The human resource manager treads a fine line in seeking to reconcile the values of the organisation with professional values about the ethical management of people. This paper seeks to explore this ambiguity. The research findings suggest that the extent to which HR professionals can influence organisational ethics is dependent on the culture and structure of the organisation, as well as on the status and credibility of the HR specialists themselves. In the main there is little evidence that their influence (...) is significant. (shrink)

The human resource manager treads a fine line in seeking to reconcile the values of the organisation with professional values about the ethical management of people. This paper seeks to explore this ambiguity. The research findings suggest that the extent to which HR professionals can influence organisational ethics is dependent on the culture and structure of the organisation, as well as on the status and credibility of the HR specialists themselves. In the main there is little evidence that their influence (...) is significant. (shrink)

Whilst there is a growing volume of literature exploring the ethical implications of organisational change for HRM and the ethical aspects of certain HRM activities, there have been few published U.K. studies of how HR managers actually behave when faced with ethical dilemmas in their work. This paper seeks to enhance the foundations of such knowledge through an examination of the influence of organisational values on the ethical behaviour of Human Resource Managers within a sample of charities in the U.K. (...) and the Republic of Ireland. A qualitative research design is adopted utilising semi-structured interviews. Findings highlight ethical inconsistency in people management in the charity sector arising from the clear application of strong and explicit organisational values to external client groups but their limited influence on people management strategies and practices within the organisation. Many of the ethical issues faced by HRM professionals in both countries arise from this inconsistency. In their handling of ethical dilemmas, the HRM professionals exhibit a combination of a care ethic and a concern for justice but it is also clear that in situations of management intransigence, a desire to be conscience driven often gives way to a contingent approach. Whilst respondents considered it inappropriate for the HRM function to be the conscience of the organisation, it is seen to have a key role in providing management with advice on ethical action. However, the ability of HRM to influence ethical behaviour is highly dependent on the status of the function within the organisation. (shrink)

This paper reports on the findings of the first stage of a research project that experiments with the use of laddering technique in an attempt to enhance understanding of the influence of values in the behaviour of HRM professionals. Laddering has been chosen because it allows flexible, systematic investigation of aspects of ethics and people management which have hitherto been difficult to clarify. It also provides the opportunity to undertake both qualitative and quantitative analysis of the data obtained. The research (...) design incorporates two phases – a questionnaire and a laddering interview; it involves a sample of respondents drawn from HRM practitioners participating in the CIPD Professional Qualification Scheme. In comparing the results obtained from each phase of the research, it is clear that the laddering interviews have enabled more detailed information to be elicited and more specific goals to be identified. The authors believe that laddering can provide valuable additional insight into ethical practice, behaviour and goals. (shrink)

This paper reports on the findings of the first stage of a research project that experiments with the use of laddering technique in an attempt to enhance understanding of the influence of values in the behaviour of HRM professionals. Laddering has been chosen because it allows flexible, systematic investigation of aspects of ethics and people management which have hitherto been difficult to clarify. It also provides the opportunity to undertake both qualitative and quantitative analysis of the data obtained. The research (...) design incorporates two phases – a questionnaire and a laddering interview; it involves a sample of respondents drawn from HRM practitioners participating in the CIPD Professional Qualification Scheme. In comparing the results obtained from each phase of the research, it is clear that the laddering interviews have enabled more detailed information to be elicited and more specific goals to be identified. The authors believe that laddering can provide valuable additional insight into ethical practice, behaviour and goals. (shrink)

This article will argue that much of Kierkegaard’s authorship is reflective of the characteristics of the Eucharistic liturgy found in the 1830 Forordnet Alter-Bog for Danmark (confession, invitation, preparation/exhortation, consecration, and thanksgiving/praise/blessing), particularly as each of those elements of the liturgy are reflected in his seven Discourses at the Communion on Fridays in Part IV of Christian Discourses. Major components of his authorship function as an indirect invitation to the single individual reader to inwardly experience the prototype-redeemer dialectic as it (...) was enacted in a typical Eucharistic liturgy of Kierkegaard’s day. The readers of Kierkegaard’s work make interpretive decisions not only about Kierkegaard’s texts, but most importantly about themselves, God, and the paradox of Christ, such that by the time they finish the authorship they find themselves inwardly standing at the foot of the altar, either offended by the paradox of Christ and ready to turn and leave, or beating their breasts alongside the tax collector. (shrink)

"Foot stands out among contemporary ethical theorists because of her conviction that virtues and vices are more central ethical notions than rights, duties, justice, or consequences--the primary focus of most other contemporary moral theorists....[These] essays embody to some extent her commitment to an ethics of virtue. Foot's style is straightforward and readable, her arguments subtle..."--Choice.

"This reviewer had to be restrained from stopping people in the street to urge them to read it: They would learn something of the way science is done,...

Metaphysics, morals and science -- The classics : value -- The neo-classics : utility -- The Keynesian revolution -- Development and under-development -- What are the rules of the game?

This classic, with a new introduction by Madeleine L'Engle, is by turns an entrancing mediation on language a piercing commentary on the nature of art and why so much of what we read, hear, and see falls short and a brilliant examination of the fundamental tenets of Christianity. The Mind of the Maker will be relished by those already in love with Dorothy L. Sayers and those who have not yet met her. A mystery writer, a witty and perceptive (...) theologian, culture critic, and playwright, Dorothy Sayers sheds new,unexpected light on a specific set of statements made in the Christian creeds. She examines anew such ideas as the image of God, the Trinity, free will, and evil, and in these pages a wholly revitalized understanding of them emerges. The author finds the key in the parallels between the creation of God and the human creative process. She continually refers to each in a way that illuminates both. (shrink)

I address a question in moral metaphysics: How are conflicts between moral obligations possible? I begin by explaining why we cannot give a satisfactory answer to this question simply by positing that such conflicts are conflicts between rules, principles, or reasons. I then develop and defend the “Dispositional Account,” which posits that conflicts between moral obligations are conflicts between the manifestations of obligating dispositions (obligating powers, capacities, etc.), just as conflicts between physical forces are conflicts between the manifestations of (certain) (...) causal dispositions (causal powers, capacities, etc.). This account combines the so-called “moral forces” interpretation of prima facie obligations with a dispositional moral metaphysic according to which the metaphysical grounds of moral obligations are not rules or laws, but rather real, irreducibly dispositional properties (or powers) of moral agents and patients. My principal aims are to offer a theoretically attractive and suitably metaphysical account of conflicts of obligation, and to show that the dispositional moral metaphysic that grounds the Dispositional Account can explain and accommodate plausible normative views that rule- and law-based alternatives cannot, as well as to answer objections that have been pressed against other accounts of moral conflict (especially Ross’s) that appeal to moral dispositions or forces. (shrink)

Moral Dilemmas is the second volume of collected essays by the eminent moral philosopher Philippa Foot, gathering the best of her work from the late 1970s to the 1990s. It fills the gap between her famous 1978 collection Virtues and Vice (now reissued) and her acclaimed monograph Natural Goodness, published in 2001. In this new collection, Professor Foot develops further her critique of the dominant ethical theories of the last fifty years, and discusses such topics as the nature of moral (...) judgement, practical rationality, and the conflict of virtue with desire and self-interest. Moral Dilemmas, alongside her other two books, completes the summation of her distinctive and lasting contribution to twentieth-century moral philosophy. (shrink)

Conditional judgements—judgements employing ‘if’—are essential to practical reasoning about what to do, as well as to much reasoning about what is the case. We handle them well enough from an early...

Introduction -- The ethics of care and global politics -- Rethinking human security -- 'Women's work' : the global care and sex economies -- Humanitarian intervention and global security governance -- Peacebuilding and paternalism : reading care through postcolonialism -- Health and human security : gender, care and HIV/AIDS -- Gender, care, and the ethics of environmental security -- Conclusion. Security through care.

The purpose of the paper is to present the challenges and difficulties that may be encountered in the process of the evaluation of qualitative research on sex workers by ethics committees. Such research is usually subject to review by ethics committees because of the risk of harm to participants, who are considered “vulnerable”. At the same time, due to the social stigma arising from the provision of sex services, researchers, research participants, and ethics committee members may have their own ideas (...) and expectations about how ethical research in this area should be conducted. Referring to the experience of researchers from common law countries, this paper will discuss how these expectations and the requirements of ethics committees collide, confronting the researcher with the need to meet the divergent or even contradictory expectations of various social actors. I will also propose alternative procedures for Polish ethics committees to ensure that the process of obtaining their approval is more democratic and open to the diverse needs of both researchers and research participants. (shrink)

This book gives a descriptive analysis of specific Madhyamika texts. It compares the ideology of Kumarajiva (a translator of the four Madhyamika treatises 400 A.D.) with the ideologies of the three Chinese contemporaries - HuiYuan, Seng-Jui and Seng-Chao. It envisages an intercultural transmission of religious and philosophical ideas from India to China.

The novel On the rocks o f Calvados is the first and the greatest achievement of Antoni Sygietyński’s art. The author of this article considered the work worthy of a special attention with regard to the way of presenting the problem of adultery. The writer gives the social explanation of infidelity not concentrating on the psychological side of this phenomenon. He emphasizes the decisive role of such social factors as: the origin, the model of education and the social milieu. From (...) his point of view they exert a great influence on the main heroine’s behaviour. The subject of the novel centres around the moral dilemmas of an individual more cultured than her fellow-citizens, who is forced to live in a primitive world. Sygietyński’s heroine, Berta – educated in a monastic school in Caen – experiences a painful disappointment after coming back to her family village. Her imagination, excited by the lecture of sentimental romances, lets her dream of an ideal, romantic love. She has high expectations of life. Unfortunately, the reality by no means resembles the literary world of stormy feelings and passions. Berta feels alienated in her own society as the lifestyle of its members conflicts definitely with her beliefs. It is worth noting that the writer shows a very striking picture of Grandcamp’s community. Its primitive and monotonous existence overwhelms the novel’s heroine. The marriage with a brutal, devoid of sensibility fisherman – Gabriel Orange – deepens much her loneliness. Small wonder then that the arrival of the French engineer to the sea-town arouses hope in Berta’s heart again. Armand de Coux seems to be an embodiment of all her yearnings. Berta Boudard commits adultery trusting that the lover will soon free her from such common and boring inhabitants of the fishermen’s village. On the Rocks o f Calvados is not the only work that points out the sociological aspect of a marital betrayal. Thus, this opinion encourages the reader to make further literary research. (shrink)

Bullying has damaging short-term and long-term consequences. Research suggests that perpetrators have low empathy and high moral disengagement, but relations between these variables are unclear and are rarely integrated in a single study. Thus, the objective of this study was to discover if empathy and moral disengagement mechanisms were related to bullying perpetration. This study was conducted with 904 Polish adolescents enrolled in 6 rural and urban upper secondary schools. High affective empathy predicted lower bullying perpetration. Moral-disengagement mechanisms such as (...) moral justification, euphemistic language, advanced comparison, and distorting consequences were uniquely related to increased bullying perpetration. Low affective empathy was also uniquely related to increased perpetration. These findings have important implication for school policy and practice. (shrink)

"This book is very valuable. Today, there are too many books on the Work that are either deliberately impersonal and as a result are just a re-explaining of basic ideas which are already there in Ouspensky.

I investigate: to what extent do folk ascriptions of lying differ between casual and courtroom contexts? to what extent does motive to lie influence ascriptions of trust, mental states, and lying judgments? to what extent are lying judgments consistent with previous ascriptions of communicated content? Following the Supreme Court’s Bronston judgment, I expect: averaged lying judgments to be similar in casual and courtroom contexts; motive to lie to influence levels of trust, mental states ascriptions, and patterns of lying judgments; retrospective (...) judgments of lying, after being presented with the state of the world, to be inconsistent with previous judgments of communicated content: participants hold the protagonist responsible for content she did not communicate. I performed a survey experiment on the Qualtrics platform. Participants were recruited through Amazon Mechanical Turk. I employed standard Likert scales and forced-choice questions. I found that: average lying judgments are similar in casual and courtroom contexts; motive to lie decreases trust ascription and increases lying judgment; judgments of lying are inconsistent with previous judgments of communicated content: participants hold the protagonist responsible for content they did not communicate. Perjury ascriptions are inconsistent. The Supreme Court’s worries expressed in the Bronston judgment are well founded. This article helps reforming jury instructions in perjury cases. (shrink)

Introduction -- On human nature -- The strange history of altruism -- The Freudian self -- Thinking again.

This book proposes a novel, descriptive theory that unveils the linguistic mechanisms lurking behind judicial decisions. It offers a comprehensive account of the ongoing debate, as well as a novel solution to the problem of understanding legal pragmatics. Linguistic pragmatics is based on a theory created by Paul Grice, who observed that people usually convey more than just the amalgam of the meaning of the words they use. He labeled this surplus of meaning a “conversational implicature.” This book addresses the (...) question of whether implicatures occur in the legal language, firstly illustrating why the classic Gricean theory is not applicable to the description of legal language and proposing a novel approach based on a modification of Andrei Marmor’s “strategic speech.” Subsequently, it analyzes neo-Gricean theories and their limited use for describing the mechanisms of legal interpretation, and discusses the possibility of pragmatic enrichment of legal content as well as the notion of completeness of a legal proposition. Lastly, it illustrates how the developed theory works in practice, with examples from penal and civil law cases. The book is helpful to legal practitioners, since it provides insights into the reasons for and linguistic mechanisms behind courts’ decisions, but also to philosophers of law, philosophers of language, linguists and non-experts wishing to better understand the mechanisms of legal decision making. (shrink)

There has been a long debate on whether demonstratives are directly referential as Kaplan originally argued, or indirectly referential like a definite description. I propose a new analysis of demonstratives that combines intuitions from both direct and indirect approaches. The demonstrative is analyzed as an indirectly referential expression with a binary maximality operator that takes two arguments, where the second argument can be a deictic pointing, an anaphoric index, or a relative clause. Direct reference is encoded not in the meaning (...) of the demonstrative but in the meaning contributed by the pointing gesture, thus capturing both direct and indirect uses. I further propose that some pronouns in English function as demonstratives, realizing the binary structure and competing with the demonstrative. The main advantages of this proposal include (a) deriving the distribution of pronominal and adnominal demonstratives systematically; (b) capturing the unique interaction that demonstratives have with a pointing gesture; and (c) locating English demonstratives against a larger, cross-linguistic picture. (shrink)

In recent decades, issues that reside at the center of philosophical and psychological inquiry have been absorbed into a scientific framework variously identified as "brain science," "cognitive science," and "cognitive neuroscience." Scholars have heralded this development as revolutionary, but a revolution implies an existing method has been overturned in favor of something new. What long-held theories have been abandoned or significantly modified in light of cognitive neuroscience? _Consciousness and Mental Life_ questions our present approach to the study of consciousness and (...) the way modern discoveries either mirror or contradict understandings reached in the centuries leading up to our own. Daniel N. Robinson does not wage an attack on the emerging discipline of cognitive science. Rather, he provides the necessary historical context to properly evaluate the relationship between issues of consciousness and neuroscience and their evolution over time. Robinson begins with Aristotle and the ancient Greeks and continues through to René Descartes, David Hume, William James, Daniel Dennett, John Searle, Richard Rorty, Hilary Putnam, and Derek Parfit. Approaching the issue from both a philosophical and a psychological perspective, Robinson identifies what makes the study of consciousness so problematic and asks whether cognitive neuroscience can truly reveal the origins of mental events, emotions, and preference, or if these occurrences are better understood by studying the whole person, not just the brain. Well-reasoned and thoroughly argued, _Consciousness and Mental Life_ corrects many claims made about the success of brain science and provides a valuable historical context for the study of human consciousness. (shrink)

In this paper I will tackle three issues. First, I aim to briefly outline the backbone of semantic minimalism, while focusing on the idea of ‘liberal truth conditions’ developed by Emma Borg in her book ‘Minimal Semantics’. Secondly, I will provide an account of the three principal views in legal interpretation: intentionalism, textualism and purposivism. All of them are based on a common denominator labelled by lawyers ‘literal meaning’. In the paper I suggest a novel way of viewing this common (...) denominator as almost identical to the Borgian ‘liberal truth conditions’, at least at a conceptual level. In the third section I will focus on the conceptual similarities between the two ideas. I intend to depict that, although legal theorists do not admit it explicitly, they treat literal legal meaning as minimal propositional content that can be ascribed liberal truth conditions. There are two main objections to liberal truth conditions: their under-determinacy and unintuitive character. Both objections can be applied to ‘literal meaning’. However, the idea of liberal truth conditions gives an adequate account of what lawyers call literal meaning and is helpful in explaining the mechanism of understanding of provisions and reasons leading to the necessity of statutory interpretation. (shrink)

The transformation of the modern world of work towards the information society, knowledge society, have a rapid course. These transformations take on a global character, and the most of their consequences are negative. One of them is to base the employment process on the flexible solutions. Nowadays, neither the high level of education, nor the high competences are not enough to give confidence in finding employment. The contemporary labour market is characterised by unstableness, ‘elusiveness’ and, above all, flexibility. The challenge (...) has become a flexible company, which employs only flexible workers within the framework of flexible forms of employment. Despite its universality, the concept of flexibility still remains inconsistent and vaguely defined. (shrink)

The education is, no doubt, a fundamental question in Plato’s thought. The Republic, considerate by many people as his masterpiece, takes care of this aspect, not without directing it through a political obliquity. In the greek society that honoured, above all, the formation of free citizens, education and politics were necessarily together. Nevertheless, we want to punctuate how, to Plato, both of them are subordinate to the ontological question.

Philosophical dialogue has the power to improve interdisciplinary scientific research. The Toolbox Dialogue Initiative (TDI) conducts workshops that foster philosophical dialogue among interdisciplinary researchers. This chapter focuses on 20 of these workshops, all of which used the Toolbox STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) instrument and were conducted with interdisciplinary research teams of scientists. We analyze data from some of these workshops and demonstrate that philosophical dialogues conducted using the Toolbox method have two salutary effects. First, they lead to a (...) significant increase in belief formation about philosophical topics relevant to interdisciplinary science. Scientists sometimes do not have preconceived commitments on issues in philosophy of science, and Toolbox workshops tend to prompt them to adopt views on these topics. Second, these philosophical …. (shrink)