BackgroundOnline assessment of narrative production and comprehension became an important component of language assessment during the COVID-19 pandemic. This study aimed to establish quantitative measures of narrative macrostructure in the production and comprehension of adult Irish-English bilinguals in an online assessment.MethodsA total of 30 Irish-English bilingual adults participated in an online assessment of oral narrative production and comprehension. Narratives were elicited using LITMUS-MAIN for Irish and English. Story-tell elicitation method was used for all stories. Twenty participants produced Baby Birds and (...) Baby Goats story pairs while 10 participants produced Cat and Dog story pairs. Quantitative measures of story structure, comprehension score, and the overall number of Internal State Terms in production and comprehension were compared across the story pairs, languages, and the output type.ResultsA general linear model indicated no differences in either story structure or story comprehension scores across languages for both sets of stories. Combined analysis for all participants and stories indicated no difference in the story structure scores or comprehension scores across the languages or the story pairs. While the overall number of ISTs was the same across languages, a higher number of ISTs was observed in comprehension relative to production in both languages for Cat and Dog story pair only, but not for Baby birds and Baby goats' stories. The major benefit of using online assessment was the accessibility of participants. The major drawback was the inability to control the environment and the quality of the internet connection.Conclusion and implicationsWhile online assessment increased the availability of participants, which is a significant factor in rural Ireland characterized by low population density and the high percentage of Irish speakers, the availability of stable internet connection limited the applicability of online assessment. Measures of narrative macrostructure were stable across the languages and the story pairs. This is important because of high variability in exposure to Irish, frequent code-switching, and a high number of morphosyntactic errors due to rapid language change that characterizes Irish-English bilinguals. Identifying reliable measures of language performance for Irish-English adult speakers is an important step toward establishing developmental norms for Irish-English bilinguals. (shrink)

Positive education seeks to enhance wellbeing in schools by establishing a culture where success is measured in terms of happiness. This goal aligns well with Dewey’s educational philosophy, which espouses the importance of a positive school experience in the nurturing of good citizenship and the creation of a harmonious community. Dewey’s ideas and those expressed within the field of positive education, however, diverge on some aspects of their approach to education and, importantly, in their perspective on the role of philosophy (...) in science. This thesis explores the possibility of a Deweyan contribution to positive education and advances the argument that embracing Dewey’s ethics and epistemology will augment efforts to create a culture of wellbeing in schools. Specifically, this thesis argues that Dewey’s work may contribute a perspective on the complementary role of philosophy and science; suggest an experiential pedagogy that contends with the nature of subjective experience; contribute a social focus that prioritizes the common good; and provide a unified philosophical stance on the purpose of schooling. These contributions may, however modestly, address concerns expressed by writers from within and outside of positive psychology about challenges such as a need for a more philosophical approach, the effects of psychology in education, the difficulties with avoiding normative content in order to remain scientific, the problem of subjective experience, the perceived focus on individualism, and the implication that positive psychology may be a fad. Ultimately, by creating a dialogue between positive education and the work of Dewey, this thesis seeks to elicit thinking about the possibility of a Deweyan contribution to both the theory and practice of positive education. (shrink)

In this paper I seek to consider the project of analytical Thomism with particular regard to Aquinas’s metaphysics of esse. My overall conclusion is that Thomas’s thought on esse is part and parcel of a way of philosophizing that is alien to analytical philosophy and is such that analytical philosophy is constitutionally unable to come to terms with it. In order to argue for such a conclusion, I begin with a presentation of Aquinas’s metaphysics of esse. I then respond to (...) the objection that arguably some analytical philosophers have already arrived at the same thought at which Aquinas arrived, thereby blocking the way to my denial of the possibility of an encounter between analytical philosophy and Thomist esse. Having removed that obstacle, I argue that analytical philosophy is constitutionally unable to come to terms with Thomist esse. (shrink)

In recent years, the idea has been gaining ground that our traditional conceptions of knowledge and cognition are unduly limiting, in that they privilege what goes on inside the ‘skin and skull’ of an individual reasoner. Instead, it has been argued, knowledge and cognition need to be understood as embodied, situated, and extended. Whether these various interrelations and dependencies are ‘merely’ causal, or are in a more fundamental sense constitutive of knowledge and cognition, is as much a matter of controversy (...) as the degree to which they pose a challenge to ‘traditional’ conceptions of cognition, knowledge and the mind. In this paper we argue that when the idea of ‘extendedness’ is applied to a core concept in epistemology and the philosophy of science—namely, scientific evidence—things appear to be on a much surer footing. The evidential status of data gathered through extended processes—including its utility as justification or warrant—do not seem to be weakened by virtue of being extended, but instead are often strengthened because of it. Indeed, it is often precisely by virtue of this extendedness that scientific evidence grounds knowledge claims, which individuals may subsequently ascribe to themselves. The functional equivalence between machine-based gathering, filtering, and processing of data and human interpretation and assessment is the crucial factor in deciding whether evidence has been gathered, rather than the distinction between intra- and extracranial processes or individual and social processes. To prioritize biological processes here, and to assert the superiority of human cognitive capacities seems both arbitrary and unwarranted with respect to gathering evidence, and ultimately would lead to an unattractive skepticism about many of the methods used in science to gather evidence. In other words, conceiving of scientific evidence as ‘impersonal’ not only better captures the character of evidence-gathering in practice, but also makes sense of a large amount of evidence-gathering that ‘personal’ accounts fail to either acknowledge or accurately describe. Whilst we suggest it is likely that all internally-distributed evidence-gathering processes are merely contingently internal processes, a significant number of externally-distributed evidence-gathering processes are necessarily externally-distributed. Some evidence can only be gathered by extended epistemic agents. (shrink)

Aquinas’s Five Ways are often presented as standard cosmological arguments for God’s existence. They tend to be anthologized and presented independently of the metaphysical thought that informs them. Thus, when Aquinas deploys technical metaphysical issues in his articulation of the ways, the contemporary reader may have trouble interpreting them correctly. This is particularly the case when Aquinas uses terminology familiar to a contemporary reader that nevertheless should be understood within the context of Aquinas’s own metaphysical thought. The Third Way is (...) particularly challenging in this respect since it trades on modal notions that are familiar within a post-Leibnizian philosophical context but do not carry the same philosophical connotations. With that in mind, I propose to present a reading of the Third Way that is rooted within Aquinas’s own metaphysical thought and is defensible as an argument for God’s existence. (shrink)

This book contains a collection of selected papers from the 2017 Farm-to-Plate: Uniting for a Just and Sustainable Food System conference in Ithaca, New York, which explored what different advocates, stakeholders, growers, and community members today prioritize when it comes to justice, action, and transformation in the agri-food system. The research presented at this symposium shows the diverse range of approaches scientists have taken to investigate this aforementioned question. The papers represent a combined effort to creatively educate, share, and connect (...) work being done by stakeholders on food system transformation. Previously published in Agriculture and Human Values Volume 36, issue 4, December 2019. (shrink)

New Blackfriars, Volume 102, Issue 1101, Page 772-794, September 2021.

A number of recent discussions have argued that George Price's equationfor representing evolutionary change is a powerful and illuminatingtool, especially in the context of debates about multiple levels ofselection. Our paper dissects Price's equation in detail, and comparesit to another statistical tool: the calculation and comparison ofaverage fitnesses. The relations between Price's equation and equationsfor evolutionary change using average fitness are closer than issometimes supposed. The two approaches achieve a similar kind ofstatistical summary of one generation of change, and they (...) achieve thisvia a similar loss of information about the underlying fitnessstructure. (shrink)

Harm reduction initiatives such as the distribution of naloxone have been crucial in saving lives during the opioid crisis in North America. Despite these efforts, today’s drug supply contaminated...

Many discussions of per se and per accidens series focus on efficient causality and how a consideration of the metaphysics of the matter can deliver us a primary efficient cause of all that is (God). Drawing on my own previous work on causal series, I offer in this article a model for the understanding of per se causal series wherein the causality involved is that of finality. I then consider whether or not such per se final causal series are infinite. (...) Finally, I consider the implications this has for our conception of God as creator. (shrink)

Despite the fact that animal behavior involves a particularly powerful form of niche construction, few researchers have considered how the environmental impact of behavior may feed back to influence the evolution of the cognitive underpinnings of behavior. I explore a model that explicitly incorporates niche construction while tracking cognitive evolution. Agents and their stimuli are modeled as coevolving populations. The agents are born with “weights” attached to behaviors in a repertoire. Further, these agents are able to change these weights based (...) on previous success and an inherited learning parameter. Both the agent and the stimulus receive payoffs through a behavioral interaction . The behaving agent exhibits niche construction through its effects on stimuli , which can feed back to influence the value of different cognitive strategies. Here I focus on two forms of niche construction: the stimulus and responding agent have common interests and the stimulus and agent have dissimilar interests . The form of niche construction qualitatively affects cognitive evolution . Given a mutualism between the stimulus and responding agent, rapid learning and “fixed” behavioral distributions evolve. Given an antagonism between the stimulus and agent, slower learning and “flexible” behavioral distributions evolve. I discuss these results in light of findings from the fields of ethology, psychology, and evolutionary ecology. (shrink)

Previous research has established that creative adolescents are generally low in neuroticism and as well-adjusted as their peers. From 2006 to 2013, data from cohorts of creative adolescents attending a counseling laboratory supported these results. Clinical findings of increased anxiety, depression, and suicidality among creative students in 2014 led the researchers to create 3 studies to explore these clinical findings. Once artifactual causes of these changes were ruled out, a quantitative study was conducted. Study 1, an analysis of mean differences (...) of pre-2014 and post-2014 cohorts showed that post-2014 cohorts scored significantly higher in Neuroticism, Openness to Experience, and Conscientiousness and lower in Extraversion on Big 5 inventories. Regression analyses suggested that while Neuroticism was associated with gender, Conscientiousness and Grade Point Average for the earlier group, Neuroticism in the post 2014 groups was related to complex interplay of all personality dynamics except Agreeableness. In the qualitative Study 2, focus groups of 6–10 students, for a total of 102 participants were queried about the reasons they perceived for increased anxiety and depression in creative students. Increased achievement pressures and awareness of environmental and social problems were major sources of external stressors; perfectionism and desire to fulfill expectations of others were the primary sources of internal stress. The authors suggest that creative students' openness to experience and advanced knowledge made it possible for these students to see the potential for environmental and social crises and respond to their inability to solve these problems with anxiety and depression. Study 3 was a qualitative study that followed up 19 participants from the post-2014 cohort to explore the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on mental health and creativity. While the majority perceived a negative effect of the pandemic on their mental health, most also produced a surprising variety of creative works during that time. In conclusion, rapid changes in the lives of creative adolescents since 2014 suggest that scholars focus on current cohorts and the ways in which adolescent personality is shaped by internal expectation and external pressures and global events. Despite the pandemic, creative young people continued to create. (shrink)

This paper reports on a study of teachers’ perceptions of teaching and learning in Scotland during the COVID-19 pandemic through the lens of engaged pedagogy and the ideas of bell hooks. It aimed to explore the different ways that teachers experienced teaching and learning during this time and the impact this may have had on teacher identity. Sixty teachers and head teachers were interviewed using MS Teams in the period April-June, 2020. For this paper, 18 transcripts were analyzed by members (...) of the research team. Four key themes emerged from the interview data: Working from home, parental engagement, teacher identity, and changes in pedagogy. Each of these themes were discussed in terms of concepts such as engaged pedagogy, agency, self-actualization, recognition and boundary transgression situated in the work of bell hooks. The idea of boundaries wove itself throughout our data as teachers expressed how the transgression of boundaries was occurring in multiple, and often contradictory, ways in pedagogical, professional, institutional and personal spaces and systems. We see in our data evidence of a shift in practice not just in the way teachers are ‘doing’ education but also, perhaps, in the way that teachers are ‘being’ as educators as they adapt to different ways of knowing. This study provides a unique exploration of a time and space in Scotland during 2020. However, the themes and understandings that emerged are of relevance to educators internationally. Schools across the world were impacted by various lockdowns imposed by the Covid-19 pandemic and teachers faced a common set of challenges that were resolved via re-negotiation and recognition of individual and collective agency to create new pedagogies. (shrink)

The distinction drawn by Rawls between the ideas of property-owning democracy and welfare state capitalism parallels his distinction between justice-based ‘liberalisms of freedom’ (including his own conception of justice as fairness) and utilitarian- based ‘liberalisms of happiness’. In this paper I argue that Rawls’s failure to attach the same level of significance to essential socio-economic rights and liberties as he attached to the traditional liberal civil and political rights and liberties gives justice as fairness a quasi-utilitarian character, which is incompatible (...) with the fundamental objective of protecting the highest.-order interests of citizens conceived as free and equal. I argue that in order fully to protect these interests, rights to access to non-human capital and productive resources should be assigned the same level of significance as that assigned to the civil and political rights and liberties, and prioritized over the lower-order rights and benefits regulated by Rawls’s second principle of justice. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:The Summa Contra Gentiles and Aquinas's Way to GodGaven KerrThere is to be found in Aquinas's writings a way to God which is his own and most personal. This way to God is the way from existence (esse) and arrives at God as pure existence itself, the fount of all being, without which nothing would be. It is deployed in several contexts ranging from the De ente et essentia (...) to the Summa theologiae [ST]. Yet, in the Summa contra gentiles [SCG], it is peculiarly absent. The proofs of God's existence which Aquinas offers in the latter are almost exclusively drawn from Aristotle, and they do not exhibit any of the refined metaphysical thinking about esse that characterizes Thomas's thinking about God in other works.1 For a work that is intended to be both apologetical in nature and explicitly philosophical from the outset, this is strange. Thomas is always at home in his own metaphysics of esse, and he deploys it with ease and finesse especially when demonstrating God's existence and discussing the divine nature. But in the SCG his proofs of God's existence and the subsequent reasoning about the divine nature are awkward and, one could even say, clumsy. Why did he not just dispense with the Aristotelian thinking on motion and movers and all the clarifications that involves? Why not simply stick with his own favored account of act and potency interpreted in terms of the metaphysics of esse?In the current paper I wish to address these issues. I shall begin with an account of what I take to be Aquinas's way to God and why I think it is [End Page 1273] his way to God. Having done that, I will then address the issue as to why this way to God does not appear in the SCG reasoning, but slowly emerges only after God's existence has been demonstrated. I shall conclude that the apologetical and consciously philosophical nature of the SCG offer us an insight into why Thomas did not lean on his metaphysics of esse in his (initial) discussions of God there.Aquinas's Way to GodAquinas famously argues that there is a distinction between essence and esse in things. The context of this distinction is that of universal hylemorphism, which holds that in all composite things there are two principles: a principle of potency and a principle of actuality. In traditional Aristotelian fashion, defenders of universal hylemorphism held that the principle of actuality in a thing is its form, whereas the principle of potency is its matter.2 All things other than God are composed of matter and form, since all things other than God have some element of potency. But to locate the potentiality of anything other than God in the matter of the thing creates a problem when it comes to separated substances (angels) and the immaterial rational soul. Such substances (or components of substances in the case of the rational soul) are taken to be separated from matter and all material conditions. Nonetheless they are created and thereby dependent on God, so they must have some potentiality.So how do we attribute matter—that is, potency—to separate substances?According to defenders of universal hylemorphism, the answer is to distinguish between corporeal matter and incorporeal matter. The former is the kind of physical matter that we typically take to be the matter of things, whereas the latter is a kind of non-physical matter which the separate substances possess. Thus, it is not proper to say that such substances are [End Page 1274] immaterial, but rather that whilst material they are incorporeal. Universal hylemorphism has the advantage that it neatly distinguishes all things from God by isolating a principle of potency (matter) which all things other than God have. Nevertheless, universal hylemorphism presents problems of its own, not least the thorny one of making intelligible just what exactly a real (as opposed to conceptual) kind of matter is that is incorporeal.Aquinas for his part rejected universal hylemorphism from his earliest writings.3 He holds that it is precisely because separated substances are separated from all material conditions that... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Dei Filius III:On FaithGaven KerrThe First Vatican council offers a straightforward, traditional, some might say perfunctory account of faith in its short chapter dedicated to the issue. Were it not for the particular stage in the history of thought out of which the Council emerged, one would be tempted to say that the chapter on faith is an exercise in Scholastic theology, recognizable to those who are familiar with (...) the treatment of the same in many of the Scholastic doctors, especially Aquinas. However, given the movement of thought in the nineteenth century, especially the emergence and predominance of certain philosophical views about human nature and the self, the chapter on faith not only (re)articulates a highly traditional account of the nature of faith but also envisages an account of man without which such an account of faith would be impossible.1In this essay, I propose to do two things. Firstly, I will set out Aquinas's account of faith and connect it with the Council's account of the same. Secondly, I will show that this account of faith is incompatible with modern accounts of man which present him as a disunified and disengaged self. Having done that I will conclude that in order to honor the Council's account of faith, we need to return to a pre-modern view of man in which he is seen in his engaged unity. [End Page 855]On FaithChapter 3 of Dei Filius is devoted to faith. Therein the Council document affirms a number of traditional tenets pertaining to faith that can be seen defended in the thought of St. Thomas Aquinas; indeed, one might argue that the text on faith is an engagement with and refinement of Aquinas's thought on the same.2Aquinas holds that faith is a particular habit of mind by which we are disposed to believe the things of God because they are from God. As we shall see, this habit of mind has God for its object, in which case it cannot be developed in us by natural reason or practice, but comes as a gift, a grace from God. Thus, the one who has faith is already in a relationship with God, since, in accepting the gift of faith from God, the faithful is not resistant to God. Faith is the beginning of the spiritual life, whereby the truth about what is revealed is accepted by the faithful and offers a glimpse of the vision of God that will be enjoyed by the blessed.3For Thomas, the formal object of faith is the first truth—God in himself—whereas its material objects are those things which pertain to God.4 The reason why God, the first truth, is the object of faith, is because formally speaking faith assents to something only because it has been revealed by God. Hence, the divine truth is the object on which the assent of faith is based. The other things of faith come under its assent because they are related to God in some way.5 [End Page 856]As the object of faith, this first truth is not an object of vision, for we do not have a direct and immediate intuition of God. Rather, faith's object is unseen (Heb 11:1). As something assented to but unseen, the intellect is not compelled by the certainty of what is seen, as in normal epistemic circumstances. Hence, there is required an act of the will by which the assent is willed rather than drawn by the natural light of the intellect itself.6 The act of faith then is a willed assent to those things about God which are not seen by the natural light of human reason. This assent is accompanied by certainty given that it is the first truth which moves the will to command the intellect to assent.7 The certitude of faith then does not lie in the intellect's being compelled by the evidence, but in the will's attachment to God as the good itself.8On the basis of the foregoing, there are three different modes by which the object of faith can... (shrink)

After the emergence of the neo-Thomist movement in the early twentieth century, the question of how best to present Aquinas’s latent epistemological realism came to the fore. Léon Noël was an important contributor to this area of neo-Thomism, but his work has unfortunately been eclipsed by that of other more recognizable authors such as Etienne Gilson and Jacques Maritain. Noël argued that Aquinas’s realism is a form of immediate realism that recognizes the challenge of modern representationalist epistemologies but does not (...) succumb to non-realist ways of thinking. Hence Noël presented immediate realism as an epistemological position that is inspired by Aquinas but also capable of addressing philosophical concerns that emerged after his death. In this article I present Noël’s view as interesting in its own right and capable of engaging with contemporary non-Thomist trends in epistemology. (shrink)

After the emergence of the neo-Thomist movement in the early twentieth century, the question of how best to present Aquinas’s latent epistemological realism came to the fore. Léon Noël was an important contributor to this area of neo-Thomism, but his work has unfortunately been eclipsed by that of other more recognizable authors such as Etienne Gilson and Jacques Maritain. Noël argued that Aquinas’s realism is a form of immediate realism that recognizes the challenge of modern representationalist epistemologies but does not (...) succumb to non-realist ways of thinking. Hence Noël presented immediate realism as an epistemological position that is inspired by Aquinas but also capable of addressing philosophical concerns that emerged after his death. In this article I present Noël’s view as interesting in its own right and capable of engaging with contemporary non-Thomist trends in epistemology. (shrink)

In his 1950 lecture entitled “Language,” Martin Heidegger announces a turn in the philosophy of language: for the opening theme, “man speaks,” he substitutes a countervailing theme: “language speaks”. Heidegger saw himself living in an era in which the historical determination of the inquiry into language that began with the Greek conception of human being as the animal with language had developed into a relentlessly technical way of thinking that viewed language instrumentally. By abandoning this conception, displacing the occurrence of (...) language away from “man” and toward language itself, Heidegger enacts a dehumanization of language that attempts to open a different avenue for thought.... (shrink)

Objective: To examine lay persons’ ability to identify methods of random allocation and their acceptability of using methods of random allocation in a clinical trial context.Design: Leaflets containing hypothetical medical, non-medical, and clinical trial scenarios involving random allocation, using material from guidelines for trial information leaflets.Setting and participants: Adults attending further education colleges , covering a wide range of ages, occupations, and levels of education.Main measures: Judgements of whether each of five methods of allocation to two groups was random in (...) a medical or non-medical scenario. Judgements of whether these allocation methods were acceptable in a randomised clinical trial scenario, with or without a scientific justification for randomisation.Results: The majority of our group of participants judged correctly that allowing people their preference was not random, and that the following were random: using a computer with no information about the individual , tossing a coin, drawing a name out of a hat. Judgements were split over allocating people in turn . Judgements were no different in medical and non-medical scenarios. Few of the correctly identified random methods were judged to be acceptable in a clinical trial scenario. Inclusion of a scientific justification for randomising significantly increased the acceptability of only one random method: allocation by computer.Conclusions: Current UK guidelines’ recommended description of random allocation by computer seems warranted. However, while potential trial participants may understand what random allocation means, they may find it unacceptable unless offered an acceptable justification for its use. (shrink)

The topic of epistemic normativity has come to the fore of recent work in epistemology, and so naturally, theories of knowledge, truth and justification have been increasingly held accountable to preserving normative epistemological platitudes. Central to discussions of epistemic normativity are questions about epistemic agency and epistemic value. Here, our aim is to take up some of these issues as they come to bear on the rather unconventional brand of epistemology that was defended by Richard Rorty. Our purpose is to (...) explore whether Rorty’s epistemology—or perhaps his replacement for epistemology—can preserve these normative platitudes about epistemic agency, responsibility, achievement, and the value of knowledge. Our conclusion is a negative one: that Rorty’s commitments leave him firmly at odds with some of the most plausible assumptions about epistemic agency and epistemic value. (shrink)

This is a translation, by A. Létourneau, of a book by Fergus Kerr, Theology after Wittgenstein previously published by Oxford U. Press The author provides a reading of Wittgenstein, and explains how theology as a discipline can take into account his main philosophical thoughts about religion and ethics.

Although improving both the ecological and social conditions of agriculture are central pillars of agroecology, emerging empirical research has focused largely on exploring its ecological contributions. Key among the less studied social aspects is gender (in)equity. Drawing data from northern Malawi, this paper investigates the relationship between agroecology and women’s autonomy in smallholder farming households. Overall, our findings showed participatory agroecology with a gender transformative lens can promote women’s autonomy. Although there was no observed significant difference in women’s autonomy at (...) the baseline, women in agroecology practicing households (β = 0.20, _p_. (shrink)

With a focus on the areas of theory, literature, culture, society and film, this collection of essays examines, questions and broadens the applicability of Postcolonialism and Islam from a multifaceted and cross-disciplinary perspective.Topics covered include the relationship between Postcolonialism and Orientalism, theoretical perspectives on Postcolonialism and Islam, the position of Islam within postcolonial literature, Muslim identity in British and European contexts, and the role of Islam in colonial and postcolonial cinema in Egypt and India. At a time at which Islam (...) continues to be at the centre of increasingly heated and frenzied political and academic deliberations, Postcolonialism and Islam offers a framework around which the debate on Muslims in the modern world can be centred.Transgressing geographical, disciplinary and theoretical boundaries, this book is an invaluable resource for students of Islamic Studies, Cultural Studies, Sociolgy and Literature. (shrink)

This book offers a more challenging appraisal of Newman’s life and thought.