The central contention of theories of deliberative democracy is that deliberative arrangements should encourage the support of interests that are general to all. Democratic theorists have also suggested that the natural environment will be a likely beneficiary following public deliberation, given the inherent rationality in supporting interests that will lead to the long-term survival of the planet. This paper addresses the question of general environmental interests through two case studies in Australian local government and argues there are at least three (...) factors that affect the ability of notionally deliberative arrangements to deliver outcomes that appear favourable to the natural environment. (shrink)

The Human Genome Project is regarded by many as one of the major scientific achievements in recent science history, a large-scale endeavour that is changing the way in which biomedical research is done and expected, moreover, to yield considerable benefit for society. Thus, since the completion of the human genome sequencing effort, a debate has emerged over the question whether this effort merits to be awarded a Nobel Prize and if so, who should be the one to receive it, as (...) no more than three individuals can be selected. In this article, the HGP is taken as a case study to consider the ethical question to what extent it is still possible, in an era of big science, of large-scale consortia and global team work, to acknowledge and reward individual contributions to important breakthroughs in biomedical fields. Is it still viable to single out individuals for their decisive contributions in order to reward them in a fair and convincing way? Whereas the concept of the Nobel prize as such seems to reflect an archetypical view of scientists as solitary researchers who, at a certain point in their careers, make their one decisive discovery, this vision has proven to be problematic from the very outset. Already during the first decade of the Nobel era, Ivan Pavlov was denied the Prize several times before finally receiving it, on the basis of the argument that he had been active as a research manager rather than as a researcher himself. The question then is whether, in the case of the HGP, a research effort that involved the contributions of hundreds or even thousands of researchers worldwide, it is still possible to “individualise” the Prize? The “HGP Nobel Prize problem” is regarded as an exemplary issue in current research ethics, highlighting a number of quandaries and trends involved in contemporary life science research practices more broadly. (shrink)

The existing scholarship has developed six main explanations to account for the success of the Chinese Revolution, which has been anomalous for major paradigms derived from cross-national comparisons. Methodologically, we use a social geographical approach to test these existing explanations systematically by constructing and analyzing a unique dataset of Communist growth in 93 counties in the three most contested provinces during its most pivotal period of ascendence. Theoretically, we advance and test an alternative perspective, based on the groundwork of Tocqueville (...) and Fei Xiaotong, that integrates the state-centric theory, elite theory, and cultural analysis. Our perspective emphasizes the interplay between state centralization and local elite structure, which leads to intensified state extraction and local elite fracturing, thus creating favorable conditions for revolution. The quantitative analysis strongly supports the importance of the Japanese invasion but provides limited support for many other conventional explanations. The analysis largely confirms the Tocqueville-Fei perspective on state centralization, elite fracturing, cultural change, and revolution. The findings are buttressed by a detailed case study of Lianshui County. The study unveils a common structural challenge that a modernizing state faces in an agrarian status society, to recreate its political legitimacy while disrupting local elite structure. It also sheds historical light on the evolution of state-society relationship through the Chinese Revolution. (shrink)

This paper explores the effects of incidental guilt on Socially Responsible Investment (SRI) decisions of retail investors. Do investors who feel guilty invest more in SRIs to clear their conscience? Are guilty investors willing to sacrifice returns to restore their moral selves? Using survey data from an online quasi-experiment among a sample of US retail investors, we find that individuals who experience incidental guilt are willing to invest more in SRI funds than those in a neutral state. We show that (...) this effect, albeit moderate in magnitude, cannot be explained solely by differences in retail investors’ moral reasoning, attitudes towards social responsibility, risk tolerance and demographic factors. When presented with a trade-off between sustainability, risk and return characteristics of the funds, guilty investors are more willing to sacrifice returns for greater sustainability than non-guilty participants. Our research provides new evidence of the effect that incidental guilt has on the sustainable investing decisions of retail investors. (shrink)

Introduction 'Indoctrination' belongs to a family of concepts which includes ' teaching', 'education', 'instruction', and 'learning'. ...

Gatchel, R. H. The evolution of the concept.--Wilson, J. Indoctrination and rationality.--Green, T. F. Indoctrination and beliefs.--Kilpatrick, W. H. Indoctrination and respect for persons.--Atkinson, R. F. Indoctrination and moral education.--Flew, A. Indoctrination and doctrines.--Moore, W. Indoctrination and democratic method.--Wilson, J. Indoctrination and freedom.--Flew, A. Indoctrination and religion.-- White, J. P. Indoctrination and intentions.--Crittenden, B. S. Indoctrination as mis-education.--Snook, I. A. Indoctrination and moral responsibility.--Gregory, I. M. M. and Woods, R. G. Indoctrination: inculcating doctrines.-- White, J. P. Indoctrination without doctrines?

Epistemic logic is one of the most exciting areas in medieval philosophy. Neglected almost entirely after the end of the Middle Ages, it has been rediscovered by philosophers of the twentieth century. Epistemic Logic in the Later Middle Ages provides the first comprehensive study of the subject. Ivan Boh explores the contrast between epistemic and alethic conceptions of consequence, the general epistemic rules of consequence, the search for conditions of knowing contingent propositions, the problems of substitutivity in intentional contexts, (...) the considerations of epistemic/doxastic iterated modalities, and the problems of composite and divided senses in authors ranging from Abelard to Frachantian. Boh concludes with a comparison between medieval endeavors and the epistemic logic of our own times. Written in a clear and readable style with minimal symbolic apparatus, this book employs modern symbolism and conceptual frameworks, and complements the studies of the syntacticand semantic dimensions of medieval logic. (shrink)

_Epistemic Logic_ studies statements containing verbs such as 'know' and 'wish'. It is one of the most exciting areas in medieval philosophy. Neglected almost entirely after the end of the Middle Ages, it has been rediscovered by philosophers of the present century. This is the first comprehensive study of the subject. Ivan Boh explores the rules for entailment between epistemic statements, the search for the conditions of knowing contingent propositions, the problems of substitutivity in intentional contexts, the relationship between (...) epistemic and modal logic, and the problems of composite and divided senses in authors ranging from Abelard to Frachantian. (shrink)

This paper addresses the two interpretations that a combination ofnegative indefinites can get in concord languages like French:a concord reading, which amounts to a single negation, and a doublenegation reading. We develop an analysis within a polyadic framework,where a sequence of negative indefinites can be interpreted as aniteration of quantifiers or via resumption. The first option leadsto a scopal relation, interpreted as double negation. The secondoption leads to the construction of a polyadic negative quantifiercorresponding to the concord reading. Given that (...) sentential negationparticipates in negative concord, we develop an extension of thepolyadic approach which can deal with non-variable binding operators,treating the contribution of negation in a concord context assemantically empty. Our semantic analysis, incorporated into agrammatical analysis formulated in HPSG, crucially relies on theassumption that quantifiers can be combined in more than one wayupon retrieval from the quantifier store. We also considercross-linguistic variation regarding the participation ofsentential negation in negative concord. (shrink)

If we are to believe the proponents of the Theory of Practice and of Rational Choice, the gap between these two paradigmatic approaches cannot be bridged. They rely on ontological premises, theories of motivations and causal models that stand too far apart. In this article, I argue that this theoretical antinomy loses much of its edge when we take as objects of sociological investigation processes of historical change, that is, when we try to specify in theoretical terms how and in (...) which conditions historical actors enact and endorse shifts in patterns of relations as well as shifts in the symbolic and cognitive categories that make these relations significant. I substantiate this argument in light of the distinction between two temporalities of historical change: first, the long waves of gradual change and, second, the short waves of moments of breaks and ruptures. Along the way, I develop an argument about the conditions of emergence of self-limiting norms and the centrality of epistemic beliefs in situations of high disruption. (shrink)

_Epistemic Logic_ studies statements containing verbs such as 'know' and 'wish'. It is one of the most exciting areas in medieval philosophy. Neglected almost entirely after the end of the Middle Ages, it has been rediscovered by philosophers of the present century. This is the first comprehensive study of the subject. Ivan Boh explores the rules for entailment between epistemic statements, the search for the conditions of knowing contingent propositions, the problems of substitutivity in intentional contexts, the relationship between (...) epistemic and modal logic, and the problems of composite and divided senses in authors ranging from Abelard to Frachantian. (shrink)

In this work, we propose a meaningful extension of description logics for non-monotonic reasoning. We introduce \, a logic allowing for the representation of and reasoning about both typical class-membership and typical instances of a relation. We propose a preferential semantics for \ in terms of partially-ordered DL interpretations which intuitively captures the notions of typicality we are interested in. We define a tableau-based algorithm for checking \ knowledge-base consistency that always terminates and we show that it is sound and (...) complete w.r.t. our preferential semantics. The general framework we here propose can serve as the foundation for further exploration of non-monotonic reasoning in description logics and similarly structured logics. (shrink)

This chapter contains sections titled: Schopenhauer on the Inevitability of Suffering Criticisms of Schopenhauer's Thesis that to Desire Is to Suffer The Unattainability of True Satisfaction The Inevitability of Boredom The Negative Nature of Pleasure and Satisfaction Happiness and Well‐Being Degrees of Unhappiness: The Possibility of Amelioration The Paradox of the Suspension or Negation of the Will The Inevitability of Unhappiness References Further Reading.

ResumoEste artigo propõe elucidar a relação entre a cibernética e a mecanologia na obra de Simondon, considerando suas duas teses de doutorado e a entrevista concedida em 1968 a Jean Le Moyne, a pedido do Ofício do Filme do Québec, no Canadá, ao longo da qual é predominante o uso de "mecanologia", em contraste com as teses, onde sofre a concorrência dos vocábulos "alagmática" e "organologia", ficando o termo "cibernética" na penumbra. A cibernética é celebrada na França em 1962, no (...) contexto dos famosos Colóquios de Royaumont, quando Norbert Wiener foi homenageado e a cibernética ocupou toda a cena, com a participação ativa de Simondon na organização do evento. Essa situação leva os estudiosos a interrogar-se pelo destino do termo "cibernética" em sua obra, caso estivesse em jogo a segunda cibernética, em vez da primeira, e que só veio a lume mais tarde. Mais do que o interesse historiográfico do assunto, o artigo pretende suscitar um interesse epistemológico na filosofia da tecnologia. O desafio é lançar luz sobre a questão ainda por demais obscura acerca das relações entre a tecnologia, a engenharia e a ciência.This article aims to clarify the relationship between cybernetics and mechanology in Simondon's work, considering his two doctoral theses and the interview he gave in 1968 to Jean Le Moyne, at the request of the Quebec Film Office in Canada. In this interview the use of "mechanology" is predominant, in contrast with the theses, where it suffers from competition with terms such as "allagmatics" and "organology", leaving the term "cybernetics" in the shade. Cybernetics is celebrated in France in 1962, in the context of the famous Royaumont Colloquia, when Norbert Wiener was honored and cybernetics occupies the whole scene, with Simondon's active participation in the event organization, This situation leads experts to question the fate of the word "cybernetics" in his work, in the case the second cybernetics was at stake, instead of the first one, but that only came to light later. More than a subject of historiographical interest, the article aims to evoke an epistemic interest in the philosophy of technology. The challenge is to shed light on a question that still remains obscure: the relationships among technology, engineering and science. (shrink)

Višestoljetni model Crkve kao zajednice laika i klerika koji ju inspiriraju i vode, ulazi u funkcionalnu krizu. U doba revolucija i liberalizma laici se nalaze u novim, često oprečnim ulogama: vjernika odanih Crkvi i građana lojalnih sekularnom društvu. Tražeći izlaz iz krize, Crkva se oslanja na sposobnost demokratskog djelovanja laika koji svojim društvenim nastupom promiču kršćanske vrijednosti, ali se i bore za politička prava Crkve. Uz političke stranke katoličke inspiracije posebnu ulogu ima organizirani katolički laikat, kulturno i moralno oblikujući laičke (...) staleže. Pretpovijest nastanka katoličkoga laičkog pokreta (Katoličke akcije) daje uvide u složenost društava druge polovice XIX. i početka XX. st., ali i zavidnu razinu inventivnosti i laika i hijerarhije u aktiviranju laika, što će postati epohalni uspjeh Crkve XX. stoljeća. (shrink)

This article has four main objectives. First, it introduces the ideal types of domination of Weber. Contrary to the received wisdom, which knows only “three ideal types” (traditional, charismatic and legal rational) I present the “fourth” type of domination, Weber called “Wille der Beherrschten” as an important correction of his ideal type of legal-rational authority. Next I make a novel, critical distinction between patrimonial and prebendal types of traditional authority. Third, I discuss various ways that communist regimes tried to legitimate (...) themselves and how they entered eventually a legitimation crisis, leading to the collapse of communism. In the next section, I explore the different ways post-communist capitalisms seek legitimacy (with various combinations of legal rational authority and patrimonialism), and finally I conclude with a trend of re-convergence of some post-communist systems (especially Russia and Hungary, but with signs for similar trends elsewhere) into an illiberal, prebendal quasi-democratic system. (shrink)

Karl Polanyi’s scholarship is interpreted in radically different ways. The “hard” reading of Polanyi sees him as a radical socialist; the “soft” reading presents him as a theorist of mixed economy. This article sides with the soft interpretation. It uses Polanyi’s biography to explain his theoretical “elusiveness,” presents a novel interpretation of his three types of economic integration, claiming all economies are “mixed.” While it acknowledges Polanyi as one of the major sources of world system theory, it claims that Polanyi (...) saw not only the dangers, but also the necessity and positive consequences of globalization. Finally, it shows that, in spite of Polanyi’s life-long commitment to the political left, his scholarly work did not offer an apology of socialism. Instead this article uses Polanyi’s theory of economic integration to build a critical political economy of state socialism. (shrink)

O artigo visa pensar a relação entre ética, ciência e tecnologia, enfatizando o problema de sua revinculação depois da cisão entre os juízos de fato e os juízos de valor, ocorrida no início dos tempos modernos. Uma vez examinada a ética da aristocracia guerreira e a moral do santo, procura-se delinear o caminho tomando como referência a ética da responsabilidade, cujo protótipo é a moral do sábio, desaparecido no curso dos tempos modernos, em razão da fragmentação do saber e do (...) advento do especialista. Ao fim do estudo, é discutida a relação entre a ética e a metafísica, com o intuito de ajustar a questão antropológica à perspectiva cosmológica, bem como de fornecer as bases de um novo humanismo, objetivando a humanização da técnica e a geração de um novo homem, alfabetizado em ciência, tecnologia e humanidades.The article aims at thinking the relation among ethics, science and technology, emphasizing the problem of their re-tying, after the division into judgments of fact and judgments of value, wich happened in the begininning of modern times. Since the warlike aristocracy's ethics and the saint man's moral are examined, it tries to outline its way, taking as a reference the ethics of responsability, whose prototype is the wise man's moral, which disappeared in the course of modern times, due to the fragmentation of knowing and the advent of the specialist. At the end of the study, the relationship between ethics and metaphysics is discussed, aiming at adjusting the anthropological question to the cosmological perspective, as well as at providing the bases of a new humanism, objectifying the humanization of the technique and the generation of a new man, literate at science, technology and the humanities. (shrink)

Endosomes, which comprise a diverse population of membrane vesicles and tubules, sort proteins and lipids to various cellular destinations. The organization and functions of these pleiomorphic cellular organelles have been extensively studied. Matsuo et al.1 now provide new exciting evidence on the role of lysobiphosphatidic acid (LBPA), a resident phospholipid of internal vesicles of the late endosome, in the control of membrane invagination and endosome biogenesis. In vivo, LBPA functions are controlled by the adaptor protein Alix and depend on pH (...) gradients along the endosomal compartments. BioEssays 26:604–607, 2004. © 2004 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. (shrink)

Soluble components of Notch signalling can be applied to manipulate a central pathway essential for the development of metazoans and often deregulated in illnesses such as stroke, cancer or cardiovascular diseases. Commonly, the Notch cascade is inhibited by small compound inhibitors, which either block the proteolysis of Notch receptors by γ‐secretases or interfere with the transcriptional activity of the Notch intracellular domain. Specific antibodies can also be used to inhibit ligand‐induced activation of Notch receptors. Alternatively, naturally occurring endogenous inhibitors of (...) Notch signalling might offer a specific way to block receptor activation. Examples are the soluble variants of the canonical Notch ligand Jagged1 and the non‐canonical Notch ligand Dlk1, both deprived of their transmembrane regions upon ectodomain shedding, or the bona fide secreted molecule EGFL7. We present frequently used methods to decrease Notch signalling, and we discuss how soluble Notch inhibitors may be used to treat diseases. (shrink)

By freedom, classical liberals meant non-interference, independence from the state, the personal and proprietary liberty of the governed. It is negative freedom as the antithesis both to absolutism and anarchy. In the republican interpretations, the freedom of a free political community is made possible and guaranteed by the institutionalization of the liberty of the political community. Political liberty is the medium, stage and precondition for the freedom of its members. That, in turn, is conditional upon the readiness of its members (...) to protect the liberty of their community and themselves, i.e. upon the virtue of the free citizen. In this article I engage with four different interpretations of both kinds of liberty concepts in different discourses of the 20th-century UK and US and 20th—21st-century Hungary. (shrink)

This paper focuses on Brazilian contemporary philosophy and aims to introduce [i] the conceptual tools on the philosophical-theoretical plan, emphasizing the problem of the nature of Brazilian philosophy and taking the ideas of authoriality / originality as a starting point; [ii] the analytical tools on the epistemic-methodological plan, when associating the metaphilosophical methods, operating and giving expression to the philosophical ratio, and the intellectual history methods, when operating and giving expression to philosophy’s historical realization and the philosophical intelligentsia. The discussions (...) field is that of metaphilosophy, in the sense of philosophy of philosophy, when designing an argumentative course where metaphilosophy, history of philosophy and intellectual history go together. We will then have, in the intellectual history branch, in terms of the hypotheses to operate the historical processes, the formation and post-formation paradigms, and in the metaphilosophical branch, with focus on the ethos, in order to distinguish the different stances taken towards the European matrix in the XX-XXIst centuries, the attitudes of: alignment and reverence; assimilation and critical independence; ideological appropriation and political instrumentalization; suspicion and defenestration. (shrink)

O artigo trata da relação entre Humanidades, Ciências Humanas e Sociais e Filosofia, considerada à luz dos projetos pedagógico e epistêmico das humanidades clássicas, tendo por fio condutor a Renascença italiana e os Studia Humanitatis, com a Filosofia como disciplina-piloto. Ao fazer o trânsito para a modernidade, com o surgimento das ciências humanas e sociais e o descentramento da filosofia, haverá o colapso dos projetos pedagógico e epistêmico dos Studia dos renascentistas, num ambiente de pesada cultura disciplinar, tendo por resultado (...) a ultrafragmentação do conhecimento, levada a cabo sem qualquer perspectiva de unificação. O resultado é o mal-estar epistemológico, que vai junto com a ideia de perda de relevância da filosofia, ao se ver afastada dos processos pedagógico e epistêmico das ciências, e, paralelamente, das próprias disciplinas científicas, impedidas, em razão da ultrafragmentação, de nos dar uma visão unificada da humanidade e da realidade humana circundante. Tal situação levará ao questionamento acerca da oportunidade de relançamento do projeto pedagógico-epistêmico das Humanidades Clássicas, visando vencer o mal-estar epistemológico e a síndrome da irrelevância da filosofia e das ciências empíricas do homem. Contudo, como mostraremos, tal relançamento não poderá consistir numa volta aos Studia ou em sua retomada pura e simples, mas deverá dar-se em novas bases científicas e filosóficas, levado a cabo em bases interdisciplinares, e não mais holísticas, com a filosofia como disciplina-piloto, como na Renascença. Neste cenário, o Brasil será considerado e uma proposta condizente com o nosso contexto acadêmico e a realidade nacional nos dias de hoje será feita. (shrink)

Neste texto, procuro encontrar as origens de um dos mais importantes conceitos de Gilles Deleuze, o conceito de Imagem-tempo. Este conceito remete-nos para os primeiros textos de Deleuze dedicados à filosofia de Espinosa e ao problema do autómato espiritual e relaciona-se directamente com o problema da passividade/actividade do espectador. Ou seja, o conceito crucial na sua filosofia do cinema, a Imagem-tempo, esconde uma importante reflexão sobre a Imagem cinematográfica como arte de massas, os (im)poderes do pensamento e o modo fascista (...) de se pensar. This text seeks to find the origins of one of the most important of Gilles Deleuze's concepts, the concept of Time-image. This concept leads us to his first texts regarding Spinoza's philosophy and the problem of the spiritual automaton, and concerns directly with the problem of passivity/activity of the film goer. That is to say that the crucial concept of his film philosophy, Time-image, hides a fundamental consideration on the cinematic image as a mass art, the (un)powers of thinking and the fascist way of thought. (shrink)

O artigo visa pensar a relação entre ética, ciência e tecnologia, enfatizando o problema de sua revinculação depois da cisão entre os juízos de fato e os juízos de valor, ocorrida no início dos tempos modernos. Uma vez examinada a ética da aristocracia guerreira e a moral do santo, procura-se delinear o caminho tomando como referência a ética da responsabilidade, cujo protótipo é a moral do sábio, desaparecido no curso dos tempos modernos, em razão da fragmentação do saber e do (...) advento do especialista. Ao fim do estudo, é discutida a relação entre a ética e a metafísica, com o intuito de ajustar a questão antropológica à perspectiva cosmológica, bem como de fornecer as bases de um novo humanismo, objetivando a humanização da técnica e a geração de um novo homem, alfabetizado em ciência, tecnologia e humanidades.The article aims at thinking the relation among ethics, science and technology, emphasizing the problem of their re-tying, after the division into judgments of fact and judgments of value, wich happened in the begininning of modern times. Since the warlike aristocracy's ethics and the saint man's moral are examined, it tries to outline its way, taking as a reference the ethics of responsability, whose prototype is the wise man's moral, which disappeared in the course of modern times, due to the fragmentation of knowing and the advent of the specialist. At the end of the study, the relationship between ethics and metaphysics is discussed, aiming at adjusting the anthropological question to the cosmological perspective, as well as at providing the bases of a new humanism, objectifying the humanization of the technique and the generation of a new man, literate at science, technology and the humanities. (shrink)