Tradition in either of its two senses—the act of handing on , and what is handed on—is a particular instance of a law of human existence that men live in dependence on one another and by the processes of giving and receiving. So a sociologist can write, ‘If we are able to speak of real tradition, we must find the past spontaneously taken into account as the meaning of the present, without any discontinuity of social time, and without any consideration (...) of the past as irrelevant’ . ‘If democracy’, wrote Chesterton, ‘means that I give a man a vote even though he is my chauffeur, tradition means that I give a man a vote even though he is my great-great-grandfather’. What is handed on, however, is not existence of a purely biological kind, to remain always what it has been or to change very slowly over a space of aeons. Except in primitive tribes even tradition is not simply passed on as something static and timeless, and it is received by men who, though themselves in time, are not totally time-bound or restricted by what they receive. They believe themselves to be capable of significant action which is more than the repetition and reproduction of what has gone before. They are able to grasp a span of time and to call it history; they believe themselves to have a history, and they write history. (shrink)

Char et al. question the extent and degree to which machine learning applications should be treated as exceptional by ethicists. It is clear that of the suite of ethical issues raised by mac...

ResumenBasado en elementos de la filosofía clásica, el common sense británico y la Escuela de Frankfurt, el autor postula un sentido común guiado críticamente, que serviría para evaluar las tendencias históricas y los modelos de modernización en el Tercer Mundo. Evitando extremos, este teorema rechazaría tanto las pretensiones de verdad de muchos enfoques racionalistas como el relativismo epistemológico y ético. La existencia de leyes y etapas obligatorias de la historia es uno de esos extremos; otro es la opción teórica que (...) afirma que los modelos culturales son incomparables e inconmensurables entre sí. La existencia de un solo paradigma normativo-positivo de desarrollo es insostenible, pero igualmente la posición que decreta la diversidad e incomparabilidad totales de los regímenes civilizatorios. Es conveniente adoptar una línea intermedia entre universalismo y particularismo y alcanzar una síntesis fructífera de ambos.Palabras claveEscuela de Frankfurt, Habermas, Kant, particularismo, sentido común, universalismoAbstractBased on elements of classical philosophy, the British common sense and the Frankfurt School, the author proposes a critically guided common sense, which could be used to evaluate historical tendencies and specially the modernization efforts in the Third World. Avoiding extremes, this theorem rejects the pretensions of truth of rationalist theories and also the epistemic and ethic relativism. The existence of obligatory laws and periods of historical development is one of these extremes; the other one is the position which states that cultural models are incomparable and immeasurable. It is reasonable, for instance, to take a middle way between universalism and particularism and also to reach a fruitful synthesis between both currents.KeywordsCommon sense, Frankfurt School, Habermas, Kant, particularism, universalism. (shrink)

O mundo contemporâneo é o do exílio e não o da pátria, o da errância e não o do lugar. Razão pela qual nosso tempo foi denominado de “século breve”, em que os acontecimentos e os desaparecimentos de modos de vida e valores são acelerados, não permitindo o repouso para constituição de uma memória reparadora. Exílio, expatriamento e dispersão espacial são, pois, o emblema das migrações forçadas por guerras, perseguições políticas e diferentes formas de conflito, que produzem a “nostalgia do (...) inteiramente outro” diante da “vida mutilada”. Assim, a diferença entre duas figuras: a da viagem e a da partida, a odisseia e o êxodo, uma que vive no horizonte de um retorno, outra que anseia por uma pátria que não existe mais. A viagem contemporânea para uma terra de exílio tem algo de enigmático, pois populações inteiras atravessam os mares, assombradas pelos naufrágios e pela incerteza da chegada ou do encontro de um não lugar. Herdeiro problemático de um duplo trauma – o do extermínio dos judeus europeus durante o nazismo e, simultaneamente, o da expulsão dos palestinos de sua terra com a criação do Estado de Israel – Edward Saïd, um dos mais importantes intelectuais palestinos, refletiu sobre a questão da identidade em situações de exílio e estranhamento cultural, procedendo a uma genealogia do sentimento de desorientação, desrealização e perda de si que o exílio produz. Pois se, antes, cada um de nós tem o conforto de paisagens conhecidas, o aconchego do mundo entre os seus, o país estrangeiro representa a passagem do conhecido ao desconhecido, significa o enfrentamento de um incerto acolhimento, com incompreensões, desprezo e hostilidade do lugar a que se chegou. Reunindo, assim, sua formação de scholar em literatura nos Estados Unidos e de musicólogo e pensador geopolítico, Edward Saïd refletiu sobre a construção de um Oriente pelo Ocidente, pelo medium de escritores nos quais há a personagem fantasmada do Outro. (shrink)

In this paper a semantics for dynamic predicate logic is developed that uses sequence valued assignments. This semantics is compared with the usual relational semantics for dynamic predicate logic: it is shown that the most important intuitions of the usual semantics are preserved. Then it is shown that the refined semantics reflects out intuitions about information growth. Some other issues in dynamic semantics are formulated and discussed in terms of the new sequence semantics.

Companies do have ethical responsibility and are not protected by limited liability from the consequences of their actions. A company's record and the preception of its ethics affect its reputation and ensure long term success or failure.The financial community has a history of placing moral considerations above legal or opportunistic expedients. But we are often exposed to moral dangers and the dangers of contamination are increasing. Deregulation and the technological revolution are sharpening ethical conflicts.

The novel coronavirus has not only brought along disruptions to daily socio-economic activities, but sickness and deaths due to its high contagion. With no widely acceptable pharmaceutical cure, the best form of prevention may be precautionary measures which will guide against infections and curb the spread of the disease. This study explored the relationship between COVID-19 knowledge, risk perception, and precautionary behavior among Nigerians. The study also sought to determine whether this relationship differed for men and women. A web-based cross-sectional (...) design approach was used to recruit 1,554 participants from all geopolitical zones in Nigeria, through social media platforms using a snowball sampling technique. Participants responded to web-based survey forms comprising demographic questions and adapted versions of the Ebola knowledge scale, SARS risk perception scale, and precautionary behavior scale. Moderated mediation analysis of the data showed that risk perception mediated the association between COVID-19 knowledge and precautionary behavior and this indirect effect was in turn moderated by gender. Results indicate that having adequate knowledge of COVID-19 was linked to higher involvement in precautionary behavior through risk perception for females but not for males. It was also noted that awareness campaigns and psychological intervention strategies on COVID-19 related activities may be particularly important for males more than females. Drawing from the health belief model, we recommend that COVID-19 awareness campaigns should target raising more awareness of the risks associated with the infection to make individuals engage more in precautionary behaviors. (shrink)

Corporate governance is increasingly becoming an issue of global concern, not least because we are more and more living in a corporate world that transcends international boundaries. The main purpose and motivation of this study is to determine how the international community should motivate businesses in fostering exemplary corporate governance, therefore eliminating obstacles to ethically exemplary behavior. The empirical approach utilized here has been applied to 161 businesses, both listed and over-the-counter (OTC) companies, with the results indicating that ethical considerations, (...) corporate governance and organizational performance are inextricably linked and, to an extent, demonstrably proportional. This study also indicates a major finding that family management is a significant mediating variable of the ethical considerations of corporate governance and organizational performance. Finally, this study has developed an operational model of ethical considerations of corporate governance as a consultancy aid for businesses that wish to implement and/or boost their performance in respect to corporate governance. (shrink)

The development of the dynamic semantics of natural languagehas put issues of variable control on the agenda of formal semantics. Inthis paper we regard variables as names for stacks of values and makeexplicit several control actions as push and pop actions on stacks. Weapply this idea both to static and dynamic languages and compare theirfinite variable hierarchies, i.e., the relation between the number ofvariable stacks that is available and the expressivity of the language.This can be compared in natural languages with (...) relating the number ofpronouns available to the expressivity of the language.The results are obtained using techniques from static and dynamic modeltheory: model theoretic games, transition systems and bisimulation. (shrink)

This article focuses on emergency medical care in black urban populations, suggesting that the classification of a ?community? within clinical trial language is problematic. The article references a cultural history of black Americans with pre-hospital emergency medical treatment as relevant to contemporary emergency medicine paradigms. Part I explores a relationship between ?autonomy? and ?community.? The idea of community emerges as a displacement for the ethical principle of autonomy precisely at the moment that institutionalized medicine focuses on diversity. Part II examines (...) a clinical trial for the blood substitute PolyHeme? (Northfield Laboratories, Inc., Evanston, IL). It illustrates the ways in which bias in research paradigms and Institutional Review Board decisions attach to the notion and utility of the language of ?community.? The conclusion's contemporary anecdote makes apparent the vitality of the issues of prehospital emergency medical care and the ways in which decisions and practices fall too easily into a narrative of culturally biased treatment. (shrink)

Book reviewed in this article:F.H. Bradley, Collected Works Volumes 1–5.

Background Scientific and technological advancements in mapping and understanding the interrelated pathways through which biological and environmental exposures affect disease development create new possibilities for detecting disease risk factors. Early detection of such risk factors may help prevent disease onset or moderate the disease course, thereby decreasing associated disease burden, morbidity, and mortality. However, the ethical implications of screening for disease risk factors are unclear and the current literature provides a fragmented and case-by-case picture. Methods To identify key ethical considerations (...) arising from the early detection of disease risk factors, we performed a systematic scoping review. The Scopus, Embase, and Philosopher’s Index databases were searched for peer-reviewed, academic records, which were included if they were written in English or Dutch and concerned the ethics of (1) early detection of (2) disease risk factors for (3) disease caused by environmental factors or gene-environment interactions. All records were reviewed independently by at least two researchers. Results After screening 2034 titles and abstracts, and 112 full papers, 55 articles were included in the thematic synthesis of the results. We identified eight common ethical themes: (1) Reliability and uncertainty in early detection, (2) autonomy, (3) privacy, (4) beneficence and non-maleficence, (5) downstream burdens on others, (6) responsibility, (7) justice, and (8) medicalization and conceptual disruption. We identified several gaps in the literature, including a relative scarcity of research on ethical considerations associated with environmental preventive health interventions, a dearth of practical suggestions on how to address expressed concerns about overestimating health capacities, and a lack of insights into preventing undue attribution of health responsibility to individuals. Conclusions The ethical concerns arising with the early detection of risk factors are often interrelated and complex. Comprehensive ethical analyses are needed that are better embedded in normative frameworks and also assess and weigh the expected benefits of early risk factor detection. Such research is necessary for developing and implementing responsible and fair preventive health policies. (shrink)

Recently in this journal, R. Shaw-Smith suggested reading ‘citra Kal. Ian.’: ‘circa, implying that the consul died either before or after 1st January, will not do.’ Will the example of citra at Aug. 43.4, adduced by Shaw-Smith ] in support of the meaning ‘ before’?

Some humanist theologians within the French Reformed Church in the 17th century developed the notion that a disability of the intellect could exist in nature independently of any moral defect, freeing its possessors from any obligations of natural law. Sharpened by disputes with the church leadership, this notion began to suggest a species-type classification that threatened to override the importance of the boundary between elect and reprobate in the doctrine of predestination. This classification seems to look forward to the natural (...) history of mind that emerged later in the century. (shrink)