Living in modern biopolitical risk culture might be seen as synonymous with living in prognosis time, in the sense that risk of illness is endlessly forecast (prognosticated) in the broad social arena. ‘Safety,’ in this context, is framed as the anticipatory guarding against risk or disease in order to ‘make live.’ Thinking of risk and safety in these ways is limited, however, in that the prognosis cannot account for the individual’s life or death drama. This paper asks: how are we (...) to understand the constellation of risk, prognosis, and safety in relation to ‘the subject in breast cancer prognosis’? (shrink)

This paper examines cancer through the lens of abjection. While cancer can be understood as an abject lifeform, we explore what we name the abject ontologies created through both cancer detection technologies/practices and cancer treatment, specifically the drug combination Adriamycin and Cytoxan. We ask: what are the abject ontologies produced through living with and living on from cancer diagnosis and treatment? Our concern is to map how cancer undoes our supposedly stable categories inherited from modernist logic, challenges our very ideas (...) of what it means to be human, and demands an ethical reorientation of public cancer discourse. (shrink)

This book project intends to serve as a course adoption book unpacking theories of biopolitical life-making and death-making, with chapters dedicated to specific objects that ostensibly affirm life (and argue for life's inextricable links to capital), but that ultimately reify a politics of death and erasure. Specific objects, such as the pink Kommen Foundation-branded handgun, the 'super user' of health care resources, and fat cells allow the authors to discuss the political junctures at which determinations of healthy and unhealthy, life (...) and death, are made. (shrink)

Fox and Spector use multiple instances of the exhaustivity operator EXH to derive the correct meaning of utterances that include pitch-focus marked disjunction in downward-entailing environments. They argue that the \ operator evaluates alternatives to be used by EXH. Though the method is sound and gets the right result, we argue that the way in which EXH would need to interact with other instances of EXH, as well as other focus-sensitive elements, is at odds with how EXH is used to (...) explain other phenomena. Specifically, the analysis in Fox and Spector predicts intervention effects for cases where EXH interacts with other focus-sensitive elements. This is problematic for many cases in which EXH is used to derive the desired inferences. We propose a different way of focus association for EXH that would work for the approach introduced in Fox and Spector as well as elsewhere. In addition, our account does not require a covert element to be focused. (shrink)

Recent feminist criticism suggests that Hegel’s account of Antigone in the Phenomenology of Spirit is antithetical to feminism on two key counts: first, Hegel does not develop an authentic political representation of women’s agency and participation in the community, and second, he does not provide a model for a genuinely ethical order especially where relations between men and women are concerned. Patricia Jagentowicz Mills and Luce Irigaray are two feminist thinkers who have expressed these positions. They both take issue with (...) Hegel’s interpretation of Antigone’s actions, although each for different reasons. Mills argues that Hegel misrepresents the experience of women in the Greek community, symbolized by Antigone, as not self-conscious, unreflective, and incapable of enduring ethical conflict. The main reason for this mistaken identity, according to Mills, stems from Hegel’s beliefs that human law and man are ethically superior to divine law and woman, and that the former can legitimately rule over, indeed dominate, the latter. Irigaray asserts that the phallogocentric power of the masculine in Hegel’s text almost completely eliminates the possibility of an authentic feminine individual and action. According to this view, an autonomous feminine understanding of purpose and action is rendered impossible by the feminine’s very masculinization at the outset. At issue here is whether Antigone can indeed be understood as an ethical actor when she acts on behalf of the family and/or whether she can be understood as an ethical actor who represents the community. The conclusions drawn from these interpretations have been that, for Hegel, women are not genuine political actors, on the one hand, because their association with the family disqualifies them as such, and on the other hand, because their actions are constituted by consciousness which is masculine, and also instrumentalized for the masculine. (shrink)

Aus einer philosophisch-phanomenologischen und literaturwissenschaftlichen Perspektive heraus gewinnt Nadine Benz nahere Erkenntnisse uber das temporale Phanomen des Wartens. Zunachst wird die historische Entwicklung der Zeitvorstellung aus philosophisch-phanomenologischer Sicht thematisiert, spezifisch im Hinblick auf die Fragen nach Messbarkeit, Vermitteltheit und nach objektiven und subjektiven Komponenten von Zeiterfahrung in ihrer Aporetik. Im Anschluss wird vom Konzept der Lebenswelt zur Literatur ubergeleitet: Die vorliegende Studie bindet die Aporien der Zeit zunachst theoretisch in eine Narratologie von Zeiterfahrung ein, die vor allem den Faktor (...) des Fiktiven produktiv berucksichtigt. Schliesslich werden die gewonnenen Erkenntnisse und Instrumente fur eine Analyse von Erzahltexten des 20. und 21. Jahrhunderts fruchtbar gemacht. Hier erlangen die literarischen Konfigurationen von Wartezeit als Semantiken des Wartens fur die Subjekte der fiktiven Zeiterfahrung einen konstitutiven Status. (shrink)

This paper develops an account of the German discourse particle denn that captures the meaning contribution of this particle in polar questions, wh-questions, and certain conditional antecedents in a unified way. It is shown that the behavior of denn exhibits an asymmetry between polar and wh-interrogatives, which can be captured by treating the particle as sensitive to the property highlighted by its containing clause, in the sense of Roelofsen and Farkas :359–414, 2015). In addition, the paper argues that highlighting-sensitivity should (...) be incorporated in the account of another discourse particle, German überhaupt, and discusses how the proposed account of discourse particle denn may be extended to also cover the use of denn as a causal conjunction. (shrink)

Justified by spectacular achievements facilitated through applied deep learning methodology, the “Everything is possible” view dominates this new hour in the “boom and bust” curve of AI performance. The optimistic view collides head on with the “It is not possible”—ascertainments often originating in a skewed understanding of both AI and medicine. The meaning of the conflicting views can be assessed only by addressing the nature of medicine. Specifically: Which part of medicine, if any, can and should be entrusted to AI—now (...) or at some moment in the future? AI or not, medicine should incorporate the anticipation perspective in providing care. (shrink)

Background The worldwide increase in older persons demands technological solutions to combat the shortage of caregiving and to enable aging in place. Smart home health technologies (SHHTs) are promoted and implemented as a possible solution from an economic and practical perspective. However, ethical considerations are equally important and need to be investigated. Methods We conducted a systematic review according to the PRISMA guidelines to investigate if and how ethical questions are discussed in the field of SHHTs in caregiving for older (...) persons. Results 156 peer-reviewed articles published in English, German and French were retrieved and analyzed across 10 electronic databases. Using narrative analysis, 7 ethical categories were mapped: privacy, autonomy, responsibility, human vs. artificial interactions, trust, ageism and stigma, and other concerns. Conclusion The findings of our systematic review show the (lack of) ethical consideration when it comes to the development and implementation of SHHTs for older persons. Our analysis is useful to promote careful ethical consideration when carrying out technology development, research and deployment to care for older persons. Registration We registered our systematic review in the PROSPERO network under CRD42021248543. (shrink)

Based on anthropological fieldwork among protesters against the Covid policy in Germany, this paper elaborates the symmetry of accusations made against each other by proponents and opponents of the state-imposed protection measures against the backdrop of an asymmetrical distribution of power. The social dynamics that emerged during the pandemic are often understood as the result of a knowledge controversy that most participants thus categorize as a media problem. A key finding of my research on protests against the German Covid policy (...) is that, as in my research on the controversy over mediumism, the controversy is about the agency of human and nonhuman actors and carried out to a great extent based on the same values on both sides, which at the same time accuse each other of not conforming to these values. The protesters are part of a heterogeneous minority that in large parts embodies the values of the majority and, in a way, exceeds them, i.e., a minority that is hypercritical and has extreme expectations about the values of the majority society – in this case: of solidarity, science, transparency, rationality, and coherence. From its marginal position, the minority develops a canny eye for the unfulfilled promises of the majority: its contradictions and conscious or unconscious double standards are perceived as bigotry against the backdrop of the aspiration to absence of contradiction. Therefore, this minority suspects that the motivations and goals behind the measures taken are other than just the protection of health, while the majority in turn see the minority’s commitment to society and democracy as (self-)deception and also suspect hidden motives and actors behind it. This mutual suspicion leads to a hysterical state of doubt and distrust, which is rooted in the nature of mediality. (shrink)

A large number of feminist philosophers and social critics accept that Simone de Beauvoir's conception of transcendence in The Second Sex relies on masculinist ontology. In contrast with feminist interpretations that see Beauvoir claiming the success of masculinist ontology, this article argues that transcendence as masculinist ontology does not succeed in The Second Sex because it requires a relation of domination, something contrary to its own definition of freedom-producing relations. The Second Sex obliquely reveals this failure, but Beauvoir does not (...) ruminate upon it. Instead, Beauvoir turns to imagine freedom-producing gender relations in the future where the body and consciousness are already emancipated from constitutive domination. This is a future that resonates with G. W. F. Hegel's `Stoic Consciousness'. The significance of this finding is that the location of freedom neither resides in the intertwinement of the male body and consciousness previously argued to be the case, for Beauvoir, nor does it reside in the intertwinement of the female body and consciousness. Rather, freedom resides in the intertwinement of male and female bodies and consciousness where domination is already absent, that is, a place outside of history. Thus, the conclusion of The Second Sex can be read as a consolation and an escape from the inescapable limits of the present. (shrink)

With robots being introduced into caregiving, particularly for older persons, various ethical concerns are raised. Among them is the fear of replacing human caregiving. While ethical concepts like well-being, autonomy, and capabilities are often used to discuss these concerns, this paper brings forth the concept of social dignity to further develop guidelines concerning the use of robots in caregiving. By social dignity, we mean that a person’s perceived dignity changes in response to certain interactions and experiences with other persons. In (...) this paper, we will first present the concept of social dignity, and then identify a niche where robots can be used in caregiving in an ethical manner. Specifically, we will argue that, because some activities of daily living are performed in solitude to maintain dignity, a care recipient will usually prefer robotic assistance instead of human assistance for these activities. Secondly, we will describe how other philosophical concepts, which have been commonly used to judge robotic assistance in caregiving for the elderly so far, such as well-being, autonomy, and capabilities, are less useful in determining whether robotic assistance in caregiving is ethically problematic or not. To conclude, we will argue that social dignity offers an advantage to the other concepts, as it allows to ask the most pressing questions in caregiving. (shrink)

Fake news is a scourge within modern society, brought about by foreign powers amplifying messages throughout the recently constructed echo chambers of social media and exacerbated by the lack of co...

Recent feminist criticism suggests that Hegel’s account of Antigone in the Phenomenology of Spirit is antithetical to feminism on two key counts: first, Hegel does not develop an authentic political representation of women’s agency and participation in the community, and second, he does not provide a model for a genuinely ethical order especially where relations between men and women are concerned. Patricia Jagentowicz Mills and Luce Irigaray are two feminist thinkers who have expressed these positions. They both take issue with (...) Hegel’s interpretation of Antigone’s actions, although each for different reasons. Mills argues that Hegel misrepresents the experience of women in the Greek community, symbolized by Antigone, as not self-conscious, unreflective, and incapable of enduring ethical conflict. The main reason for this mistaken identity, according to Mills, stems from Hegel’s beliefs that human law and man are ethically superior to divine law and woman, and that the former can legitimately rule over, indeed dominate, the latter. Irigaray asserts that the phallogocentric power of the masculine in Hegel’s text almost completely eliminates the possibility of an authentic feminine individual and action. According to this view, an autonomous feminine understanding of purpose and action is rendered impossible by the feminine’s very masculinization at the outset. At issue here is whether Antigone can indeed be understood as an ethical actor when she acts on behalf of the family and/or whether she can be understood as an ethical actor who represents the community. The conclusions drawn from these interpretations have been that, for Hegel, women are not genuine political actors, on the one hand, because their association with the family disqualifies them as such, and on the other hand, because their actions are constituted by consciousness which is masculine, and also instrumentalized for the masculine. (shrink)

Graphical models are a powerful tool for causal model specification. Besides allowing for a hierarchical representation of variable interactions, they do not require any a priori specification of the functional dependence between variables. The construction of such graphs hence often relies on the mere testing of whether or not model variables are marginally or conditionally independent. The identification of causal relationships then solely requires some general assumptions on the relation between stochastic and causal independence, such as the Causal Markov Condition (...) and the Faithfulness Condition (Spirtes et al. 2000; Pearl 2000). However, a procedure would require further assumptions to hold. Namely those the independence tests themselves are based on. In continuous settings, Spirtes et al. (2000) suggest causal inference based on a very restrictive formulation of independence, that is, vanishing partial correlations. Such a measure does, however, limit the applicability of causal inference to linear systems. This constitutes a serious drawback especially for the social sciences where an a priori specification of the functional form proves difficult or at odds with linearity. In short: graphical models theoretically reduce specification uncertainty regarding functional dependence, but their implementation in practice deprives them of this virtue. In this paper we investigate how causal structures in continuous settings can be identified when both functional forms and probability distributions of the variables remain unspecified. We focus on tests exploiting the fact that if X and Y are conditionally independent given a set of variables Z, the two conditional densities f (X|Y, Z) and f (X|Z) must coincide. We start by estimating the conditional densities f(X|Y, Z) and f(X|Z) via nonparametric techniques (kernel methods). We proceed by testing if some metric expressing the distance between these very conditional densities is sufficiently close to zero. Out of several metrics available in the literature to express such distance we choose two, the Euclidean, and the Hellinger distance. We investigate in a Monte Carlo study how different tests involving either measure are able to detect statistical independence, conditioned on a small set of variables. One limitation may result from nonparametric density estimation being subject to the curse of dimensionality. As the number of variables increases, the estimated empirical density converges at a slower rate to its population value. To compensate this drawback we use a local bootstrap procedure which consists of resampling the data for each test. While local bootstrap strongly increases the computational time of the test, it succeeds in counterbalancing the curse of dimensionality. (shrink)

Susser and Cabrera (2024) assess the role of bespoke neuro-privacy regulations including the creation of a novel right to mental privacy. They argue that focusing on what distinguishes mental priva...

In January 2022 the new Dutch Civic Integration programme was launched together with promises of improvements it would bring in facilitating the ‘integration’ of newcomers to the Netherlands. This study presents a critical discourse analysis of texts intended for municipalities to take on their new coordinating role in this programme. The analysis aims to understand the discourse in the texts, which actors are mobilized by them, and the role these texts and these actors play in processes of governmental racialization. The (...) analysis demonstrates shifting complex assemblages are brought into cascades of governance in which all actors are disciplined to accept the problem of integration as a problem of cultural difference and distance, and then furthermore disciplined to adopt new practices deemed necessary to identify and even ‘objectively’ measure the inherent traits contributing to this problematic. Lastly, the analysis displays that all actors are disciplined to accept the solution of ‘spontaneous compliance’; a series of practices and knowledges, which move the civic integration programme beyond an aim of responsibilization, into a programme of internalization, wherein newcomers are expected to own and address their problematic ‘nature’, making ‘modern’ values their own. (shrink)

Name der Zeitschrift: Klio Jahrgang: 97 Heft: 1 Seiten: 383-386.

Supervenient libertarianism maintains that indeterminism may exist at a supervening agency level, consistent with determinism at a subvening physical level. It seems as if this approach has the potential to break the longstanding deadlock in the free will debate, since it concedes to the traditional incompatibilist that agents can only do otherwise if they can do so in their actual circumstances, holding the past and the laws constant, while nonetheless arguing that this ability is compatible with physical determinism. However, we (...) argue that supervenient libertarianism faces some serious problems, and that it fails to break us free from this deadlock within the free will debate. (shrink)

The Druze movement originated at the beginning of the eleventh century and developed out of the Ismā'īlī faction of Shī'ī Islām. Founded by the Ismā'īlī Ḥamza ibn 'Alī, the Tawḥīd is a philosophical and spiritual path that incorporates the fundamentals of Islam, Christianity, and Judaism referred to in the Qur'ān, together with the ancient philosophies of Pythagoras, Plato, Aristotle, Plotinus, and others. It is a synthesis and a unification of the most contradictory thoughts, a synthesis that leads to the real (...) Tawḥīd or "third course".The specificity of the Tawḥīd consists in establishing a bridge between monotheism and non-dualism. To say that God is One does not merely mean... (shrink)

Pregnancy is thought to be a metabolically very expensive endeavor, yet investigations have produced inconsistent results concerning the responsiveness of human birth weight to maternal nutritional stress or nutritional intervention. These findings have led some researchers to conclude that fetal growth is strongly buffered against fluctuations in maternal energy balance, making the fetus in effect a “nearly perfect parasite.” This buffering would appear to be a reasonable adaptive response given the high risk of morbidity and mortality associated with low birth (...) weight. However, a life-history approach leads to the prediction that maternal investment strategies in pregnancy should be geared toward maximizing lifetime reproductive success rather than simply the success of the current pregnancy, and by extension that maternal investment strategies should vary with reproductive value. The physiology of human pregnancy in fact appears to include a number of mechanisms that protect maternal energy resources from diversion to the fetus and preserve them for future reproductive events. These mechanisms include adjustment of blood flow to the uterus and perhaps minor adjustments in gestation length, although evidence for the latter is scant. Suggestions are made for ways of investigating these maternal options. (shrink)

The claim that theoretical foundations are historically contingent does not draw the same intensity of fire as it did one or especially two decades ago. The aftermath of debates on the political boundaries created by foundations allows for a deeper exploration of the foundations of feminist theory. This article re-examines the (anti)-Hegelian foundations of the feminist standpoint put forward by Nancy Hartsock and argues that the Hegelian subject of the early Phenomenology of Spirit resists gender codification in its experience of (...) ongoing rediscovery and fallibility in knowing. The subject against which the feminist self was constituted does not fit the masculinity thought to be natural. Hegel’s master-slave dialectic and phenomenological subject reveal contradictions that cannot be resolved by an opposing feminist standpoint, and may provide resources that resist the rigid gender categories upon which the standpoint depends. Key Words: abstract masculinity • feminist standpoint • feminist theory • foundations • Nancy Hartsock • Hegel • master-slave dialectic • subjectivity. (shrink)

La philosophie de Baudrillard est inédite puisqu'il possède une façon originale de voir le monde, ses yeux étant ceux d'un philosophe-critique, d'un sociologue, d'un journaliste et d'un pataphysicien. Ce faisant, il possède une manière fort intéressante de nommer les faits. D'où toute la série de termes qu'il revisite ou invente surtout ceux formés par le préfixe hyper comme hyperconsommation, hypermarché, hyperréel, hypercorps, hyperespace et bien d'autres. Malgré sa quête du sens et du réel, Baudrillard débouche sur le non-sens et proclame (...) moyennement l'absence du réel. C'est comme si tout l'objectif de sa quête était uniquement la description du réel disparu et non la recherche et l'instauration du réel voire d'un nouveau réel. La recherche conduite ici s'attaque à la pensée hyperréelle de Jean Baudrillard tout en présentant l'originalité de cette pensée singulière et controversée. (shrink)

Determining what constitutes an anticipatable incidental finding from clinical research and defining whether, and when, this IF should be returned to the participant have been topics of discussion in the field of human subject protections for the last 10 years. It has been debated that implementing a comprehensive IF-approach that addresses both the responsibility of researchers to return IFs and the expectation of participants to receive them can be logistically challenging. IFs have been debated at different levels, such as the (...) ethical reasoning for considering their disclosure or the need for planning for them during the development of the research study. Some authors have discussed the methods for re-contacting participants for disclosing IFs, as well as the relevance of considering the clinical importance of the IFs. Similarly, other authors have debated about when IFs should be disclosed to participants. However, no author has addressed how the “actionability” of the IFs should be considered, evaluated, or characterized at the participant's research setting level. This paper defines the concept of “Actionability at the Participant's Research Setting Level” for anticipatable IFs from clinical research, discusses some related ethical concepts to justify the APRSL concept, proposes a strategy to incorporate APRSL into the planning and management of IFs, and suggests a strategy for integrating APRSL at each local research setting. (shrink)

Proponents of modern Frankfurt-Style Counterexamples generally accept that we cannot construct successful FSCs in which there are no alternative possibilities present. But they maintain that we can construct successful FSCs in which there are no morally significant alternatives present and that such examples succeed in breaking any conceptual link between alternative possibilities and free will. I argue that it is not possible to construct an FSC that succeeds even in this weaker sense. In cases where any alternatives are clearly insignificant, (...) it does not appear at all obvious that the agent can be held responsible. Present popular FSCs include alternatives that are ambiguous in their significance, and when the examples are sharpened to remove this ambiguity, they lose their force. Moreover, the proponent of such examples faces a problem: We can easily construct scenarios in which any alternatives are obviously insignificant, and in such scenarios, we are not intuitively inclined to suppose the agent is responsible. The proponent of new FSCs must therefore distinguish any alternatives she includes from the sorts included in these scenarios. The difference must now be such that this helps to make it seem intuitively likely that the agent is responsible where the agent otherwise would not appear responsible, and these alternatives are irrelevant to any judgment about whether the agent is responsible. I maintain that it is impossible to achieve both of these goals at once. (shrink)

Many historical studies have been devoted to the French school of molecular biology, in particular to the work of Jacques Monod on adaptive enzymes. By focusing on Francois Jacob's studies on lysogeny between 1950 and 1960, we intend to redress the imbalance of historiography, as well as proposing a more fruitful point of view for understanding the relative importance of international contacts and local traditions in the genesis of the operon model.Elie Wollman and Jacob's work on temperate bacteriophages rendered respectable (...) a system that had been considered an artefact for more than two decades. They did this firstly by modelling their studies on those of the US phage group and secondly by basing these studies on a complex vision of the relations between bacteria and bacteriophages. The interaction between bacteria and temperate bacteriophages was considered ab initio as a biochemical process, the mechanisms of which would eventually be characterized. It was also considered as a ''normal'' phenomenon that could be used as a model to understand the process of differentiation, as well as the role of viruses in diseases and cancer. The temperate bacteriophage was a model system that was far more epistemologically open and, for this reason, in a sense more productive than the virulent phage studied by the US phage group. (shrink)

The informed consent process presents challenges for psychological trauma research (e.g. Institutional Review Board [IRB] apprehension). While previous research documents researcher and IRB-member perspectives on these challenges, participant views remain absent. Thus, using a mixed-methods approach, we investigated participant views on consent guidelines in two convenience samples: crowdsourced (N = 268) and undergraduate (N = 265) participants. We also examined whether trauma-exposure influenced participant views. Overall, participants were satisfied with current guidelines, providing minor feedback and ethical reminders for researchers. Moreover, (...) participant views for consent were similar irrespective of trauma-exposure. Our study has implications for IRBs and psychological researchers. (shrink)

Systems of units still fail to attract the philosophical attention they deserve, but this could change with the current reform of the International System of Units. Most of the SI base units will henceforth be based on certain laws of nature and a choice of fundamental constants whose values will be frozen. The theoretical, experimental and institutional work required to implement the reform highlights the entanglement of scientific, technological and social features in scientific enterprise, while it also invites a philosophical (...) inquiry that promises to overcome the tensions that have long obstructed science studies. (shrink)

Older adults often have long-term relationships, and many of their goals are intertwined with their respective partners. Joint goals can help or hinder goal progress. Little is known about how accurately older adults assess if a goal is joint, the role of over-reporting in these perceptions, and how joint goals and over-reporting may relate to older partners' relationship satisfaction and physical health. Two-hundred-thirty-six older adults from 118 couples listed their three most important goals and whether they thought of them as (...) goals they had in common with and wanted to achieve together with their partner. Two independent raters classified goals as “joint” if both partners independently listed open-ended goals of the same content. Goal progress and relationship satisfaction were assessed 1 week later. Allostatic load was calculated using nine different biomarkers. Results show that 85% self-reported at least one goal as joint. Over-reporting– the perception that a goal was joint when in fact it was not mentioned among the three most salient goals of the spouse – occurred in one-third of all goals. Multilevel models indicate that the number of externally-rated joint goals was related to greater goal progress and lower allostatic load, but only for adults with little over-reporting. More joint goals and higher over-reporting were each linked with more relationship satisfaction. In conclusion, joint goals are associated with goal progress, relationship satisfaction, and health, but the association is dependent on the domain of functioning. (shrink)

Our goal is to show how science fiction films have dealt with the augmentation of bodily and cognitive faculties. These cinematographic imaginaries allow us to question the interest of such innovations. They depict a world in which the artificialization and mechanization of many activities leads to a loss of control over them. This would mean that we would run the risk, in the long term, of being deprived of our human qualities. However, we will show that these films do not (...) question the viability of this type of society. Indeed, these fictions do not insist on the constraints that these transformations nevertheless impose on the environment. Faced with the ecological crisis, the hold of technological innovations on all societies, far from appearing as the solution, risks on the contrary being identified as part of the problem. (shrink)