This article introduces evolutionary psychology to a general readership, with the purpose of applying evolutionary psychology to suicide terrorism. Some of the key concepts related to evolutionary psychology are discussed, as well as several misconceptions associated with this approach to psychology. We argue that one of the primary, but insufficient, motivating factors for suicide terrorism is strong religious belief. Evolutionary psychological theories related to religious belief, and supporting empirical work, are described, laying a foundation for examining suicide terrorism. Several promising (...) directions for future research on suicide terrorism from an evolutionary psychological perspective are highlighted, particularly within the theoretical framework of kin selection, and the implications of applying evolutionary psychology to suicide terrorism are discussed. (shrink)

This volume explores the role of some of the most prominent twentieth-century philosophers and political thinkers as teachers. It examines what obstacles they confronted as teachers and how they overcame them in conveying truth to their students in an age dominated by ideological thinking.

As our world becomes increasingly interconnected, threats to global public health continue to proliferate. New and novel risks to health have emerged consistently over the past 30 years. Moreover, our shrinking world now allows health threats to spread more quickly than ever before. Given these realities, efforts to protect and improve global health must be expansive, flexible, and able to take into account the variety of circumstances that may imperil good health. These efforts also must consider the multiple levels and (...) varying contexts in which laws, policies, and other factors govern global health and affect health outcomes. (shrink)

This book is a collection of secondary essays on America's most important philosophic thinkers—statesmen, judges, writers, educators, and activists—from the colonial period to the present. Each essay is a comprehensive introduction to the thought of a noted American on the fundamental meaning of the American regime.

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Faith and Reason in Continental and Japanese Philosophy: Reading Tanabe Hajime and William Desmond by Takeshi MorisatoLance H. Gracy (bio)Faith and Reason in Continental and Japanese Philosophy: Reading Tanabe Hajime and William Desmond. By Takeshi Morisato. England: Bloomsbury Publishing, 2019. Pp. viii + 269. Hardcover $116.00, isbn 978-1-350-09251-8.Faith and Reason in Continental and Japanese Philosophy: Reading Tanabe Hajime and William Desmond by Takeshi Morisato is an informative and (...) insightful read on metaphysics, philosophy of religion, ethics, and relevant areas of interest. Morisato's stated objective in the introduction is (a) to investigate the possibility of comparative philosophy through William Desmond's metaxological way of thinking, and (b) to examine how the "absolute dialectic" in Tanabe Hajime's metanoesis can help us understand the relationship between one framework of thinking and another (p. 16). Morisato's book proceeds in five parts. Part One orients the reader to the scope of the project through an overview of comparative philosophy and its methodological frameworks--namely, the metaxological methodology of William Desmond, which deals importantly with the (modern) predicament of religion as expressed in the "transcendental univocity" of the Kantian system; and the metanoetic methodology of Tanabe Hajime, which deals importantly with the issue of "rational progress" in Hegelian dialectic. Yet each intellectual framework deals with both Kant's and Hegel's systems. Part Two addresses what the problem of religion in Kantian and Hegelian philosophy is in more detail. Part Three, "Metaxology and the Problems of the Philosophy of Religion," and Part Four, "Metanoetics and the Problems of the Philosophy of Religion," offer a more detailed account concerning how Desmond's and Tanabe's philosophies tackle conceptual problems in modern philosophy of religion. Morisato's conclusion follows from these along with an endnotes section, bibliography, and index.According to Morisato, overcoming the problem of comparative philosophy--i.e., the "philosophical problem of comparing two systems of thinking rooted in different cultural and intellectual contexts" (p. 22)--means, at least in part, clarifying the extent to which philosophers of different culturalintellectual contexts and backgrounds share, as "kindred spirits" or as "intellectual companions," a consonance of thought regarding their philosophical perspectives. Desmond and Tanabe represent just such a pair, whose consonance of thought, expressed by Morisato en passant and expressed more definitively in the conclusion, is unified in a struggle against hegemonic structures in the [End Page 1] philosophy of religion, specifically those of Kant's and Hegel's philosophies of religion. William Desmond (1951–present) is a Catholic philosopher who currently holds the David R. Cook Chair in Philosophy at Villanova University. He has worked extensively on metaphysics, ontology, philosophy of religion, aesthetics, and German idealism. Tanabe Hajime (1885–1962) was a Japanese philosopher of the Kyoto school and is perhaps most well-known for his Philosophy as Metanoetics. Morisato does a commendable job elucidating issues in modern systems of religion, which have undoubtedly been influenced by Kant's and Hegel's systems. As it concerns Kant, contemporary philosophy of religion still struggles with the claims of transcendental idealism, particularly its reduction of religious belief to mere postulates of practical reason. And as it concerns Hegel, what seems to be an unending, "progressive" self-return of dialectical monism has deeply influenced the way, and manner, in which religious adherents deal with societal views of the individual and individuals' views of society. By this token, Morisato's attempt to get beyond the so-called "extirpation" of the source of religious truth as the "creative power behind our understanding of reality and our existence" is refreshing, to say the least (p. 46). In what follows, I offer a relatively brief overview of Morisato's book and conclude with a reflection on the text.Morisato's critique of the Kantian and Hegelian systems begins with the argument that Kantian transcendental univocity implies that reason's autonomy, as dictates of the moral law as absolute duties, not only precedes divine legislation, but becomes one with it or else is reduced to it. In other words, for Kant, the rational-moral universal is divine law. However, reason's autonomy fails to comprehend the divine origination of finite particulars due to... (shrink)

Good informal arguments offer justification for their conclusions. They go wrong if the justifications double back, rendering the arguments circular. Circularity, however, is not necessarily a single property of an argument, but may depend on (a) whether the argument repeats an earlier claim, (b) whether the repetition occurs within the same line of justification, and (c) whether the claim is properly grounded in agreed‐upon information. The experiments reported here examine whether people take these factors into account in their judgments of (...) whether arguments are circular and whether they are reasonable. The results suggest that direct judgments of circularity depend heavily on repetition and structural role of claims, but only minimally on grounding. Judgments of reasonableness take repetition and grounding into account, but are relatively insensitive to structural role. (shrink)

A substantial body of evidence shows that people tend to rely too heavily on explanations when trying to justify an opinion. Some research suggests these errors may arise from an inability to distinguish between explanations and the evidence that bears upon them. We examine an alternative account, that many people do distinguish between explanations and evidence, but rely more heavily on unsubstantiated explanations when evidence is scarce or absent. We examine the philosophical and psychological distinctions between explanation and evidence, and (...) show that participants use explanations as a substitute for missing evidence. Experiment 1 replicates the results of other researchers, but further shows that participants generate more evidence when they are not constrained by their lack of data. Merely mentioning a source of data can alter both their evaluation (Experiment 2) and their production (Experiment 3) of explanations and evidence. In Experiment 4, we show that participants can explicitly consider the availability of evidence and other pragmatic factors when evaluating arguments. Finally, we consider the implications of using explanations to replace missing evidence as a strategy in argument. (shrink)

Accountability is a significant factor in the soundness of the organisational environment in Australia, for both the public and private sectors. The accountability process rests on the quality and accessibility of organisational records, the information environment. While the Australian liberal democratic open society and free market system relies on accountability, paradoxically accountability is constrained by the needs of the open society and the market. Setting appropriate mechanisms for accountability while preserving civil liberty and innovative free markets is a difficult (...) task, and is one that falls to government. Governments have a ubiquitous role in implementing accountability in both the public and the private sectors, and the Australian federal system further complicates governments'' difficult role. The 1990s will bring further corporate pathologies, similar to those of the 1980''s. However the public and private sectors can reduce the impact of corporate pathologies in the 1990''s by learning the lessons of the 1980''s, through placing a priority on inculcating ethical and moral behavior, emphasising democratic values, and raising the organisational status of records. (shrink)

Volume 18, Issue 5, October 2019, Page 529-534.

A substantial body of evidence shows that people tend to rely too heavily on explanations when trying to justify an opinion. Some research suggests these errors may arise from an inability to distinguish between explanations and the evidence that bears upon them. We examine an alternative account, that many people do distinguish between explanations and evidence, but rely more heavily on unsubstantiated explanations when evidence is scarce or absent. We examine the philosophical and psychological distinctions between explanation and evidence, and (...) show that participants use explanations as a substitute for missing evidence. Experiment 1 replicates the results of other researchers, but further shows that participants generate more evidence when they are not constrained by their lack of data. Merely mentioning a source of data can alter both their evaluation (Experiment 2) and their production (Experiment 3) of explanations and evidence. In Experiment 4, we show that participants can explicitly consider the availability of evidence and other pragmatic factors when evaluating arguments. Finally, we consider the implications of using explanations to replace missing evidence as a strategy in argument. (shrink)

This paper presents findings from a literature review exploring the operationalisation issues for corporate responsibility performance and corporate responsibility performance measurement systems (CR-PMS). It concludes with a synthesis for the key comparative aspects of a CR-PMS and a traditional PMS in terms of the metric and systems perspective. In light of the sparse academic literature on the specific topic, this paper proposes a new categorical tool, the Ten Factor Framework for the design of CR-PMS, which has both academic and (...) practitioner applications. (shrink)

Over the past three centuries in the West, there has been a sort of oscillation between two antagonistic visions of the world. One sees the world as being fundamentally inert, in such a manner that all hopes, dreams and technological delights are permitted. The other thinks of the world as inhabited by a spirit who consecrates all its parts by recording them in a great whole. We can think of the pantheism that sets itself in opposition to Newton's materialism or, (...) more exactly, to the materialist interpretation given to Newton in the 18th century. In the 17th century the opposite had occurred. The magic universe of the Renaissance had given place to the triumphs of the Cartesian mechanism. As for protestantism, which is said to have been one of the most powerful factors of disenchantment after the 17th century, how was one not to see it prolonged, by reaction, into a philosophy for which nature is the tangible presence of God? When Calvin wrote that nothing happens in nature that is not a direct effect of the divine will, we already see appear in the background the mystic ecstasies that Rousseau experienced in nature. For if no single leaf flutters and no breeze blows without divine intervention, then receiving the slightest sensation would mean, according to Jean-Jacques Rousseau, entering into direct contact with God. (shrink)

If a trademark becomes a generic term, it may be cancelled under trademark law, a process known as genericide. Typically, in genericide cases, consumer surveys are brought into evidence to establish a mark’s semantic status as generic or distinctive. Some drawbacks of surveys are cost, delay, small sample size, lack of reproducibility, and observer bias. Today, however, much discourse involving marks is online. As a potential complement to consumer surveys, therefore, we explore an artificial intelligence approach based chiefly on word (...) embeddings: mathematical models of meaning based on distributional semantics that can be trained on texts selected for jurisdictional and temporal relevance. After identifying two main factors in mark genericness, we first offer a simple screening metric based on the ngram frequency of uncapitalized variants of a mark. We then add two word embedding metrics: one addressing contextual similarity of uncapitalized variants, and one comparing the neighborhood density of marks and known generic terms in a category. For clarity and validation, we illustrate our metrics with examples of genericized, somewhat generic, and distinctive marks such as, respectively, DUMPSTER, DOBRO, and ROLEX. (shrink)

This paper explores the epistemological affordances of Islamic ethics as alternative knowledge within intercultural education. Despite the calls for epistemological plurality in intercultural education that centre epistemologies of the South, educators may find it hard to reaffirm their situated knowledges and practices because they may have been overwhelmed by the wide endorsements of the mainstream literature. Drawing on in-depth interviews with 25 EFL teachers, this study aims to (a) unpack educators’ perspectives around the adoption of alternative knowledges anchored in local (...) epistemologies and sensibilities, (b) foreground educators’ epistemic positioning around alternative knowledges and how they are perceived as sites for cognitive and pedagogical renewal to account for local particularities and conditions and (c) examine inter-epistemic tensions within educators’ reasoning in terms of how they navigate (in)congruencies between the mainstream and Islamic philosophy at the conceptual, pedagogical and practical levels. Findings reveal that educators acknowledge the legitimacy of Islamic ethics and their epistemological/pedagogical significance in intercultural education. However, some factors may problematize educators’ attempts at making use of Islamic ethics including the additional burden of reflecting alternative knowledges while attending to contextual factors (class size, the course’s orientation, exams, time constraints, etc.) and the lack of sufficient training in intercultural education. (shrink)

Since the English translation first appeared in 1923, Rudolf Otto's volume has established itself as a classic in the field of religious philosophy. It offers an in-depth inquiry into the non-rational factor in the idea of the divine and its relation to the rational.

This chapter explores the notion of the Web‐extended mind, which is the idea that the technological and informational elements of the Web can sometimes serve as part of the mechanistic substrate that realizes human mental states and processes. It is argued that while current forms of the Web may not be particularly suited to the realization of Web‐extended minds, new forms of user interaction technology as well as new approaches to information representation do provide promising new opportunities for Web‐based forms (...) of cognitive extension. In addition, it is suggested that extended cognitive systems often rely on the emergence of social practices and conventions that shape how a technology is used. Web‐extended minds may thus depend on forms of socio‐technical co‐evolution in which social forces and factors play just as important a role as do the processes of technology design and development. (shrink)

Although research has examined factors influencing understanding of informed consent in biomedical and forensic research, less is known about participants' attention to details in consent documents in psychological survey research. The present study used a randomized experimental design and found the majority of participants were unable to recall information from the consent form in both in-person and online formats. Participants were also relatively poor at recognizing important aspects of the consent form including risks to participants and confidentiality procedures. Memory effects (...) and individual difference characteristics also appeared to influence recall and recognition of consent form information. (shrink)

The role of individual factors in behavioral neuroscience is an important, but still neglected, area of research. For example, the Elevated Plus-Maze Test has been one of the most used paradigms to gauge unconditioned aversively motivated behavior in rodents. However, despite a great number of experiments with this test there have been only few efforts to assess systematic individual variations in the elevated plus-maze and related neurobiological functions. The present review aims to give, first, a general overview and introduction about (...) the test, and second, an animal model of anxiety based on natural variance of plus-maze behavior within a given unselected population of rats. Finally, critical aspects of such approaches in animal research are discussed, and suggestions are given as to where to go from here. (shrink)

Munch-Jurisic’s account of perpetrator disgust raises important new questions concerning the complexity of emotions and their connection with moral actions. In this commentary, we discuss this account by applying some of the author’s ideas to the case of anger. We suggest that just as the relations between disgust and moral action are much more nuanced than previously thought, as Munch-Jurisic explains, analyses of anger can also profit from a more careful approach to such connections. Specifically, we propose that contextual factors (...) can affect the moral character of anger reactions, which in turn can provide them with moral value. We also argue that the contextual view deployed to study disgust reactions can also support distinctions between core forms and socio-moral forms of the same emotion, which in turn raises interesting questions concerning different forms of anger. Lastly, we extend the contextual approach to problems of emotion individuation and theories in emotion science, showing how current scientific emotion theories can learn from a detailed examination of disgust, anger, and other context-sensitive emotions. We aim to highlight some important contributions of Munch-Jurisic’s work to broader discussions on emotions, morality, and how to theorize about emotions overall. (shrink)

This book is a unique collection of essays by the leading scholars in business ethics. The purpose of the volume is to examine the emergence of business ethics as an important element of managerial practice and as an integral area of scholarship. The four lead essays--by Norman Bowie, Kenneth Goodpaster, Thomas Donaldson, and Ezra Bowen--are examples of some of the best thinking about the role of ethics in business. These essays examine such issues as the nature of scholarship and knowledge (...) in business ethics, how ethics is a central factor in managerial leadership, the complexities of ethics in multinational and multicultural settings, and the problems of ethical literacy and moral debate in a free society. Each lead essay develops several themes which are then explored by other prominent thinkers, including Robert Solomon, Richard DeGeorge, and Joanne Cuilla. (shrink)

Communicating genetic information to family members has been the subject of an extensive debate recently in bioethics and law. In this context, the extent of the relatives’ right to know and not to know is examined. The mainstream in the bioethical literature adopts a liberal perception of patient autonomy and offers a utilitarian mechanism for solving familial tensions over genetic information. This reflects a patient-centred approach in which disclosure without consent is justified only to prevent serious harm or death to (...) others. Based on a legal and bioethical analysis on the one hand, and an examination of empirical studies on the other, this paper advocates the adoption of a relational perception of autonomy, which, in the context of genetics, takes into account the effect that any decision—whether to disclose or not to disclose—will have on the familial relationship and the dynamics of the particular family. Adding this factor to the criteria usually advocated by lawyers and ethicists will facilitate reaching a sensitive decision, which recognises the various interests of family members beyond the risk to physical health. Taking this factor into account will require a process of deliberation both between doctors and patients, and in the family. It will also require a relaxation of medical confidentiality, as the family rather than the patient is gradually perceived as the unit of care. Moreover, adopting such a relational approach will accord with current views of doctors and patients who base their decision primarily on the nature of the familial relationship. (shrink)

This book brings together a collection of essays written by scholars inspired by Eugene Gendlin's work, particularly those interested in thinking with and beyond Gendlin for the sake of a global community facing significant crises. The contributors take inspiration from Gendlin's philosophy of the implicit, and his theoretical approach to psychology. The essays engage with Gendlin's ideas for our era, including critiques and corrections as well as extrapolations of his work. Gendlin himself worried that knowing about a problem is too (...) often conflated with actions that might lead to change; the essays in this book point to a form of understanding that is activated, an embodied and immediate way of thinking about today's problems. Throughout the volume, the contributors creatively engage with Gendlin's work and its applicability to the complex, pressing crises of our time: the Covid-19 pandemic, environmental/climate issues, racism, sexism, economic inequality, and other factors threatening human persons and communities. Gendlin's theoretical approach to psychology is naturally interdisciplinary, making this book an essential read for anyone interested in moving to the boundaries where psychology meets philosophy, theology, art, environmental studies, science, and technology, and much more. (shrink)

An algebraic semantics, based on factor algebras, for one-way and two-way implicative verbs is proposed. Implicative verbs denote elements of filters or of ideals generated by identity functions in factor algebras. This semantics explains in particular the problem of implicational equivalence raised by two-way implicative verbs, and shows that the negation necessary to establish the implicativity of these verbs is the negation which preserves the presuppositions of sentences with implicative verbs. In addition, it follows from the proposed semantics (...) that any two implicative verbs denoting in the same algebra but belonging to different categories, are semantically related. (shrink)

Background Papers retracted for fraud (data fabrication or data falsification) may represent a deliberate effort to deceive, a motivation fundamentally different from papers retracted for error. It is hypothesised that fraudulent authors target journals with a high impact factor (IF), have other fraudulent publications, diffuse responsibility across many co-authors, delay retracting fraudulent papers and publish from countries with a weak research infrastructure. Methods All 788 English language research papers retracted from the PubMed database between 2000 and 2010 were evaluated. (...) Data pertinent to each retracted paper were abstracted from the paper and the reasons for retraction were derived from the retraction notice and dichotomised as fraud or error. Data for each retracted article were entered in an Excel spreadsheet for analysis. Results Journal IF was higher for fraudulent papers (p<0.001). Roughly 53% of fraudulent papers were written by a first author who had written other retracted papers (‘repeat offender’), whereas only 18% of erroneous papers were written by a repeat offender (χ=88.40; p<0.0001). Fraudulent papers had more authors (p<0.001) and were retracted more slowly than erroneous papers (p<0.005). Surprisingly, there was significantly more fraud than error among retracted papers from the USA (χ2=8.71; p<0.05) compared with the rest of the world. Conclusions This study reports evidence consistent with the ‘deliberate fraud’ hypothesis. The results suggest that papers retracted because of data fabrication or falsification represent a calculated effort to deceive. It is inferred that such behaviour is neither naïve, feckless nor inadvertent. (shrink)