The newly updated Right and Wrong 2nd Edition is an accessible introduction to the major traditions in western philosophical ethics, written in a lively and engaging style. It is designed for entry-level ethics courses and includes real-life ethical scenarios chosen to appeal directly to students. Greatly expanded and improved, this successful text introduces students to the major ethical traditions, and provides a simple methodology for resolving ethical dilemmas Treats teleological and deontological approaches to ethics as the two most important traditions, (...) but now includes chapters on virtue ethics and the ethics of care The very accessible writing style speaks directly to students’ own experience Draws examples from three types of real-life ethical scenarios submitted by students: academic dishonesty, partying, and personal relationships Provides a concise treatment of this notoriously complex subject, perfect for entry-level ethics and applied ethics courses. (shrink)

People are motivated by shared social values that, when held with moral conviction, can serve as compelling mandates capable of facilitating support for ideological violence. The current study examined this dark side of morality by identifying specific cognitive and neural mechanisms associated with beliefs about the appropriateness of sociopolitical violence, and determining the extent to which the engagement of these mechanisms was predicted by moral convictions. Participants reported their moral convictions about a variety of sociopolitical issues prior to undergoing functional (...) MRI scanning. During scanning, they were asked to evaluate the appropriateness of violent protests that were ostensibly congruent or incongruent with their views about sociopolitical issues. Complementary univariate and multivariate analytical strategies comparing neural responses to congruent and incongruent violence identified neural mechanisms implicated in processing salience and in the encoding of subjective value. As predicted, neuro-hemodynamic response was modulated parametrically by individuals’ beliefs about the appropriateness of congruent relative to incongruent sociopolitical violence in ventromedial prefrontal cortex, and by moral conviction in ventral striatum. Overall moral conviction was predicted by neural response to congruent relative to incongruent violence in amygdala. Together, these findings indicate that moral conviction about sociopolitical issues serves to increase their subjective value, overriding natural aversion to interpersonal harm. (shrink)

In this review, we discuss how two evolutionarily conserved pathways at the interface of DNA replication and repair, template switching and break-induced replication, lead to the deleterious large-scale expansion of trinucleotide DNA repeats that cause numerous hereditary diseases. We highlight that these pathways, which originated in prokaryotes, may be subsequently hijacked to maintain long DNA microsatellites in eukaryotes. We suggest that the negative mutagenic outcomes of these pathways, exemplified by repeat expansion diseases, are likely outweighed by their positive role in (...) maintaining functional repetitive regions of the genome such as telomeres and centromeres. Break-induced replication and template switching are conserved mechanisms of replication fork restart. They do not cause microsatellite instability in prokaryotes, but promote repeat expansion in eukaryotes. We suggest that TS and BIR persisted in eukaryotes despite their mutagenic potential because they help maintain long repetitive telomeres and centromeres. (shrink)

This chapter contains section titled: Personhood: A Start Are Dolphins Persons? Language and the Hand Personhood Redefined Conclusion: What Kind of Beings Are Dolphins?

This chapter contains section titled: Problem‐solving Summary: problem solving ‐ Gory, Kuczaj, Pryor, Grover, DRC Language Comprehension Commands: FETCH, IN, MIMIC.

This chapter contains section titled: Human Consciousness Nonhumans, Consciousness and Appropriate Treatment Dolphin consciousness Do Dolphins Recognize Other Minds? Moving on: Inner World and Choice Do Dolphins Have Emotions? Do Dolphins Think? Conclusion: Dolphin onsciousness and Moral Standing.

This chapter contains section titled: Human Adaptations to the Water: An Exercise in Imagination Life in the ocean: the importance of other people Dolphin Intelligence in the Wild Dolphin Communication Social Intelligence and Group Cohesion Dolphins and Sex The Cognitive and Affective Skills Involved in Group Living Conclusion: Dolphin Intelligence.

This chapter contains section titled: “Human” Versus “Person” Human, Person and Ethics Philosophical Ethics Ethics and Nonhumans “Alien Intelligence” Two Questions.

This chapter contains section titled: “Interspecies ethics” The Dolphin/Tuna Controversy Dolphins in Captivity So What Do We Do? The Ethics of Human/Dolphin Contact: Two Final Thoughts.

This chapter contains section titled: Basic Facts about Dolphins Adaptations to Living in the Water The Dolphin Brain The Human Brain The Human Brain: Summary The Dolphin Brain Compared to the Human Brain The Dolphin Brain: Summary.

For courses in Business Ethics A fresh approach to the assumptions that underlie business practices Two recent events — the 2008 economic meltdown and the ongoing concentration of the nation's wealth in the hands of a very small percentage of the population — have led many people to question a number of basic assumptions about business, corporations, and the workings of contemporary free-market capitalism in a global economy. Written as a dialogue between Socrates and a hypothetical contemporary CEO,Socrates Comes to (...) Wall Street leads students to think critically about perspectives and practices that are taken as “givens” in most American business schools and corporations. Employing this original and provocative approach, author Thomas White seeks to encourage the next generation of business leaders to be more astute about the implications of their actions, and to act more prudently and more fairly than we have seen in the recent past. (shrink)

The theory is presented that the sexual process is a repair mechanism which maintains redundancy within the sub-structure of hierarchical, self-reproducing organisms. In order to keep the problems within mathematically tractable limits , a simple model is introduced: a wheel with 6 spokes, 3 of them vital and 3 redundant, symbolizes the individual . Random accidents destroy spokes; the wheels replicate at regular cycles and engage periodically in pairing and repair phases during which missing spokes are copy-reproduced along the intact (...) spokes of the partner wheel.The hierarchical structure of such a system is analysed and an ‘autonomous unit’ is defined: this is the unit of minimal hierarchical complexity which is capable of perpetuating autonomously all higher and all lower levels of the hierarchy; this is the central unit of selection.Four basic, physical parameters are isolated which determine the essential features of any eucaryotic life cycle: 1. The number of levels of the hierarchy ; 2. the relation between the phases of replication and repair ; 3. the duration of potential repair ; 4. the position of the sexual partners within the hierarchy .The evaluation of fitness components is considered in relation to trends of reproductive patterns in evolution. (shrink)

Boltzmann's gas model representing the second law of thermodynamics is based on the improbability of certain molecular distributions in space. Maxwell argued that a hypothetical ‘being’ with the faculty of seeing individual molecules could bring about such improbable distributions, thus violating the law of entropy. However, it appears that to render the molecules visible for any observer would increase the entropy more than the demon could decrease it, hence ‘Maxwell's Demon cannot operate’ . In the study presented here Maxwell's Demon (...) is interpreted in a general way as a biological observer system within systems which can upset thermodynamic probabilities provided that the relative magnitudes between observer system and observed system are appropriate.Maxwell's Demon within Boltzmann's Gas Model thus appears only as a special case of inappropriate, relative magnitude between the two systems. (shrink)

A simple model, illustrating the transition from a population of free swimming, solitary cells to one consisting of small colonies serves as a basis to discuss the evolution of the cooperative group. The transition is the result of a mutation of the dynamics of cell division, delayed cell separation leads to colonies of four cells. With this mutation cooperative features appear, such as synchronised cell divisions within colonies and coordinated flagellar function which enables the colony to swim in definite directions. (...) The selective advantages under given, environmental conditions are defined and the periods necessary for complete allelic replacement in small populations are calculated for asexual and sexual reproduction. The assumption of a steady-state population during allelic substitution is critically considered, particularly under conditions of competition. It is shown that density-dependent population control must operate in the process of selection. Sexual reproduction slows down the rate of selection even though all cells dre haploid. This phenomenon can be explained in general terms of `organizational dominance', where individual units coordinate the function of their neighbours which may be of a different allelotype.Cooperativity is pointed out as an a priori systemic feature which resides in the sub-units of systems, group formation and coordination appears thus as an almost inevitable event. A particular type of system described as ‘closed cycle of positive fitness interaction’ is discussed in more detail. It has the remarkable feature that its members cannot compete with each other; selection takes place between whole cycles .Gonium has a wide spectrum of `somatic plasticity' which enables it to assume various colonial configurations depending on physiological and environmental conditions. This feature can be explained as the result of dynamic flexibilities on the macro-molecular level. The particular relationship between the vast, molecular complexity and the relative simple dynamics of the cell cycle must lead eventually to the genetic fixation of an environmentally induced phenotype. (shrink)

Exact definitions in physical and biological terms of the coefficients in Volterra's (1926, 1931) original competition equations are indispensable for the understanding of the system. In agreement with Volterra's own, but not quite sufficient specifications, it is tried in this paper to give more precise definitions of the parameters used by Volterra. This leads to some consequences; i.a. that there does not exist a principle of competitive exclusion. In order to allow for competitive exclusion — or for stabilization — the (...) Volterra equations need additional biophysical specifications and mathematical modifications. Some such modifications are proposed, for instance for aggressive interference as a function of population numbers. (shrink)

The inanimate world, including Man's wheeled vehicles, follow the classical mechanical laws: trajectories of objects in phase-space are predictable on the basis of the vectors of forces acting on the objects. Animal locomotion does not involve wheels, but relies on antagonistic contractile fibre systems, and defies prediction of trajectories. These features are tied up with the faculty of immediate steering in response to momentaneous physiological and environmental stimuli. Thus, animal motor systems have two relatively independent inputs: the sensory/information system, which (...) is the cause for specific trajectories, and the erfolg system which permits for the execution of the thus instructed motion. The problem of relative energetic magnitudes between the two systems — in that the causative system involves small, yet the executive system large energies — is specially considered in relation to locomotion by antagonistically functioning mechanical elements. (shrink)

Analysis of the biophysical conditions for a correct application of the Volterra Competition Equations with resource-independent coefficients reveals the following:The traditional, mathematical formalism with the two equations representing two straight lines at the condition of zero growth applies.

The argument is put forward that genetic mutations are viable then only, when the changed pattern of growth and/or metabolism is accommodated by the taxon-specific biochemistry of the organisms, i.e. by adaptive, somatic/physiological plasticity. The range of somatic plasticity under changing environmental conditions, therefore, has a certain predictive value for the kind of mutations that are likely to be viable.

The potential for the occurrence of multiple-role relationships is increased when professors also consult with athletic teams on their campuses. Such multiple-role relationships have potential ethical implications that are unclear and largely unexplored, and consultants may find multiple-role relationships both difficult to deal with and unavoidable. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to explore the nature of teacher-practitioner multiple-role relationships. Participants (N = 35) were recruited from Association for the Advancement of Applied Sport Psychology (AAASP) certified consultants (CCs) who (...) were also affiliated with a university (N = 68). All participants completed a 28-item survey exploring the incidence and relevant issues pertaining to multiple-role relationships. Chi-square analyses revealed that licensed mental health practitioners (i.e., psychologists and counselors) were more likely than nonlicensed AAASP CCs to believe that multiple-role relationships were never appropriate in sport psychology, 2(1, N = 30) = 12.80, p < .001, and to have never taken part in a multiple-role relationship, 2(1, N = 33) = 12.44, p < .001. Independent samples t tests revealed that mental health practitioners also reported that they would have higher levels of concern for both the practitioner, t(30) = -2.77, p = .009, and the client, t(30) = -2.50, p = .018, in such a relationship. (shrink)