Theological schools are well situated to create intentional cultures for the purpose of spiritual formation. Indeed, most schools of theology have this goal as an essential part of their mission as well as a requirement for continued accreditation. And yet, the measurement of spiritual formation over time is fraught with challenges. This article seeks to address some of these challenges by means of developing a meta-theory of positive change/growth which would eventually serve as a theoretical basis for the development of (...) a generalizable and reliable measurement tool. (shrink)

Neuroimaging offers great potential to clinicians and researchers for a host of mental and physical conditions. The use of imaging has been trumpeted for forensic psychiatric and psychological evaluations to allow greater insight into the relationship between the brain and behavior. The results of imaging certainly can be used to inform clinical diagnoses; however, there continue to be limitations in using neuroimaging for insanity cases due to limited scientific backing for how neuroimaging can inform retrospective evaluations of mental state. In (...) making this case, this paper reviews the history of the insanity defense and explains how the use of neuroimaging is not an effective way of improving the reliability of insanity defense evaluations. (shrink)

This work on the theory of education was first published in 1839. The five writers had been chosen as the winners in a competition for an essay on the 'Expediency and Means of Elevating the Profession of the Educator in Society', organised by the Central Society of Education, founded in 1837 to promote state funding of education, at a time when the 'monitor' system, whereby older children taught younger ones, was seen as an effective method. The journalist John Lalor won (...) first prize with a wide-ranging consideration of all the aspects of education, comparing the status of teachers through history and across several countries, and championing their 'sacred mission'. The runners-up were the writer John A. Heraud, the Unitarian minister Edward Higginson, the lawyer and author James Simpson, and Mrs Sarah Porter, prolific writer on education and sister of the political economist David Ricardo. (shrink)

Rawls famously argues that the parties in the original position would agree upon the two principles of justice. Among other things, these principles guarantee equal political liberty—that is, democracy—as a requirement of justice. We argue on the contrary that the parties have reason to reject this requirement. As we show, by Rawls’ own lights, the parties would be greatly concerned to mitigate existential risk. But it is doubtful whether democracy always minimizes such risk. Indeed, no one currently knows which political (...) systems would. Consequently, the parties—and we ourselves—have reason to reject democracy as a requirement of justice in favor of political experimentalism, a general approach to political justice which rules in at least some non-democratic political systems which might minimize existential risk. (shrink)

There is a standard story told about the rise and fall of ordinary language philosophy: it was a widespread, if not dominant, approach to philosophy in Great Britain in the aftermath of World War II up until the early 1960s, but with the development of systematic approaches to the study of language—formal semantic theories on one hand and Gricean pragmatics on the other—ordinary language philosophy more or less disappeared. In this paper we present quantitative evidence to evaluate the standard story (...) of the rise and fall of ordinary language philosophy, building on the topic model of over 30,000 philosophy articles in Weatherson (2022). Using a combination of qualitative judgment and a topic-model-based measurement of similarity between individual articles, we find evidence that supports the first part of the standard story, according to which ordinary language philosophy arises in the 1940s, peaks between the early 1950s and the late 1960s, and then rapidly declines. But we argue that there is also evidence of a "new wave" of ordinary language philosophy in the early 21st century that defies the second part of the standard story. (shrink)

We investigate claims about the frequency of "know" made by philosophers. Our investigation has several overlapping aims. First, we aim to show what is required to confirm or disconfirm philosophers’ claims about the comparative frequency of different uses of philosophically interesting expressions. Second, we aim to show how using linguistic corpora as tools for investigating meaning is a productive methodology, in the sense that it yields discoveries about the use of language that philosophers would have overlooked if they remained in (...) their "armchairs of an afternoon", to use J.L. Austin’s phrase. Third, we discuss facts about the meaning of "know" that so far have been ignored in philosophy, with the aim of reorienting discussions of the relevance of ordinary language for philosophical theorizing. (shrink)

Complex‐trait genetics has advanced dramatically through methods to estimate the heritability tagged by SNPs, both genome‐wide and in genomic regions of interest such as those defined by functional annotations. The models underlying many of these analyses are inadequate, and consequently many SNP‐heritability results published to date are inaccurate. Here, we review the modelling issues, both for analyses based on individual genotype data and association test statistics, highlighting the role of a low‐dimensional model for the heritability of each SNP. We use (...) state‐of‐art models to present updated results about how heritability is distributed with respect to functional annotations in the human genome, and how it varies with allele frequency, which can reflect purifying selection. Our results give finer detail to the picture that has emerged in recent years of complex trait heritability widely dispersed across the genome. Confounding due to population structure remains a problem that summary statistic analyses cannot reliably overcome. Also see the video abstract here: https://youtu.be/WC2u03V65MQ. (shrink)

This is a “bottom-up” paper in the sense that it draws lessons in defining disciplinary categories under study from a series of empirical studies of interdisciplinarity. In particular, we are in the process of studying the interchange of research-based knowledge between Cognitive Science and Educational Research. This has posed a set of design decisions that we believe warrant consideration as others study cross-disciplinary research processes.

In the USA, civic involvement in adolescence includes political and nonpolitical activities. Given that identities can motivate behavior, how do political and moral identities relate to civic activity choices? In this study, high school students (N = 1578) were surveyed about their political and nonpolitical civic actions and their moral and political identities. Overall, students were more involved in service than they were in political activities. Hierarchical regression analyses were used to investigate the relation between identity and involvement, controlling for (...) known correlates of involvement: sex, ethnicity, parent education, peer civic engagement, parent civic engagement and school civic opportunities. Moral and political identity were positively related to overall involvement. Political identity was positively related to political involvement, but was not related to nonpolitical service. Moral identity was positively related to service and expressive-political involvement, but negatively related to traditional-political involvement. Findings are discussed in light of civic and moral education initiatives. (shrink)

While there has been an increase of Black women faculty in higher education institutions, the academy writ large continues to exploit, discriminate, and uphold institutionalized gendered racism through its policies and practices. Black women have navigated, negotiated, and learned how to thrive from their respective standpoint and epistemologies, traversing the academy in ways that counter typical narratives of success and advancement. This edited volume bridges together foundational and contemporary intergenerational, interdisciplinary voices to elucidate Black feminist epistemologies and praxis. Chapters highlight (...) relevant research, methodologies, and theoretical or conceptual frameworks; share experiences as doctoral students, current faculty, and academic administrators; and offer lessons learned and strategies to influence systemic and institutional change for, with, and alongside Black women. (shrink)

Elisabeth Porter's guide to the development of feminist thought on ethics & moral agency surveys feminist debates on the nature of feminist ethics, intimate relationships, professional ethics, politics, sexual politics, abortion and reproductive choices.

Little is known about older persons’ expectancies (or anticipations) about the possible actions of home-care professionals, although such data have implications for the ethics of home care and home-care policies. From a longitudinal study of older women’s experience of home care, findings are reported concerning their expectancies of professional home-care providers. A descriptive phenomenological method was used to detail the structure of the experience and its context. Data were analyzed from a series of interviews with 13 women aged 82 to (...) 96 years. Among the five key structures of experience were ‘finding that someone has the job of helping me here’ and ‘determining where the helper’s field lies’. Two subsets within a category of expectancies were differentiated: speculations about helpers’ possible actions and expectancies about outcomes of helpers’ actions. As parameters of relational ethics, clients’ speculations and expectancies are appropriate bases for dialogue about older widows’ relationships with home-care professionals and the foci of home-care policies. (shrink)

Background: Clinical genomic implementation studies pose challenges for informed consent. Consent forms often include complex language and concepts, which can be a barrier to diverse enrollment, and these studies often blur traditional research-clinical boundaries. There is a move toward self-directed, web-based research enrollment, but more evidence is needed about how these enrollment approaches work in practice. In this study, we developed and evaluated a literacy-focused, web-based consent approach to support enrollment of diverse participants in an ongoing clinical genomic implementation study. (...) Methods: As part of the Cancer Health Assessments Reaching Many (CHARM) study, we developed a web-based consent approach that featured plain language, multimedia, and separate descriptions of clinical care and research activities. CHARM offered clinical exome sequencing to individuals at high risk of hereditary cancer. We interviewed CHARM participants about their reactions to the consent approach. We audio recorded, transcribed, and coded interviews using a deductively and inductively derived codebook. We reviewed coded excerpts as a team to identify overarching themes. Results: We conducted 32 interviews, including 12 (38%) in Spanish. Most (69%) enrolled without assistance from study staff, usually on a mobile phone. Those who completed enrollment in one day spent an average of 12 minutes on the consent portion. Interviewees found the information simple to read but comprehensive, were neutral to positive about the multimedia support, and identified increased access to testing in the study as the key difference from clinical care. Conclusions: This study showed that interviewees found our literacy-focused, web-based consent approach acceptable; did not distinguish the consent materials from other online study processes; and valued getting access to testing in the study. Overall, conducting empirical bioethics research in an ongoing clinical trial was useful to demonstrate the acceptability of our novel consent approach but posed practical challenges. (shrink)

Restorative practices is providing Thailand with a culturally relevant and highly effective means of dealing with criminal offenders, especially juveniles. Spearheaded by Wanchai Roujanavong, director general of the Department of Juvenile Observation and Protection of Thailand’s Ministry of Justice, the Thais have developed a restorative conferencing model. Called family and communitygroup conferencing, the approach is based on the International Institute for Restorative Practices restorative conferencing model, combined with elements of the New Zealand family group conferencing model. The resultant approach suits (...) Thailand’s traditional community-inclusive culture. Since 2003, Thailand’s 52 juvenile protection centers have conducted more than 19,000 conferences, usually in place of court prosecution. Recidivism rates among offenders participating in these conferences are markedly lower than those of juvenile offenders prosecuted in court. (shrink)

Our understanding of biological processes in humans is often based on examination of analogous processes in other organisms. The nematode worm Caenorhabditis elegans has been a particularly valuable model, leading to Nobel prize winning discoveries in development and genetics. Until recently, however, the worm has not been widely used as a model to study transcription due to the lack of a comprehensive catalogue of its RNA transcripts. A recent study by Chen et al. uses next‐generation sequencing to address this issue, (...) mapping the transcription initiation sites in C. elegans and finding many unexpected similarities between the transcription of enhancers and promoters in the worm and mammalian genomes. As well as providing a valuable resource for researchers in the C. elegans community, these findings raise the possibility of using the worm as a model to investigate some key, current questions about transcriptional regulation that remain technically challenging in more complex organisms. (shrink)