Offers a physical explanation of the Coriolis force. This book is useful for studying the hydrodynamics of the ocean and atmosphere. It also presents many aspects of classical mechanics/dynamics physics. It explains the complexities of this force, about which many scientists have had lingering uncertainties since it was first described in 1831.

In the last two centuries, our world would have been a safer place if philosophers such as Rousseau, Marx, and Nietzsche had not given intellectual encouragement to the radical ideologies of Jacobins, Stalinists, and fascists. Maybe the world would have been better off, from the standpoint of sound practice, if philosophers had engaged in only modest, decent theory, as did John Stuart Mill. Yet, as Ronald Beiner contends, the point of theory is not to think safe thoughts; the point is (...) to open intellectual horizons. In Philosophy in a Time of Lost Spirit, Beiner reflects on the dualism of theory and practice. The purpose of the theorist is not to offer sensible guidance on the conduct of social life but to test the boundaries of our vision of social order. Whereas the liberal citizen should embody the practical virtues of prudence and moderation, the theorist should be radical, probing, and immoderate. Looking back at the liberal-communitarian debate of the 1980s, Beiner recognizes that the antidote to our spiritless times lies neither in the embrace of community over individualism nor of individualism over community: both individual and community need to be submitted to radical questioning. It is by exposing ourselves to the challenge of fearless thinking encountered at the philosophical extremities that we are most likely to understand our own world at a deeper level. In this collection of essays and reviews, Ronald Beiner helps us to think critically about the thought-worlds of our foremost contemporary thinkers, including Hannah Arendt, Allan Bloom, Michel Foucault, Hans-Georg Gadamer, J¦rgen Habermas, Will Kymlicka, Christopher Lasch, Richard Rorty, Judith Shklar, Leo Strauss, Charles Taylor, and Michael Walzer. (shrink)

Ernest Gellner's final book, first published in 1998, is a synoptic interpretation of the thought of Wittgenstein and Malinowski.

Democracy has been a flawed hegemony since the fall of communism. Its flexibility, its commitment to equality of representation, and its recognition of the legitimacy of opposition politics are all positive features for political institutions. But democracy has many deficiencies: it is all too easily held hostage by powerful interests; it often fails to advance social justice; and it does not cope well with a number of features of the political landscape, such as political identities, boundary disputes, and environmental crises. (...) Although democracy is valuable it fits uneasily with other political values and is in many respects less than equal to the demands it confronts. In this volume prominent political theorists and social scientists present original discussions of such central issues. Democracy's Values deals with the nature and value of democracy, particularly the tensions between it and such goods as justice, equality, efficiency, and freedom. (shrink)

The papers collected in this volume exemplify some of the trends in current approaches to logic, language and computation. Written by authors with varied academic backgrounds, the contributions are intended for an interdisciplinary audience. The first part of this volume addresses issues relevant for multi-agent systems: reasoning with incomplete information, reasoning about knowledge and beliefs, and reasoning about games. Proofs as formal objects form the subject of Part II. Topics covered include: contributions on logical frameworks, linear logic, and different approaches (...) to formalized reasoning. Part III focuses on representations and formal methods in linguistic theory, addressing the areas of comparative and temporal expressions, modal subordination, and compositionality. (shrink)

Doctoral programs at U.S. universities play a critical role in the development of human resources both in the United States and abroad. This volume reports the results of an extensive study of U.S. research-doctorate programs in five broad fields: physical sciences and mathematics, engineering, social and behavioral sciences, biological sciences, and the humanities. Research-Doctorate Programs in the United States documents changes that have taken place in the size, structure, and quality of doctoral education since the widely used 1982 editions. (...) This update provides selected information on nearly 4,000 doctoral programs in 41 subdisciplines at 274 doctorate-granting institutions. This volume also reports the results of the National Survey of Graduate Faculty, which polled a sample of faculty for their views on the scholarly quality of program faculty and the effectiveness of doctoral programs in preparing research scholars/scientists. This much-anticipated update of such an essential reference will be useful to education administrators, university faculty, and students seeking authoritative information on doctoral programs. (shrink)

The papers in this volume reflect much of the current unease of a world that perceives itself once more at the edge of chaos. The authors present different vistas of that experience and their inherent dialectic, expressed in numerous and ceaseless conflicts between ordering and disordering processes. They can be read as comments on the ongoing processes that lead toward greater complexity.

Most clinicians take for granted a simple, reductionist understanding of medical knowledge that is at odds with how they actually practice medicine; routine medical decisions incorporate more complicated kinds of information than most standard accounts of medical reasoning suggest. A better understanding of the structure and function of knowledge in medicine can lead to practical improvements in clinical medicine. This understanding requires some familiarity with epistemology, the study of knowledge and its structure, in medicine. Michael Polanyi's theory of tacit (...) knowing is advanced as the basis for developing a more accurate understanding of medical knowledge. Tacit knowing, which explores the taken-for-granted background knowledge that underlies all human knowing, is explained in detail with a focus on its relevance for clinical medicine. The implications of recognizing tacit knowing in medicine and medical decisions are discussed. These include the ability to explain the importance of the clinical encounter in medical practice, mechanisms for analysing patient and doctor as persons, and the need for humility given the uncertainty that the tacit dimension injects into all medical decisions. This more robust medical epistemology allows clinicians to better articulate the nature and importance of patient-centred care, to avoid pitfalls inherent in reductionist approaches to medical knowledge, and to think more clearly about the relationships between medicine and health care at the individual and population levels. (shrink)

Current work in language models (LMs) helps us speed up or even skip thinking by accelerating and automating cognitive work. But can LMs help us with critical thinking -- thinking in deeper, more reflective ways which challenge assumptions, clarify ideas, and engineer new concepts? We treat philosophy as a case study in critical thinking, and interview 21 professional philosophers about how they engage in critical thinking and on their experiences with LMs. We find that philosophers do not find LMs (...) to be useful because they lack a sense of selfhood (memory, beliefs, consistency) and initiative (curiosity, proactivity). We propose the selfhood-initiative model for critical thinking tools to characterize this gap. Using the model, we formulate three roles LMs could play as critical thinking tools: the Interlocutor, the Monitor, and the Respondent. We hope that our work inspires LM researchers to further develop LMs as critical thinking tools and philosophers and other 'critical thinkers' to imagine intellectually substantive uses of LMs. (shrink)

In both law and ethics, precedent shapes the deliberation of novel issues. Despite the interconnection between new and old decisions, few research ethics boards have an explicit mechanism for archiving issue-based research ethics decisions to inform future decisions. With the intent of promoting expediency, consistency, and accountability in REB decision-making, Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre implemented a “decision bank”: a formal mechanism for systematically capturing institutional REB decisions. We describe the development of the decision bank, its implementation, and the lessons (...) we have learned from both. The decision bank, which is categorized by general issue themes such as consent, study design, and privacy, is still in the early implementation phase, but it provides a much-needed method to address the paucity of formal mechanisms and literature in a biomedical field otherwise inundated with evidence-based information. (shrink)

For the first time a complete medieval logical textbook has now been translated into English, accompanied by a lengthy introduction and very full notes. The original Latin text is not presented, but key sections of it are added in brackets at appropriate points. In general, the contents of this volume would serve quite well as an initiation into the style, topics and history of medieval logic, as well as into some of the discussions which currently centre around that logic. (...) They would have served even better had the translation been accompanied by the Latin text, since anyone interested enough to pursue the notes would surely have some acquaintance with the Latin which is essential for study in this field. It is hence rather difficult to imagine the exact type of student for whom the book as it stands is intended. (shrink)

Little is known about the aims and impact of university-based ethics centers. Less is known about how centers leverage their unique campus positions to engage undergraduates in transformative ethics education. This article provides a foundation for future research on university-based ethics centers. First, this article addresses the history of ethics education in higher education, the rise of university ethics centers, and the factors necessary for successful ethics programs. Next, this piece shows the geographic distribution of ethics centers and which centers (...) provide undergraduate-focused ethics education. Finally, this article enables future research on effective ethics center structure, leadership, and outreach. (shrink)

This study investigated the link between meditation, self-reported mindfulness and cognitive flexibility as well as other attentional functions. It compared a group of meditators experienced in mindfulness meditation with a meditation-naïve control group on measures of Stroop interference and the “d2-concentration and endurance test”. Overall the results suggest that attentional performance and cognitive flexibility are positively related to meditation practice and levels of mindfulness. Meditators performed significantly better than non-meditators on all measures of attention. Furthermore, self-reported mindfulness was higher (...) in meditators than non-meditators and correlations with all attention measures were of moderate to high strength. This pattern of results suggests that mindfulness is intimately linked to improvements of attentional functions and cognitive flexibility. The relevance of these findings for mental balance and well-being are discussed. (shrink)

Developmental origins of health and disease and epigenetics have expanded understanding of how the environment affects the health of women before and during pregnancy—with lifelong health consequences for the fetus. This has translated to a narrow focus on women’s lifestyle during pregnancy, especially for women classified as obese. In this study, we show that psychosocial harms such as distress or shame felt by pregnant women are rarely countenanced in these endeavors. To demonstrate this, we examine published documents about a (...) large set of trials of lifestyle interventions united through an international consortium. Yet there is now a literature in which pregnant women with large bodies report feeling humiliated and a wider literature on the stigma of obesity. We argue that shame is produced and reproduced through the discursive and material knowledge-making scientific practices of DOHaD translation. Interventions that intensify the shame of large body size in pregnancy may be stressful, and neurophysiological stress pathways are well-known within DOHaD to have consequences for fetal development, so these interventions potentially undermine the very processes they set out to protect. A feminist response may protect women from shame and redirect attention to the social and structural determinants of health. (shrink)

This work seeks to develop a Kantian ethical theory in terms of a general ontology of values and norms together with a metaphysics of the person that makes sense of this ontology. It takes as its starting point Kant’s assertion that a good will is the only thing that has an unconditioned value and his accompanying view that the highest good consists in virtue and happiness in proportion to virtue. The soundness of Kant’s position on the value of the good (...) will is defended against criticisms directed against it by G. E. Moore and it is argued that there is an ambiguity in Moore’s notion of ‘intrinsic value’ that makes him unable to fully understand and appreciate the Kantian view. It is also argued that the special value of moral goodness has been unduly neglected in modern moral philosophy, even by those working in the Kantian tradition, and it is suggested that the possibility of a Kantian ethical theory centred on the notion of the highest good remains to be explored. In order to lay the ground for such a theory a Kantian approach to reasons for action and the metaphysics of the person is developed and defended, albeit in a way that, in contrast to Kant himself, emphasizes the social dimension inherent in being a person and acting on reasons. It is also argued that there exists what Henry Sidgwick has called a dualism of practical reason, which means that there are two systematic modes, the self-interested and the moral, of approaching action. These two modes correspond to the two components of the highest good as understood by Kant and it is argued that the highest good represents a reasonable way of unifying them. These two parts of the highest good are then considered, each in turn, and Kantian models for understanding them are elaborated and defended against main rivals. On the matter of happiness, it is argued that standard philosophical theories fail to properly account for the way in which a subject’s own opinions about what constitutes her happiness are important in determining where her happiness actually lies. On the matter of morality, Kantianism is contrasted with consequentialism, the other leading theory that understands morality in terms of an ideal of impartiality and it is argued that the Kantian ideal, which can be called ‘impartiality as universalizability’ is superior to the consequentialist one, which can be called ‘impartiality as impersonality’. A version of Kantian ethics that places its emphasis on the Formula of Universal Law is then elaborated and it is argued that it is reasonable to understand maxims, or at least those maxims eligible for the universalizability test, as having to do with the basic general principles according to which we live. This kind of interpretation creates a large room for the exercise of judgment on the part of the agent and it is suggested that the standards according to which such judgment is exercised are largely determined through our actual moral practices and discourses. (shrink)

Cardiovascular disease (CVD) and sustained high blood glucose as prediabetes are an established comorbidity. People's experience in reconciling these long‐term conditions requires deeper appreciation if nurses are to more effectively support person‐centred care for people who have them. Our analysis explores the initial experience of people admitted to hospital with CVD who then find they also have sustained high blood glucose. Our methodology is informed by the philosophy of Gadamer and applies interpretive description to develop an interpretation of participant experiences. (...) The major theme emerging from participant interviews was the ‘invisible disequilibrium’ characterised by three subthemes: ‘losing equilibrium’, ‘becoming embattled’ and ‘evolving illness’. This study examines CVD and prediabetes in conjunction with the Gadamerian notion of the ‘whole’, as being in a social and emotional world in which illness is also a component part. We explore how participants lived within an ‘invisible disequilibrium’, with prediabetes frequently remaining unnoticed, while CVD was manifest. To identify multiple conditions and support effective intervention to manage them as part of person‐centric care, nursing practice should explore the ‘whole’ of the person's experience, value people’s knowledge as potential indicators of complex illness, thereby reducing the risk of accelerating complex illness. (shrink)

This essay surveys recent discussion of the problem of form in literary studies, identifies several ways in which the notion of form might be expanded, and suggests ways in which such an expanded category of form might be useful to historians of science and literary critics alike.

Do children have a theory of mind? If they do, at what age is it acquired? What is the content of the theory, and how does it differ from that of adults? The Child's Theory of Mind integrates the diverse strands of this rapidly expanding field of study. It charts children's knowledge about a fundamental topic - the mind - and characterizes that developing knowledge as a coherent commonsense theory, strongly advancing the understanding of everyday theories as well as (...) the commonsense theory of mind. Wellman presents evidence that children as young as age three do possess a commonsense theory of mind - that they grasp the distinction between mental constructs and physical entities and that they have an understanding of the relationship between individuals' mental states and their overt actions. He delves in detail into questions about the nature of adults' commonsense theories of mind and about the nature of commonsense theories. Wellman then examines the content of the three-year-old's theory of mind, the nature of children's notions of mind before age three, the changes in the theory during subsequent development from ages three to six, and the young child's conception of mind in comparison with those of older children and adults. Henry M. Wellman is a Professor in the Department of Psychology and the Center for Human Growth and Development at the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor. (shrink)

Plato is a much more experimental philosopher, this book argues, than most commentators acknowledge. Supporting this position, Henry Teloh combines exegesis of particular passages with a synoptic view of Plato's philosophical development through his early, middle, and late dialogues. The result is a study of Plato's ideas with a more ambitious scope than any since W. D. Ross's in 1951,The book chronicles Plato's changing interests through a focus on his ontological commitments—that is, on the types of entities he (...) addresses. It also traces many of the assumptions in Plato's thought back to their sources in pre-Socratic philosophy. By depicting the changes in Plato's thought from one period of dialogue composition to another, and by seeking to explain these changes from textual evidence, this book offers an appealing introduction to Plato for all humanists. (shrink)

Dialectical materialism was born in 1857, when Marx returned to studying Hegel. In opposition to Hegel, Marx adopted a realist epistemology. Abandoning the pragmatist ambiguities of his Economic?Philosophical Manuscripts, he became a materialist in the traditional sense of that word. Influenced by Hegel, Marx simultaneously attempted a dialectical proof for the labor theory of value. Abandoning his positivist critique in The Holy Family, he started using dialectic to discover beneath appearances an otherwise inaccessible reality. But his dialectic was incompatible with (...) his materialism. The identification of reality with Praxis, rejected at the level of philosophical statement, was retained at the level of economic argument. Turning Hegel upside down proved harder than Marx thought. (shrink)

In the process of implementing an ethical code of conduct, a business organization uses formal methods. Of these, training, courses and means of enforcement are common and are also suitable for self-regulation. The USA is encouraging business corporations to self regulate with the Federal Sentencing Guidelines (FSG). The Guidelines prescribe similar formal methods and specify that, unless such methods are used, the process of implementation will be considered ineffective, and the business will therefore not be considered to have complied with (...) the guidelines. Business organizations invest enormous funds on formal methods. However, recent events indicate that these are not, by themselves, yielding the desired results. Our study, based on a sample of 812 employees and conducted in an Israeli subsidiary of a leading multinational High-Tech corporation headquartered in the US, indicates that, of the methods used in the process of implementation, one of the informal methods (namely, the social norms of the organization) is perceived by employees to have the most influence on their conduct. This result, when examined against employee tenure, remains relatively stable over the years, and stands in contradistinction to the formalistic approach embedded in the FSG. We indirectly measure the effectiveness of the percieved most influential implementation process methods by analyzing their impact on employee attitudes (namely, personal ethical commitment and employees'' commitment to organizational values). Our results indicate that the informal methods (manager sets an example or social norms of the organization) are likely to yield greater commitment with respect to both employee attitudes than the formal method (training and courses on the subject of ethics). The personal control method (my own personal values) differs significantly from all the other methods in that it yields the highest degree of personal ethical commitment and the lowest degree of employees'' commitment to organizational values. (shrink)

In his new book the eminent Kant scholar Henry Allison provides an innovative and comprehensive interpretation of Kant's concept of freedom. The author analyzes the concept and discusses the role it plays in Kant's moral philosophy and psychology. He also considers in full detail the critical literature on the subject from Kant's own time to the present day. In the first part Professor Allison argues that at the centre of the Critique of Pure Reason there is the foundation (...) for a coherent general theory of rational agency. The second part employs this account of rational agency as a key to understanding Kant's concept of moral agency and associated moral psychology. The third part focuses on Kant's attempt to ground both moral law and freedom in the Groundwork and the Critique of Practical Reason. This is a major contribution to the interpretation of Kant which will be of special interest to scholars and graduate students of Kant's moral theory. (shrink)

Organizations continue to show renewed focus on managing their ethics programs by developing organizational infrastructures to support their ethics implementation efforts. An important part of this process has been the creation of an ethics officer position. Whether individuals appointed to the position are successful in the role or not may depend on a number of factors. This study presents a suggested framework for their effectiveness. The framework includes a focus on personal, organizational and situational factors to predict performance in (...) the role. The study examines the complex nature of the role. These include task complexity, low task visibility, role conflict, and role ambiguity. Personal, organizational and situational factors that can serve as buffers against the complexities associated with the role are presented. The study suggests that individuals with certain competencies and orientations may be better suitable for the ethics position, and firms need to consider key organizational and situational issues critical to the performance of an ethics officer. The research and practice implications of the study are given. (shrink)

The practice of evidence based medicine has changed the role of the physician from information dispenser to gatherer and analyser. Studies and controlled trials that may contain unknown errors, or uncertainties, are the primary sources for evidence based decisions in medicine. These sources may be corrupted by a number of means, such as inaccurate statistical analysis, statistical manipulation, population bias, or relevance to the patient in question. Regardless of whether any of these inaccuracies are apparent, the uncertainty of their presence (...) in physician information should be disclosed to the patient. These uncertainties are not, however, shared by physicians with patients, and have caused a direct increase in patient responsibilities and mistrust. Only when disclosure of uncertainty becomes commonplace in medical practice will the physician/patient relationship evolve to a level of greater understanding and satisfaction for both the physician and patient. (shrink)

In the Germany of the 1860s and 1870s, the problem of the value of life was urgently debated, as a consequence of the two culture-defining systems of thought that had risen to prominence in those decades—Schopenhauerian Weltschmerz and the theory of evolution—and the degree to which they could be reconciled. On one hand, the struggle for existence affirmed the pessimistic inference as to the suffering and meaninglessness of the cosmos; on the other, it appeared to promise moral and material improvement (...) in human affairs. This article reconstructs the historical connections between the emergence of pessimism and Darwinism, most clearly represented by the work of Eduard von Hartmann, and it argues that Nietzsche’s programmatic statements on life, culture, and pessimism, from the Untimely Meditations on, are best understood in light of this context and his engagement with Hartmann’s writings. (shrink)

Interdisciplinary work is intractable because the search for knowledge in different fields entails different interests, and thereby different values too; and the different possibilities of knowledge about different subjects also lead to different epistemologies. Thus differ ences among practitioners of the various disciplines are pervasive and aptly described as cultural ones, and interdisciplinary work requires transcending unconscious habits of thought. The more those unconscious habits are explicated and the more we under stand how the disparate characteristics of the various intellectual (...) cultures are related to the necessarily different interests, values, and epistemologies, the more feasible becomes the goal of transcending thought habits. Two sorts of interdisciplinary effort seem to have been successful: specific, delimited problems have been solved by teams in what is actually multidisciplinary rather than interdisciplinary work, and new disciplines have sprung up at the intersections of existing ones. STS fits neither of those patterns. Can it nevertheless be viable? (shrink)

This article undertakes to examine the reception of Platonic theories of falsification in the contemporary philosophy of Leo Strauss and his adherents. The aim of the article is to consider the Straussian response to, and interaction with, Platonic ideas concerning deception and persuasion with an emphasis on the arguments found in the Laws. The theme of central interest in this analysis is Plato’s development of paramyth in the Laws. Paramyth entails the use of rhetorical language in order to persuade the (...) many that it is to their advantage to obey certain laws. It does so without explaining in detail why a given law is ethically correct and its use assumes that the audience, on the whole, is not capable of understanding the finer philosophical underpinnings of the law. The so-called ‘noble lie’ of the Republic is also considered in this context. The crucial issue, for Plato if not for Strauss, is whether or not an instance of falsification, however minor, for the purposes of persuasion contains ‘truth-value’, that is, whether it is morally justifiable in terms of ends and means. In terms of Strauss’s reception of Plato, such issues as ancient Hebrew mysticism, Medieval Jewish and Islamic scholarship and Heideggerian Phenomenology figure in the argument. Ultimately, the article finds that Strauss and his followers have constructed a particular view of Platonic ideas that, while unique, is not compatible with their original signification. (shrink)

Bourdieu suggested that the habitus contains the ‘genetic information’ which both allows and disposes successive generations to reproduce the world they inherit from their parents’ generation. While his writings on habitus are concerned with embodied dispositions, biological processes are not a feature of the practical reason of habitus. Recent critiques of the separate worlds of biology and culture, and the rise in epigenetics, provide new opportunities for expanding theoretical concepts like habitus. Using obesity science as a case study we (...) attempt to conceptualise the enfolding of biological and social processes (via a Deleuzian metaphor) to develop a concept of biohabitus – reconfiguring how social and biological environments interact across the life course, and may be transmitted and transformed intergenerationally. In conclusion we suggest that the enfolding and reproduction of social life that Bourdieu articulated as habitus is a useful theoretical frame that can be enhanced to critically develop epigenetic understandings of obesity, and vice versa. (shrink)

This article advances theory on social movements’ strategic adaptation to political opportunity structures by incorporating a narrative perspective. Our theory explains how people acquire and use knowledge about political opportunity structures through storytelling about the movement’s past, present, and imagined future. The discussion applies the theory in an ethnographic case study of the climate movement’s mobilization around the UN Climate Summit in Paris, 2015. This analysis demonstrates how a dominant narrative of defeat about the prior protest campaign in Copenhagen, (...) 2009 shaped the strategizing process. While those who experienced Copenhagen as a success preferred strategic continuity, those who experienced defeat developed a “Copenhagen narrative” to advance strategic adaptation by projecting previously experienced threats and opportunities onto the Paris campaign. Yet by relying on a retrospective narrative, movement actors tended to overlook emerging political opportunities. We demonstrate that narrative analysis is a useful tool for understanding the link between structure and agency in social movements and other actors affected by (political) opportunity structures. (shrink)

Autonomous vehicles are one of the most spectacular recent developments of Artificial Intelligence. Among the problems that still need to be solved before they can fully autonomously participate in traffic is the one of making their behaviour conform to the traffic laws. This paper discusses this problem by way of a case study of Dutch traffic law. First it is discussed to what extent Dutch traffic law exhibits features that are traditionally said to pose challenges for AI & Law (...) models, such as exceptions, rule conflicts, open texture and vagueness, rule change, and the need for commonsense knowledge. Then three approaches to the design of law-conforming AV are evaluated in light of the challenges posed by Dutch traffic law, which includes an assessment of the usefulness of AI & Law models of nonmonotonic reasoning, argumentation and case-based reasoning. (shrink)

Few if any philosophical schools have championed family values as persistently as the early Confucians, and a great deal can be learned by attending to what they had to say on the subject. In the Confucian tradition, human morality and the personal realization it inspires are grounded in the cultivation of family feeling. One may even go so far as to say that, for China, family reverence was a necessary condition for developing any of the other human qualities of excellence. (...) On the basis of the present translation of the Xiaojing (Classic of Family Reverence) and supplemental passages found in other early philosophical writings, Professors Rosemont and Ames articulate a specifically Confucian conception of "role ethics" that, in its emphasis on a relational conception of the person, is markedly different from most early and contemporary dominant Western moral theories. This Confucian role ethics takes as its inspiration the perceived necessity of family feeling as the entry point in the development of moral competence and as a guide to the religious life as well. In the lengthy introduction, two senior scholars offer their perspective on the historical, philosophical, and religious dimensions of the Xiaojing. Together with this introduction, a lexicon of key terms presents a context for the Xiaojing and provides guidelines for interpreting the text historically in China as well as suggesting its contemporary significance for all societies. The inclusion of the Chinese text adds yet another dimension to this important study. The Chinese Classic of Family Reverence is sure to appeal to specialists of comparative and Chinese philosophy and to all readers interested in the enduring importance of the family. (shrink)

In discussions of ‘religion-and-science’, faith is usually emphasized more than works, scientists’ beliefs more than their deeds. By reversing the priority, a lingering puzzle in the life of Ronald Aylmer Fisher , statistician, eugenicist and founder of the neo-Darwinian synthesis, can be solved. Scholars have struggled to find coherence in Fisher’s simultaneous commitment to Darwinism, Anglican Christianity and eugenics. The problem is addressed by asking what practical mode of faith or faithful mode of practice lent unity to his life? Families, (...) it is argued, with their myriad practical, emotional and intellectual challenges, rendered a mathematically-based eugenic Darwinian Christianity not just possible for Fisher, but vital. (shrink)

John Pollock (1940?2009) was an influential American philosopher who made important contributions to various fields, including epistemology and cognitive science. In the last 25 years of his life, he also contributed to the computational study of defeasible reasoning and practical cognition in artificial intelligence. He developed one of the first formal systems for argumentation-based inference and he put many issues on the research agenda that are still relevant for the argumentation community today. This paper presents an appreciation of Pollock's (...) work on defeasible reasoning and its relevance for the computational study of argument. In our opinion, Pollock deserves to be remembered as one of the founding fathers of the field of computational argument, while, moreover, his work contains important lessons for current research in this field, reminding us of the richness of its object of study. (shrink)

BackgroundBiobanks have recently been established in several low- and middle-income countries in the Arab region of the Middle East. We aimed to explore the views of biobank managers regarding the challenges, ethical issues, and governance arrangements of their biobanks.MethodsIn-depth semi-structured qualitative interviews were conducted with a purposive sample of eight biobank managers from Egypt, Jordan, and Sudan. Interviews were performed either face-to-face, by phone, or via Zoom and lasted approximately 45–75 min. After verbal consent, interviews were recorded and then transcribed. (...) The authors performed a thematic analysis of the transcripts independently and then integrated the themes via a consensus process.ResultsBiobank managers discussed the main challenges in establishing their biobanks. These included the staff’s lack of experience and training, limited funds, deficit awareness of biobanks, obtaining funding from different sources. Only four reported they were active in distributing biospecimens and health data to researchers. Six biobanks used a broad consent model, one used tiered consent, and another allowed participants to opt-out of being recontacted. Five managers avoided partnerships with pharmaceutical companies due to concerns with unfavorable reactions from the community. Five managers did not have clear policies for returning research results to the donors. Five expressed challenges with sample and data sharing with international collaborators; all five used material transfer agreements. The biobank managers revealed variable governance arrangements and activities with community involving awareness and educational efforts rather than active engagement. Several expressed the importance of transparency with the operations of their biobanks and gaining the trust of their stakeholders.ConclusionManagers of biobanks in LMICs in the Arab Middle East encounter financial, operational, and social challenges toward their sustainability efforts. Discussions with key stakeholders are warranted to manage ethical issues involving informed consent, privacy, data sharing, and the return of results. We recommend that biobank managers in the Arab Middle East form collaborative networks within the region and internationally, develop trusting governance relationships with their stakeholders, and pursue engagement activities with their communities to enhance trust. (shrink)

This article investigates how firms address the stability-change paradox inherent in sustainability transitions through the maintenance and utilization of a portfolio of sustainability-oriented partnerships. Drawing on a retrospective case study of Dong/Ørsted, a Danish energy company, we demonstrate the varying manifestations of the stability-change paradox during different phases of the company’s transition, influenced by both exogenous and endogenous factors. Furthermore, our findings reveal how Dong/Ørsted employed their partnership portfolio to implement diverse responses to manage the paradox. Based on these (...) findings, we argue that partnership portfolios can serve as spatiotemporal pockets, enabling organizations to effectively address and leverage the temporal and spatial aspects inherent in sustainability paradoxes. In addition, we highlight how partnership portfolios facilitate sustainability transitions by creating and leveraging different forms of collaborative value. (shrink)

This paper reports research concerning a suitable dialogue model for human computer debate. In particular, we consider the adoption of Moore's (1993) utilization of Mackenzie's (1979) game DC, means of using computational agents as the test-bed to facilitate evaluation of the proposed model, and means of using the evaluation results as motivation to further develop a dialogue model, which can prevent fallacious argument and common errors. It is anticipated that this work will contribute toward the development of human computer (...) dialogue, and help to illuminate research issues in the field of dialectics itself. (shrink)

This study constitutes an ethical analysis through the lens of distributive justice in the case of the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP), which was enacted in the midst of the Great Recession of 2007–2009. It begins by engaging with the visions of justice constructed by John Rawls and Robert Nozick, using their insights to locate the injustices of TARP according to their moral imaginations. However, this study argues that Rawls’ and Nozick’s theories of justice primarily envision the nature (...) of law as being restrictive of vice, not as instructors of virtue. Thus, it resources the legal philosophy of St. Thomas Aquinas to demonstrate how the positive pedagogy of law can enable a more just construction of economic rescue legislation, one that not only prevents future repetitions of economic vices and injustice, but is also formative for a society that prizes economic justice and virtues. In doing so, the study proposes two criteria for a more just consideration of economic rescue legislation that embraces law’s positive pedagogy. (shrink)

This landmark book is now reissued in a new edition that has been vastly rewritten and updated to respond to recent Kantian literature. It includes a new discussion of the Third Analogy, a greatly expanded discussion of Kant’s _Paralogisms, _and entirely new chapters dealing with Kant’s theory of reason, his treatment of theology, and the important Appendix to the Dialectic. _Praise for the earlier edition: _ “Probably the most comprehensive and substantial study of the Critique of Pure Reason written (...) by any American philosopher.... This is a splendid book.”—Lewis White Beck “This masterful study... will most certainly join the canon of required reading for future interpreters of Kant’s theoretical philosophy. Superbly organized and lucidly written.”—Garrett Green, _Journal of Religion_. (shrink)