiological correlates of sociopathy suggest that research in cognitive neuroscience can lead toward a solution. Promising pathways include building upon current knowledge of self-deceit, the independence of positive and negative emotions, the lateralization of risk and caution, and the conditions promoting prosocial behavior.

All psychology research should strictly adhere to ethical principles outlined by the researcher's local governing body. In the UK, this is the British Psychological Society. However, in papers advising on methodology used in psychophysiology, issues linked to ethics are rarely mentioned despite the invasive nature of this type of research. Guidelines published by local governing bodies are never mentioned. In this paper, important ethical issues in psychophysiology research are discussed with respect to BPS guidelines. Recommendations are made for ensuring ethical (...) practice when conducting psychophysiology research. This paper is intended for those new to psychophysiology research and should be read in conjunction with the BPS ‘Code of ethics and conduct’. (shrink)

Roger Fortin has written a thought-provoking history of the Founding Fathers' ideals and America's promise. Being the core and essence of America's identity, the Founders' ideals can inspire individuals and the community to live more meaningfully and purposely, 'one for all and all for one'"--Back cover.

Roger A. Shiner; VII*—Wittgenstein and the Foundations of Knowledge, Proceedings of the Aristotelian Society, Volume 78, Issue 1, 1 June 1978, Pages 103–124, ht.

This paper will examine a claim that nursing is united by its moral stance. The claim is that there are moral constraints on nurses' actions as people practising nursing and that they are in some way different from both what for now can be called standard morality and also different from the person's own moral views who also happens to be a nurse, hence the defining and unifying factor for nursing. I will begin by situating the claim within the broader (...) area about the need for a definition to state features that are essential to all and only members of its class. This will highlight the fact that there are two distinct types of definition used by authors seeking to find a unity for nursing. One type of definition has to do with goals or purposes given to nursing and the other with ends discovered as nursing. But even if there are ends waiting to be discovered a particular practical concern is how we can have knowledge of them. I will suggest that knowledge by intuition is plausible but that as things currently stand in moral epistemology it will not provide the unifying ground for nursing. Then I will argue that in the latter approach to definition a certain account of human nature has been advanced in order to provide features that are there to be discovered and so not dependent on human beings for the definition or classification. However, such an attempt to define nursing cannot do what is wanted. Rather than the account of human nature grounding morality and doing so for nursing, the account of human nature itself relies upon a prior account of morality. Because of this it loses its supposed ground of unity for the profession. Nursing is not united by its moral stance especially if this is understood in a strong sense as unique moral stance, but as things currently stand in moral epistemology this is not necessarily a bad thing for practitioners or patients. (shrink)

Charles Sanders Peirce developed a mature Christian faith under the influence of his father Benjamin Peirce and Frederic Dan Huntington, a teacher and pastor at Harvard. Peirce’s Christian self-understanding and concern shape the development of his philosophical logic as well as the development and refinement of pragmatism.

This commentary suggests that an equilibrium framework may be retained, in an evolutionary model such as Gintis's and with more satisfactory results, if rationality is relaxed in a slightly different way than he proposes: that is, if decisions are assumed to be related to rewards probabilistically, rather than with certainty. This relaxed concept of rationality gives rise to probabilistic equilibria. (Published Online April 27 2007).

It has been claimed that there are certain acts that nurses as people practising nursing must never do because they are nurses and this is regardless of what the same agent should do; that certain actions are not part of proper nursing practice. The concept of an internal morality has been discussed in relation to medicine and has been used to ground the actions proper to medicine in a realist tradition. Although the concept of an internal morality of nursing is (...) not explicitly mentioned in the literature the underpinning ideas about the proper practice of nursing based on philosophical realism I argue equate with it and a discussion of the method of an internal morality can help to understand how arguments against euthanasia related to the profession of nursing are far from clear. Ultimately, although the idea of particular acts proper to nurses qua nurses is not clear, the concept of an internal morality can help to get practitioners to see how the profession is tightly linked to moral actions, even so the hard problems in bioethics such as the morality of euthanasia remain hard for all and the easy ones easy for all. (shrink)