In this paper we prove the independence of δ 1 n for n ≥ 3. We show that δ 1 4 can be forced to be above any ordinal of L using set forcing. For δ 1 3 we prove that it can be forced, using set forcing, to be above any L cardinal κ such that κ is Π 1 definable without parameters in L. We then show that δ 1 3 cannot be forced by a set forcing to (...) be above every cardinal of L. Finally we present a class forcing construction to make δ 1 3 greater than any given L cardinal. (shrink)

In this paper we prove the equiconsistency of "Every ω 1 -tree which is first order definable over (H ω 1 ·ε) has a cofinal branch" with the existence of a Π 1 1 reflecting cardinal. We also prove that the addition of MA to the definable tree property increases the consistency strength to that of a weakly compact cardinal. Finally we comment on the generalization to higher cardinals.

In recent years, firms have greatly increased the amount of resources allocated to activities classified as Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR). While an increase in CSR expenditure may be consistent with firm value maximization if it is a response to changes in stakeholders' preferences, we argue that a firm's insiders (managers and large blockholders) may seek to overinvest in CSR for their private benefit to the extent that doing so improves their reputations as good global citizens and has a "warm-glow" effect. (...) We test this hypothesis by investigating the relation between firms' CSR ratings and their ownership and capital structures. Employing a unique data set that categorizes the largest 3000 U. S. corporations as either socially responsible (SR) or socially irresponsible (SI), we find that on average, insiders' ownership and leverage are negatively related to the firm's social rating, while institutional ownership is uncorrelated with it. Assuming that higher CSR ratings is associated with higher CSR expenditure level, these results support our hypothesis that insiders induce firms to over-invest in CSR when they bear little of the cost of doing so. (shrink)

When harm is caused by multiple injurers, damages are allocated among the responsible injurers in proportion to their relative responsibility for harm. This Article shows that a proportional allocation of liability between strictly-liable injurers distorts incentives to take precautions. The effects of this distortion depend on the nature of the injurers’ precautions. If precautions are complements, injurers compete for lower liability shares, which results in excessive care-taking. If precautions are substitutes, injurers are afflicted by moral hazard, which gives rise to (...) insufficient care-taking. By illuminating injurers’ strategic incentives, this Article highlights a tension between equity and efficiency under a proportional allocation of liability. (shrink)

There are two kinds of view in the literature concerning the relevance of intention to permissibility. While subjectivism assumes that an agent acts permissibly if he or she believes that the conduct is necessary for a moral purpose, for objectivism the de facto presence of an objective reason to justify one’s deeds is what matters. Recently, Scanlon and Hanser defend a moderate version of objectivism and subjectivism, respectively. Although I have a degree of sympathy toward both views, I will argue (...) that the truth lies somewhere in between. The view that I suggest in this paper hopefully occupies a space between subjectivism and objectivism and can accommodate the intuitions that neither of those views cannot account for. (shrink)

The acquaintance principle (AP) and the view it expresses have recently been tied to a debate surrounding the possibility of aesthetic testimony, which, plainly put, deals with the question whether aesthetic knowledge can be acquired through testimony—typically aesthetic and non-aesthetic descriptions communicated from person to person. In this context a number of suggestions have been put forward opting for a restricted acceptance of AP. This paper is an attempt to restrict AP even more.

Background: Ethical conflict is a barrier to decision-making process and is a problem derived from ethical responsibilities that nurses assume with care. Intensive care unit nurses are potentially exposed to this phenomenon. A deep study of the phenomenon can help prevent and treat it. Objectives: This study was aimed at determining the frequency, degree, level of exposure, and type of ethical conflict among nurses working in the intensive care units. Research design: This was a descriptive cross-sectional research. Participants and research (...) context: In total, 382 nurses working in the intensive care units in Iranian hospitals were selected using the random sampling method. Data were collected using the Ethical Conflict in Nursing Questionnaire-Critical Care Version (Persian version). Ethical considerations: This study was approved by the Medical Research Ethics Committee. Ethical considerations such as completing the informed consent form, ensuring confidentiality of information, and voluntary participation were observed. Findings: The results showed that the average level of exposure to ethical conflict was 164.39 ± 79.06. The most frequent conflict was related to “using resources despite believing in its futility,” with the frequency of at least once a week or a month (68.6%, n = 262). The most conflictive situation was violation of privacy (76.9%, n = 294). However, the level of exposure to ethical conflict according to the theoretical model followed was the situation of “working with incompetent staff.” The most frequently observed type of conflict was moral dilemma. Conclusion: The moderate level of exposure to ethical conflict was consistent with the results of previous studies. However, the frequency, degree, and type of ethical conflict were different compared to the results of other studies. Recognizing ethical conflict among intensive care unit nurses can be useful as it allows to consolidate those measures that favor low levels of ethical conflict, design appropriate strategies to prevent ethical conflicts, and improve the nursing work environment. (shrink)

Seeking Mandela is a disappointing book. This is not because it does injustice to the subject matter of its research. The opposite is true: the book deals with the Israeli/Palestinian conflict and with the historical transition of power in South Africa in a rigorous and attentive manner. The problem lies in the name that the authors, Heribert Adam and Kogila Moodley, chose to give the book. Seeking Mandela: Peacemaking between Israelis and Palestinians is a promising, hopeful title for a project. (...) The promise is, in fact, spelled out in the preface: “Our metaphor ‘Seeking Mandela’ speculates on what would have…. (shrink)

Publication date: 31 January 2018 Source: Author: Amir Abbas Moslemi Ezra Pound’s Shi-Shu: Rats is read Foucauldianly to instantiate an interaction between Confucianism and Western schools of thought in response to the problem of evil. There is a review of Leibniz’s theodicy to clear up confusion, and also to pave the way for a succession of readings of a number of philosophers like Hume and James — foregrounding epistemic inclination of poets like Pope, Wordsworth and Burns. ‘Accidentality’ and ‘essentiality’ (...) are key philosophic terms, without which this problem cannot hold its logical structure, especially in terms of an answer. Epistemo-political ‘docility’ and literal ‘decency’ are employed together for the first time to be reintroducing ancient relationship between cruel politicians and carceral system. Utopia is taken as a mere dream so that ‘the problem’ would tend to keep its identity. What is new in this paper is a ‘gaze’-wise trace of mice in literature supporting the problem of evil in philosophy, based on an actual political background, within a broad sociological realm. (shrink)

Journal Name: Semiotica Issue: Ahead of print.

Ptolemy presents only one argument for the eccentricity in his models of the superior planets, while each one of them has two eccentricities: one for center of the uniform motion, the other for the center of the constant distance. To take into account the first eccentricity, he introduces the equant point, but he provides no argument for the eccentricity of the center of the deferent. Why is the second eccentricity different from the first one? The 13 th century astronomer Quṭb (...) al-Dīn al-Shīrāzī, a member of the famous school of Marāgha, who was interested in this problem, suggests the “retrograde arcs” as the empirical origin of the second eccentricity and develops an argument to justify this conjecture. Although his argument is not without difficulty, his suggestion is in line with the suggestions made by some historians of astronomy in recent decades. Résumé Ptolémée ne donne qu'un seul argument pour expliquer dans son système l'excentricité des planètes supérieures, alors que chacune d'elles a deux excentricités: l'une par rapport au centre du mouvement uniforme, l'autre par rapport au centre de la distance constante. Pour rendre compte de la première excentricité, il introduit le point équant, mais il ne donne en revanche aucun argument pour l'excentricité par rapport au centre du cercle déférent. Or, pourquoi la seconde excentricité est-elle différente de la première? Quṭb al-Dīn al-Shīrāzī, astronome du xiii e siècle membre de l'école de Marāgha, qui s'est intéressé à cette question, a fait l'hypothèse que les “arcs de rétrogradation” constituent l'origine empirique de cette seconde excentricité. Bien que l'argument sur lequel il appuie cette hypothèse ne soit pas exempt de difficultés, sa suggestion rejoint celles faites par des historiens de l'astronomie durant les dernières décennies. (shrink)

Schelling's philosophy can be seen as perpetrating the philosophical fallacy known as the Myth of the Given, in that it takes rational activity to be affected by an experience which is not conceptually mediated. This is supported by Schelling's repeated claim that there is an experience which is indescribable, and which forces us to silence. In the first part of the paper it will be shown how different readings of Schelling result in this fallacy. In the second and third parts (...) an alternative reading will be developed which avoids the fallacy while still making room for unsayable experience. Finally, the proposed interpretation will enable us to interpret Schelling's claim that expressing the unsayable, conveying it to another, is possible after all. »The wish for intelligibility is a terrible one. It means that we are willing to reveal ourselves through the self 's betrayal of itself.« (Stanley Cavell, The World Viewed. (shrink)

This article tackles Giorgio Agamben's critique of Michel Foucault's genealogy of governmentality in two ways: first, by presenting an alternative model of the relations between pastoral and theological economy and, second, by conducting a genealogy of the former as revealed in the state of exception, when canon law is suspended. Following the author's genealogy of oikonomia in the state of exception, he argues that politics and economy are distinct from one another by virtue of the fact that the primary relation (...) of the latter is one of inclusion while that of the former is one of exclusion. Finally, the author traces three of oikonomia's prolific qualities in the operation of governmentality in civil society and of market economy: (i) its inclusiveness; (ii) the constant representation of the irreconcilability of law and authority; and (iii) its operation by accommodating to the ways of the governed. (shrink)

_An exploration of philosophical and religious ideas about humor in modern philosophy and their secular implications._.

The task of this paper is to offer an interpretation of Kant’s notion of proportionality between morality and happiness, which is fundamental to his conception of the highest good. Kant claims that the complete good of humans as both natural and rational beings is a proportionate relation between virtue and happiness. He takes this to mean that nature is purposively designed so it accords with morality, which is only possible in a divine world where God secures this responsiveness. The paper (...) shows various difficulties with this claim and argues that they can be resolved by a nuanced interpretation of what Kant might mean by “happiness”. This finally leads to a conception of proportionality modeled on Kant’s aesthetics. (shrink)

The article reviews the uses of the term ‘oikonomia’ in Greek-speaking antiquity and illustrates how the term was used in all spheres of human existence and in various arts and sciences, usually denoting the prudent dispensation of the field resources. In this era the arts and sciences also received their own economies, and the term oikonomia, designating in most cases the prudent management of resources, appears in political theory, military strategy, law, finance, medicine, literary criticism, architecture, music, history and rhetoric. (...) Among all the spheres, arts and sciences that were economized, the story of oikonomia in the field of rhetoric is at the center of this article’s attention. As shown, the concept of oikonomia took an intermediate form between the realm of thought – that is, the domain of philosophy – and the realm of public speech – the domain of politics. (shrink)

Using the Stroop paradigm, we have previously shown that a specific suggestion can remove or reduce involuntary conflict and alter information processing in highly suggestible individuals . In the present study, we carefully matched less suggestible individuals to HSIs on a number of factors. We hypothesized that suggestion would influence HSIs more than LSIs and reduce the Stroop effect in the former group. As well, we conducted secondary post hoc analyses to examine negative priming – the apparent disruption of the (...) response to a previously-ignored item. Our present findings indicate that suggestion reduces Stroop effects in HSIs. Secondary analyses show that LSIs had an NP effect at baseline and that suggestion influenced the NP condition. Thus, at least in this experimental context, suggestion seems to dampen a deeply-engrained and largely automatic process – reading – by wielding a larger influence on HSIs relative to comparable LSIs. (shrink)

While research on political violence often focuses on its outcome, there is little attention to the process of political violence. Filling the knowledge gap, the present research applies the theory of instrumentalism to understand political violence as a means to achieve certain political ends. The research is a qualitative case study on Lyari, which was a comparatively peaceful neighborhood in Karachi but transformed into a violent no-go area during 2000s. The paper describes the process of instrumentalization of political violence in (...) Lyari with the objective of outlining the relationship of three key actors – political parties, state authorities, and criminal gangs – using violence for their respective interests. The paper explains how the convergence of their interests influenced the intensity of political violence and converted it into an ethnic conflict. Hence, it expands the literature on political violence by outlining the complexities of the real world where multiple political actors simultaneously use violence to achieve varied objectives that sometimes compliment and sometimes clashes with each other, resulting in further extension of violence. (shrink)

This article offers an interpretation of Schelling's theory of ideas within his philosophy of identity, arguing that it should be understood as a theory of the intelligibility of being—that is, the capacity for the world to be meaningfully articulated in thought. By placing Schelling's ideas into dialogue with Wittgenstein's Tractatus Logico -Philosophicus, the author aims to show how Schelling's philosophy might provide valuable insights for contemporary analytic interpretations of German idealism. Schelling's notion of ideas encompasses three key features: (1) they (...) express the principle of identity as the foundation of reality, (2) they constitute totalities or self-contained universes, and (3) they are individuals that are unified within a single totality. The author explains these features and demonstrates how they jointly establish the conditions necessary for the possibility of meaning and coherent thought. (shrink)

Vrednovanje i ocjenjivanje u nastavi Glazbene kulture važna je sastavnica odgojno-obrazovnog procesa koja sa sobom nosi razne poteškoće i subjektivnost. U nastavi Glazbene kulture realiziraju se različite glazbene aktivnosti i sadržaji, koji su više ili manje specifični te se navedeno odražava i na vrednovanje i ocjenjivanje. Navedene aktivnosti i sadržaji u okviru Kurikuluma nastavnog predmeta Glazbena kultura za osnovne škole i Glazbena umjetnost za gimnazije organizirane su u okviru tri domene/nastavna područja: Slušanje i upoznavanje glazbe, Izražavanje glazbom i uz glazbu (...) i Glazba u kontekstu. U radu je prikazano istraživanje provedeno tijekom 2019. godine, a koje je obuhvatilo 269 ispitanika, tj. 30 osnovnoškolskih učitelja Glazbene kulture i 239 učenika osmih razreda. Istraživanje je provedeno u Osječko-baranjskoj i Požeško-slavonskoj županiji te je obuhvatilo učitelje Glazbene kulture i učenike osmih razreda šest osnovnih škola od kojih se četiri nalaze u urbanom, a dvije u ruralnom području. Cilj ovog istraživanja bio je doznati stavove učenika i učitelja o vrednovanju i ocjenjivanju u nastavi Glazbene kulture, utvrditi moguću povezanost sociodemografskih varijabla i mišljenja učitelja i učenika te utvrditi na koji se način provodi ocjenjivanje u nastavi Glazbene kulture. Slušanje glazbe i pjevanje su aktivnosti koje se, prema mišljenju i učitelja i učenika, najčešće vrednuju i ocjenjuju u nastavi Glazbene kulture. Ujedno, učitelji u većoj mjeri smatraju da provode individualno i skupno ocjenjivanje nego li to smatraju učenici. Utvrđeno je da učitelji najčešće ocjenjivanje provode tako što tijekom svakog sata prate učenike, skloni su učenike ocijeniti odmah na satu i najčešće usmeno. Utvrđeno je da su učitelji i učenici mišljenja da učenik ne treba imati razvijene glazbene sposobnosti za ocjenu ‘odličan’ u predmetu Glazbena kultura. S obzirom na povezanost sociodemografskih varijabla i mišljenja ispitanika o vrednovanju i ocjenjivanju, pokazalo se kako su područje na kojemu se nalazi škola i spol značajni prediktori učeničkih stavova, dok se kod učitelja nijedna varijabla nije pokazala prediktorskom. Evaluation and grading in the teaching of Music Culture is an important component of the educational process that carries various difficulties and subjectivity with it. In the course of Music Culture, various music activities and contents are realized, which are more or less specific and also reflect on the evaluation and evaluation. The activities and contents of the Curriculum for the Elementary School Music Culture and High School Musical Arts curricula are organized within three domains/teaching areas: Listening and learning about music, Expressing music and with music, and Music in context. The research was conducted in 2019 and included 269 respondents, i.e. 30 elementary music teachers and 239 eighth grade students. The survey was conducted in Osijek-Baranja and Pozega-Slavonia counties and it included Music teachers and eighth grade students from six primary schools, four of whom are in urban and two in rural areas. The aim of this research was to find out students’ and teachers’ views on evaluation and assessment and to determine the possible correlation of sociodemographic variables and teachers’ and students’ opinions on evaluation and assessment in Music Culture teaching and to determine how the assessment is conducted in Music Culture teaching. Listening to music and singing are activities that, in the opinion of both teachers and students, are most commonly evaluated and graded in teaching Music Culture. At the same time, teachers are more likely to carry out individual and group assessments than students. Teachers usually conduct their assessment by monitoring students every class, they tend to evaluate students during class and most often orally. Teachers and students think that student should not have the developed musical skills to score excellently in Music Culture. Considering the correlation between sociodemographic variables and the respondents’ opinions on evaluation and grading, it was shown that the area in which school is located and gender are significant predictors of students’ attitudes, while in the teachers no variables proved to be predictive. (shrink)

In this paper I present a criticism of Sarah Moss‘ recent proposal to use scoring rules as a means of reaching epistemic compromise in disagreements between epistemic peers that have encountered conflict. The problem I have with Moss‘ proposal is twofold. Firstly, it appears to involve a double counting of epistemic value. Secondly, it isn‘t clear whether the notion of epistemic value that Moss appeals to actually involves the type of value that would be acceptable and unproblematic to regard as (...) epistemic. (shrink)

L’article présente les informations essentielles sur la vie de Fritz Jahr , enseignant et théologien allemand, qui a été le premier dans l’histoire à utiliser, dans un article de 1927, le terme « bioéthique » et qui a proposé le concept d’une nouvelle discipline fondée sur l’ « impératif bioéthique », une révision de l’impératif catégorique de Kant élargi aux animaux et aux plantes. Si quelques informations sur les publications de Fritz Jahr sont déjà connues – 18 articles ont été (...) identifiés jusqu’à présent – le contexte biographique demeure complètement inexploré. Également, cette étude examine brièvement la chronologie de la découverte de l’oeuvre de Jahr , déplaçant la date et l’endroit de la fondation de la bioéthique à environ un demisiècle plus tôt et d’un continent à un autre. (shrink)

Mindful of how the history of bioethics has often been presented, we explore the background, contributions, and influence of Van Rensselaer Potter on the roots of bioethics. In the last few decades, dozens of papers have been written and published, including several doctoral theses and defenses on V. R. Potter‘s concept of bioethics. In those works, the context of the emergence of Potter’s bioethics has sometimes been suggested, but never analyzed thoroughly. We identify seven pillars of influence for Van Rensselaer (...) Potter’s bioethical credo, drawing on several facts from the rich cultural heritage of Wisconsin, where Potter had lived and worked for the most part of his life. (shrink)

Recent data indicate that under a specific posthypnotic suggestion to circumvent reading, highly suggestible subjects successfully eliminated the Stroop interference effect. The present study examined whether an optical explanation could account for this finding. Using cyclopentolate hydrochloride eye drops to pharmacologically prevent visual accommodation in all subjects, behavioral Stroop data were collected from six highly hypnotizables and six less suggestibles using an optical setup that guaranteed either sharply focused or blurred vision. The highly suggestibles performed the Stroop task when naturally (...) vigilant, under posthypnotic suggestion not to read, and while visually blurred; the less suggestibles ran naturally vigilant, while looking away, and while visually blurred. Although visual accommodation was precluded for all subjects, posthypnotic suggestion effectively eliminated Stroop interference and was comparable to looking away in controls. These data strengthen the view that Stroop interference is neither robust nor inevitable and support the hypothesis that posthypnotic suggestion may exert a top-down influence on neural processing. (shrink)

Generative Artificial Intelligence (GenAI), such as ChatGPT, shows great promise and potential and is gradually being used in mental health care, but it also raises ethical concerns. These relate t...

Because you are highly unlikely to cast the deciding vote in the next elections, it is often said that you don’t have a reason to vote in order to change the outcomes. In a recent paper, however, Zach Barnett forcefully argues that this is a mistake. He shows how it follows, from rather conservative assumptions, that in many real-life cases the expected social value of voting is higher than its cost. Barnett is successful, we believe, in showing that the commonly (...) held belief – that voters do not have a reason to vote in order to change the outcomes – is way too hasty. However, Barnett is – we argue in this paper – too quick on one key premise, and once this is noticed, it becomes unclear how often Barnett’s reasoning can point to a justification of voting to change the outcomes. Barnett’s reasoning, we conclude, may apply to significantly less real-life scenarios than he suggests. (shrink)

The purpose of the paper is to show that semanticexternalism – the thesis that contents are notdetermined by ``individualistic'' features of mentalstates – is mistaken. Externalist thinking, it isargued, rests on two mistaken assumptions: theassumption that if there is an externalist wayof describing a situation the situation exemplifiesexternalism, and the assumption that cases in which adifference in the environment of an intentional stateentails a difference in the state's intentional objectare cases in which environmental factors determine thestate's content. Exposing these mistakes (...) leads to seethat the conditions that are required for thetruth of externalism are inconsistent. (shrink)

Computational properties, it is standardly assumed, are to be sharply distinguished from semantic properties. Specifically, while it is standardly assumed that the semantic properties of a cognitive system are externally or non-individualistically individuated, computational properties are supposed to be individualistic and internal. Yet some philosophers (e.g., Tyler Burge) argue that content impacts computation, and further, that environmental factors impact computation. Oron Shagrir has recently argued for these theses in a novel way, and gave them novel interpretations. In this paper I (...) present a conception of computation in cognitive science that takes Shagrir's conception as its starting point, but further develops it in various directions and strengthens it. I argue that the explanatory role of computational properties emerges from the idea that syntactical properties and the relevant external factors presented by cognitive systems compose wide computational properties. I also elaborate upon the notion of content that is in play, and argue that it is contents of the kind that are ascribed by transparent interpretations of content ascriptions that impact computation. This fact enables the thesis that external factors impact computation to rebuff the challenge which concerns the claim that psychology must be individualistic. (shrink)

Plagiarism has been on the rise amongst university students in recent decades. This study puts university teachers in the spotlight and investigates their role in raising students’ awareness about plagiarism. To that end, plagiarism policies in 207 Iranian university TEFL teachers’ syllabuses were analyzed. The researchers analyzed the syllabuses to find out if they contain a plagiarism policy, and if so, how the term is defined; whether they approach the issue of plagiarism directly; if they offer students any guidelines on (...) how to avoid plagiarism; and if the consequences of committing plagiarism are specified. The results indicated that the majority of the syllabuses (83.6%) lacked a plagiarism policy and those that did include a policy were often vague in their definition of the phenomenon. However, when there was a plagiarism policy in the syllabuses, the teachers tried to address the issue directly half of the time and offered students brief guidelines on how to avoid plagiaristic behavior, which was a small step in the right direction. It is recommended that other higher education institutions make it obligatory for their academic staff to include a plagiarism policy in their syllabuses if they wish to cultivate academic integrity in students. (shrink)

Religious diversity is a key topic in contemporary philosophy of religion. One way religious diversity has been of interest to philosophers is in the epistemological questions it gives rise to. In other words, religious diversity has been seen to pose a challenge for religious belief. In this study four approaches to dealing with this challenge are discussed. These approaches correspond to four well-known philosophers of religion, namely, Richard Swinburne, Alvin Plantinga, William Alston, and John Hick. The study is concluded by (...) suggesting four factors which shape one’s response to the challenge religious diversity poses to religious belief. (shrink)

First Published in 1984. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.

Nowrouz is the Iranian New Year that is celebrated during Eid, the longest Iranian festival. During the festival, families construct a Nowrouz cloth upon which several symbolic items are placed to celebrate the new year. One of these items is a goldfish who is placed in a bowl and discarded at the conclusion of the holiday. Goldfish are viewed as objects to be purchased, used, and disposed of without serious moral consideration. Given both the principle of the Nowrouz holiday as (...) a celebration of peace as well as the current scientific evidence supporting the existence of pain in goldfish, the use of one in the Nowrouz is ironic and ethically inconsistent. (shrink)

The present essay explores the question of continuity and change between Kaneš and Ḫattuša in the cultic sphere, reviewing the cult of Parga, probably a fertility goddess of local Anatolian origin, in the Hittite sources. It reveals that Parga appears in several different cultic contexts but within a relatively invariable sequence of offerings, often appearing with the same, often “exotic” deities, such as Zūluma, Šišumma/i, and Šurra. The probable location for performance of many of these cultic sequences in the lower (...) town of Ḫattuša, one of the most ancient parts of the city, shows a great deal of continuity between the Old Assyrian and the Old Hittite periods, and may further highlight the antiquity of these cults. Since some of the cultic action considered in this essay took place in close proximity to the ašuša-gate, the evidence concerning the location of that gate, probably at the western or northwestern section of the fortification wall and near some of the institutions located in its vicinity, will be examined. (shrink)