Addressing the debate inspired by John Rawls's restrictive idea of the political role of religion, Jürgen Habermas proposes the institutional translation proviso as an alternative that corrects an overly secularist notion of the state. Maeve Cooke has suggested that religious arguments can be allowed without translation in the institutional level as long as they are non-authoritarian. However, her definition of non-authoritarianism requires an acceptance of the fallibility of the truths acquired by faith, which I argue is unnecessary. Instead, I propose (...) that non-authoritarianism is realized in the recognition of the reconcilability of religious and secular reasons. I demonstrate the viability of this form of non-authoritarianism using particular examples from the Philippine context. I conclude that these attempts constitute an alternative form of epistemic openness to the more stringent forms that Habermas and Cooke have proposed. (shrink)

"Family" has been a contested institution for the first Italian gay movement in the Seventies, sharing the feminist rebellion against patriarchy. It was Arci Gay that started using the word famiglie in the 90s during the political campaigns for a legal recognition of same-sex couples, while more radical groups still contested the term. In the mainstream political debate, the use of the singular family vs the plural families became a sign of closure or opening towards the GLBT movement's requests. National (...) polls and Eurobarometers have tested the level of social acceptance for same-sex unions and adoptions overtime, and are a good source to describe the changing social situation for families with lesbian and gay parents. In 2000s political groups formed specifically around the issue of GLBT parenting. The word omogenitorialitÀ was coined after the french example, and used in the political debate. Notwithstanding the long debate and the diffusion in many countries all over the world of the recognition of same-sex partnerships and parenthood, in Italy no law has been approved yet, and opposition is still strong. (shrink)

This article develops a more comprehensive understanding of data mining by examining the application of this technology in the marketplace. In addition to exploring the technological issues that arise from the use of these applications, we address some of the social concerns that are too often ignored.As more firms shift more of their business activities to the Web, increasingly more information about consumers and potential customers is being captured in Web server logs. Sophisticated analytic and data mining software tools enable (...) firms to use the data contained in these logs to develop and implement a complex relationship management strategy. Although this new trend in marketing strategy is based on the old idea of relating to customers as individuals, customer relationship management actually rests on segmenting consumers into groups based on profiles developed through a firm's data mining activities. Individuals whose profiles suggest that they are likely to provide a high lifetime value to the firm are served content that will vary from that which is served to consumers with less attractive profiles. (shrink)

In our dynamic social world, a premium is placed on the individual's ability to innovate and to change . Yet traditional role theory has difficulty accounting for innovation, leaving unanswered the question of how individual level negotiations affect social-structural processes . This study addresses this tension by linking role theory with social cognition. By positioning behavior and cognition as two interrelated continuums, I stretch the meaning of role enactment to include 4 role typologies. I utilize these typologies as a heuristic (...) to chart the processes through which individuals adapt to and affect a role performance over time. I conclude by outlining how sociocognitive role typologies aid social researchers in accounting for individual efficacy in response to social-structural situations. (shrink)

This paper presents the use of the Giving Voice To Values pedagogical approach for educating entrepreneurial leaders. First, we introduce a new framework for entrepreneurial leadership and review the three principles of this framework. Second, we discuss how the GVV pedagogical approach provides a unique way to educate entrepreneurial leaders. Finally, we describe how Babson College plans to use the GVV approach in our curricula.

This paper presents the use of the Giving Voice To Values (GVV) pedagogical approach for educating entrepreneurial leaders. First, we introduce a new framework for entrepreneurial leadership and review the three principles of this framework. Second, we discuss how the GVV pedagogical approach provides a unique way to educate entrepreneurial leaders. Finally, we describe how Babson College plans to use the GVV approach in our curricula.

Despite spending more on health care than every other industrialized country, the U.S. ranks 37th in health outcomes. These differences cannot be explained away with differences in age and income, or even with quality of care. And, the rate of growth in health care spending in the U.S. continues to increase. The share of the Gross Domestic Product attributable to health care grew from 9% in 1980 to more than 17% in 2011. Health care costs are projected to account for (...) more than one-fifth of our economy by 2021. Despite spending more and more, the U.S. does not have better health outcomes than other countries. Worse, our increasing spending is largely attributable to preventable conditions. More than 85 cents of every dollar spent on health in the U.S. are spent on the treatment and management of chronic diseases, such as those caused by preventable conditions related to obesity and tobacco use. (shrink)

Social exclusion has a significant impact on cognition, emotion, and behavior. Some behavioral studies investigated how social exclusion affects pain empathy. Conclusions were inconsistent, and there is a lack of clarity in identifying which component of pain empathy is more likely to be affected. To investigate these issues, we used a Cyberball task to manipulate feelings of social exclusion. Two groups participated in the same pain empathy task while we recorded event-related potentials when participants viewed static images of body parts (...) in painful and neutral situations. The results showed early N2 differentiation between painful and neutral pictures in the central regions in both groups. The pattern at the late controlled processing stage was different. Parietal P3 amplitudes for painful pictures were significantly smaller than those for neutral pictures in the social exclusion group; they did not differ in the social inclusion group. We observed a parietal late positive potential differentiation between painful and neutral pictures in both groups. LPP amplitudes were significantly smaller in the social exclusion group than those in the social inclusion group for painful stimuli. Our results indicate that social exclusion does not affect empathic responses during the early emotional sharing stage. However, it down-regulates empathic responses at the late cognitive controlled stage, and this modulation is attenuated gradually. The current study provides neuroscientific evidence of how social exclusion dynamically influences pain empathy. (shrink)

In this article, Bianca Thoilliez draws on pragmatist notions of fallibilism and pluralism to develop proposals for possible educational interventions to address the problem of “post-truth” conditions. Post-truth, she contends, is not only a political danger for liberal democracies, but it also poses a serious threat of extinction for our educational practices. With the help of some of Bruno Latour's and Danna Haraway's categories, and with the narrative intervention of Gerald Durrell's My Family and Other Animals, Thoilliez attempts to (...) adapt both Charles Peirce's and William James's classic pragmatist ideas in order to experiment with new horizons of thought capable of overcoming the exhausted pedagogical divides of docility/indocility, conserve/discard, and optimism/pessimism that often seem woven into the definition of educational relationships, the establishment of curriculum content, and the orientation of pedagogical actions. As an alternative, she recommends building communitarian alliances of fallibilistic inquiry and promoting practices of pluralistic cultural provision as more useful educational ends-in-view that embody a down-to-earth pedagogy capable of reinstating trust, taking care of truths, looking for ways of keeping our lives together, and making education possible again. Thus, here Thoilliez proposes a pedagogy that neither fixes nor evades our troubles, but one that stays with them. (shrink)

Coincidenţa contrariilor reprezintă un punct esenţial în gândirea umanităţii, echivalând, în cele din urmă, cu dorinţa omului de a aduna într-un tot unitar pe cele ce se opun în univers. Această preocupare a stat la baza scrierilor unor gânditori importanţi, între care se numără Sfântul Dionisie Areopagitul, Meister Eckhart, Nicolaus Cusanus sau Mircea Eliade. Deşi au scris în perioade de timp diferite şi au aparţinut unor tradiţii diferite, operele lor stau mărturie faptului că motivul coincidentia oppositorum a fost şi (...) continuă să fie o constantă în viaţa omului în dorinţa acestuia de a atinge Absolutul. (shrink)

Seit einem halben Jahrhundert prüfen die Logiker der Sozialwissenschaften die Kausalerklärung auf ihre Anwendbarkeit und auf ihre Tragweite im Bereiche der sogenannten Geisteswissenschaften. Die vorliegende Untersuchung gehört diesem Problemkreis an. Die darin formulierten Argumente unterstützen die These, daß im Strukturalismus eine Möglichkeit zur Ablösung der Kausalanalyse zu sehen ist, und zwar unter der Bedingung, daß der Strukturalismus in der Lage ist, ein Erklärungsschema abzugeben, das den Forderungen der "DN-Erklärung" von Hempel genügt. Im ersten Teil werden die verschiedenen Gründe der Verteidiger (...) und die zahlreichen Einwände der Gegner der Kausalerklärung kurz zusammengefaßt, in der Absicht, darzulegen, weshalb der Gebrauch des Ursache-Begriffs zum Problem geworden, ja selbst in Mißgunst gefallen ist. Der zweite Teil stellt einen beispielhaften Fall von Strukturanalyse dar. Es geht bei dieser Darstellung um eine Neuformulierung des Entwurfs von Lévi-Strauss zu einer allgemeinen Theorie der Verwandtschaftssysteme und damit zur Strukturforschung über jegliche soziale Phänomene. Im dritten Teil wird danna das Strukturschema von Lévi-Strauss in Bezug auf die Hempelschen Erklärungskriterien überprüft, um festzulegen, ob dabei eine den theoretischen Problemen und festgestellten Fakten adäquate Erklärung herauskommt, und ob die Strukturanalyse in die "Tiefe" der Wirklichkeit vordringt, wo Kausalerklärung nicht mehr angebracht ist. (shrink)

Quali opzioni filosofiche contrassegnano il realismo? La questione della conoscenza del reale appartiene al pensiero filosofico di ogni tempo: nei dibattiti filosofici contemporanei essa si accende di varie tonalità, per il moltiplicarsi di forme di realismo e antirealismo. Il problema di fondo è se, conoscendo il reale, siamo consapevoli di ciò che comporti affermarsi conoscenti in termini personali e culturali. Quali concezioni della cultura possono accompagnare il sapere? Come affrontare i problemi attinenti al dialogo tra discipline? Il sapere, contrassegnato da (...) rivoluzioni scientifiche e da trasformazioni storico-culturali, può ancora ricomporsi attorno a un metodo? Quali attenzioni richiede il pluralismo delle culture? Domande e risposte di carattere epistemologico e metodologico s’intrecciano nel presente volume: esse sono state elaborate scavando soprattutto in alcuni contesti culturali contemporanei e attingendo alle proposte provenienti dal pensiero di B. Lonergan. Le esplorazioni presenti in ciascun capitolo appartengono a una ricerca interdisciplinare, criticamente affrontata da docenti universitari che hanno selezionato peculiari nuclei problematici, rappresentativi di alcune sfide attuali sui versanti del sapere. Contributi di: Carlo Cirotto, Valter Danna, Rosanna Finamore, Pasquale Giustiniani, Paolo Gherri, Giuseppe Guglielmi, Pierpaolo Triani. (shrink)