In the next few years, biotechnology will continue to develop a wide variety of functional foods, foods whose benefits go well beyond basic nutrition. Minors are a major potential market for bioengineered foods that are promoted not as sustaining health but rather as supporting desired lifestyles through the enhancement of physical, athletic, intellectual, or social performance. The experience of other industries suggests that such biomarketing is likely to create a variety of highly public ethical controversies. After a discussion of (...) some of these potential issues, suggestions on how companies and industries can work with marketing ethicists and child advocates to limitnegative impacts on children and youth are presented. That discussion includes a preliminarily analysis of some of the considerations that should be involved in the initial development of a model of biomarketing ethics and in the use of that model to prevent ethical abuses. (shrink)

It is well established that demographic representation in clinical research is important for understanding the safety and effectiveness of novel therapeutics and vaccines in diverse patient populations. In recent years, the National Institutes of Health and Food and Drug Administration have issued guidelines and recommendations for the inclusion of women, older adults, and racial and ethnic minorities in research. However, these guidelines fail to provide an adequate explanation of why racial and ethnic representation in clinical research is important. (...) This article aims to both provide the missing arguments for why adequate representation of racial and ethnic minorities in clinical research is essential and to articulate a number of recommendations for improving diversity going forward.Appropriate racial and ethnic representation and fair inclusion help (1) increase the generalisability of clinical trial results, (2) equitably distribute any benefits of clinical research and (3) enable trust in the research enterprise. (shrink)

For those interested in developing baccalaureate programs in health humanities, this essay draws on our experience of developing a minor in health humanities to share insights on what to expect, strategies that work well, and how to deal with obstacles. These insights range from how to explain the concept of health humanities to stakeholders to how to decide where to house a health humanities program. We share our insights in a way that promises to translate well (...) to different institutional contexts. That said, this paper is more relevant for institutional contexts where budgets are stressed and, consequently, proposals to invest in humanities programs are a difficult sell. This paper is divided into sections addressing how to earn institutional support, gain campus buy-in, identify benefits of the proposed program, decide where to house the program, calculate program cost, and secure external funding. We conclude with some final reflections on the current status of our program and why we are committed to health humanities education. (shrink)

The negative health effects of stress are well documented in medical and psychological research, but these effects are underexplored in political philosophy. This essay evaluates these effects in relation to the explanatory and normative value of the concept that I call “being at home.” The phenomenological description of the state of being at home is the sense of feeling safe and at ease in your context, and therefore able to relax. Although it characterizes a particular state of being for (...) an individual person, its conditions are relational. I show how the normative value of being at home can guide nonideal action-guiding recommendations to respond to racism in light of the claim that one of the negative effects of racism is a steady stream of disruptions to a person’s sense of ease in the world. Racism and microaggressions create stress, which then causes further negative health effects to the minority body. Consequently, the physical harms perpetrated by racist and sexist societies on the members of oppressed identities can be as great as the effects of actions standardly understood as violence. Demonstrating that a nonideal theoretical approach to bioethics is well suited to evaluating the philosophical ramifications of the bodily damage incurred by microaggressions, I recommend selective and episodic separatism from the perpetrators of microaggressions as a health-protective response to the realities of living in an unjust world. (shrink)

In contrast to medical care, which is focused on the individual patient, public health is focused on collective health. This article argues that, in order to better protect the individual, discussions of public health would benefit from incorporating the insights of virtue ethics. There are three reasons to for this. First, the collective focus may cause neglect of the effects of public health policy on the interests and rights of individuals and minorities. Second, whereas the (...) one-on-one encounters in medical care facilitate a compassionate and caring attitude, public health involves a distance between professionals and the public. Therefore, public health professionals must use imagination and care to evaluate the effects of policies on individuals. Third, the relationship between public health professionals and the people who are affected by the policies they design is characterized by power asymmetry, demanding a high level of responsibility from those who wield them. Against this background, it is argued that public health professionals should develop the virtues of responsibility, compassion and humility. The examples provided, i.e. breastfeeding information and vaccination policy, illustrate the importance of these virtues, which needed for normative as well as instrumental reasons, i.e. as a way to restore trust. (shrink)

Obesity is the definitive epidemic of the modern era in the United States. Its well-documented public health impacts, especially related to children and adolescents, are horrific. Nearly one-third of American minors are overweight; over 50% of them are obese. Already, these kids suffer from multiple adverse physical and mental health conditions. Sadly, absent serious communal and individual interventions, their lives may be cut short compared to their own parents’ life expectancy. While recent surveillance suggests childhood obesity may be (...) trending down slightly in some populations, public health experts remain concerned about the threat obesity poses to the health of America's youth.The concurrent travesty underlying childhood obesity is the relative societal failure to slow and reverse its spread. (shrink)

Obesity is the definitive epidemic of the modern era in the United States. Its well-documented public health impacts, especially related to children and adolescents, are horrific. Nearly one-third of American minors are overweight; over 50% of them are obese. Already, these kids suffer from multiple adverse physical and mental health conditions. Sadly, absent serious communal and individual interventions, their lives may be cut short compared to their own parents’ life expectancy. While recent surveillance suggests childhood obesity may be (...) trending down slightly in some populations, public health experts remain concerned about the threat obesity poses to the health of America's youth.The concurrent travesty underlying childhood obesity is the relative societal failure to slow and reverse its spread. (shrink)

It is one of the remarkable and significant consequence of the AIDS epidemic that out of the context of enormous suffering and death there emerged a forceful set of ideas linking the domains of health and human rights. At first, the effort centered on the observation that protecting individuals from discrimination and unwarranted intrusions on liberty were, contrary to previous epidemics, crucial to protecting the public health and interrupting the spread of HIV But in fairly short order, the (...) scope of the health and human rights perspective expanded dramatically to focus on the ways in which the most fundamental social arrangements rendered individuals and communities vulnerable to HIV Racial and ethnic minorities, those who were marginalized, and women were at risk because of their subordinate status. In the face of such an understanding, nothing short of social change could be adequate to the challenge posed by the AIDS epidemic. (shrink)

It is one of the remarkable and significant consequence of the AIDS epidemic that out of the context of enormous suffering and death there emerged a forceful set of ideas linking the domains of health and human rights. At first, the effort centered on the observation that protecting individuals from discrimination and unwarranted intrusions on liberty were, contrary to previous epidemics, crucial to protecting the public health and interrupting the spread of HIV But in fairly short order, the (...) scope of the health and human rights perspective expanded dramatically to focus on the ways in which the most fundamental social arrangements rendered individuals and communities vulnerable to HIV Racial and ethnic minorities, those who were marginalized, and women were at risk because of their subordinate status. In the face of such an understanding, nothing short of social change could be adequate to the challenge posed by the AIDS epidemic. (shrink)

Health care reform that includes universal coverage could lower a major barrier to care for people of color and ethnic minorities—the inability to pay for care. But universal coverage alone, even with comparable fee-for-service payment or appropriately risk-adjusted capitated reimbursement, will not eradicate the racial and ethnic inequities in health care delivery. Restrictive admissions practices, geographic inaccessibility, culture, racial stereotypes, and the failure to employ minority health care professionals will still create barriers to minority health (...) care. In addition to universal financing, health care reform should include new civil rights legislation to address and reduce these noneconomic barriers to minority health care. (shrink)

Health care reform that includes universal coverage could lower a major barrier to care for people of color and ethnic minorities—the inability to pay for care. But universal coverage alone, even with comparable fee-for-service payment or appropriately risk-adjusted capitated reimbursement, will not eradicate the racial and ethnic inequities in health care delivery. Restrictive admissions practices, geographic inaccessibility, culture, racial stereotypes, and the failure to employ minority health care professionals will still create barriers to minority health (...) care. In addition to universal financing, health care reform should include new civil rights legislation to address and reduce these noneconomic barriers to minority health care. (shrink)

A dearth of clinical research involving children has resulted in off-licence and sometimes inappropriate medications being prescribed to the paediatric population. In this environment, recent years have seen the introduction of a raft of regulation aimed at increasing the involvement of children in clinical trials research and generating evidence-based medicinal preparations for their use. However, this regulation pays scant attention to the autonomy of competent minors. In particular, it makes no provision for the ability of competent minors to consent to (...) participate in medical research and is therefore at odds with best ethical practice. This article explores the tensions between law and ethics in relation to clinical research involving minors and concludes that greater respect should be given to the autonomy of those minors who are competent to decide for themselves. (shrink)

Decision-making capacity in children and adolescents in healthcare requires thorough assessment: the minor's maturity, understanding of the decision, risk of the situation and contextual factors needs to be explored. The intention was to design and validate a test—the Maturtest—to assess the maturity of minors in decision-making processes in healthcare. A reasoning test on moral conflicts for adolescents was designed to infer the degree of maturity of minors applied to decision-making regarding their own health. The test was completed by a (...) sample of 441 adolescents aged from twelve to sixteen, with a corresponding analysis of their psychometric skills to measure feasibility, viability, reliability, validity, and sensitivity to change. Psychometric test results showed viability, reliability, validity, and sensitivity to change. High correlation between the test score and the reference method were notable. A high stability was obtained with an intraclass correlation coefficient. The average response time of the test was twenty-three minutes. This test measures the moral maturity of adolescents. It is presented as an objective, useful, valid, reliable tool, easy to fill out, edit and apply in a healthcare context. It helps to assess the maturity of minors faced with a decision. (shrink)

Criminalization is a form of social marginalization that is little appreciated as a determinant of poor health. Criminalization can be understood in at least two ways — in the narrow sense as the imposition of criminal penalties for a certain behavior, and more broadly as the conferral of a criminalized status on all individuals in the population, whether proven guilty of a specific offense or not. Both criminal penalties and criminalized status threaten the mental and physical health of (...) these populations in many ways. Incarceration, abandonment by families and communities, social disdain, physical abuse, discrimination, and relentless fear undermine their ability to enjoy their right to the highest attainable standard of health goods and services. Understanding the social determinants of health in these populations and formulating programs to address them have rarely been high priorities in national or international policy. (shrink)

There is longstanding interest within anthropology and sociology in the meaning of humour, but little research that examines humour within fathers’ health experiences. This paper specifically analyses fathers’ stories about humour shared with other men, and the links between gender and health, in order to identify the implications for health‐care and future research. Findings indicate that humour is an important aspect of fathers’ experiences of social connectedness with other men. Indeed, for African‐Caribbean fathers specifically, humour was an (...) important aspect of their relationships with other ethnic minority men. Humour was also used to objectify, humiliate or ridicule others, for example in the form of sexualised or racist humour. However, fathers’ stories were also mediated by masculinities, it that masculinities enabled fathers to avoid disclosure of vulnerability regarding health experiences to others. The links between masculinities and health, the implications for interviewing fathers, and the implications for future research and healthcare practice with fathers are also discussed. (shrink)

The dual-continua model of mental health provides a contemporary framework for conceptualising and operationalising mental health. According to this model, mental health is distinct from but related to mental illness, and not the opposite or merely the absence of psychopathology symptoms. To examine the validity of the dual-continua model, previous studies have either applied variable-based analysis such as confirmatory factor analysis, or used predetermined cut-off points for subgroup division. The present study extends this contribution by subjecting data (...) from an African sample to both CFA and latent class analysis to test the dual-continua model in Africa. We applied CFA separately for the Mental Health Continuum—Short Form and Patient Health Questionnaire—9 ; and LCA on combined item responses. College students from Ghana, Kenya, Mozambique, and South Africa completed the MHC-SF and PHQ-9. With minor modifications to the measurement models, the CFA results of this study confirm the three-factor structure of the MHC-SF, and a unidimensional solution for the PHQ-9. LCA results show the presence of three distinct latent classes: languishing with moderate endorsement of depressive symptoms, flourishing with low endorsement of depressive symptoms, and moderate mental health with high endorsement of depressive symptoms. These findings further contribute to affirming the evidence for the dual-continua model of mental health, with implications for the assessment of mental health, to inform policy, practise, and future research in community and clinical settings in Africa. (shrink)

If ‘community’ is the answer, what is the problem? While questions undoubtedly arise in allocating resources to public health, such as ‘how much?’ and ‘to whom?’, we already have answers based on (i) the observation that disease and illness are bad, (ii) views of justice and fairness and (iii) an appreciation of market failure. What does the concept of community add to the existing answers? Not nothing, I shall argue, but not much either. In some cases, health providers (...) should take advantage of ties of community to deliver services more effectively. The desire to preserve communities may have some minor implications for devolved health care funding. The value of community may set some limits to inequalities in access to health care. That’s about it. I do consider some other claims of behalf of the concept, e.g. that people would not support justice in health care without a sense of community; but I don’t find these claims very plausible. Finally, I point out some ways in which communities can be damaged by the promotion of public health understood as population health. (shrink)

The non-identity problem arises when our actions in the present could change which people will exist in the future, for better or worse. Is it morally better to improve the lives of specific future people, as compared to changing which people exist for the better? Affecting the timing of fetuses being conceived is one case where present actions change the identity of future people. This is relevant to questions of public health policy, as exemplified in some responses to the (...) Zika epidemic. There is philosophical disagreement about the relevance of non-identity: some hold that non-identity is not relevant, while others think that the only morally relevant actions are those that affect specific people. Given this disagreement, we investigated the intuitions about the moral relevance of non-identity within an educated sample of the public, because there was previously little empirical data on the public’s views on the non-identity problem. We performed an online survey with a sample of the educated general public. The survey assessed participants’ preferences between person-affecting and impersonal interventions for Zika, and their views on other non-identity thought experiments, once the non-identity problem had been explained. It aimed to directly measure the importance of non-identity in participants’ moral decision-making. We collected 763 valid responses from the survey. Half of the participants (50%) had a graduate degree, 47% had studied philosophy at a university level, and 20% had read about the non-identity problem before. Most participants favoured person-affecting interventions for Zika over impersonal ones, but the majority claimed that non-identity did not influence their decision (66% of those preferring person-affecting interventions, 95% of those preferring impersonal ones). In one non-identity thought experiment participants were divided, but in another they primarily answered that impersonally reducing the quality of life of future people would be wrong, harmful and blameworthy, even though no specific individuals would be worse off. Non-identity appeared to play a minor role in participants’ moral decision-making. Moreover, participants seem to either misunderstand the non-identity problem, or hold non-counterfactual views of harm that do not define harm as making someone worse off than they would have been otherwise. (shrink)

There is a tendency, a bad tendency, to make epistemic agency the central focus of epistemology. In brief, epistemologists have traditionally elevated epistemic agency as the crucial issue to be addressed, and ask all other epistemological questions in light of that issue. This is not surprising given the Cartesian influence on epistemology, but I argue that epistemic agency should not always be the central focus of epistemology. There are times when giving central place to epistemic agency gets in the way (...) of good epistemology. In this paper, I show how one approach to a communitarian epistemology falters precisely because of the primacy given to epistemic agency. Specifically, I take a close look at Lynn Hankinson Nelson?s notion of epistemological communities in terms of epistemic agency and analyze both its merits and its shortcomings. This is an important analysis for general consideration given the trend in non-traditional epistemologies to look towards social complexes as the real seats of knowledge. But this is also important because my analysis pushes one to consider an alternative framing concept for epistemology?that of epistemic practises instead of epistemic agency. (shrink)

Karen Barad develops a view she calls ‘posthumanism,’ or ‘agential realism,’ where the human is reconfigured away from the central place of explanation, interpretation, intelligibility, and objectivity to make room for the epistemic importance of other material agents. Barad is not alone in this kind of endeavor, but her posthumanism offers a unique epistemological position. Her aim is to take a performative rather than a representationalist approach to analyzing ‘socialnatural’ practices and challenge methodological assumptions that may go unnoticed in some (...) disciplinary fields. Yet for all the good of the challenge, Barad must support it with sound epistemological theorizing, theorizing that would apply to any methodology, whether that be sociological, historical, anthropological, or philosophical. Thus, where one might critique Barad on her assessments of sociological, historical, or anthropological incorporations of humans and the nonhuman, I critique Barad’s epistemology on its sense of objectivity and dismissal of the centrality of the human. I argue that Barad’s epistemology must retain a particular form of humanism, a humanism that stakes human subjectivity as the locus of rationality and objectivity, without which it creates intractable problems. To recuperate Barad’s challenge to contest assumptive distinctions while avoiding her epistemological problems, I offer some parting reflections. (shrink)

In 1942, American Nobel Prize-winning physicist Arthur Compton pointed out that, “Because in this field of cosmic ray studies certain unique advantages are given by their geographical position, this field of physics has been especially emphasized in South America.” This paper seeks to interrogate the making of Latin America's uniqueness with respect to cosmic-ray research through an analysis that considers Compton's geographical argument, but also goes beyond it, referring to the interactions of nature, knowledge, practices, scientific communities, and diplomacy. To (...) begin with, it highlights the place-based strategies and practices associated with cosmic-ray research. Once research in the field at different altitudes demonstrated that cosmic rays traveled from outer space to the Earth surface, their nature was scrutinized by expeditions that covered broad vertical and horizontal expanses. The study of cosmic rays in Latin America displayed the mobilization of that strategy, which reinforced the reliability of certain sites located at high altitudes and close to the geomagnetic equator in projected investigations. Moreover, such analysis of cosmic rays involved research practices in the field, the emergence of (local, regional, or international) research traditions, and the creation of spaces of knowledge at different scales. By centering on the interaction of knowledge and place, this paper shows that an exploration of the “up-and-down journeys” of cosmic-ray research in Latin America expands our understanding of the geographies and practices of 20th-century physics. (shrink)

Study on the thought and activities of a mystic philosopher of India.

Background This article describes the issues encountered when designing a study to evaluate recruitment of minority ethnic groups into clinical cancer research in order to monitor adherence to the principles for good practice set out in the Department of Health, Research Governance Framework, England. Methods (i) A review of routine data sources to determine whether their usefulness as a source of data on prevalence of cancer in the population by ethnic category. (ii) A local case study at one hospital (...) trust to ascertain whether the ethnicity of cancer trial participants was representative of admitted cancer patients. Results (i) The lack of a comparator population makes it problematic to assess recruitment levels by ethnic group in clinical research. (ii) The odds of being in a trial were 30% lower for a member of a minority ethnic group compared to a white cancer patient after adjusting for disease, age and gender, OR 0.70 (0.53 to 0.94). These results differed for each ethnic group; Asian patients did not appear under-represented while Black and Chinese did so. However, there are important caveats to the findings based on the limited recording of ethnicity. Conclusions The lack of available data on the ethnicity of participants in clinical research and the prevalence of cancer in the population according to ethnicity makes it difficult to design a study to monitor representation of minority ethnic groups. This information is necessary to assess adherence to the Research Governance Framework principle that research evidence reflects the diversity of the population. (shrink)

Barry Barnes and David Bloor of the Strong Programme of the sociology of knowledge advance a naturalized epistemology that reduces all accounts of normativity to social causes. I endorse their program of naturalizing one kind of normativity, but I argue that there is another kind they cannot naturalize. Within the context of sociological explanations of rationality, there are norms of rationality instantiated by scientists that Barnes and Bloor study, and Barnes and Bloor's own normative ascriptions of scientists as rational beings. (...) I argue that Barnes and Bloor successfully justify their naturalization of the norms of rationality of the scientists they describe by a methodological caution and arguments from under-determination and finitism. But they inevitably fail to naturalize their own normative ascriptions of those scientists as rational. (shrink)

Human immunodeficiency virus and other sexually transmitted infections significantly burden youth 13–24 years of age in the United States. Directly engaging youth in sexual health research is a public health priority and urgently needed to develop targeted, youth-friendly, and culturally relevant HIV/sti prevention interventions. Controversies arise, however, regarding informed assent and consent, parental permission or consent, and the definition of “child”/“minor” as it relates to medical, legal, and ethical issues. In this article, we describe challenges in the human (...) subjects review processes that were undertaken before beginning an HIV/sti prevention research project with sexually active youth in an urban setting. These findings provide important contextual information to facilitate youth sexual health research and care, and Institutional Review Board approval processes with fewer delays. (shrink)

Sri Aurobindo Ghose , the Indian Nationalist and yogi, developed in the period of his life at Pondicherry in Southeast India a system of thought, practice and experience which he called ‘Integral Yoga’. The title indicated, he said, that ‘it takes up the essence and many processes of the old Yogas — its newness is in its aim, standpoint and the totality of its method’. In the development of Integral Yoga Aurobindo believed he was speaking and acting as a ‘realized (...) yogi’ or, better still, a yogi who was in the process of realization. He had not attained a final experience of jñāna , but he believed he had experienced levels of supra-mental consciousness which would lead to the higher level of Supermind itself. (shrink)

Atension exists in Foucault’s writings concerning his alleged antihumanism. While his early archaeological period is taken to sediment his post-structuralist, anti-humanist methodology, Foucault still lets humanism creep into his writing, particularly in his later work. In the spirit of charity, I consider two ways of reading Foucault to overcome this tension: either emphasize his post-structuralism over his humanist leanings or take his humanism seriously and minimize his post-structuralism. After analysis, neither reading is adequate. I conclude that Foucault’s oeuvre is best (...) understood simply as incongruent, contrary to his own remarks to unify his writings and methodologies. (shrink)

Many work on flushing out what our consciousness means in cognitive and phenomenological terms, but no one has yet connected the dots on how consciousness and truth intersect, much less how our phenomenal consciousness can form the ground for most of our models of truth. Here, I connect those dots and argue that the basic structure of our phenomenal consciousness grounds the nature of truth as concordance, to harmonize in agreement, and that most extant theories on truth are well explained (...) in that grounding. Said another way, the unifying and bifurcating intentional structure of phenomenal consciousness is the non-epistemic ground of truth, such that most theories of truth can be explained as particular expressions of concordance based upon the differing aspects of that ground. (shrink)

A couple and their five‐year‐old daughter are in a car accident. The parents are not expected to survive. The child is transported to a children's hospital, and urgent treatment decisions must be made. Whom should the attending physician approach to make decisions for the child? When such cases arise in, for example, the hospitals where we work, the social worker or chaplain is instructed to use the Illinois Health Care Surrogacy Act as a guidepost to identify a decision‐maker. But (...) in our state and the country overall, the limitations of such statutes leave hospital workers to make a judgment call among friends, family, and clergy who may come forward. While surrogate decision‐making statutes comprehensively address surrogate decision‐makers for adults, a patchwork of laws—permanency statutes, kinship provider statutes, standby guardianship statutes, and, in some cases, surrogate decision‐making statutes—provide variable decision‐making pathways for children. (shrink)

Jean-Paul Sartre is known for his analysis of human consciousness. Surprisingly, however, he never takes seriously what it might mean to theorize God’s existence through that same understanding of consciousness. In this paper, I endeavor that analysis and outline the Sartrean conscious God, where nothingness haunts God’s own being. My argument is not to prove God’s existence through a Sartrean theology. My argument is only that a Sartrean theology centered on the conscious God is fully consistent within Sartre’s existentialism and (...) that such a conception of God should appeal to the Christian. (shrink)

Used wisely the concepts of race and ethnicity in research have great potential, but used unwisely they can do immense damage. We need to consider the potential issues that might require a change of emphasis or application of ethics in a multi-ethnic society. Doing no harm is the most important ethical pillar in the ethnicity and health field. Ethnic differences can be used in damaging ways. Without the ethic of beneficence in place it is better not to draw attention (...) to ethnic differences. Respect is the pre-condition for autonomy. Autonomy of ethnic minority populations to live in their own traditional way is not easy to achieve in multi-ethnic societies. There are difficult issues in multi-ethnic societies that require great sensitivity to create a sense of fairness and justice. Justice is the core value that underpins equity. There is a deep paradox – to promote equality, we may need to treat people and groups unequally. Ethical codes need to be modified to emphasize the importance of including ethnic minority populations in research and not bypassing them, as has been happening. It is correct, for example, that potential research participants' personal details are guarded. If such a person, however, does not read it may be unethical to send written information about a project. It may be more ethical to tele phone or even call at the doorstep of such a person. The history of racism in research is worrying, not least the fear that it might return. We need a governing code of conduct. Ethical research can help ethnic minority groups to move from the shadows of society and participate in a vibrant, healthy, multi-ethnic society. (shrink)

Realism about the external world enjoys little philosophical support these days. I rectify this predicament by taking a relatively pragmatist line of thought to defend commonsense realism; I support commonsense realism through an interpretation and application of Donald Davidson’s notion of triangulation, the triangle composed of two communicators coordinating and correcting their responses with a shared causal stimulus. This argument is important because it has a crucial advantage over the often used abductive argument for realism. My argument avoids unwarranted conclusions, (...) whereas the abductive argument is “inflationary” because it reaches beyond the limits of evidence for its realist conclusion. To illustrate the problems of the abductive argument and motivate my Davidsonian approach, I take a brief look at the abductive argument for realism in Frederick Will’s work. (shrink)

In Heidi Grasswick?s response to ??Epistemological communities? and the problem of epistemic agency,? she criticizes my move to reconceptualize epistemology as an affair primarily centered on epistemic practises instead of epistemic agency. In this paper, I address some of Grasswick?s counterpoints, and I restate my argument for why epistemology should be centered on practises instead of epistemic agency. However, to advance the discussion, I urge that a more fruitful dialogue would engage looking at what consequences and advantages might follow from (...) reframing epistemology around practises. Therefore, I entertain an additional advantage this turn to practises makes regarding the danger of apriorism, the prior construction and application of theoretical structures upon groups of people and their practises without consideration for the actuality of these people and their practises. I argue that reorientating one?s epistemology around practises gives adequate grounds to avoid aprioristic tendencies, whereas an epistemology primarily centered on epistemic agency can fall into trouble. (shrink)

The paper focuses on the semantics of distributivity, grammatical number, and cardinality predicates. I argue that constructions involving so-called ‘dependent plurals’, i.e. plurals lacking cardinality predicates occurring in the scope of certain quantificational items such as all and most, pose a challenge to familiar semantic frameworks that distinguish between two sources of multiplicity: mereological plurality and distributive quantification. I argue that dependent plural readings should be analysed as distinct both from cumulative readings and distributive readings, in the classical sense. I (...) demonstrate how this can be accomplished in a semantic framework where expressions are evaluated relative to sets of assignments, or plural info states Proceedings of the 7th Amsterdam Colloquium, ILLC, University of Amsterdam, Amsterdam, 1990, in Dekker and Stokhof Proceedings of the 9th Amsterdam Colloquium, ILLC, University of Amsterdam, Amsterdam, 1994, Some aspects of the Internal Structure of Discourse. The Dynamics of Nominal Anaphora. PhD thesis, University of Amsterdam, 1996). The specific formal implementation is based on a modified version of Brasoveanu’s :129–209. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10988-008-9035-0, 2008) Plural Compositional DRT. In this framework we are able to distinguish between two types of distributivity: weak distributivity across the assignments in a single plural info state and strong distributivity across multiple info states. I argue that both of these types of distributivity play a role in the semantics of natural language, accounting for the contrasting properties of ‘singular quantifiers’, such as each and every, and ‘plural quantifiers’, such as all and most. The contrasting properties of bare plurals and plurals involving cardinality modifiers are analysed in terms of the distinction between state-level and assignment-level plurality. (shrink)