Severe obesity has been associated with reduced performance on tests of verbal memory in bariatric surgery candidates. There is also some evidence that bariatric surgery leads to improved verbal memory, yet these findings need further elucidation. Little is known regarding postoperative memory changes in the visual domain and how patients subjectively experience their everyday memory after surgery. The aim of the current study was to repeat and extend prior findings on postoperative memory by investigating visual, verbal, and self-reported everyday memory (...) following surgery, and to examine whether weight loss and somatic comorbidity predict memory performance. The study was a prospective, observational study in which participants underwent cognitive testing at baseline, 1 and 2 years after bariatric surgery. Repeated measures analyses of variance revealed significantly poorer visual and verbal memory performance at the 1-year follow-up, with performance subsequently returning to baseline levels after 2 years. Verbal learning and self-reported everyday memory did not show significant postoperative changes. Memory performance at 1 year was not significantly predicted by weight loss, changes in C-reactive protein levels or postoperative somatic comorbidity. The study demonstrated poorer visual and verbal memory performance at 1-year follow-up that returned to baseline levels after 2 years. These findings are in contrast to most previous studies and require further replication, however, the results indicate that postoperative memory improvements following bariatric surgery are not universal. Findings suggest that treatment providers should also be aware of patients potentially having poorer memory at 1 year following surgery. (shrink)

Support for the prototype theory of categorization was found in a study of the structure of social categories. Though occupational terms such as DOCTOR are socially defined, they do not have the classical structure their clear definitional origins would predict. Conceptions of social categories are richer and more complex than those of physical object categories and subjects agree upon them. Comparison of various instructions for eliciting attributes of categories showed that whether subjects are asked to define a term, give characteristics, (...) or describe ways they recognize members of categories, the attributes they list contribute to a prototype structure. These data provide evidence against the view that prototype structure is relevant only to an identification procedure and not to the core of concepts, as has been suggested. (shrink)

Symbolic arithmetic is fundamental to science, technology and economics, but its acquisition by children typically requires years of effort, instruction and drill1,2. When adults perform mental arithmetic, they activate nonsymbolic, approximate number representations3,4, and their performance suffers if this nonsymbolic system is impaired5. Nonsymbolic number representations also allow adults, children, and even infants to add or subtract pairs of dot arrays and to compare the resulting sum or difference to a third array, provided that only approximate accuracy is required6–10. Here (...) we report that young children, who have mastered verbal counting and are on the threshold of arithmetic instruction, can build on their nonsymbolic number system to perform symbolic addition and subtraction11–15. Children across a broad socio-economic spectrum solved symbolic problems involving approximate addition or subtraction of large numbers, both in a laboratory test and in a school setting. Aspects of symbolic arithmetic therefore lie within the reach of children who have learned no algorithms for manipulating numerical symbols. Our findings help to delimit the sources of children’s difficulties learning symbolic arithmetic, and they suggest ways to enhance children’s engagement with formal mathematics. We presented children with approximate symbolic arithmetic problems in a format that parallels previous tests of non-symbolic arithmetic in preschool children8,9. In the first experiment, five- to six-year-old children were given problems such as ‘‘If you had twenty-four stickers and I gave you twenty-seven more, would you have more or less than thirty-five stickers?’’. Children performed well above chance (65.0%, t1952.77, P 5 0.012) without resorting to guessing or comparison strategies that could serve as alternatives to arithmetic. Children who have been taught no symbolic arithmetic therefore have some ability to perform symbolic addition problems. The children’s performance nevertheless fell short of performance on non-symbolic arithmetic tasks using equivalent addition problems with numbers presented as arrays of dots and with the addition operation conveyed by successive motions of the dots into a box (71.3% correct, F1,345 4.26, P 5 0.047)8.. (shrink)

Several hundred thousand intellectually talented 12-to 13-year-olds have been tested nationwide over the past 16 years with the mathematics and verbal sections of the Scholastic Aptitude Test (SAT). Although no sex differences in verbal ability have been found, there have been consistent sex differences favoring males in mathematical reasoning ability, as measured by the mathematics section of the SAT (SAT-M). These differences are most pronounced at the highest levels of mathematical reasoning, they are stable over time, and they are observed (...) in other countries as well. The sex difference in mathematical reasoning ability can predict subsequent sex differences in achievement in mathematics and science and is therefore of practical importance. To date a primarily environmental explanation for the difference in ability has not received support from the numerous studies conducted over many years by the staff of Study of Mathematically Precocious Youth (SMPY) and others. We have studied some of the classical environmental hypotheses: attitudes toward mathematics, perceived usefulness of mathematics, confidence, expectations/ encouragement from parents and others, sex-typing, and differential course-taking. In addition, several physiological correlates of extremely high mathematical reasoning ability have been identified (left-handedness, allergies, myopia, and perhaps bilateral representation of cognitive functions and prenatal hormonal exposure). It is therefore proposed that the sex difference in SAT-M scores among intellectually talented students, which may be related to greater male variability, results from both environmental and biological factors. (shrink)

Este artículo estudia la visión que Ibn Hazm de Córdoba (m. 456 / 1064) tenía del concepto de fitra, que aparece en el Corán (azora XXX, aleya 30) y en algunas tradiciones exegéticas. Basándose en este texto, Ibn Hazm afirma que todos los seres humanos nacen musulmanes, incluso los idólatras y otras clases de infieles, y que todos han de ser considerados musulmanes hasta que alcancen la mayoría de edad. En ese momento de sus vidas han de elegir entre reafirmar (...) su fe y, si no son hijos de musulmanes, de elegir entre la religión en la que han nacido o renunciar a ella. Su decisión afectará a su destino en el Más Allá. La creencia de Ibn Hazm de que todos los niños son musulmanes hasta la edad en que puedan discernir y, por tanto, de que en caso de que mueran niños irán al Paraíso, tiene también implicaciones legales y, a través de ellas, se puede observar cómo actúan los principios zahiríes. Ibn Hazm muestra una tendencia a otorgar a los musulmanes la custodia de niños no musulmanes, así como a evitar que los nacidos musulmanes queden desvinculados de su religión. Este es el caso de los niños expósitos o cuya paternidad es dudosa. Aunque, en general, no requiere que los niños no musulmanes fallecidos, que en el fondo son considerados creyentes, sean enterrados de acuerdo con el rito islámico, ordena que un niño, cuyos padres no sean musulmanes y hayan sido hechos cautivos, reciba un entierro musulmán. Aunque, a primera vista, estas normas parezcan confirmar las afirmaciones de Goldziher sobre "el fananatismo personal contra los seguidores de otras religiones" de Ibn Hazm, se observa también que, según su punto de vista, la indemnización que se debía pagar por la lesión del feto de una mujer no musulmana era igual al que le correspondía a una musulmana que hubiese perdido su hijo en las mismas circunstancias. (shrink)

In this article, we explore the organization of assistance in multilingual interaction in Swedish residential care. The data that form the basis for the study cover care encounters involving three residents with a language background other than Swedish, totalling 13 hours and 14 minutes of video documentation. The empirical data consists of a collection of 134 instances where residents seek assistance with the realization of a practical action. For this article, three examples that involve the manipulation of an object have (...) been selected for analysis. We use the concept of ‘recruitment’ to encompass the various methods by which assistance is sought in the care encounter. In the first example, the need for assistance concerns the transfer of an object that is recognizable and physically available for both participants. This, in combination with the resident’s gestural work that pinpoints the description of the action, facilitates its realization. In the second and third examples, the realization of the action becomes more difficult because the object involved is not recognizable for the caregiver. The article highlights the collaborative ways in which residents manage to support their talk through bodily practices, and the strong and empathetic engagement with which caregivers become involved in interpreting the meaning of these practices. Finally, we discuss the implications of our findings for care provision in multilingual circumstances. (shrink)

In most countries in the global north, social differences in health status and disease prevalence and outcomes are persistent and growing. This is also the case in the welfare states of Scandinavia. In Denmark, the empirical point of departure for this article, income inequality is relatively low and social mobility is generally considered to be high. One of the ideals of the Danish welfare state is that all citizens have free and open access to the tax-funded health-care system. All Danish (...) citizens can register at a general practice, which serves as the gatekeeper for more specialized health-care... (shrink)

Can rational agents coordinate in simultaneous interactions? According to standard game theory they cannot, even if there is a uniquely best way of doing so. To solve this problem we propose an argument in favor of ‘belief-less reasoning’, a mode of inference that leads to converge on the optimal solution ignoring the beliefs of the other players. We argue that belief-less reasoning is supported by a commonsensical Principle of Relevant Information that every theory of rational decision must satisfy. We show (...) that this principle can be used to justify (some versions of) team reasoning, as well as other schemes of practical reasoning that do not involve sophisticated meta-representation. (shrink)

Recent work on workplace narratives as a site for the discursive construction of professional identities has focused on speakers who can be considered experienced and knowledgeable experts in their fields. The present study, in contrast, explores two types of workplace narratives — reflective and relational narratives — produced by a group of professionals who are non-experts: in this case, novice language teachers. Specifically, the article illustrates how the moral stance that a novice constructs within a narrative may be formulated in (...) uncertain terms, may be destabilized by the primary narrator, or may be subject to revision by other participants. Finally, the study highlights the relationship between the narrative dimensions of moral stance and tellership, and suggests that participant structure, participants' role relationships, and institutional power asymmetry are especially relevant factors to consider in any further analyses of novices' workplace narratives. (shrink)

This study aims to analyze what drives and prevents the purchasing of eco-friendly products across different consumer groups and develops a conceptual model embracing the positive altruistic, positive ego-centric, and negative ego-centric antecedents of eco-friendly product purchase intention and behavior. We empirically validate the conceptual model for green and non-green consumers. Data are analyzed using structural equation modeling and multi-group analysis of the two groups. The results confirm the relevance of the determining factors in the model and show significant differences (...) in eco-friendly product purchasing patterns between green and non-green consumers. Altruistic motives are more important for green than for non-green consumers. Negative ego-centric motives affect the purchase intentions of non-green consumers more than the intentions of green consumers, whereas the impact of negative motives on behavior is stronger for green than for non-green consumers. The first contribution of this paper is the development and testing of a parsimonious model of eco-friendly products purchasing that embraces both positive and negative antecedents, which have been theoretically suggested in the past but have rarely been empirically tested together. The second contribution of this study is that it develops insight into the specific antecedents of eco-friendly products purchasing for green and non-green consumers to assess potential similarities and differences in eco-friendly products purchasing process, the hypothesized antecedents, their impact on eco-friendly products purchase intention and behavior, and the intention–behavior relation. (shrink)

One of the standard examples in contemporary moral psychology originates in the works of social psychologist Jonathan Haidt. He treats people's responses to the story of Julie and Mark, two siblings who decide to have casual, consensual, protected sex, as facts of human morality, providing evidence for his social intuitionist approach to moral judgements. We argue that Haidt's description of the facts of the story and the reactions of the respondents as ‘morally dumbfounded’ presupposes a view about moral reasoning that (...) is more substantial than he acknowledges. Drawing on the philosophical work by Iris Murdoch and Cora Diamond, we explore how different descriptions of human morality, sexuality, and family relations engage us in evaluations about distinctive features of human life and language that go deeper than Haidt envisages. Thus, we show the need to attend to the concepts used to describe the facts of human moral psychology and the pictures of morality these concepts reveal about the researcher's own understanding of moral experience. This points to the particular responsibility any researcher into human moral psychology has for ensuring that the descriptions they offer are attuned to the complexities of the lives of those they form theories about and that these do not appear conceptually confounding. (shrink)

Este artículo discute las opiniones de Ibn Ḥazm de Córdoba jurista y teólogo, acerca de la homosexualidad. Aunque se hace referencia a su obra literaria Ṭawq al-ḥamāma, rica en anécdotas sobre atracción homoerótica, el artículo se centra en su voluminosa obra legal zahirí Kitāb al-Muḥallā y analiza el razonamiento legal de Ibn Ḥazm sobre la homosexualidad tanto masculina como femenina comparándola con la de otros juristas, en particular, malikíes.A diferencia de sus contemporáneos malikíes, Ibn Hazm mantiene que la homosexualidad no (...) debe equipararse a la fornicación que incurre en la pena de muerte. Por el contrario, aboga por el relativamente suave castigo de diez latigazos por prácticas homosexuales, basado en su interpretación de las fuentes reveladas tal y como se expone en este artículo.Aunque algunos autores modernos han insinuado que el propio Ibn Ḥazm era homosexual, él condena categóricamente las relaciones entre miembros de un mismo sexo y mantiene que los homosexuales deben reformarse. (shrink)

Review of The Path to Hidden Knowledge, art exhibition curated by Nina Kokkinen, 3.6.–11.10.2020 at Villa Gyllenberg, Helsinki.

Abstract What sense are we to make of the promise of love against the contingency of human life? I discuss two replies to this question: (1) the suggestion that marriage, based on the probable success of this kind of relationship, is a more or less worthwhile endeavour (cf. Moller and Landau), and (2) Martha Nussbaum's Aristotelian proposal that we only live life fully if we embrace aspects of life, such as loving relationships, that are vulnerable to fortune. I show that (...) both responses, in different ways, depend on the presupposition that the sense of our promises to love is dependent on our ability to make predictions. The philosophers I discuss assume an epistemological standpoint from which we may attempt to judge whether it is in our general interest to love. I argue that embracing such a perspective by itself leads our attention away from the kind of personal and moral engagement in other people of which our promises to love are expressive. From the perspective of love, the attempt to calculate the risks and gains of loving itself appears as a moral failure to be present to the reality of other people. (shrink)

Presentation of the dossier. Places for testimony: history and justice.

In this paper we give an axiomatisation of the concept of a computability structure with partial sequences on a many-sorted metric partial algebra, thus extending the axiomatisation given by Pour-El and Richards in [9] for Banach spaces. We show that every Banach-Mazur computable partial function from an effectively separable computable metric partial Σ-algebra A to a computable metric partial Σ-algebra B must be continuous, and conversely, that every effectively continuous partial function with semidecidable domain and which preserves the computability of (...) a computably enumerable dense set must be computable. Finally, as an application of these results we give an alternative proof of the first main theorem for Banach spaces first proved by Pour-El and Richards. (shrink)

In this paper we give an axiomatisation of the concept of a computability structure with partial sequences on a many‐sorted metric partial algebra, thus extending the axiomatisation given by Pour‐El and Richards in [9] for Banach spaces. We show that every Banach‐Mazur computable partial function from an effectively separable computable metric partial Σ‐algebraAto a computable metric partial Σ‐algebraBmust be continuous, and conversely, that every effectively continuous partial function with semidecidable domain and which preserves the computability of a computably enumerable dense (...) set must be computable. Finally, as an application of these results we give an alternative proof of the first main theorem for Banach spaces first proved by Pour‐El and Richards. (© 2004 WILEY‐VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim). (shrink)

From colonialism to a neocolonial state -- Law and court : the making of familial ideologies during the Colonial era -- The making of the new Yemeni woman -- "This is our customs and traditions" -- Social maps and a mystery -- Morality, causality, and social praxis.

This article turns a critical eye on the indigenista movement that flourished in Latin America in the first half of the twentieth century, specifically as it relates to gender, race, and the visual...

In order to articulate an account of erotic love that does not attempt to transcend its personal features, Robert Solomon and Martha Nussbaum lean on the speeches by Aristophanes and Alcibiades in Plato’s Symposium. This leads them to downplay the sense in which love is not only for another person, but also for the good. Drawing on a distinction between relative and absolute senses of speaking about the good, I mediate between two features of love that at first may seem (...) irreconcilable. The first is the sense in which love is deeply personal in character. The second is the sense in which we in love come to articulate ethical demands. With the help of the Diotimian ascent of love that Socrates presents in his speech, I submit that these two can come together in the realization that our personally conditioned responses in love are transformed to accommodate demands that carry an unconditional meaning. (shrink)

Does one’s love for a particular person, when it is pure, also constitute a love of life? The significance of speaking about leading a passionate life, I submit, is found in the spontaneous, embodied character of opening up to and finding meaning in one’s life rather than in heightened fleeting feelings or experiences of meaning that help one forget life’s meaninglessness. I contrast this view with Simone Weil’s suspicion that our passionate attachment to another person is an obstacle to attending (...) to him or her from the distance proper to love and friendship. From that perspective it appears as if the meaning with which personal love endows life is mostly illusory, including the loss of meaning characteristic of grief. I question whether Weil’s view should be seen as an unconditional, though for most unattainable, ideal of love, or if it is rather expressive of a rejection of one of the central features of love: the vulnerability that ensues from the recognition that when we love there are times where we stand in need of the other’s love to be able to embrace life as meaningful. (shrink)

Among the beliefs Wittgenstein holds that cannot be taken to be true or false, but rather appear to him as certain, are "all human beings have parents" (On Certainty §240): "I believe that I have forebears and that every human being has them" (OC §240) and "I have a father and a mother" (OC §282). I ask what moral questions are entailed in thinking of the changes that our current Western conceptual landscape has undergone in relation to parenthood and family (...) life in the light of the growing rights and recognition of sexual and gendered minorities. What is changing when we start to think of sentences such as "Everyone has a father and a mother" as not expressing an indubitable truth, a fundamental fact of our existence, but as constituting an oppressive social norm? What has already changed in our ways of conceiving of ourselves when we stop regarding such ways of expressing ourselves as a necessary aspect of our natural history but start thinking of them as one possibility among others in finding good and meaningful forms of life? What aspects remain unquestionable in Wittgenstein's beliefs throughout these changes, and what aspects of our family ties would we do best not to let slide? (shrink)