Praise for the First Edition: '... a unique and lively business ethics text... fresh and delightful... Sekhar's witty use of stories and cases will engage and enlighten business people in India and the rest of the world' - Joanne B Ciulla, The Journal of Business Ethics 'Richly international in scope and contributes to global concern' - Newsltter IIAS Leiden University 'This book makes an important contribution through its holisitc and balanced approach to the issue... Each chapter has a fair (...) number of relevant cases - many of which are good living examples one can learn from' - Business Standard This Second Edition of Sekhar's highly acclaimed book on business ethics has been revised keeping the student reader in mind. This unique text discusses the way ethical conflicts are handled in reality. The author argues that ethical education should be designed to produce balanced, pleasant and effective managers with the power of insight. Only then will they have the courage to create and use ethically desirable means to sustain organizations in an ambience of liberalism and democratic choice. (shrink)

This paper explores the ethical dimensions of some of the current issues engaging rural India, affecting 600 million people. It uses the evolutionary framework of Sri Aurobindo's integral yoga, and also tags on to it the rights concepts of Amartya Sen's ethics. It attempts to take a balanced view between Ambedkar's perception of the ancient Indian village as a sink of localism, a den of ignorance, narrow-mindedness and communalism, and the more common and traditional, but historically untrue, idealized view of (...) the Vedic times. In this process it also steers clear of the pitfalls in the Marxist writings or positivist research, which has taken a wrong position that there was no rule of law and therefore no ethics as understood in modern times. It then attempts to show the more eternal features of perennial ethics in India, the idiom, institutions and the instruments it has nurtured, and the manner it is getting integrated with and is supportive of evolving modern values of democracy and social justice in Indian villages. (shrink)

Leadership styles vary across the vast Indian sub‐continent and are in a state of flux and change. The norms are influenced by ancient mythology and by imprints of world‐wide movements of political liberalism, socialism and economic globalization. But through all these styles, one discerns basic values which are universal and can be intuitively grasped by multi‐national managers. The paper describes the various sources of leadership understandings in India and relates them to Western traditions, notably to Aristotle’s ‘virtue ethics’.

Although mind-wandering research is rapidly progressing, stark disagreements are emerging about what the term “mind-wandering” means. Four prominent views define mind-wandering as 1) task-unrelated thought, 2) stimulus-independent thought, 3) unintentional thought, or 4) dynamically unguided thought. Although theorists claim to capture the ordinary understanding of mind-wandering, no systematic studies have assessed these claims. Two large factorial studies present participants (n=545) with vignettes that describe someone’s thoughts and ask whether her mind was wandering, while systematically manipulating features relevant to the four (...) major accounts of mind-wandering. Dynamics explains between four and twenty times more variance in participants’ mind-wandering judgments than other features. Our third study (n=153) tests and supports a unique prediction of the dynamic framework—obsessive rumination contrasts with mind-wandering. Our final study (n=277) used vignettes that resemble mind-wandering experiments. Dynamics had significant and large effects, while task-unrelatedness was insignificant. These results strongly align with the dynamic conception of mind-wandering. (shrink)

Randomized control trials (RCTs) are recognized as the preferred tool of analysis in modern development economics literature/research and policy evaluation. This may lead to methodologies, including case studies, tabular analysis, simple regressions, taking a back seat. This survey explores the implications of such a methodological hierarchy and the implications of preoccupation with a particular evidence/methodology for research and policy. Similar developments in macroeconomic modelling are also discussed. Major advantages and limitations of RCTs and the attempts to address them are highlighted. (...) The article argues that preoccupation with a methodology can sometimes lead to important inquiries for research and policy getting side-lined on methodological considerations. This leads to inferences favouring a particular technique/methodology or issue. Focusing solely on methodologies that emphasize quantifying the ‘effect’ may not be appropriate to address all questions relevant to development. As policies involve multiple and conflicting social concerns, methodological pluralism may be preferable. (shrink)

Leadership styles vary across the vast Indian sub‐continent and are in a state of flux and change. The norms are influenced by ancient mythology and by imprints of world‐wide movements of political liberalism, socialism and economic globalization. But through all these styles, one discerns basic values which are universal and can be intuitively grasped by multi‐national managers. The paper describes the various sources of leadership understandings in India and relates them to Western traditions, notably to Aristotle’s ‘virtue ethics’.

In this article we investigate origins of several cases of failure of Artificial Intelligence (AI) systems employing machine learning and deep learning. We focus on omission and commission errors in (a) the inputs to the AI system, (b) the processing logic, and (c) the outputs from the AI system. Our framework yields a set of 28 factors that can be used for reconstructing the path of AI failures and for determining corrective action. Our research helps identify emerging themes of inquiry (...) necessary for developing more robust AI-ML systems. We are hopeful that our work will help strengthen the use of machine-learning AI by enhancing the rates of true positive and true negative judgements from AI systems, and by lowering the probabilities of false positive and false negative judgements. (shrink)

The idea of finding Foucault first looks at the many influences on Foucault, including his Nietzschean acclamations. It examines Foucault’s critical history of thought, his work on the orders of discourse with his emphasis on being a pluralist: the problem he says that he has set himself is that of the individualization of discourses. Finally, it addresses his work on the culture of the self which became a philosophical and historical question for Foucault later in his life as he investigated (...) the historical form of relations between subjectivity and truth in Western philosophy since Antiquity and how philosophy as an activity taught about the care of the self. The conclusion suggests some ways that students might approach his work as they proceed in finding Foucault and their own selves. (shrink)

Since the publication of Miranda Fricker’s seminal book Epistemic Injustice, philosophy of education scholarship has been mostly limited to analyses of culprit-based epistemic injustice in education. This has left structural manifestations relatively underexplored with great detriment to those who are most vulnerable to experience such injustice. This paper aims to address this oversight and open avenues for further research by exploring approaches to theorizing structural epistemic injustice in education and envisioning efficacious remedies. The author identifies three approaches: one that focusses (...) on educational institutions; one that focusses on institutional processes that impact educational outcomes; and one that focusses on epistemological processes that are internal to education. Whilst the approaches differ as to their explanatory power and ease of implementation, it is argued that all three demonstrate that epistemic injustice in education is often the result of structural factors which cannot be attributed to individual epistemic agents. The author concludes by suggesting that educational philosophers must examine each of these approaches in greater depth to make significant progress in disrupting the impact of epistemic injustice in education. (shrink)

This five volume Routledge Library Editions set is dedicated to the life and work of Adam Smith, the founding father of modern economics and pioneer of free markets. With individual volumes originally published between 1974 and 1988, this five volume collection looks to determine Smith’s impact and significance by placing his work within the context of the historical development of economic thought. These volumes also consider Smith’s scientific approach to the study of morality and the sociological foundation of his economic (...) theory, whilst offering pioneering insights into his life and the context of the society in which he lived. (shrink)

This paper explores how work in the philosophy of science can be used when teaching scientific content to science students and when training future science teachers. I examine the debate on the concept of fitness in biology and in the philosophy of biology to show how conceptual pluralism constitutes a problem for the conceptual change model, and how philosophical work on conceptual clarification can be used to address that problem. The case of fitness exemplifies how the philosophy of science offers (...) tools to resolve teaching difficulties and make the teaching of scientific concepts more adequate to the actual state of affairs in science. (shrink)

The phenomenon of cheating in higher education is of overwhelming importance in that the students engaging in these acts are unlikely to have the skills necessary for their future professional life. Despite its relevance, the empirical evaluation of cheating in universities has been almost exclusively focused on the US context. Little is known about cheating at the European level, let alone in Portugal. Even less is explored at the regional level. In this paper we present evidence on the perception of (...) cheating by Portuguese undergraduate students of economics/business degrees. We undertake a large-scale survey, involving 2675 students from all Portuguese mainland public universities. We found that copying-favourable environments are associated with a higher propensity to cheat. Moreover, in universities where ‘codes of honour’ exist, this propensity tends to be lower. Finally, the propensity to copy seems to be highly influenced by the cultural systems and socially-related factors of different regions. (shrink)

_Sonoran Desert, Stuart Hameroff and Alwyn Scott awoke from their_ _siestas to take margaritas in the shade of a ramada. On a nearby_ _table, a tape recorder had accidentally been left on and the following_ _is an unedited transcript of their conversation._.

Despite many years of discussion, the species problem has still not been adequately resolved. Why is this the case? Here I discuss two recent suggested answers to this question that place the blame on the species problem's empirical aspects or on its philosophical aspects. In contrast, I argue that neither of these two faces of the species problem constitute the principal cause of the species problem's persistence. Rather, they are merely symptoms of the real cause: the species problem has not (...) yet gone away because of a failure to recognize that not one but a number of distinct concepts are at the heart of the problem. To illustrate this point, a recently proposed solution to the problem is examined: the suggestion to understand the concept of species as a family resemblance concept. BioEssays 26:300–305, 2004. © 2004 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. (shrink)

We have learned to be suspicious of the claim that a serious account of knowledge must begin at the Cartesian starting point, that is, with private data of consciousness serving as a basis for outward inferences to the world, these inferences proceeding on the security of one or another kind of epistemic collateral ranging from the goodness of a deity to the bruteness of the given. But the good reasons we have for dismissing the egocentric predicament as our motive for (...) epistemology are not good reasons for dismissing a different predicament, one with which it is too often confused: namely, our finitary predicament, the fact that our powers of perception, memory and reason, even when co-operatively applied, are limited. For even if we are bound to conceive of general knowledge as the outcome of fundamental kinds of conceptual co-operation, the fact remains that our knowledge claims are underdetermined by the evidence we have for them; and that the framework, however collectively established, of what Quine calls our ‘immemorial theory’ of the world does not therefore protect particular knowledge-claims from defeasibility. (shrink)

As part of the roundtable “World Peace,” this essay argues that an ideal state of peace might not be attainable, but a positive form of peace could be achieved on a global scale if states and peoples made a serious investment—comparable to their investment in military expenditure—in promoting the kind of mutual cultural understanding that reduces tensions and divisions and fosters cooperation. Peacemaking usually focuses on diplomatic and military détente; the argument in this essay is that these endeavors, though obviously (...) important, are not by themselves enough for the best attainable kind of peace, for which the further and even more important aim of cultural entente is essential. This implies that peacemaking activities need to apply vastly more effort to intercultural and interpersonal exchange and education. (shrink)

There are some indications that the philosophy of science is reaching the age of discretion. Now, as I understand it, the age of discretion is characterized by self-examination. Youth is a period of blundering enthusiasm. But maturity demands the sobering influence of principles, perspectives and techniques. The adult must put away childish things. This does not demand the elimination of spontaneity and imagination, but it does require their chastening according to the principles of propriety. It seems time to ask ourselves (...) whether the philosophy of science ought to be allowed henceforth just to grow, like Topsy, or whether a serious attempt ought not to be made to determine its nature and task. (shrink)

Following Aristotle’s description of youth and brief discussion about indoctrination and parrhesia, the article historicizes Socrates’ trial as the intersection of philosophy, education and a teacher’s influence on youth. It explores the historic-political context and how contemporary Athenians might have viewed Socrates and his student’s actions, whereby his teachings were implicated in three coups led by his former students against Athenian democracy, for or which he accepted little or no responsibility. Socrates appears subversively anti-democratic. This provides grounds that challenge the (...) dominant and standard philosophical account of Socrates as one of the great teachers, perhaps the greatest in the Western tradition, and critiques the way philosophy so often presents a de-contextualized and ahistorical picture. Concerns about the influence of education, teachers and indoctrination on youth have existed since ancient times. Currently, many states, especially, but not only, democracies, are concerned about Islamic fundamentalist teachings potentially leading to terrorism. The article presents contemporary exemplars from four countries: Austria, Kenya, the UK and Saudi Arabia. The crucial question remains: to what extent is it reasonable to hold a teacher responsible for a student’s subsequent actions? (shrink)

Following Aristotle’s description of youth and brief discussion about indoctrination and parrhesia, the article historicizes Socrates’ trial as the intersection of philosophy, education and a teacher’s influence on youth. It explores the historic-political context and how contemporary Athenians might have viewed Socrates and his student’s actions, whereby his teachings were implicated in three coups led by his former students against Athenian democracy, for or which he accepted little or no responsibility. Socrates appears subversively anti-democratic. This provides grounds that challenge the (...) dominant and standard philosophical account of Socrates as one of the great teachers, perhaps the greatest in the Western tradition, and critiques the way philosophy so often presents a de-contextualized and ahistorical picture. Concerns about the influence of education, teachers and indoctrination on youth have existed since ancient times. Currently, many states, especially, but not only, democracies, are concerned about Islamic fundamentalist teachings potentially leading to terrorism. The article presents contemporary exemplars from four countries: Austria, Kenya, the UK and Saudi Arabia. The crucial question remains: to what extent is it reasonable to hold a teacher responsible for a student’s subsequent actions? (shrink)

Professor Harry Frankfurt has made a distinction between what he calls first-order desires, such as a desire for a Porsche, and second-order desires, such as a desire to desire a Porsche. He claims that this analysis of the structure of the will can provide an account of free human action. I argue against Frankfurt as follows: First, his account does not really free our wills, but only binds our wills at successively higher levels of desire; second, there is no good (...) reason to think that desires of any level higher than second exist; and third, critical review of one's desires necessarily involves the idea of an ought, and is thus not really a second-order desire at all. Rightly understood, all "higher-order" critical review of one's desires occurs at a single "level" of review, contrary to what Frankfurt believes, and this fact makes room for the theory of agency. (shrink)