Over the past decade, genetic tests have become available for a wide variety of disorders. As a result we are able to predict, with some degree of certainty, whether or not an individual will develop such diseases as breast cancer, Huntington's disease, polycystic kidney disease, and familial adenomatous polyposis. The ability to predict disease poses several unique ethical considerations for clinical decisionmaking regarding the provision of genetic testing. Patients must be able to comprehend the complexities of genetic testing and the (...) potential meaning of the results. Patients must consider the emotional, social, and economic consequences of revelations regarding their risk status. Also, obtaining information on risk status may have implications for persons other than the individual seeking genetic testing. (shrink)

Over the past decade, genetic tests have become available for a wide variety of disorders. As a result we are able to predict, with some degree of certainty, whether or not an individual will develop such diseases as breast cancer, Huntington's disease, polycystic kidney disease, and familial adenomatous polyposis. The ability to predict disease poses several unique ethical considerations for clinical decisionmaking regarding the provision of genetic testing. Patients must be able to comprehend the complexities of genetic testing and the (...) potential meaning of the results. Patients must consider the emotional, social, and economic consequences of revelations regarding their risk status. Also, obtaining information on risk status may have implications for persons other than the individual seeking genetic testing. (shrink)

“When Species Meet is a breathtaking meditation on the intersection between humankind and dog, philosophy and science, and macro and micro cultures.” —Cameron Woo, Publisher of Bark magazine In 2006, about 69 million U.S. households had pets, giving homes to around 73.9 million dogs, 90.5 million cats, and 16.6 million birds, and spending over $38 billion dollars on companion animals. As never before in history, our pets are truly members of the family. But the notion of “companion species”—knotted from human (...) beings, animals and other organisms, landscapes, and technologies—includes much more than “companion animals.” In When Species Meet, Donna J. Haraway digs into this larger phenomenon to contemplate the interactions of humans with many kinds of critters, especially with those called domestic. At the heart of the book are her experiences in agility training with her dogs Cayenne and Roland, but Haraway’s vision here also encompasses wolves, chickens, cats, baboons, sheep, microorganisms, and whales wearing video cameras. From designer pets to lab animals to trained therapy dogs, she deftly explores philosophical, cultural, and biological aspects of animal-human encounters. In this deeply personal yet intellectually groundbreaking work, Haraway develops the idea of companion species, those who meet and break bread together but not without some indigestion. “A great deal is at stake in such meetings,” she writes, “and outcomes are not guaranteed. There is no assured happy or unhappy ending—socially, ecologically, or scientifically. There is only the chance for getting on together with some grace.” Ultimately, she finds that respect, curiosity, and knowledge spring from animal-human associations and work powerfully against ideas about human exceptionalism. One of the founders of the posthumanities, Donna J. Haraway is professor in the History of Consciousness Department at the University of California, Santa Cruz. Author of many books and widely read essays, including The Companion Species Manifesto: Dogs, People, and Significant Otherness and the now-classic essay “The Cyborg Manifesto,” she received the J. D. Bernal Prize in 2000, a lifetime achievement award from the Society for Social Studies in Science. (shrink)

Mental time travel is defined as projecting the self into the past and the future. Despite growing evidence of the similarities of remembering past and imagining future events, dominant theories conceive of these as distinct capacities. I propose that memory and imagination are fundamentally the same process – constructive episodic simulation – and demonstrate that the ‘simulation system’ meets the three criteria of a neurocognitive system. Irrespective of whether one is remembering or imagining, the simulation system: acts on the same (...) information, drawing on elements of experience ranging from fine-grained perceptual details to coarser-grained conceptual information and schemas about the world; is governed by the same rules of operation, including associative processes that facilitate construction of a schematic scaffold, the event representation itself, and the dynamic interplay between the two ; and is subserved by the same brain system. I also propose that by forming associations between schemas, the simulation system constructs multi-dimensional cognitive spaces, within which any given simulation is mapped by the hippocampus. Finally, I suggest that simulation is a general capacity that underpins other domains of cognition, such as the perception of ongoing experience. This proposal has some important implications for the construct of ‘MTT’, suggesting that ‘time’ and ‘travel’ may not be defining, or even essential, features. Rather, it is the ‘mental’ rendering of experience that is the most fundamental function of this domain-general simulation system enabling humans to re-experience the past, pre-experience the future, and also comprehend the complexities of the present. (shrink)

What constitutes better schooling for today's youth? In 1984 educational theorist Theodore R. Sizer formulated nine Common Principles to answer this question and launched The Coalition of Essential Schools, an organization of schools attempting to change their own structure, curriculum, pedagogy, and power relations according to Sizer's Principles. This important book, the first comprehensive look at Coalition schools, charts the course of reform at eight charter member schools. The Coalition now counts over 900 private, parochial, public, urban, suburban, and rural (...) secondary schools among its affiliates nationwide. Donna E. Muncey and Patrick J. McQuillan, experts in anthropology as well as education, conducted a five-year ethnographic study to understand what happened in Coalition schools. The authors looked at curricular and pedagogical developments; how changes affected individual students, teachers, administrators, and other school personnel; and how American cultural beliefs influenced efforts to change. The schools' reform experiences differed: some efforts were sustained when others stalled, change divided some faculties while others found a sense of shared purpose, and the principals of some schools facilitated change while others clearly inhibited it. This compelling book, written for all who are concerned with education in America, offers a wealth of insights into the complexities of change efforts in individual schools and in classrooms. (shrink)

This study examines the impact of a social desirability response bias as a personality characteristic (self-deception and impression management) and as an item characteristic (perceived desirability of the behavior) on self-reported ethical conduct. Findings from a sample of college students revealed that self-reported ethical conduct is associated with both personality and item characteristics, with perceived desirability of behavior having the greatest influence on self-reported conduct. Implications for research in business ethics are drawn, and suggestions are offered for reducing the effects (...) of a socially desirable response bias. (shrink)

Donna Haraway's work has transformed the fields of cyberculture, feminist studies, and the history of science and technology. Her subjects range from animal dioramas in the American Museum of Natural History to research in transgenic mice, from gender in the laboratory to the nature of the cyborg. Trained as an historian of science, she has produced a series of books and essays that have become essential reading in cultural studies, gender studies, and the history of science. The Haraway Reader (...) brings together a generous selection of Donna Haraway's work. Included is her "Manifesto for Cyborgs," in which she famously wrote that she "would rather be a cyborg than a goddess." Other selections are taken from her three major works, Primate Visions, Modest Witness , and Simians, Cyborgs and Women , as well as some of her more recent writing on animals. For readers in cultural studies, feminist theory, science studies, and cyberculture, Donna Haraway is one of our keenest observers of nature, science, and the social world. This volume is the best introduction to her thought. (shrink)

In the early twentieth century, the life philosophy of Henri Bergson summoned the _élan vital_, or vital force, as the source of creative evolution. Bergson also appealed to intuition, which focused on experience rather than discursive thought and scientific cognition. Particularly influential for the literary and political Négritude movement of the 1930s, which opposed French colonialism, Bergson's life philosophy formed an appealing alternative to Western modernity, decried as "mechanical," and set the stage for later developments in postcolonial theory and vitalist (...) discourse. Revisiting narratives on life that were produced in this age of machinery and war, Donna V. Jones shows how Bergson, Nietzsche, and the poets Leopold Senghor and Aimé Césaire fashioned the concept of life into a central aesthetic and metaphysical category while also implicating it in discourses on race and nation. Jones argues that twentieth-century vitalism cannot be understood separately from these racial and anti-Semitic discussions. She also shows that some dominant models of emancipation within black thought become intelligible only when in dialogue with the vitalist tradition. Jones's study strikes at the core of contemporary critical theory, which integrates these older discourses into larger critical frameworks, and she traces the ways in which vitalism continues to draw from and contribute to its making. (shrink)

In the early twentieth century, the life philosophy of Henri Bergson summoned the _élan vital_, or vital force, as the source of creative evolution. Bergson also appealed to intuition, which focused on experience rather than discursive thought and scientific cognition. Particularly influential for the literary and political Négritude movement of the 1930s, which opposed French colonialism, Bergson's life philosophy formed an appealing alternative to Western modernity, decried as "mechanical," and set the stage for later developments in postcolonial theory and vitalist (...) discourse. Revisiting narratives on life that were produced in this age of machinery and war, Donna V. Jones shows how Bergson, Nietzsche, and the poets Leopold Senghor and Aimé Césaire fashioned the concept of life into a central aesthetic and metaphysical category while also implicating it in discourses on race and nation. Jones argues that twentieth-century vitalism cannot be understood separately from these racial and anti-Semitic discussions. She also shows that some dominant models of emancipation within black thought become intelligible only when in dialogue with the vitalist tradition. Jones's study strikes at the core of contemporary critical theory, which integrates these older discourses into larger critical frameworks, and she traces the ways in which vitalism continues to draw from and contribute to its making. (shrink)

Nourishing the Inner Life of Clinicians and Humanitarians: The Ethical Turn in Psychoanalysis, demonstrates the demanding, clinical and humanitarian work that psychotherapists often undertake with fragile and devastated people, those degraded by violence and discrimination. In spite of this, Donna M. Orange argues that there is more to human nature than a relentlessly negative view. Drawing on psychoanalytic and philosophical resources, as well as stories from history and literature, she explores ethical narratives that ground hope in human goodness and (...) shows how these voices, personal to each analyst, can become sources of courage, warning and support, of prophetic challenge and humility which can inform and guide their work. Over the course of a lifetime, the sources change, with new ones emerging into importance, others receding into the background. Donna Orange uses examples from ancient Rome, from twentieth century Europe, from South Africa, and from nineteenth century Russia. She shows how not only can their words and examples, like those of our personal mentors, inspire and warn us; but they also show us the daily discipline of spiritual self-care, although these examples rely heavily on the discipline of spiritual reading, other practitioners will find inspiration in music, visual arts, or elsewhere and replenish the resources regularly. Nourishing the Inner Life of Clinicians and Humanitarians will help psychoanalysts to develop a language with which to converse about ethics and the responsibility of the therapist/analyst. This is an exceptional contribution highly suitable for practitioners and students of psychoanalysis and psychotherapy. Donna M. Orange teaches, consults, and offers study groups for psychoanalysts and gestalt therapists. She seeks to integrate contemporary psychoanalysis with radically relational ethics. Recent books are _Thinking for Clinicians: Philosophical Resources for Contemporary Psychoanalysis and the Humanistic Psychotherapies _, and _The Suffering Stranger: Hermeneutics for Everyday Clinical Practice_, both from Routledge. (shrink)

Modest_Witness@Second_Millennium. FemaleMan_Meets_OncoMouse explores the roles of stories, figures, dreams, theories, facts, delusions, advertising, institutions, economic arrangements, publishing practices, scientific advances, and politics in twentieth- century technoscience. The book's title is an e-mail address. With it, Haraway locates herself and her readers in a sprawling net of associations more far-flung than the Internet. The address is not a cozy home. There is no innocent place to stand in the world where the book's author figure, FemaleMan, encounters DuPont's controversial laboratory rodent, OncoMouse. (...) Haraway sees the world of contemporary technoscience as a drama. Information sciences and life sciences are at the center of the dramatic action. Scenes are set in landscapes where maps of human genetic differences are stored in databases, racialized bodies are reconfigured by morphing for photographs in popular magazines, and transgenic mice important to breast cancer research are patented intellectual property. The actors are many, and not all are human. Beginning with the Modest Witness, the key figure in the Science Revolution, Haraway shows us the trouble lurking in race and gender- marked practices for attesting to matters of fact. In later scenes, Haraway explores the kinship relations among the many cyborg creatures produced in the late twentieth-century--in nuclear research, genetic engineering, reproductive technologies, computer-mediated representational practices, and mutations in biological approaches to "race.". (shrink)

Interview by Klasien Horstman on gender and genetics. 'Unlike many gender theorists, I do not view the body as socially constructed; nor do I share postmodern and deconstructionist disquiet at the notion of a unified subject. Frankly, I think these constructions get in the way of political action and are bad for women’s rights.' -/- .

Psychoanalysis engages with the difficult subjects in life, but it has been slow to address climate change. Climate Crisis, Psychoanalysis, and Radical Ethics draws on the latest scientific evidence to set out the likely effects of climate change on politics, economics and society more generally, including impacts on psychoanalysts. Despite a tendency to avoid the warnings, times of crisis summon clinicians to emerge from comfortable consulting rooms. Daily engaged with human suffering, they now face the inextricably bound together crises of (...) global warming and massive social injustices. After considering historical and emotional causes of climate unconsciousness and of compulsive consumerism, this book argues that only a radical ethics of responsibility to be "my other s keeper" will truly wake us up to climate change and bring psychoanalysts to actively take on responsibilities, such as demanding change from governments, living more simply, flying less, and caring for the earth and its inhabitants everywhere. Linking climate justice to radical ethics by way of psychoanalysis, Donna Orange explores many relevant aspects of psychoanalytic expertise, referring to work on trauma, mourning, and the transformation of trouble into purpose. Orange makes practical suggestions for action in the psychoanalytic and psychotherapeutic communities: reducing air travel, consolidating organizations and conferences, better use of internet communication and education. This book includes both philosophical considerations of egoism as problematic, together with work on shame and envy as motivating compulsive and conspicuous consumption. The interweaving of climate emergency and massive social injustice presents psychoanalysts and organized psychoanalysis with a radical ethical demand and an extraordinary opportunity for leadership. Climate Crisis, Psychoanalysis, and Radical Ethics will provide accessible and thought-provoking reading for psychoanalysts and psychotherapists, as well as philosophers, environmental studies scholars and students studying across these fields. ". (shrink)

Interview on the commodified body with Donna Dickenson by Alana Cattapan.

The study assesses how a social desirability (SD) bias influences the relationship between several independent and dependent variables commonly investigated in ethics research. The effect of a SD bias was observed when a questionnaire was administered under varying conditions of anonymity and with different measurement techniques for the SD construct. Findings reveal that a SD bias is present in the majority of relationships studied, and it most frequently plays a moderating role. While the measure of SD influences the strength and (...) type of relationship, condition of anonymity has relatively little effect on the level of SD. (shrink)

We argue that Néron and Norman’s article stops short of the point where it would truly advance our understanding of corporate citizenship. Their article, in our view, fosters normative confusion and displays significant gaps in logic. In addition, the large and useful literature on business-government relations has for the most part been overlooked by Néron and Norman, even though their article ends with an enthusiastic call for scholarly attention to this subject.

With a unique blend of clinical compassion and philosophical reflection, Donna M. Orange illuminates the nature and process of psychoanalytic understanding within the intimate and healing human context of treatment. Moving away from objectivist empiricism and its polar opposite, constructivist relativism, her work details a paradigm shift to a perspectival realism that does justice to the concerns of both. Laying the groundwork for a fuller, more encompassing view of psychoanalytic practice, Emotional Understanding is enlightening reading for all mental health (...) professionals interested in psychodynamic theory and treatment. (shrink)

This study investigated individual differences in the belief bias effect, which is the tendency to accept conclusions because they are believable rather than because they are logically valid. It was observed that the extent of an individual's belief bias effect was unrelated to a number of measures of reasoning competence. Instead, as predicted by mental models theory, it was related to a person's ability to generate alternative representations of premises: the more alternatives a person generated, the less likely they were (...) to show a belief bias effect. In contrast to belief effects, which were predicted by the number of alternatives generated, scores on logical reasoning tasks were predicted by an individual's understanding of the concept of logical necessity. These two mediating variables, ability to generate alternatives and understanding of logical necessity, were themselves predicted by similar variables, such as cognitive motivation and abstract reasoning ability. Our findings strongly support the mental models interpretation of the belief bias effect, and suggest that individual differences in this effect are associated with a specific ability to generate alternatives, rather than with a general logical competence. (shrink)

The purpose of this study is to explore with more rigor and detail the role of social norms in tax compliance. This study draws on Cialdini and Trost’s (The Handbook of Social Psychology: Oxford University Press, Boston, MA, 1998) taxonomy of social norms to investigate with more specificity this potentially decisive (Alm and McKee, Managerial and Decision Economics, 19:259–275, 1998) influence on tax compliance. We test our research hypotheses regarding the direct and indirect influences of social norms using a hypothetical (...) compliance scenario with 174 experienced taxpayers as participants. Factor analysis of the social norm questions successfully identified four distinct social norm constructs, in line with Cialdini and Trost (1998). Results of the path analysis show that individuals’ standards for behavior/ethical beliefs (personal norms) as well as the expectations of close others (subjective norms) directly influence tax compliance decisions, whereas general societal expectations (injunctive norms) and other individuals’ actual behavior (descriptive norms) have an indirect influence. This shows that social norms have important direct as well as indirect influences on tax compliance behavior. We also investigate a number of attitudinal variables that may be related to social norms and taxpayer compliance. The results of this study further clarify the important role that social norms have with regard to taxpayers’ compliance behavior. (shrink)

Acclaimed theorist and social scientist Donna Jeanne Haraway uses the work of pioneering developmental biologists Ross G. Harrison, Joseph Needham, and Paul Weiss as a springboard for a discussion about a shift in developmental biology from a vitalism-mechanism framework to organicism. The book deftly interweaves Thomas Kuhn's concept of paradigm change into this wide-ranging analysis, emphasizing the role of model, analogy, and metaphor in the paradigm and arguing that any truly useful theoretical system in biology must have a central (...) metaphor. (shrink)

The article clarifies the way in which ‘the aesthetic’ is conceptualised in relation to business ethics in order to assess its potential to inform theory building and developmental practices within the business ethics field. A systematic review of relevant literature is undertaken which identifies three ontologically based accounts of the relationship between the aesthetic and business ethics: ‘positive’ ones, ‘negative’ accounts and ‘Postmodern’ renderings. Five epistemologically based approaches are also made explicit: those in which the aesthetic is thought to develop (...) enhanced perceptual discernment, those in which the aesthetic catalyses emotional sensitivity, those in which the aesthetic contributes to imaginative capacity, those in which the aesthetic prompts integrative apprehension and those in which the aesthetic is seen to foster critical reflexivity. The review reveals two key findings: firstly, the dearth of empirically based research to substantiate claims made about the aesthetic’s ability to foster ethical capabilities, which leads to proposals for further research; secondly, the analysis indicates the significance of critical reflexivity both in resolving the apparent dichotomy between ontologically based perspectives asserting the aesthetic’s ability to lead to ethically sound or egregious behaviour, and in underpinning the capacities of perceptual discernment, emotional connectivity, imagination and integrative apprehension which epistemologically based approaches assert the aesthetic can foster. (shrink)

"I experience language as an intensely physical process," writes Donna Haraway. "I cannot not think through metaphor... Biochemistry and language just don't feel that different to me." Since the appearance of her monumental Primate Visions and the now classic essay "A Manifesto for Cyborgs," feminist historian of science Donna Haraway has created a way of thinking about culture, science, and the production of knowledge that has made her one of the most highly regarded theorists in America. She is (...) admired for her passion and rigor, her wicked ironies, and her deep commitment to issues of gender and race, as well as species. The author of four seminal works on science and culture, Donna Haraway here speaks for the first time in a direct and non-academic voice. Thyrza Nichols Goodeve leads her subject through conversation about Haraway's intellectual development, theories and influences, the role of Catholicism in her thinking, and how her ethical stands have mirrored issues in her personal life. For readers who have admired and struggled with the rich and complex performances of her earlier works, How Like a Leaf will be a welcome inside view of the author's thought. At the same time, this work makes Haraway's contribution to modern thought available to a much wider audience who cares about the issues she addresses. This is a highly personal introduction to a major thinker's body of work. (shrink)

Tax compliance is a concern to governments around the world. Prior research (Alm, J. and I. Sanchez: 1995, KYKLOS 48, 3–19) has attributed unexplained inter-country differences in compliance rates to differences in social norms. Economics researchers studying tax compliance in the United States (U.S.) (see for example J. Andreoni et al.: 1998, Journal of Economic Literature 36, 818–860) have called for more attention to social (as opposed to economic) influences on tax compliance. In this study, we extend this prior research (...) by explicitly examining the role of social norms [Cialdini, R. and M. Trost: 1998, The Handbook of Social Psychology (Oxford University Press, New York)] on tax compliance in three different countries. We test our research hypotheses using a hypothetical compliance scenario, which was administered in Australia, Singapore, and the U.S. There were differences in compliance rates and social norms among the three countries. Factor analysis of the social norm questions identified three distinct social norm constructs. Two of these factors were significant in explaining tax compliance behavior. The first and most influential factor was taxpayers’ own personal moral beliefs, along with the beliefs of those close to them (e.g., friends and important others). The second significant factor represented societal views of proper behavior. We conclude that social norms help to explain tax compliance intentions and why tax compliance rates are higher than would be predicted by strictly economic models. (shrink)

Business and society academics face an ongoing dilemma between the rigorous demands of good scholarship and the personal and pragmatic demands of constituencies and themselves. This dilemma is, above all, an ethical one, but it is partially solvable by paying closer attention to theory and methodology while acknowledging individual biases and desires and helping others in the field to do the same.

The concept of corporate social responsibility (CSR) is being supplanted by a new term—corporate citizenship (CC). For many reasons, it’s not a bad idea to replace the CSR term. But the core content of CSR is also gradually being replaced in a significant portion of the literature by a narrower, voluntaristic concept of corporate community service. This is not a viable replacement for the broad ethics-based and problem-solving norms of social reciprocity that are represented by CSR. A more legitimate successor-term (...) is needed so that corporate community relations and philanthropy take their rightful place among the larger set of rights, duties, stakeholder relationships, and opportunities accruing to business organizations.Therefore, we develop a working theory of business citizenship (BC), a more palatable term, and a concept designed to capture the core moral and social content of CSR. In this article we extract and synthesize several key ideas about individual citizenship that have evolved over several thousand years. We then transpose these ideas from the level of individual members of a polity to the level of organizations within society. In a companion article, we extend the business citizenship concept from its single-polity boundaries to the institutional and global levels of analysis. This approach allows a view of business citizenship that accommodates strong moral guidance, structural and institutional realities, and the flexibility necessary to respond to the structures and dynamics of particular company-stakeholder relationships. (shrink)