On the one hand, according to Richard Rorty, Paulo Freire and others, education is the practice of freedom. On the other hand, according to Michael Foucault, Mary Midgley and others, ethics is the practice of freedom. How, then, are education and ethics related to one another and what do these authors mean by ‘the practice of freedom’? In this piece, I argue that education and ethics are two mutually constitutive aspects of the practice of freedom. Individuals who are able to (...) engage in this practice can most properly be said to be the authors of their lives, that is, individuals who, to borrow from Neil MacGregor, are able to find their ‘place in things’. To find our ‘place in things’ is to do the necessary educative work required for becoming the authors of our lives, that is, for self-actualization. To take on the authorial role is, moreover, to be able effectively to take control of our lives, to organize them into unities for which we are individually responsible. This, according to Midgley, is precisely what it is to be ethical. This work, moreover, requires ongoing development, that is, education, in Dewey’s sense. I further argue that professional education and skills training cannot be understood properly in isolation from these broader educational aims and I criticize mainstream educational practices for not paying sufficient attention to the intimate relationship between the vocational and non-vocational aspects of education. (shrink)

The article focuses on a currently hot debate in contemporary ethics that takes place between so-called situationists and the advocates of virtue ethics. The fundamental assumption made by virtue ethics is that developing and perfecting one’s moral character or moral virtues warrants one’s morally good action. Situationists claim that this assumption contradicts the results of the latest empirical studies. From this observation, they conclude that virtue ethics is based on an empirically inadequate moral psychology.In the first part of the article, (...) I present the conceptions of virtue and moral character developed in response to the situationist criticism. I show to which degree these conceptions differ from the classical, so-called global approach in virtue ethics In the second part, based on the references to the latest empirical studies in social and cognitive psychology, I argue, against the situationist objection, that the classical notion of virtue meets the requirement of empirical adequacy. I mainly resort to the interactionist theory of personality by W. Mischel, R. Baumeister’s studies over self-control, D. Kahneman's conception of two-processual mind, and the studies over automatized processes by J. Bargh. (shrink)

Virtue ethics is currently one of the most widely known ethical theories. According to it, to act morally well, one needs to perfect one’s moral character by acquiring virtues. Among various virtues, we can distinguish the group of so-called virtues of will power to which, among others, belong self-control, decisiveness, patience, etc. As they are necessary for the effectiveness of human actions, they are also called executive virtues. It is doubtful, however, if they deserve the proper name of virtues because (...) they can be used either in the realization of good goals or evil ones. To serve the realization of what is good, they need to be combined with so-called substantial virtues. Virtues of will power are often identified with practical skills, and perfecting will power is identified with exercising such practices as playing an instrument, doing some sports, or taking practice in medicine. In my article, I am trying to compare the view of will power virtues with the results in empirical, psychological studies over self-control and self-regulation. I will show to what extent these two descriptions – philosophical and psychological – are congruent. I will also take a closer look at the observed phenomenon of the depleted will, and whether this observation undermines the conclusions assumptions of virtue ethics. (shrink)

Many believe that values are crucially dependent on emotions. This paper focuses on epistemic aspects of the putative link between emotions and value by asking two related questions. First, how exactly are emotions supposed to latch onto or track values? And second, how well suited are emotions to detecting or learning about values? To answer the first question, the paper develops the heuristics-model of emotions. This approach models emotions as sui generis heuristics of value. The empirical plausibility of the heuristics-model (...) is demonstrated using evidence from experimental psychology, evolutionary anthropology and neuroscience. The model is used then to answer the second question. If emotions are indeed heuristics of value, then it follows that emotions can be an important and useful source of information about value. However, emotions will not be epistemically superior in the sense of being the highest court of appeal for the justification of axiological beliefs (the latter view is referred to as the Epistemic Dependence Thesis, or EDT for short). The paper applies the heuristics-model to celebrated cases from the philosophy of emotions literature arguing that while the heuristics-model offers a good explanation of typical patterns of emotional reactions in such cases, advocates of EDT will have a hard time accounting for these patterns. The paper also shows that the conclusions drawn from special cases generalize. The paper ends by arguing that skepticism about the metaethical significance of emotions is compatible with a commitment to the importance of emotions in first-order normative ethics. (shrink)

Practical wisdom is the intellectual virtue that enables a person to make reliably good decisions about how, all-things-considered, to live. As such, it is a lofty and important ideal to strive for. It is precisely this loftiness and importance that gives rise to important questions about wisdom: Can real people develop it? If so, how? What is the nature of wisdom as it manifests itself in real people? I argue that we can make headway answering these questions by modeling wisdom (...) on expert skill. Presenting the main argument for this expert skill model of wisdom is the focus of this paper. More specifically, I’ll argue that wisdom is primarily the same kind of epistemic achievement as expert decision-making skill in areas such as firefighting. Acknowledging this helps us see that, and how, real people can develop wisdom. It also helps to resolve philosophical debates about the nature of wisdom. For example, philosophers, including those who think virtue should be modeled on skills, disagree about the extent to which wise people make decisions using intuitions or principled deliberation and reflection. The expert skill model resolves this debate by showing that wisdom includes substantial intuitive and deliberative and reflective abilities. (shrink)

In this study, we analyzed the relationship between confirmation bias, which causes people to preferentially view information that supports their opinions and beliefs, and web search behavior. In an online user study, we controlled confirmation bias by presenting prior information to participants that manipulated their impressions of health search topics and analyzed their behavioral logs during web search tasks. We found that web search users with poor health literacy and negative prior beliefs about the health search topic did not spend (...) time examining the list of web search results, and these users demonstrated bias in webpage selection. In contrast, web search users with high health literacy and negative prior beliefs about the search topic spent more time examining the list of web search results. In addition, these users attempted to browse webpages that present different opinions. No significant difference in web search behavior was observed between users with positive prior beliefs about the search topic and those with neutral belief. (shrink)

Knowledge sharing is the major driving force to maintain enterprises’ competitiveness. This study extends the current knowledge-sharing research by considering knowledge sharing as comprising four types: automatic response, rational reflection, ridiculed reflection, and deprived reflection, based on Kahneman’s types of system thinking. Drawing on the motivation-action-outcome model, this study explored how individuals’ intrinsic motivation can guide the action of knowledge sharing and reflect the outcome of creative self-efficacy in intelligent transportation jobs. By snowball sampling in intelligent transportation companies, a total (...) of 232 effective questionnaires were collected, and confirmatory factor analysis with structural equation modeling was performed. The research results showed that: intrinsic motivation was positively related to the four types of knowledge sharing tendencies; automatic response was not significantly related to creative self-efficacy; rational reflection was positively associated with creative self-efficacy; but ridiculed and deprived reflection were negatively related to creative self-efficacy. These results can be applied to encourage employees to practice rational reflection in knowledge sharing to enhance their creative self-efficacy in intelligent transportation jobs. (shrink)

This article presents a theory of intuitive skill in terms of three constitutive elements: getting things right intuitively, not getting things wrong intuitively, and sceptical ability. The theory draws on work from a range of psychological approaches to intuition and expertise in various domains, including arts, business, science, and sport. It provides a general framework that will help to further integrate research on these topics, for example building bridges between practical and theoretical domains or between such apparently conflicting methodologies as (...) a heuristics and biases approach on the one hand and one based on naturalistic decision-making on the other. In addition, the theory provides a clearer and more precise account of relevant concepts, which will help to inspire new directions for future research. Intuitive skill is defined as a high level of intuitive ability, that is, the ability to make good use of intuition; specifically, a high level of ability at either getting things right intuitively, not getting things wrong intuitively, or sceptical ability, where the latter is the ability to detect instances of getting things wrong intuitively so as to avoid forming incorrect intuitive judgements, which may itself be partly intuitive. (shrink)

The development of personal technologies has recently shifted from devices that seek to capture user attention to those that aim to improve user well-being. Digital wellness technologies use the same attractive qualities of other persuasive apps to motivate users towards behaviors that are personally and socially valuable, such as exercise, wealth-management, and meaningful communication. While these aims are certainly an improvement over the market-driven motivations of earlier technologies, they retain their predecessors’ focus on influencing user behavior as a primary metric (...) of success. Digital wellness technologies are still persuasive technologies, and they do not evade concerns over whether their influence on users is ethically justified. In this paper, we describe several ethical frameworks with which to assess the justification of digital wellness technologies’ influence on users. We propose that while some technologies help users to complete tasks and satisfy immediate preferences, other technologies encourage users to reflect on the values underlying their habits and teach them to evaluate their lives’ competing demands. While the former approach to digital wellness technology is not unethical, we propose that the latter approach is more likely to lead to skillful user engagement with technology. (shrink)

Social scientists are increasingly interested in beliefs about farm animal well-being and the factors that predict these beliefs. Yet little attention has been given to the role of values, which social psychologists consider to be the building blocks of human cognition. This study draws from research on values in the environmental social sciences to examine the relationship between environmental values and Americans’ beliefs about farm animal well-being. It also makes a methodological contribution by demonstrating the importance of measuring beliefs about (...) farm animal well-being on large industrial and small family farms separately. A series of paired sample t-tests finds Americans believe the well-being of farm animals on large industrial farms is significantly worse than on small family farms. Multiple regression results reveal the importance of environmental values, as well as various demographic factors, in understanding beliefs about farm animal well-being. They also suggest the presence of direct and indirect effects of values on beliefs. Implications and avenues for further research are discussed. (shrink)

Taking my departure from the discussion of the concept of understanding in contemporary epistemology, I will suggest that we need to fine-tune the concept of explanatory understanding in order to c...

Sometimes we learn through the use of imagination. The epistemology of imagination asks how this is possible. One barrier to progress on this question has been a lack of agreement on how to characterize imagination; for example, is imagination a mental state, ability, character trait, or cognitive process? This paper argues that we should characterize imagination as a cognitive ability, exercises of which are cognitive processes. Following dual process theories of cognition developed in cognitive science, the set of imaginative processes (...) is then divided into two kinds: one that is unconscious, uncontrolled, and effortless, and another that is conscious, controlled, and effortful. This paper outlines the different epistemological strengths and weaknesses of the two kinds of imaginative process, and argues that a dual process model of imagination helpfully resolves or clarifies issues in the epistemology of imagination and the closely related epistemology of thought experiments. (shrink)

It is often claimed that formal and optimizing norms of the standard conception of rationality and the heuristics of the bounded rationality approach are at odds with one another. This claim, I arg...

Human and non-human animals are social beings, both have social interactions. The ability to anticipate behavior of others is a fundamental requirement of social interactions. However, there are several ways of how agents can succeed in this. Two modes of anticipation, namely mindreading and behavior-reading, shape the animal mindreading debate. As a matter of fact, no position has yet convincingly ruled out the other. This paper suggests a strategy of how to argue for a mentalistic interpretation as opposed to a (...) behavioral interpretation. The first step suggests considering a pluralistic approach in order to allow for shortcomings such as not having a natural language. Second, a critical examination of the principle called Morgan’s Canon will show that this principle cannot be used as a final argument to rule out mentalistic approaches. Finally, the author argues that the setting of current experiments is responsible for the indistinguishability of mindreading versus behavior-reading and she suggests alternative experimental designs. (shrink)

Recent neuroscientific research has caused a paradigm shift in our understanding of the meaning and scope of compassion. Derived from the Latin root compassiō, compassion used to be a religious emotion that implied suffering with the perceived sufferer, whereas now it is examined as a psychological, neuroscientific, neurobiological, and thus natural, phenomenon. The newly arisen research interest in compassion led to the development of secular compassion training programs that follow closely in the footsteps of the “mindfulness revolution.” Whereas the latter (...) has been criticized for its reductionist appropriation of Buddhist thought by the capitalist west, in this paper, I demonstrate that the secularization of compassion is the result of innovative activities by representatives of the Buddhist traditions. I argue that some of the causes for the recent secularization and sciencization can be traced back into the fourteenth century Tibet, namely to the innovative exegetical activities of the scholars of the Tibetan Lojong tradition. I argue that from the perspective of the tradition, the sciencization of compassion resembles a deliberate purposeful “translation” effort that fits into the “two-track approach” of Buddhist propagation. (shrink)

Hilary Kornblith argues that many traditional philosophical accounts involve problematic views of reflection. According to Kornblith, reflection does not add reliability, which makes it unfit to underlie a separate form of knowledge. We show that a broader understanding of reflection, encompassing Type 2 processes, working memory, and episodic long-term memory, can provide philosophy with elucidating input that a restricted view misses. We further argue that reflection in fact often does add reliability, through generalizability, flexibility, and creativity that is helpful in (...) newly encountered situations, even if the restricted sense of both reflection and knowledge is accepted. And so, a division of knowledge into one reflexive form and one reflective form remains a plausible, and possibly fruitful, option. (shrink)

Peterson, Karlawish, and Largent’s “Supported Decision Making with People at the Margins of Autonomy” brings welcome attention to the rights of people with cognitive impairment and provides...

A moderately risk averse person may turn down a 50/50 gamble that either results in her winning $200 or losing $100. Such behaviour seems rational if, for instance, the pain of losing $100 is felt more strongly than the joy of winning $200. The aim of this paper is to examine an influential argument that some have interpreted as showing that such moderate risk aversion is irrational. After presenting an axiomatic argument that I take to be the strongest case for (...) the claim that moderate risk aversion is irrational, I show that it essentially depends on an assumption that those who think that risk aversion can be rational should be skeptical of. Hence, I conclude that risk aversion need not be irrational. (shrink)

This paper has two aims. One is to defend an incrementalist view of the evolution of language, not from those who think that syntax could not evolve incrementally, but from those who defend a fundamental distinction between Gricean communication or ostensive inferential communication and code-based communication. The paper argues against this dichotomy, and sketches ways in which a code-based system could evolve into Gricean communication. The second is to assess the merits of the Sender–Receiver Framework, originally formulated by David Lewis, (...) and much elaborated and set into an evolutionary context by Brian Skyrms and colleagues, as a framework for thinking about the evolution of language. Despite the great strengths of that framework, and despite the great value of a framework that is both general and formally tractable, I argue that there are critical features of language that it fails to capture. (shrink)

The literature on affective determinants of physical activity is growing rapidly. The present paper aims to provide greater clarity regarding the definition and distinctions among the various affect-related constructs that have been examined in relation to PA. Affective constructs are organized according to the Affect and Health Behavior Framework, including: affective response to PA; incidental affect; affect processing; and affectively charged motivational states. After defining each category of affective construct, we provide examples of relevant research showing how each construct may (...) relate to PA behavior. We conclude each section with a discussion of future directions for research. (shrink)

According to an increasingly popular epistemological view, people need outright beliefs in addition to credences to simplify their reasoning. Outright beliefs simplify reasoning by allowing thinkers to ignore small error probabilities. What is outright believed can change between contexts. It has been claimed that thinkers manage shifts in their outright beliefs and credences across contexts by an updating procedure resembling conditionalization, which I call pseudo-conditionalization (PC). But conditionalization is notoriously complicated. The claim that thinkers manage their beliefs via PC is (...) thus in tension with the view that the function of beliefs is to simplify our reasoning. I propose to resolve this puzzle by rejecting the view that thinkers employ PC. Based on this solution, I furthermore argue for a descriptive and a normative claim. The descriptive claim is that the available strategies for managing beliefs and credences across contexts that are compatible with the simplifying function of outright beliefs can generate synchronic and diachronic incoherence in a thinker’s attitudes. Moreover, I argue that the view of outright belief as a simplifying heuristic is incompatible with the view that there are ideal norms of coherence or consistency governing outright beliefs that are too complicated for human thinkers to comply with. (shrink)

In view of the ethical crises that have proliferated over the last decade, scholars have reflected critically on the ideal of management as a value-neutral, objective science. The alternative conceptualization of management as a craft has been introduced but not yet sufficiently elaborated. In particular, although authors such as Mintzberg and MacIntyre suggest craft as an appropriate alternative to science, neither of them systematically describes what “craft” is, and thus how it could inform an ethical managerial orientation. In this paper, (...) we draw from the literature to elaborate three caring orientations associated with craft practices: caring for materials, caring for process, and caring for end-users. We suggest that conceptualizing management as a craft in these terms offers an approach to business ethics that goes beyond the “ethics of compliance” and toward a more embodied and embedded form of ethical enactment within organizations. (shrink)

This article seeks to address current debates comparing polls and opinion mining as empirically based figuration models of public opinion in the light of in-depth intellectual debates on the role and nature of public opinion that began after the French Revolution and the controversy over public opinion spurred by the invention of polls. Issues of historical quantification and re-conceptualisation of public opinion are addressed in four parts. The first summarises the history of the rise and fall of the concept of (...) public opinion. The second re-examines the key controversies in the debates on the theoretical, empirical and social implications and consequences of the invention of polling. The third part scrutinises the datafication of public opinion that started with polling industry and continues in the age of big data and data mining. The final section discusses the controversial potentials of opinion-mining technology and suggests ways in which social scientists could critically respond to the big data and opinion-mining challenges in order to reintegrate the ideas of publicness, the public and public sphere into public opinion research. (shrink)

I survey four categories of factors that might give a digital mind, such as an upload or an artificial general intelligence, an advantage over humans. Hardware advantages include greater serial speeds and greater parallel speeds. Self-improvement advantages include improvement of algorithms, design of new mental modules, and modification of motivational system. Co-operative advantages include copyability, perfect co-operation, improved communication, and transfer of skills. Human handicaps include computational limitations and faulty heuristics, human-centric biases, and socially motivated cognition. The shape of hardware (...) growth curves, as well as the ease of modifying minds, are found to have a major impact on how quickly a digital mind may take advantage of these factors. (shrink)

We present a framework for epistemic logic, modeling the logical aspects of System 1 and System 2 cognitive processes, as per dual process theories of reasoning. The framework combines non-normal worlds semantics with the techniques of Dynamic Epistemic Logic. It models non-logically-omniscient, but moderately rational agents: their System 1 makes fast sense of incoming information by integrating it on the basis of their background knowledge and beliefs. Their System 2 allows them to slowly, step-wise unpack some of the logical consequences (...) of such knowledge and beliefs, by paying a cognitive cost. The framework is applied to three instances of limited rationality, widely discussed in cognitive psychology: Stereotypical Thinking, the Framing Effect, and the Anchoring Effect. (shrink)

ABSTRACT We appreciate and respond to Cokelet’s thoughtful criticisms of our book. First, he points to deliberative forms of practical wisdom as objectionable to anti-rationalist’s. In response, we point to non-conscious (yet complex) forms of deliberation that occur as individuals automatically process and respond to virtue-relevant stimuli. Second, Cokelet states that reflecting upon one’s life as a whole may be unnecessary and ineffective for virtue development. We clarify that reflection is not the only means of virtue cultivation, and even flawed (...) reflection is likely helpful. Finally, Cokelet recommends aiming for ‘theoretical neutrality’ by recasting these core tenets as empirical hypotheses. We argue against a neutral perspective that accommodates antirationalist views that we think are on the wrong track. Non-neutral claims help generate testable empirical hypotheses that can move virtue science forward. (shrink)

The existence of deep and persistent moral disagreement poses a problem for a defender of moral knowledge. It seems particularly clear that a philosopher who thinks that we know a great many moral truths should explain how human populations have failed to converge on those truths. In this paper, I do two things. First, I show that the problem is more difficult than it is often taken to be, and second, I criticize a popular response, which involves claiming that many (...) false moral beliefs are the product of nonmoral ignorance. (shrink)

According to the Rationality Constraint, our concept of belief imposes limits on how much irrationality is compatible with having beliefs at all. We argue that empirical evidence of human irrationality from the psychology of reasoning and the psychopathology of delusion undermines only the most demanding versions of the Rationality Constraint, which require perfect rationality as a condition for having beliefs. The empirical evidence poses no threat to more relaxed versions of the Rationality Constraint, which only require only minimal rationality. Nevertheless, (...) we raise problems for all versions of the Rationality Constraint by appealing to more extreme forms of irrationality that are continuous with actual cases of human irrationality. In particular, we argue that there are conceivable cases of “mad belief” in which populations of Lewisian madmen have beliefs that are not even minimally rational. This undermines Lewis’s claim that our ordinary concept of belief is a theoretical concept that is implicitly defined by its role in folk psychology. We argue that introspection gives us a phenomenal concept of belief that cannot be analyzed by applying Lewis’s semantics for theoretical terms. (shrink)

The aim of this paper is to argue that what I call the simple theory of introspection can be extended to account for our introspective knowledge of what we believe as well as what we consciously experience. In section one, I present the simple theory of introspection and motivate the extension from experience to belief. In section two, I argue that extending the simple theory provides a solution to Moore’s paradox by explaining why believing Moorean conjunctions always involves some degree (...) of irrationality. In section three, I argue that it also solves the puzzle of transparency by explaining why it’s rational to answer the question whether one believes that p by answering the question whether p. Finally, in section four, I defend the simple theory against objections by arguing that self-knowledge constitutes an ideal of rationality. (shrink)

The main goal of this paper is to investigate what explanatory resources Robert Brandom’s distinction between acknowledged and consequential commitments affords in relation to the problem of logical omniscience. With this distinction the importance of the doxastic perspective under consideration for the relationship between logic and norms of reasoning is emphasized, and it becomes possible to handle a number of problematic cases discussed in the literature without thereby incurring a commitment to revisionism about logic. One such case in particular is (...) the preface paradox, which will receive an extensive treatment. As we shall see, the problem of logical omniscience not only arises within theories based on deductive logic; but also within the recent paradigm shift in psychology of reasoning. So dealing with this problem is important not only for philosophical purposes but also from a psychological perspective. (shrink)

The Equal Weight View holds that, when we discover we disagree with an epistemic peer, we should give our peer’s judgment as much weight as our own. But how should we respond when we cannot tell whether those who disagree with us are our epistemic peers? I argue for a position I will call the Earn-a-Spine View. According to this view, parties to a disagreement can remain confident, at least in some situations, by finding justifiable reasons to think their opponents (...) are less credible than themselves, even if those reasons are justifiable only because they lack information about their opponents. (shrink)

From 2012 to 2015 I was the first Eugene H. Fram Chair in Applied Critical Thinking at Rochester Institute of Technology, in Rochester, NY. To the best of my knowledge it is the only such endowed position devoted solely to this at a major North American university. It was made possible by a generous 3 million dollar gift from an anonymous alumnus who wished to honor a retired faculty member who had taught for 51 years. The honoree was revered for (...) his devotion to Bloom’s taxonomy and his academic rigor, which infused case studies and the Socratic method. A primary motivation for the chair was a belief that an alarming number of college graduates lack the necessary critical thinking skills in order to advance successfully in their careers. My responsibilities included collaborative leadership, advocacy and oversight for critical thinking across the entire campus. It provided a unique opportunity to reflect on the current state of critical thinking instruction–very broadly construed, as well as to examine its specific role at RIT, an institution with its own unique history, mission, and character. (shrink)

In contrast to the fruitful relationship between psychoanalysis/psychoanalysts and the humanities, institutionalized psychoanalysis has been largely resistant to the integration of psychoanalysis with other empirical branches of knowledge, as well as clinical ones [primarily cognitive-behavioral therapy ]. Drawing from two decades of theoretical and empirical work on psychopathology, psychotherapy, and psychoanalysis, the author aims to show how a reformulation of object relations theory using psychological science may enhance a clinical-psychoanalytic understanding and treatment of suicidal depression, which constitutes one of the (...) most formidable health challenges of our time. Specifically, he rewrote the notion of Melanie Klein positions—primarily the depressive position—using extant knowledge of structure of emotions, the centrality of mental representations of the future and the toxic nature of criticism-based emotions. This reformulation enables a dialog between clinical psychoanalysis and other therapeutic schools of thought and sheds light on the understanding and treatment of suicidal depression. (shrink)

This paper presents a case study of the South African operation of a logistics company, operating in a context of short-termism and under-performance. Frustration with managing in this context, and concern that this environment might erode the customer value proposition, prompted an exploration of the question: “How can the business prioritise its investment in intangibles to support sustainable growth in an environment of short-termism and sub-par business performance?” The study followed an inductive grounded theory approach and began with an exploration (...) of the system of short-termism as it was being experienced by the management team. This evolved in an iterative process to include an exploration of the customer value proposition, the organisation’s capabilities and the system of investment in intangibles. Data were collected over a period of 6 months, across a series of four stages as the management team grappled with the short-term financial objectives imposed on them. The data categories were used to develop 214 propositions across all stages. Through the four stages, four artefacts were developed from the propositions a causal loop diagram of the system of short-termism; a documented value proposition; an assessment of the health of the business’ capitals; and a multi-year intangibles investment programme. The findings indicate that a focus on investment in intangible assets can play a vital role in stimulating sustainable value creation in an environment of historically poor returns on investment and pressure for short-term financial results. It is suggested that investment in intangibles can be introduced as a multi-year capabilities investment plan. The study succeeded in getting investment in intangibles approved and the implication is that long-term decision-making can co-exist in an environment of short-termism and low growth. (shrink)

According to one highly influential approach to moral responsibility, human beings are responsible (eligible to be praised or blamed) for what they do because they are _responsive to reasons _(Fischer & Ravizza 1998). However, this amounts to a descriptive assumption about human beings that may not be borne out by the empirical research. According to a recent trend in moral psychology (Haidt 2001), most human judgment is caused by fast, nonconscious, and intuitive processes, rather than explicit, conscious deliberation about one’s (...) reasons. And when humans do engage in explicit deliberation, it primarily serves to provide post hoc rationalization of their intuitive judgments (confabulation). If this is correct, it is tempting to conclude that most of our judgments—and the actions we perform on their basis—are not genuine responses to reasons. The reasons-responsiveness approach would thus appear to be committed to the implausible conclusion that we are not responsible for very much after all, including, most problematically, our implicit biases. I argue that the reasons-responsiveness approach can avoid this conclusion by showing three things: (1) that affective and intuitive processes can be reasons-responsive; (2) that the responsiveness of those processes can be bolstered by the agent’s environment; and (3) that practices like blame are one of the key ways in which human beings are attuned to reasons over time. I argue that the first and second of these items, despite their initial plausibility, are insufficient on their own to explain why humans can be held accountable for things like implicit biases, and that the way forward is to appreciate what holding each other accountable _does—_i.e., its effects. (shrink)

Many comparative philosophers discuss ceyinzhixin 惻隱之心 and its moral psychological nature to understand the Confucian heart-mind and the unique Confucian approach to other-concerning love. This essay examines and analyzes different interpretations of ceyinzhixin. First, it surveys and compares the four interpretations in recent publications of comparative Chinese philosophy, and analyzes their moral psychological viewpoints. Second, three major approaches to ceyinzhixin and their differences are analyzed. Third, the moral psychological complexity of ceyinzhixin and the advantage of the integrative approach are discussed. (...) The integrative approach, in comparison to other approaches, explains both the complexity and the unity of ceyinzhixin better and develops an inclusive and comprehensive interpretation of ceyinzhixin and the unique moral psychological nature of the Confucian heart-mind in its empathic other-concerning love. (shrink)

We seem to ascribe mental states and agency to groups. We say ‘Google knows such-and-such,’ or ‘Amazon intends to do such-and-such.’ This observation of ordinary parlance also found its way into philosophical accounts of social groups and collective intentionality. However, these discussions are usually quiet about how groups self-ascribe their own beliefs and intentions. Apple might explain to its shareholders that it intends to bring a new iPhone to the market next year. But how does Apple know what it intends? (...) How do groups get to know their own mental states? This is the question of collective self-knowledge. I argue that collective self-knowledge is a distinct phenomenon that deserves our attention. In particular I suggest: that we should be interested in collective self-knowledge, because our behaviour indicates that we already engage with collective self-knowledge in practice; that groups can collectively avow, which indicates that they have privileged and peculiar access to their own intentional states; and that collective self-knowledge is not reducible to intentional states of individuals and therefore is an independent explanandum. (shrink)

In this work, we evaluate the status of both theory and empirical evidence in the field of experimental rest-break research based on a framework that combines mental-chronometry and psychometric-measurement theory. To this end, we provide a taxonomy of rest breaks according to which empirical studies can be classified. Then, we evaluate the theorizing in both the basic and applied fields of research and explain how popular concepts relate to each other in contemporary theoretical debates. Here, we highlight differences between all (...) these models in the light of two symbolic categories, termed the resource-based and satiation-based model, including aspects related to the dynamics and the control mechanisms at work. Based on a critical assessment of existing methodological and theoretical approaches, we finally provide a set of guidelines for both theory building and future empirical approaches to the experimental study of rest breaks. We conclude that a psychometrically advanced and theoretically focused research of rest and recovery has the potential to finally provide a sound scientific basis to eventually mitigate the adverse effects of ever increasing task demands on performance and well-being in a multitasking world at work and leisure. (shrink)

Reflection has been proclaimed as a means to help physicians deal with medicine’s inherent complexity and remedy many of the shortcomings of medical education. Yet, there is little agreement on the nature of reflection nor on how it should be taught and practiced. Emerging neuroscientific concepts suggest that human thought processes are largely nonconscious, in part inaccessible to introspection. Our knowledge of the world is fraught with uncertainty, ignorance and indeterminacy, and influenced by emotion, biases and illusions, including the illusion (...) of not having illusions. Neuroscience also documents that lifelong learning processes may hone nonconscious cognition to high levels of sophistication, allowing rapid and precise perceptions, judgments and actions in complex situations. We argue that knowledge of mechanisms underlying human thought may be useful in designing educational programs to foster desired attributes such as curiosity, critical self-awareness and intuitive acumen in medical professionals. The juxtaposition of neuroscientific insights with ideas from Kant on reflective judgement, van Manen on tact, and Aristotle on phronésis, supports a concept of reflection that manifests as wise practice. We suggest that reflection in medical education should be an imperative for educators seeking to guide learners to manage the complexity and “messiness” of medical practice, and a role-modelling mode of medical practice characterized by self-correcting behaviors that culminate in good and right professional actions. An example illustrates reflective practice in the teaching and learning of physicianship. (shrink)

We propose a unified theory of intentions as neural processes that integrate representations of states of affairs, actions, and emotional evaluation. We show how this theory provides answers to philosophical questions about the concept of intention, psychological questions about human behavior, computational questions about the relations between belief and action, and neuroscientific questions about how the brain produces actions. Our theory of intention ties together biologically plausible mechanisms for belief, planning, and motor control. The computational feasibility of these mechanisms is (...) shown by a model that simulates psychologically important cases of intention. (shrink)

As the gap between the world’s rich and poor grows wider and the limitations of institutional solutions such as foreign aid continue to be exposed, students of development are shifting their focus toward individualistic business-based solutions that seek to draw members of marginalized communities into the global marketplace. This focus on the individual, however, raises three interconnected issues: it privileges a view of the human person as individualistic versus relational, it proposes isolated solutions that are not scalable, and it can (...) leave would-be change agents feeling hopeless. Drawing on insights from sociology, political philosophy, and Catholic social thought, the current paper presents an alternative path to educating for an inclusive economy by arguing that our greatest structural challenges require us not to abandon institutional solutions but rather to develop better institutions rooted in a fuller notion of the human person. Specifically, by cultivating a mindset of relationality through immersion experiences and mindfulness practices, we propose that business education can empower students to develop hope-filled solidarity with the marginalized, understand their role in the global economic system, and as future business leaders, build virtuous institutions for the common good. (shrink)