Intervening on causal systems can illuminate their underlying structures. Past work has shown that, relative to adults, young children often make intervention decisions that appear to confirm a single hypothesis rather than those that optimally discriminate alternative hypotheses. Here, we investigated how the ability to make informative causal interventions changes across development. Ninety participants between the ages of 7 and 25 completed 40 different puzzles in which they had to intervene on various causal systems to determine their underlying structures. Each (...) puzzle comprised a three‐ or four‐node computer chip with hidden wires. On each trial, participants viewed two possible arrangements of the chip's hidden wires and had to select a single node to activate. After observing the outcome of their intervention, participants selected a wire configuration and rated their confidence in their selection. We characterized participant choices with a Bayesian measurement model that indexed the extent to which participants selected nodes that would best disambiguate the two possible causal structures versus those that had high causal centrality in one of the two causal hypotheses but did not necessarily discriminate between them. Our model estimates revealed that the use of a discriminatory strategy increased through early adolescence. Further, developmental improvements in intervention strategy were related to changes in the ability to accurately judge the strength of evidence that interventions revealed, as indexed by participants' confidence in their selections. Our results suggest that improvements in causal information‐seeking extend into adolescence and may be driven by metacognitive sensitivity to the efficacy of previous interventions in discriminating competing ideas. (shrink)

This article presents a study of corporate-stakeholder relationships using an empirical technique called Data Envelopment Analysis (DEA) to assess company "best practices" with respect to five primary stakeholders at an industry level of analysis. Five key stakeholder domains are considered: community relations, employee relations, environment, customer (product category), and stockholders (financial performance). These data reflect the relationships between companies and these five primary stakeholders; these relationships are considered to be important elements of corporate social performance. About 15% of companies, (...) on average, are found to be operating at the multidimensional "best practices frontier" that DEA establishes. Differences in treatment of stakeholders within industries and between industries are observed. (shrink)

This paper explores how Charles Peirce’s habit-based epistemology leads him to theorise perception. I show how Peirce’s triadic semiotic analysis of perceptual judgment renders his theory of perception neither a representationalism nor a relationism /direct realism, but an interesting hybrid of the two. His view is also extremely interesting, I argue, in the way that by analysing symbols as habits it refuses the common assumption that perception is an affair best understood synchronically, as a ‘language-entry event’. Relatedly, I extend (...) previous work (Legg 2008) which argues that Peirce’s epistemology counts as a ‘hyperinferentialism’ in Robert Brandom’s terms, but this does not mean that Peirce’s theory of perception cannot accommodate unmediated contact with reality - what Peirce called ‘the outward clash’. (shrink)

Tetris provides a difficult, dynamic task environment within which some people are novices and others, after years of work and practice, become extreme experts. Here we study two core skills; namely, choosing the goal or objective function that will maximize performance and a feature-based analysis of the current game board to determine where to place the currently falling zoid so as to maximize the goal. In Study 1, we build cross-entropy reinforcement learning models to determine whether different goals result in (...) different feature weights. Two of these optimization strategies quickly rise to performance plateaus, whereas two others continue toward higher but more jagged heights. In Study 2, we compare the zoid placement decisions made by our best CERL models with those made by 67 human players. Across 370,131 human game episodes, two CERL models picked the same zoid placements as our lowest scoring human for 43% of the placements and as our three best scoring experts for 65% of the placements. Our findings suggest that people focus on maximizing points, not number of lines cleared or number of levels reached. They also show that goal choice influences the choice of zoid placements for CERLs and suggest that the same is true of humans. Tetris has a repetitive task structure that makes Tetris more tractable and more like a traditional experimental psychology paradigm than many more complex games or tasks. Hence, although complex, Tetris is not overwhelmingly complex and presents a right-sized challenge to cognitive theories, especially those of integrated cognitive systems. (shrink)

Tetris provides a difficult, dynamic task environment within which some people are novices and others, after years of work and practice, become extreme experts. Here we study two core skills; namely, choosing the goal or objective function that will maximize performance and a feature-based analysis of the current game board to determine where to place the currently falling zoid so as to maximize the goal. In Study 1, we build cross-entropy reinforcement learning models to determine whether different goals result in (...) different feature weights. Two of these optimization strategies quickly rise to performance plateaus, whereas two others continue toward higher but more jagged heights. In Study 2, we compare the zoid placement decisions made by our best CERL models with those made by 67 human players. Across 370,131 human game episodes, two CERL models picked the same zoid placements as our lowest scoring human for 43% of the placements and as our three best scoring experts for 65% of the placements. Our findings suggest that people focus on maximizing points, not number of lines cleared or number of levels reached. They also show that goal choice influences the choice of zoid placements for CERLs and suggest that the same is true of humans. Tetris has a repetitive task structure that makes Tetris more tractable and more like a traditional experimental psychology paradigm than many more complex games or tasks. Hence, although complex, Tetris is not overwhelmingly complex and presents a right-sized challenge to cognitive theories, especially those of integrated cognitive systems. (shrink)

Smoking is frequently presented as being particularly problematic when the smoker is a pregnant woman because of the potential harm to the future child. This premise is used to justify targeting pregnant women with a unique approach to smoking cessation including policies such as the routine testing of all pregnant women for carbon monoxide at every antenatal appointment. This paper examines the evidence that such policies are justified by the aim of harm prevention and argues that targeting pregnant women in (...) this way is likely to do more harm than good. Routine carbon monoxide testing is particularly problematic as it sends a message to pregnant women that they cannot be trusted either to truthfully answer questions as to whether or not they smoke, or to make decisions in the best interests of themselves and their future children in the way that non-pregnant individuals are. Further, if the aim is to reduce rates of prenatal harm, the evidence suggests that adopting a supportive and empowering approach to prenatal care is the most effective way to achieve this, something that the current policies aimed at pregnant women are in conflict with. (shrink)

Faced with the difficult task of discerning Plato’s true ideas from the contradictory voices he used to express them, scholars have never fully made sense of the many incompatibilities within and between the dialogues. In the magisterial _Plato’s Philosophers_, Catherine Zuckert explains for the first time how these prose dramas cohere to reveal a comprehensive Platonic understanding of philosophy. To expose this coherence, Zuckert examines the dialogues not in their supposed order of composition but according to the dramatic order (...) in which Plato indicates they took place. This unconventional arrangement lays bare a narrative of the rise, development, and limitations of Socratic philosophy. In the drama’s earliest dialogues, for example, non-Socratic philosophers introduce the political and philosophical problems to which Socrates tries to respond. A second dramatic group shows how Socrates develops his distinctive philosophical style. And, finally, the later dialogues feature interlocutors who reveal his philosophy’s limitations. Despite these limitations, Zuckert concludes, Plato made Socrates the dialogues’ central figure because Socrates raises the fundamental human question: what is the best way to live? Plato’s dramatization of Socratic imperfections suggests, moreover, that he recognized the apparently unbridgeable gap between our understandings of human life and the nonhuman world. At a time when this gap continues to raise questions—about the division between sciences and the humanities and the potentially dehumanizing effects of scientific progress—Zuckert’s brilliant interpretation of the entire Platonic corpus offers genuinely new insights into worlds past and present. (shrink)

Smoking is frequently presented as being particularly problematic when the smoker is a pregnant woman because of the potential harm to the future child. This premise is used to justify targeting pregnant women with a unique approach to smoking cessation including policies such as the routine testing of all pregnant women for carbon monoxide at every antenatal appointment. This paper examines the evidence that such policies are justified by the aim of harm prevention and argues that targeting pregnant women in (...) this way is likely to do more harm than good. Routine carbon monoxide testing is particularly problematic as it sends a message to pregnant women that they cannot be trusted either to truthfully answer questions as to whether or not they smoke, or to make decisions in the best interests of themselves and their future children in the way that non-pregnant individuals are. Further, if the aim is to reduce rates of prenatal harm, the evidence suggests that adopting a supportive and empowering approach to prenatal care is the most effective way to achieve this, something that the current policies aimed at pregnant women are in conflict with. (shrink)

Recent law and ethics literature has been inundated with recommendations of the "best interests" criterion as the appropriate guide for neonatal and maternal-fetal decision-making. Increasingly, however, its adequacy is being questioned. In Chapter 1, I survey the arguments of "best interests" defenders and critics and suggest one problem is that the "best interests" criterion has yet to be subjected to a systematic conceptual and ethical analysis. In Chapter 2, therefore, I conduct such an analysis to evaluate more (...) systematically its appropriateness as a decision-making guide in neonatal and maternal-fetal medicine, concluding that the "best interests" criterion cannot assist us in seeing and addressing all that is at stake in neonatal and maternal-fetal decision-making because it excludes any consideration of the "interdependent" and other interests of family members. Therefore, I suggest that an ethical criterion or set of criteria which can explicitly consider and adequately balance the interests of infants or fetuses and family members would be a more helpful guide for neonatal and maternal-fetal decision-making. ;In Chapters 3-7, I attempt to move beyond the "best interests" criterion, drawing on fieldwork I conducted in the United States, Sweden, and India to point out some conceptual and normative gaps to be addressed in the development of a more adequate guide for neonatal and maternal-fetal decision-making. In Chapter 3, I describe this fieldwork and explain its purpose as illustrating the clinical ethical strategies employed in these countries to balance the interests of various parties in actual decision-making. In Chapters 4-6, I describe these strategies. Finally, in Chapter 7, I point out some conceptual and normative gaps in these decision-making strategies, noting that these gaps have also been unaddressed by the "best interests" critics reviewed in Chapters 1 and 2. I suggest that we must address these gaps to develop theoretical structures that will enable us to explicitly consider and adequately balance the "interdependent" and other interests of infants or fetuses, their family members, and even society in neonatal and maternal-fetal decision-making. (shrink)

Severe staffing shortages have emerged as a prominent threat to maintaining usual standards of care during the COVID-2019 pandemic. In dire settings of crisis capacity, healthcare systems assume the ethical duty to maximise aggregate population-level benefit of existing resources. To this end, existing plans for rationing mechanical ventilators and intensive care unit beds in crisis capacity focus on selecting individual patients who are most likely to survive and prioritising these patients to receive scarce resources. However, staffing capacity is conceptually different (...) from availability of these types of discrete resources, and the existing strategy of identifying and prioritising patients with the best prognosis cannot be readily adapted to fit this real-world scenario. We propose that two alternative approaches to staffing resource allocation offer a better conceptual fit: prioritise the worst off: restrict access to acute care services and hospital admission for patients at relatively low clinical risk and prioritise staff interventions with high near-term value: universally restrict selected interventions and treatments that require substantial staff time and/or energy but offer minimal near-term patient benefit. These strategies—while potentially resulting in care that deviates from usual standards–support the goal of maximising the aggregate benefit of scarce resources in crisis capacity settings triggered by staffing shortages. This ethical framework offers a foundation to support institutional leaders in developing operationalisable crisis capacity policies that promote fairness and support healthcare workers. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Why Socrates and Thrasymachus Become FriendsCatherine ZuckertIn the Platonic dialogues Socrates is shown talking to two, and only two, famous teachers of rhetoric, Thrasymachus of Chalcedon and Gorgias of Leontini.1 At first glance relations between Socrates and Gorgias appear to be much more courteous—they might even be described as cordial—than relations between Socrates and Thrasymachus. In the Gorgias Socrates explicitly and intentionally seeks an opportunity to talk to Gorgias (...) and treats him with great respect. Socrates shows that Gorgias’s claims concerning the power of his art are contradictory, but the philosopher does not press his advantage or embarrass the rhetorician (Stauffer 2006, 34). Although Gorgias indicates his interest in hearing what Socrates has to say by urging his young friends Polus and Callicles to continue the conversation, Gorgias never says that he is convinced by Socrates. And Socrates never announces that Gorgias has become his friend.2In the Republic Socrates reports that Thrasymachus burst into the conversation like a lion. Socrates even claims that he and his interlocutor (Polemarchus) were frightened. The initial exchange between Socrates and Thrasymachus thus appears to be hostile. In the argument that follows, Socrates embarrasses Thrasymachus; the famous teacher of rhetoric blushes. Nevertheless, Socrates declares later in the conversation (1900, 498d) that he and Thrasymachus have become friends.3 [End Page 163]The difference in the relations Socrates had—or at least thought that he could have—with the two teachers of rhetoric is important, because it indicates what sort of rhetoric Socrates thought was compatible not only with his philosophy but also with a just political order and what was not. The differences between the claims and arguments of the two teachers of rhetoric are not easy to pinpoint, however. Many of the charges that Gorgias’s associates Polus and Callicles make against Socrates, at least partly in defense of Gorgias, sound very much like charges Thrasymachus makes against Socrates. In order to discover the grounds of the difference in the relation between the philosopher and the two teachers of rhetoric, it thus becomes necessary to review and compare the claims Gorgias and his students make with those Thrasymachus levels against Socrates at the beginning of the Republic.Socrates’ Encounter with GorgiasAt the beginning of the Gorgias the famous rhetorician’s Athenian host Callicles expresses surprise that Socrates has come to hear Gorgias declaim. But Socrates is not interested in witnessing a demonstration of Gorgias’s prowess as a speaker; he wants to ask the rhetorician what the power of his art is and what he teaches. Since Gorgias had previously offered to answer any questions after his speech, he agrees to respond to Socrates’ queries.In order for them to converse, Socrates emphasizes, Gorgias will have to keep his responses short. Although Gorgias sensibly observes that all questions cannot be answered adequately with brief replies, his first responses to Socrates’ questions are very short. Since Gorgias claims to be a knower and practitioner of an art, Socrates asks what he does and makes others capable of doing. Gorgias replies that he gives speeches and teaches others how to orate. Socrates asks what the speeches are about. “The greatest of human affairs, and the best” (1998, 451d), Gorgias vaguely and rather evasively responds. Pressed to be more specific, he finally declares that his art provides “the greatest good and cause both of freedom for human beings themselves and rule over others in each man’s own city” by enabling them to make speeches that “persuade judges in the law court, councilors in the council, assemblymen in the assembly, and in every other... political gathering” (1998, 452d–e, translation slightly modified).The Grounds of Gorgias’s ClaimsIf Gorgias had not been restricted to brief replies by his agreement with Socrates, he might have explained the reasons for his vast claims with [End Page 164] arguments like those to be found in two of his remaining fragments. In his “Encomium to Helen” he explains the overwhelming power of speech, and in “On the Nonexistent” he demonstrates the reason or basis of this power by arguing that there is no form of “being” that exists independent of our... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Why Socrates and Thrasymachus Become FriendsCatherine ZuckertIn the Platonic dialogues Socrates is shown talking to two, and only two, famous teachers of rhetoric, Thrasymachus of Chalcedon and Gorgias of Leontini.1 At first glance relations between Socrates and Gorgias appear to be much more courteous—they might even be described as cordial—than relations between Socrates and Thrasymachus. In the Gorgias Socrates explicitly and intentionally seeks an opportunity to talk to Gorgias (...) and treats him with great respect. Socrates shows that Gorgias’s claims concerning the power of his art are contradictory, but the philosopher does not press his advantage or embarrass the rhetorician (Stauffer 2006, 34). Although Gorgias indicates his interest in hearing what Socrates has to say by urging his young friends Polus and Callicles to continue the conversation, Gorgias never says that he is convinced by Socrates. And Socrates never announces that Gorgias has become his friend.2In the Republic Socrates reports that Thrasymachus burst into the conversation like a lion. Socrates even claims that he and his interlocutor (Polemarchus) were frightened. The initial exchange between Socrates and Thrasymachus thus appears to be hostile. In the argument that follows, Socrates embarrasses Thrasymachus; the famous teacher of rhetoric blushes. Nevertheless, Socrates declares later in the conversation (1900, 498d) that he and Thrasymachus have become friends.3 [End Page 163]The difference in the relations Socrates had—or at least thought that he could have—with the two teachers of rhetoric is important, because it indicates what sort of rhetoric Socrates thought was compatible not only with his philosophy but also with a just political order and what was not. The differences between the claims and arguments of the two teachers of rhetoric are not easy to pinpoint, however. Many of the charges that Gorgias’s associates Polus and Callicles make against Socrates, at least partly in defense of Gorgias, sound very much like charges Thrasymachus makes against Socrates. In order to discover the grounds of the difference in the relation between the philosopher and the two teachers of rhetoric, it thus becomes necessary to review and compare the claims Gorgias and his students make with those Thrasymachus levels against Socrates at the beginning of the Republic.Socrates’ Encounter with GorgiasAt the beginning of the Gorgias the famous rhetorician’s Athenian host Callicles expresses surprise that Socrates has come to hear Gorgias declaim. But Socrates is not interested in witnessing a demonstration of Gorgias’s prowess as a speaker; he wants to ask the rhetorician what the power of his art is and what he teaches. Since Gorgias had previously offered to answer any questions after his speech, he agrees to respond to Socrates’ queries.In order for them to converse, Socrates emphasizes, Gorgias will have to keep his responses short. Although Gorgias sensibly observes that all questions cannot be answered adequately with brief replies, his first responses to Socrates’ questions are very short. Since Gorgias claims to be a knower and practitioner of an art, Socrates asks what he does and makes others capable of doing. Gorgias replies that he gives speeches and teaches others how to orate. Socrates asks what the speeches are about. “The greatest of human affairs, and the best” (1998, 451d), Gorgias vaguely and rather evasively responds. Pressed to be more specific, he finally declares that his art provides “the greatest good and cause both of freedom for human beings themselves and rule over others in each man’s own city” by enabling them to make speeches that “persuade judges in the law court, councilors in the council, assemblymen in the assembly, and in every other... political gathering” (1998, 452d–e, translation slightly modified).The Grounds of Gorgias’s ClaimsIf Gorgias had not been restricted to brief replies by his agreement with Socrates, he might have explained the reasons for his vast claims with [End Page 164] arguments like those to be found in two of his remaining fragments. In his “Encomium to Helen” he explains the overwhelming power of speech, and in “On the Nonexistent” he demonstrates the reason or basis of this power by arguing that there is no form of “being” that exists independent of our... (shrink)

I discuss in this paper how robotic scientists tend to produce replicas of human bodies that are consistent with their own cultural norms by exploring how gender is embodied in humanoid robots. My focus is specifically on care robots, and their reception in the African context. I argue that since the bodies of the robotic scientists are the reference points according to which they design and manufacture robots, a somaesthetics of robotics can best reveal and challenge how gendered norms (...) are materialised in these machines. (shrink)

In the United States, the decision of whether to withdraw or continue to provide artificial nutrition and hydration (ANH) for patients in a permanent vegetative state (PVS) is placed largely in the hands of surrogate decision-makers, such as spouses and immediate family members. This practice would seem to be consistent with a strong national emphasis on autonomy and patient-centered healthcare. When there is ambiguity as to the patient's advanced wishes, the presumption has been that decisions should weigh in favor of (...) maintaining life, and therefore, that it is the withdrawal rather than the continuation of ANH that requires particular justification. I will argue that this default position should be reversed. Instead, I will argue that the burden of justification lies with those who would continue artificial nutrition and hydration (ANH), and in the absence of knowledge as to the patient's advanced wishes, it is better to discontinue ANH. In particular, I will argue that among patients in PVS, there is not a compelling interest in being kept alive; that in general, we commit a worse violation of autonomy by continuing ANH when the patient's wishes are unknown; and that more likely than not, the maintenance of ANH as a bridge to a theoretical future time of recovery goes against the best interests of the patient. (shrink)

This paper offers both a criticism of and a novel alternative perspective on current ontologies that take race to be something that is either static and wholly evident at one’s birth or preformed prior to it. In it I survey and critically assess six of the most popular conceptions of race, concluding with an outline of my own suggestion for an alternative account. I suggest that race can be best understood in terms of one’s experience of his or her (...) body, one’s interactions with other individuals, and one’s experiences within particular cultures and societies. This embeddedness of human experience has been left out of most discussions of race which tie race to a set of characteristics (either biologically or sociologically defined). To rectify this omission, I articulate what I call the “physiosocial” view of race. This emphasizes the situatedness of human experience, the reciprocal and dynamic nature of the racial identities of individuals and groups. Approaching racial identity in this way entails a union of two historically uncomfortable partners: biological and sociological conceptions of race. If successful, this philosophical stance may illuminate the process of racial self-ascription as well as provide an explanation for the potential changeability of an individual’s racial identity at different times and at different places. (shrink)

This book is one of the most important recent books on Hegel, a philosopher who has had a crucial impact on the shape of continental philosophy. Published here in English for the first time, it includes a substantial preface by Jacques Derrida in which he explores the themes and conclusions of Malabou's book. _The Future of Hegel: Plasticity, Temporality and Dialectic_ restores Hegel's rich and complex concepts of time and temporality to contemporary philosophy. It examines his concept of time, relating (...) it to perennial topics in philosophy such as substance, accident and the identity of the subject. Catherine Malabou's also contrasts her account of Hegelian temporality with the interpretation given by Heidegger in _Being and Time_, arguing that it is the concept of 'plasticity' that best describes Hegel's theory of temporality. The future is understood not simply as a moment in time, but as something malleable and constantly open to change through our interpretation. The book also develops Hegel's preoccupation with the history of Greek thought and Christianity and explores the role of theology in his thought. Essential reading for those interested in Hegel and contemporary continental philosophy, _The Future of Hegel _is also fascinating to those interested in the ideas of Heidegger and Derrida. (shrink)

Is Leo Strauss truly an intellectual forebear of neoconservatism and a powerful force in shaping Bush administration foreign policy? _The Truth about Leo Strauss_ puts this question to rest, revealing for the first time how the popular media came to perpetuate such an oversimplified view of such a complex and wide-ranging philosopher. More important, it corrects our perception of Strauss, providing the best general introduction available to the political thought of this misunderstood figure. Catherine and Michael Zuckert—both former (...) students of Strauss—guide readers here to a nuanced understanding of how Strauss’s political thought fits into his broader philosophy. Challenging the ideas that Strauss was an inflexible conservative who followed in the footsteps of Nietzsche, Heidegger, and Carl Schmitt, the Zuckerts contend that Strauss’s signature idea was the need for a return to the ancients. This idea, they show, stemmed from Strauss’s belief that modern thought, with its relativism and nihilism, undermines healthy politics and even the possibility of real philosophy. Identifying this view as one of Strauss’s three core propositions—America is modern, modernity is bad, and America is good—they conclude that Strauss was a sober defender of liberal democracy, aware of both its strengths and its weaknesses. The Zuckerts finish, appropriately, by examining the varied work of Strauss’s numerous students and followers, revealing the origins—rooted in the tensions within his own thought—oftheir split into opposing camps. Balanced and accessible, _The Truth about Leo Strauss_ is a must-read for anyone who wants to more fully comprehend this enigmatic philosopher and his much-disputed legacy. (shrink)

Is Leo Strauss truly an intellectual forebear of neoconservatism and a powerful force in shaping Bush administration foreign policy? _The Truth about Leo Strauss_ puts this question to rest, revealing for the first time how the popular media came to perpetuate an oversimplified view of a complex and wide-ranging philosopher. In doing so, it corrects our perception of Strauss, providing the best general introduction available to the political thought of this misunderstood figure. Catherine and Michael Zuckert—both former students (...) of Strauss—guide readers here to a nuanced understanding of how Strauss’s political thought fits into his broader philosophy. Challenging the ideas that Strauss was an inflexible conservative who followed in the footsteps of Nietzsche, Heidegger, and Carl Schmitt, the Zuckerts contend that Strauss’s signature idea was the need for a return to the ancients. Through their work, they conclude that Strauss was a sober defender of liberal democracy, aware of both its strengths and its weaknesses. Balanced and accessible, _The Truth about Leo Strauss_ is a must-read for anyone who wants to more fully comprehend this enigmatic philosopher and his much-disputed legacy. “_The Truth about Leo Strauss_ is the most balanced and insightful book yet written about Strauss’s thought, students, and political influence. It dispels myths promulgated by both friends and foes and persuasively traces the conflicting paths that American thinkers indebted to Strauss have taken.”—William Galston, Brookings Institution. (shrink)

Virtue ethics now constitutes one of three major approaches to the study of ethics by Anglophone philosophers. Its proponents almost all recognize the source of their approach in Aristotle, but relatively few of them confront the problem that source poses for contemporary ethicists. According to Aristotle, ethikê belongs and is subordinate to politikê. But in the liberal democracies within which most Anglophone ethicists write, political authorities are not supposed to legislate morality; they are supposed merely to establish the conditions necessary (...) for individuals to choose their own life paths. Contemporary ethicists who have addressed this question have proposed three very different answers to the question of how virtue ethics ought to be related to politics in modern nation-states. Martha Nussbaum seeks to provide all human beings with the capacities—intellectual and moral as well as material—they need to choose the best way of life. Arguing that the modern nation-state is incapable of providing its citizens with the education they need to live a good life, Alasdair MacIntyre looks to smaller, tradition-based communities. Because political action is coercive and truly ethical action is voluntary, Douglas den Uyl and Douglas Rasmussen insist, ethics and politics should be strictly separated. This article examines each of these attempts to revive an Aristotelian understanding of ethics, bringing out the advantages and problems involved. (shrink)

An understanding of the nature and development of nursing intuition can help nurse educators foster it in young nurses and give clinicians more confidence in this aspect of their knowledge, allowing them to respond with greater assurance to their intuitions. In this paper, accounts from philosophy and neurophysiology are used to argue that intuition, specifically nursing intuition, is a valid form of knowledge. The paper argues that nursing intuition, a kind of practical intuition, is composed of four distinct aspects that (...) include: embodied knowledge rather like that knowledge we have when we have learned to ride a bicycle; well‐trained sensory perceptions attentive to subtle details of complex, often rapidly changing situations; a significant store of pertinent conceptual knowledge; and a history of habitual actions intentionally directed towards achieving the best outcomes for our patients. Contemporary neurophysiology research strongly suggests that human persons experience other persons such that they directly understand the meaning of a variety of different human actions, intentions, emotions, and sensations in immediate, non‐reflective, and non‐conceptual perceptions. This research is supported by the philosophical theories of Jacques Maritain and Yves R. Simon found in their accounts of practical knowledge. Together, these accounts offer us a rich view of the reality of nursing intuition that helps us understand why we find intuitive actions in some but not all nurses and gives us some specific information about how to develop intuition in young nurses. Finally, this research shows us a path for further research. (shrink)

The grammarians of antiquity, unlike some of their modern counterparts, seem to have had little interest in investigating ‘what every speaker knows’, at least as a largescale project, consciously articulated and embarked on. The object of such a project would be to determine what constitutes such knowledge—or mastery, or cognition, or whatever name it is given—in actual speakers. An alternative goal would be an account of something knowledge of which would count as knowledge of the language in question, even if (...) this is not what actual speakers know. No ancient author seems to have set himself either task; indeed, the whole question of what it is to know a language seems to have been raised only very occasionally in classical antiquity. is probably the best known of these rare discussions.) Kaimio is surely justified in making the still more sweeping observation that ‘The concept of language knowledge was rather vague amongst ancient peoples’. (shrink)

The grammarians of antiquity, unlike some of their modern counterparts, seem to have had little interest in investigating ‘what every speaker knows’, at least as a largescale project, consciously articulated and embarked on. The object of such a project would be to determine what constitutes such knowledge—or mastery, or cognition, or whatever name it is given—in actual speakers. An alternative goal would be an account of something knowledge of which would count as knowledge of the language in question, even if (...) this is not what actual speakers know. No ancient author seems to have set himself either task; indeed, the whole question of what it is to know a language seems to have been raised only very occasionally in classical antiquity. is probably the best known of these rare discussions.) Kaimio is surely justified in making the still more sweeping observation that ‘The concept of language knowledge was rather vague amongst ancient peoples’. (shrink)

Over time, we in English departments have resigned ourselves to prophecies of doom. Our discipline is said to be in terminal decline, and civilization with it. Usually, it is our own fault: the value of our work, so the story has gone, is threatened from within, whether by submission to esoteric theories on the one hand, or by dissipation into the banalities of cultural studies on the other. Our only hope, they tell us, is the immediate restoration of the old (...) pieties, as these were cemented in the nineteenth century: literature teaches moral values; poets redeem from decay the divine element in mortal beings; a knowledge of the best that has been thought and said makes us more humane.Moral panics come and go .. (shrink)

This paper probes theories of justice underpinning the concept of equity to deconstruct the term and ascertain how best to equitably support refugee and asylum-seeking youth in U.S. schools. Building upon theories posited by John Rawls, Michael Sandel, and Amartya Sen, the paper aims to extend beyond ideal theory into a theoretical framework of equity with operationalizing potential. Recognizing refugee and asylum-seeking youth as part of the U.S. social contract and therefore bound to government support, the paper represents that (...) equitable education for these young people in our globalized world is essential from both a human rights and economic perspective. Such equitable education will only be achieved when universal minimum standards are offered to everyone and made inclusive, so that all are invited to fully participate as culturally respected learners and knowledge producers in academic spaces. (shrink)

The concept of ‘information’ is central to our understanding of financial markets, both in theory and in practice. Analysing information is not only a critical part of the activities of many financial practitioners, but also plays a central role in the Efficient Market Hypothesis (EMH). The central claim of this paper is that different data can count as information in fi-nancial markets and that particular investors do not consider all of the available data. This suggests that firstly, saying the price (...) of a stock should be $X once a particular piece of information has been incorporated in the price is only justifiable if we know that this information really is relevant for other investors. Sec-ondly, the EMH is often tested by looking at market behaviour after the release of information; again, this is only justified if we know that other market participants share the view that this is information. The purpose of this chapter is to suggest that there are good reasons for thinking that we do not know this. Finally, this chapter also suggests that bubbles in financial markets are best understood in terms of salience of information, rather than irrationality. (shrink)

This chapter explores the epistemic roles played by connectionist models of cognition, and offers a formal analysis of how connectionist models explain. It looks at how other types of computational models explain. Classical artificial intelligence (AI) programs explain using abductive reasoning, or inference to the best explanation; they begin with the phenomena to be explained, and devise rules that can produce the right outcome. The chapter also looks at several examples of connectionist models of cognition, observing what sorts of (...) constraints are used in their design, and how their results are evaluated. It argues that the point of implementing networks roughly analogous to neural structures is to discover and explores the generic mechanisms at work in the brain, not to deduce the precise activities of specific structures. The chapter explores a formal analysis of the explanations offered, which interprets connectionist models and the cognitive theories they represent as sharing membership in a type of mechanism. (shrink)

This article presents the results of a study that investigates the way in which carriers of a mutation on the BRCA1 or the BRCA2 gene, associated with a high risk of breast and ovarian cancer, make their reproductive decisions. Using semi-structured interviews, the study explored the way in which these persons reflected on the acceptability of taking the risk of transmitting this mutation to the next generation, the arguments they used in favor or against taking that risk, and in the (...) light of these arguments, their opinion on the acceptability of preimplantation genetic diagnosis (PGD) as a reproductive option. The findings suggest that when carriers are planning to have a(nother) child, they are mainly concerned by the risk of transmitting ‘much more than a gene’: essentially painful experiences not only with respect to health, such as undergoing cancer surveillance or combatting one’s own illness, but also with regards to family life, such as witnessing the illness and death of a close relative, encountering difficulties in finding a partner or reconsidering one’s plans to have a family. As for opinions concerning the acceptability of PGD as a reproductive option, opinions about personal recourse were varied but all expressed the understanding that PGD should be made available to those persons who consider it their best option. (shrink)

The progression of research and scholarly inquiry does not occur in isolation and is wholly dependent on accurate reporting of methods and results, and successful replication of prior work. Without mechanisms to correct the literature, much time and money is wasted on research based on a crumbling foundation. These guidelines serve to outline the respective responsibilities of researchers, institutions, agencies, and publishers or editors in maintaining the integrity of the research record. Delineating these complementary roles and proposing solutions for common (...) barriers provide a foundation for best practices. (shrink)

We undeniably live in an information age—as, indeed, did those who lived before us. After all, as the cultural historian Robert Darnton pointed out: ‘every age was an age of information, each in its own way’ (Darnton 2000: 1). Darnton was referring to the news media, but his insight surely also applies to the sciences. The practices of acquiring, storing, labeling, organizing, retrieving, mobilizing, and integrating data about the natural world has always been an enabling aspect of scientific work. Natural (...) history and its descendant discipline of biological taxonomy are prime examples of sciences dedicated to creating and managing systems of ordering data. In some sense, the idea of biological taxonomy as an information science is commonplace. Perhaps it is because of its self-evidence that the information science perspective on taxonomy has not been a major theme in the history and philosophy of science. The botanist Vernon Heywood once pointed out that historians of biology, in their ‘preoccupation with the development of the sciences of botany and zoology… [have] diverted attention from the role of taxonomy as an information science’ (Heywood 1985: 11). More specifically, he argued that historians had failed to appreciate how principles and practices that can be traced to Linnaeus constituted ‘a change in the nature of taxonomy from a local or limited folk communication system and later a codified folk taxonomy to a formal system of information science [that] marked a watershed in the history of biology’ (ibid.). A similar observation could be made about twentieth-century philosophy of biology, which mostly skipped over practical and epistemic questions about information management in taxonomy. The taxonomic themes that featured in the emerging philosophy of biology literature in the second half of the twentieth century were predominantly metaphysical in orientation. This is illustrated by what has become known as the ‘essentialism story’: an account about the essentialist nature of pre- Darwinian taxonomy that used to be accepted by many historians and philosophers, and which stimulated efforts to document and interpret shifts in the metaphysical understanding of species and (natural) classification (Richards 2010; Winsor 2003; Wilkins 2009). Although contemporary debates in the philosophy of taxonomy have moved on, much discussion continues to focus on conceptual and metaphysical issues surrounding the nature of species and the principles of classification. Discussions centring on whether species are individuals, classes, or kinds have sprung up as predictably as perennials. Raucous debates have arisen even with the aim of accommodating the diversity of views: is monism, pluralism, or eliminativism about the species category the best position to take? In addition to these, our disciplines continue to interrogate what is the nature of these different approaches to classification: are they representational or inferential roles of different approaches to classification (evolutionary taxonomy, phenetics, phylogenetic systematics)? While there is still much to learn from these discussions—in which we both actively participate—our aim with this topical collection has been to seek different entrypoints and address underexposed themes in the history and philosophy of taxonomy. We believe that approaching taxonomy as an information science prompts new questions and can open up new philosophical vistas worth exploring. A twenty-first century information science turn in the history and philosophy of taxonomy is already underway. In scientific practice and in daily life it is hard to escape the imaginaries of Big Data and the constant threats of being ‘flooded with data’. In the life sciences, these developments are often associated with the socalled bioinformatics crisis that can hopefully be contained by a new, interdisciplinary breed of bioinformaticians. These new concepts, narratives, and developments surrounding the centrality of data and information systems in the biological and biomedical sciences have raised important philosophical questions about their challenges and implications. But historical perspectives are just as necessary to judge what makes our information age different from those that preceded us. Indeed, as the British zoologist Charles Godfray has often pointed out, the piles of data that are being generated in contemporary systematic biology have led to a second bioinformatics crisis, the first being the one that confronted Linnaeus in the mid-18th century (Godfray 2007). Although our aim is to clear a path for new discussions of taxonomy from an information science-informed point of view, we continue where others in the history, philosophy, and sociology of science have already trod. We believe that an appreciation of biological taxonomy as an information science raises many questions about the philosophical, theoretical, material, and practical aspects of the use and revision of biological nomenclatures in different local and global communities of scientists and citizen scientists. In particular, conceiving of taxonomy as an information science directs attention to the temporalities of managing an accumulating data about classified entities that are themselves subject to revision, to the means by which revision is accomplished, and to the semantic, material, and collaborative contexts that mediate the execution of revisions. (shrink)

Spotting is a typical isolated head coordination used by many dancers during rotation. However, with sporadic and inconclusive explanations as to why dancers spot, the critical characteristics and functionalities of spotting have yet to be identified. Therefore, a Delphi method survey was used as a novel methodology for providing greater insights into this under-examined motor behavior, bringing together experts from various disciplines to generate ideas and identify the crucial elements of spotting. Following the selection of experts, three rounds of data (...) collection and analysis were conducted to narrow down relevant topics and evaluate consensus. To gather opinions in Round 1, experts were asked to respond freely to three prompts regarding the reasoning, characteristics, and uses of successfully spotting; responses were then grouped into predominant items. To rate agreement in Round 2, experts rated their agreement on the relevance of the grouped items from Round 1 on a 5-point Likert scale; items rated 4 or 5 by at least 70% of the experts were taken as those consensually relevant to the group. To rank importance in Round 3, Best-Worst Scaling was used to determine individual rankings of the relevant items from Round 2. In a series of comparisons, experts were prompted to select the most and least important items in multiple sub-groupings. Group mean ranking of items as well as ranking concordance and differentiation were analyzed to determine the most important items and the strength of consensus, respectively. Overall, consensus and differentiation in experts’ item rankings were low; however, novel insights were presented. As characteristics of successfully spotting, experts emphasized head isolation, timing, and gaze specificity alongside functional characteristics, substantiating spotting as purposeful action in rotation. Building on traditional notions of spotting for reduced dizziness and maintaining balance, successfully spotting was further deemed useful for multiple turns, orientation, and rhythm. The findings of this study thus provide informed guidelines for future analysis and training of this complex head coordination in rotations. (shrink)

Machiavelli is popularly known as a teacher of tyrants, a key proponent of the unscrupulous “Machiavellian” politics laid down in his landmark political treatise The Prince. Others cite the Discourses on Livy to argue that Machiavelli is actually a passionate advocate of republican politics who saw the need for occasional harsh measures to maintain political order. Which best characterizes the teachings of the prolific Italian philosopher? With Machiavelli’s Politics, Catherine H. Zuckert turns this question on its head with (...) a major reinterpretation of Machiavelli’s prose works that reveals a surprisingly cohesive view of politics. Starting with Machiavelli’s two major political works, Zuckert persuasively shows that the moral revolution Machiavelli sets out in The Prince lays the foundation for the new form of democratic republic he proposes in the Discourses. Distrusting ambitious politicians to serve the public interest of their own accord, Machiavelli sought to persuade them in The Prince that the best way to achieve their own ambitions was to secure the desires and ambitions of their subjects and fellow citizens. In the Discourses, he then describes the types of laws and institutions that would balance the conflict between the two in a way that would secure the liberty of most, if not all. In the second half of her book, Zuckert places selected later works—La Mandragola, The Art of War, The Life of Castruccio Castracani, Clizia, and Florentine Histories—under scrutiny, showing how Machiavelli further developed certain aspects of his thought in these works. In The Art of War, for example, he explains more concretely how and to what extent the principles of organization he advanced in The Prince and the Discourses ought to be applied in modern circumstances. Because human beings act primarily on passions, Machiavelli attempts to show readers what those passions are and how they can be guided to have productive rather than destructive results. A stunning and ambitious analysis, Machiavelli’s Politics brilliantly shows how many conflicting perspectives do inform Machiavelli’s teachings, but that one needs to consider all of his works in order to understand how they cohere into a unified political view. This is a magisterial work that cannot be ignored if a comprehensive understanding of the philosopher is to be obtained. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Making Fetal PersonsFetal Homicide, Ultrasound, and the Normative Significance of BirthCatherine MillsIn early 2012, the then attorney general of Western Australia, Christian Porter, announced plans to introduce fetal homicide laws that would “create a new offence of causing death or grievous bodily harm to an unborn child through an unlawful assault on its mother” (Porter 2012). While well established in the United States, fetal homicide laws are only beginning (...) to take shape in Australia.1 The proposed law would mean that if an offender assaulted a woman and thereby caused the death of the fetus she was gestating, the courts would be required to impose a sentence of life imprisonment in all but exceptional circumstances—equivalent to the penalty for murder. While the proposed fetal homicide law is said to give appropriate recognition to the grief and suffering of the woman involved—and while it may help to do that—this is certainly not all it would do.2 For it would also give existence to a new legal subject in Western Australia, that is, the “unborn child”: currently, under Western Australian law a child is only legally capable of being murdered when already external to the mother’s body. Thus, the woman’s body constitutes a kind of “natural” basis for a legal boundary—one that the proposed law transgresses and perhaps obliterates, at the same time as it purports to recognize the trauma associated with the transgression and obliteration of that boundary by another.Fetal homicide laws thus traverse difficult territory in the maternal-fetal relationship, in which actions against one person come to constitute a crime against another. Significantly, these laws are typically formulated to provide legal protection for pregnant women against the intrusions of a third party against [End Page 88] their person. However, it may be that they can also be interpreted more generally to provide legal protection for the fetus against others. So construed, such laws open up a danger for pregnant women themselves, insofar as their actions threaten the life and well-being of the fetus they carry. One recent example of the exploitation of this ambiguity in fetal homicide laws is the case of Bei Bei Shuai, a young woman of Chinese descent who faced felony charges of murder in Indiana after a failed suicide attempt resulted in the death of the thirty three week old fetus she was gestating (Pilkington 2011, 2012). If a woman’s actions against herself, leading to the death of her fetus, can be legally construed as murder, where does this leave the law on abortion? The Western Australian attorney general insisted that the proposed law would not affect laws on abortion in any way, since it would not encroach on a woman’s right to make decisions about her pregnancy (Porter 2012). But a woman’s decisional rights in regards to her pregnancy are at best an unstable dividing line; at worst, it is precisely her decision to terminate a pregnancy—that is, to intentionally bring about the death of the fetus—that substantiates a murder charge. Indeed, at the crux of the Shuai case was her suicide note, in which she apparently stated her intent to kill her fetus.This ambiguity between abortion and fetal homicide has been the topic of much discussion in legal literature, and it raises significant questions that bear further investigation. For one, it raises in a particularly pointed way questions about the moral and legal significance of birth, and the bearing it has on the status of the fetus. Birth has historically been significant in establishing personhood, but this reliance on birth is challenged by the shift to treating the fetus as a person for the purposes of some areas of the law. The further question then arises of whether that status must remain consistent across domains of the law, such as those addressed to the death of a fetus at the hands of a third party, and those on abortion. While these questions have been well canvassed in legal discussions, we might also consider the impact that technologies such as obstetric ultrasound have on notions of fetal life and personhood. Advances in medical technologies appear... (shrink)

The financial crisis has led to calls for increased regulation of the financial sector. In many respects this is uncontroversial because increased regulation should promote the behaviours we want to see, while limiting the behaviours we do not. This article takes issue with the idea that regulation, and guidelines, promote ethical behaviour in the way that we want them to. Firstly, judgement is often required to implement guidelines and regulations, which allows room for unethical behaviour. Secondly, we want financial professionals (...) to behave ethically even when there are significant incentives not to; so, verifying compliance with regulations and guidelines when such incentives are absent isn’t a good gauge of the ethical status of financial professionals. -/- The example of the valuation of the assets (Net Asset Value) of hedge funds illustrates these issues well. There are many rules governing how NAVs should be calculated, and while we can verify that a fund is abiding by the rules, the ability to manipulate the NAV remains. Furthermore, the incentive to do so is often only present during a crisis (usually to understate losses). Therefore, verifying compliance during ‘normal’ times is of little help in judging whether a manager will behave ethically when we most need him to. I first argue that the gap between compliance with regulations and ethical behaviour is best filled by the adoption of a virtue ethics approach, as discussed by Spalding & Oddo (2011), and Graafland & van de Ven (2011). I then discuss the implications of adopting such an approach for the financial industry’s codes of conduct, such as the CFA Institute’s ‘Code of Ethics and Standards of Professional Conduct’. Adopting a virtue ethics perspective would require a significant change in the emphasis of such codes. (shrink)

I ask whether the Recollection argument commits Socrates to the view that our only source of knowledge of the Forms is sense perception. I argue that Socrates does not confine our presently available sources of knowledge to empirically based recollection, but that he does think that we can't begin to move towards a philosophical understanding of the Forms except as a result of puzzles prompted by the shortfall of particulars in relation to the Forms, and hence that our awareness of (...) the Forms is first prompted by sense-perception. This leaves open the possibility that once that critical awareness of the Forms is established, further reflection at a conceptual level may lead to continued recollection and learning without further input from the senses, and that this approach is what is recommended for the more advanced philosopher. Hence the position endorsed by Socrates in the Phaedo, recommending that the philosopher get in training for death, fleeing as far as is possible from the bodily senses which only distract, is consistent with the position on sense perception in the Recollection argument. The senses are treated as a necessary prompt to reflection, not because they provide our best source of knowledge, but because we start life tied to the senses and believing their objects important. (shrink)

Today, new artistic practices incorporate scientific techniques linked to medical research that modify the body’s biological performance in vivo, transforming it into a singular laboratory object. In this way, some artists are making works of their bodies by subjecting them to various biotechnological procedures, often invasive. Augmented, the biological body of these performance artists becomes a site for experimentation. DIY (Do It Yourself) enthusiasts or accompanied by biologists and doctors, are these ‘bio-artists’ evidence of the changes brought about by a (...) new mechanisation of the human body, the complexity of which we are only just beginning to understand? Could there be, in the name of art, reasons that justify the creation of utopian bodies that are not eschatological, and that could make us believe in the worst or the best of all worlds? Based on performances by Stelarc, Yann Marussich, Marion Laval-Jeantet and the Quimera Rosa duo, our aim is to analyse what is at stake in this new fabrication of the body outside its biological limits. (shrink)

I ask whether the Recollection argument commits Socrates to the view that our only source of knowledge of the Forms is sense perception. I argue that Socrates does not confine our presently available sources of knowledge to empirically based recollection, but that he does think that we can't begin to move towards a philosophical understanding of the Forms except as a result of puzzles prompted by the shortfall of particulars in relation to the Forms, and hence that our awareness of (...) the Forms is first prompted by sense-perception. This leaves open the possibility that once that critical awareness of the Forms is established, further reflection at a conceptual level may lead to continued recollection and learning without further input from the senses, and that this approach is what is recommended for the more advanced philosopher. Hence the position endorsed by Socrates in the Phaedo, recommending that the philosopher get in training for death, fleeing as far as is possible from the bodily senses which only distract, is consistent with the position on sense perception in the Recollection argument. The senses are treated as a necessary prompt to reflection, not because they provide our best source of knowledge, but because we start life tied to the senses and believing their objects important. (shrink)

Plato's discussion of women in the Republic is problematic. For one, arguments in Book V which purport to establish that women should guard and rule alongside men do not deliver the advertised conclusion. In addition, Plato asserts that women are "weaker in all pursuits" than men. Given this assumption, having women guard and rule seems inimical to the health, security, and goodness of the kallipolis. I argue that we best understand the inclusion of women by seeing how women's inclusion (...) contributes to the civic unity of the kallipolis. I further argue that Plato's Laws reveals that (a) women will become more virtuous by doing similar jobs to men; and (b) women will be given lesser responsibilities than men in any polis approximating justice. (shrink)

Joseph Ransdell (1931–2010), who received his Ph.D in philosophy from Columbia University in 1966, where he was advised by Sidney Morgenbesser, and spent most of his career at Texas Tech University, offered an original and focused challenge to academic philosophy at the end of the Second Millennium. His guiding philosophical passion was understanding how communication might best encourage and support truth seeking. This introduction to a special edition of the Transactions of the Charles S. Peirce Society which is devoted (...) to Joe's legacy presents his philosophical interests, and the distinctive and valuable role he played in establishing the "Peirce Telecommunity", which has nurtured a range of Peirce scholars outside of the normal institutional frameworks for philosophical research and discussion. (shrink)

Contrary to astronomy, the early modern Chinese State did not systematically sponsor mathematics. However, early in his reign, the Kangxi Emperor studied this subject with the Jesuit missionaries in charge of the calendar. His first teacher, Ferdinand Verbiest relied on textbooks based on Christoph Clavius'. Those who succeeded Verbiest as imperial tutors in the 1690s produced lecture notes in Manchu and Chinese. Newly discovered manuscripts show Antoine Thomas wrote substantial treatises on arithmetic and algebra while teaching those subjects. In 1713, (...) the emperor commissioned a group of scholars and officials to compile a standard survey of mathematics. This work opened with the claim that mathematics had its roots in Chinese Antiquity. However, it can be shown that the Jesuits' lecture notes were the main source of the Shuli jingyun. The reconstruction of mathematics under Kangxi's patronage is thus best characterised as the imperial appropriation of Western learning. (shrink)

This article argues that it is far from trivial to convert social science concepts into accurate categories on which algorithms work best. The literature raises this concern in a general way; for example, Deeks notes that legal concepts, such as proportionality, cannot be easily converted into code noting that ‘The meaning and application of these concepts is hotly debated, even among lawyers who share common vocabularies and experiences’ (Deeks in Va Law Rev 104, pp. 1529–1593, 2018). The example discussed (...) here is recidivism prediction, where the factors that are of interest are difficult to capture adequately through questionnaires because survey responses do not necessarily indicate whether the behaviour that is of interest is present. There is room for improvement in how questions are phrased, in the selection of variables, and by encouraging practitioners to consider whether a particular variable is the sort of thing that can be measured by questionnaires at all. (shrink)

"Art history and art theory are inseparable. A history of art can be achieved only through the simultaneous construction of a theory of art." These words of the eminent scholar and critic Louis Marin suggest why he considered the paintings and the writings of Nicolas Poussin, painter and theoretician of painting, an enduring source of inspiration. Poussin was the artist to whom Marin returned most faithfully over the years. Since Marin did not live to write his proposed book on Poussin, (...) the ten major essays in this volume will remain his definitive statement on the painter who inspired his most eloquent and probing commentary. At the center of Marins inquiry into Poussins art are the theory and practice of "reading" paintings. Rather than explicate Poussins work through systematic textual and iconographic analysis, he sets out to explore a cluster of speculative questions about the meaning of pictorial art: Can painting be a discourse? If so, how can that discourse be deciphered? Marins horizon for interpreting Poussin depends more on the concepts of aesthetic philosophy and the insights of cultural history than on an account of the painters career or his relationship with his artistic predecessors. For example, he positions several of Poussins best-known landscapes with respect both to French seventeenth-century debates on the question of the sublime and to the philosophical tradition of reflection on the sublime. Among the topics Marin studies are the tempest as a major figure of the sublime in Poussins work, the presence of ruins in the paintings, Poussins use of the concept of metamorphosis, and the frequent presence of sleeping bodies in the work. The Poussin who emerges in these essays is preeminently a philosopher-artist whose painterly discourse embodies the limits of thought and of representation. (shrink)

This article argues that it is far from trivial to convert social science concepts into accurate categories on which algorithms work best. The literature raises this concern in a general way; for example, Deeks notes that legal concepts, such as proportionality, cannot be easily converted into code noting that ‘The meaning and application of these concepts is hotly debated, even among lawyers who share common vocabularies and experiences’ (Deeks in Va Law Rev 104, pp. 1529–1593, 2018). The example discussed (...) here is recidivism prediction, where the factors that are of interest are difficult to capture adequately through questionnaires because survey responses do not necessarily indicate whether the behaviour that is of interest is present. There is room for improvement in how questions are phrased, in the selection of variables, and by encouraging practitioners to consider whether a particular variable is the sort of thing that can be measured by questionnaires at all. (shrink)

Simon argues that there is an objectivity possible in moral action analogous to the objectivity found in science. While it does not allow algorithmic reasoning to certain conclusions, it does allow the agent who is determined to achieve the good to attain a relative level of comfort in his choices while acknowledging the possibility of a bad outcome resulting from contingency or unavoidable ignorance. Simon calls this "affective knowledge." He argues that the best way to grasp this "affective knowledge" (...) is to explore "intentional" relations. Simon argues that there is an analogical relation between intentional existence as it is found in cognitive knowledge and as it is found in affective knowledge. In this thesis we explore the nature of the object that exists intentionally in cognition and compare it with the object that exists intentionally in acts of volition. ;We argued that, according to Simon's metaphysics, the cognitive object is involved in several different intentional relations that deliver it intact to the cognitive agent and allow the agent to be formed by the thing itself, precisely as that extramental thing is formed in the world. Things in the world are able to make their forms present to the knower and the knower is able to achieve that form without altering the form or itself. This is intentional existence in the realm of forms. ;In volition, the agent conforms his own possibilities in relation to the good he desires to constitute a physical action that is determined to achieve that good. What allows us to choose one good possibility over another is the intentional relation our created nature gives us to that which is good in itself. We make the possible good actual. This is intentional existence in the realm of finality. ;The objectivity of knowing, then, is a relation of formal consonance between the thing itself and that thing known. The objectivity of practical action is an existential consonance between the good of the possibility, the truly good desire, and the good choice. (shrink)

Clinical research is a necessity if effective and safe treatments are to be developed. However, this may well include the need for research that is best described as ‘invasive’ in that it may be associated with some discomfort or inconvenience. Limitations in the undertaking of invasive research involving people with intellectual disabilities (ID) are perhaps related to anxieties within the academic community and among ethics committees; however, the consequence of this neglect is that innovative treatments specific to people with (...) ID may not be developed. Such concerns are likely to continue while there is limited published knowledge regarding the actual experiences of people with ID who have participated in invasive clinical research. As part of a pilot study trialling the novel use of a surgically inserted device to curb overeating in people with Prader–Willi syndrome (PWS) we have investigated the experience of research through semistructured qualitative interviews involving three participants and their carers. Thematic analysis revealed that the adults with PWS and their family carers rated their participation positively, seeing it as a rewarding and enriching experience. This brief report discusses findings from our interview data in order to highlight strategies which may ensure that research is acceptable to participants, meets the necessary ethical standards and is able to achieve the aims set out by the researchers. To our knowledge, this is the first study to record experiences directly from people with PWS and their carers regarding their involvement in invasive clinical research. (shrink)

Cet article présente une manière particulière de déterminer un nom, qui consiste à dire le degré associé à ce qui est représenté par ce nom. A partir de la Théorie des Opérations Prédicatives et Enonciatives, nous abordons l’opération de détermination comme un repérage par délimitation, qui peut se faire à l’aide d’autres éléments que des déterminants spécifiques. Nous montrons que la grande quantité, lorsqu’elle est associée à un effet d’emphase, peut s’approcher de l’expression du degré, du point de vue sémantique. (...) Cependant pour exprimer le degré, il est nécessaire de travailler sur une propriété gradable munie d’un gradient orienté. Nous montrons d’une part que quantité et degré sont intimement liés dans la comparaison scalaire, et d’autre part que le haut degré s’établit en fonction de l’orientation du gradient par rapport au centre attracteur. Cela permet de construire les superlatifs relatif et absolu, comme ceux qui sont fournis dans le discours à l’étude : the best ; very ; so ; such puis this. (shrink)

Salman Rushdie posed the question, ?What kind of idea are you?? We have borrowed his provoking question and held it up to ?Europe.? In this article, we suggest that ?Europe? cannot be primarily identified or located in terms of geographies, histories, religions, cultures or values, and that attempts to do so diminish the idea of ?Europe.? We also contest the vision of ?Europe? as a series of concentric circles emanating from Brussels and suggest that this conception indefensibly marginalizes vital portions (...) of ?Europe.? We propose that, while the European Union (EU) is attempting to define core concepts of ?Europe,? ?Europe's? frontiers and borders (wherever or whatever they may be, inside or outside ?Europe?) are actively constructing, contesting and resisting ?Europe.? The peripheries and perimeters are no less important than the core. On the contrary, they give substance to the idea of ?Europe.? Finally, we argue that ?Europe? can best be understood as a non-teleological construct, a narrative à la Roland Barthes. Inspired by Barthes, we propose a ?Europe? Theory of Classification operating at the levels of functions, actions and narration. (shrink)