In certain cases of sudden death, forensic experts may discover during an investigation or autopsy that family members of the deceased are also at risk of harm—from genetic disease, for instance. But do they have a duty to warn them? Looking at similar duties of physicians and researchers to warn third parties of risk suggests they do.

Pour yourself glass of Three Wizard's Chardonnay, Winkle's Old Peculiar, or Soggy Mountain Dew, pull up a three-legged chair, and for Om's sake, stay out of the bathtub! Keep and eye open for the octarine flashes that would indicate magic is trying to escape from the pages and be ready to grab something made of copper in order to ground uncontrolled magic without harmful incident (Some would Consider the Copper Safeguard Unnecessary) You are now ready to dive into Discworld and (...) Philosophy and join a group of philosophical Discworld fans as they explore truth, history, death, luck, morality, and reality in the magical inverse of the Disc. (shrink)

This chapter deals with one of the common fallacies in Western philosophy, inappropriate appeal to authority (IAA). IAA has many different facets. At its core, it is a fallacy that assumes that because someone is an authority, we should listen to that person. The problem with IAA is that it ignores content in favor of credentials and power. There are a few different ways in which IAA can occur. IAA seems to be the result of a flaw in human thinking. (...) Social cognitive theory, a theory that helps explain human action, notes that humans tend to act like each other. The tendency to listen to authorities who are not authorities explains why celebrities are able to sell us stuff. The important thing to remember about IAA is that it is not just a fallacy that comes up in arguments that do not matter. (shrink)

The literature on the Cambridge Platonists abounds with references to Neoplatonism and the Alexandrian Fathers on general themes of philosophical and theological methodology. The specific theme of the spiritual senses of the soul has received scant attention however, to the detriment of our understanding of their place in this important tradition of Christian speculation. Thus, while much attention has been paid to the clear influence of Plotinus and the Florentine Academy, far less has been given to important theological figures that (...) also form a vital part of the tradition the Cambridge Platonists find irresistible. Similarly, scholarship on the spiritual senses has tended to ignore early modern Protestant developments in this tradition focusing instead on patristic, medieval, and later modern figures. In response to these oversights, the present chapter provides a close reading and analysis of the reception and modification of Origen of Alexandria’s (185-252) doctrine of the spiritual senses in the “Discourse on the True Way or Method of Attaining to Divine Knowledge” by the Cambridge Platonist, John Smith (1618-1652). Although Smith accepted much of the doctrine as he found it in Origen his allegiance to modern notions of methodology, derived especially from Descartes, as well as his Protestantism, made taking the doctrine on authority or antiquity alone unacceptable. Smith therefore offered his own case for the spiritual senses, at once intentionally mimicking the Alexandrian’s interpretive synthesis of Platonism and Scripture (“Origen as model”) and echoing Origen’s own words (“Origen as source”). Whereas Origen made spiritual sensibility intelligible by means of Middle Platonic thought, Smith’s Neoplatonism provided the conceptual tools needed to make sense of biblical passages without suggesting a merely metaphorical meaning for sensory language concerning the awareness of spiritual realities. In this way, both tradition and innovation guide Smith’s reformulation of the doctrine of the spiritual senses. In addition to demonstrating Smith’s debt to patristic thought, this chapter also discusses his influence on such leading figures in modern theology as John Wesley (1703-1791) and Jonathan Edwards (1703-1758). The chapter thus presents an important moment in the development of Christian speculation about the spiritual senses that begins to bridge scholarship on the Patristic and Enlightenment periods. (shrink)

Les institutions - et en premier lieu l'Eglise - où s'exprimait et se vivait l'expérience du sacré se sont peu à peu effritées. Mais le sacré déborde le cadre des institutions et il en reste des vestiges, entre autres, dans la littérature. C'est dans l'oeuvre de Cioran que Sara Danièle Bélanger Michaud les a cherchés. Emil Michel Cioran (1911 - 1995) est un philosophe et essayiste d'origine roumaine qui a vécu en France à partir de 1937. Il est principalement (...) connu pour ses aphorismes et pour son recueil De l'inconvénient d'être né, paru en 1973. Dans son essai, l'auteure présente son oeuvre comme une manifestation de la quête du sacré et une nouvelle manière de l'habiter. Elle écrit : " Qu'il soit question de sa quête spirituelle (ou de son ratage spirituel), de ses rencontres avec l'absolu, de ses expériences d'extase, de son obsession pour le doute ou encore de sa nature religieuse à rebours, c'est toujours en même temps du sacré dont il est question ". (shrink)

This chapter focuses on one of the common fallacies in Western philosophy, 'intentional fallacy (IF)'. The IF is an odd kind of fallacy. Rather than being a fallacy focused on logic and argumentation, it is a fallacy that focuses on art, relating to how we judge art and engage in literary criticism. The IF focuses on the fact that we often think that there is one right interpretation of a work of art. According to David Fenner, the IF “states that (...) we do not need to know, nor can we on most occasions, what was in the mind of the artist in order to interpret the art work”. So, it seems unreasonable to use the artist's intention as the most important way to understand a work of art as the artist's intention is often unavailable. The IF is an error in art interpretation that causes us to realize important things about art. (shrink)

Le constat est maintenant partout: la puissance du fondamentalisme religieux, la montee des populismes de droite comme de gauche, le discredit de la classe politique, le rejet de la construction europeenne, rendent caducs les schemas anciens. En particulier l'idee que la democratie, a force de bienveillance, peut tolerer toutes les differences, toutes les croyances. Oui! Il y a des croyances insupportables et intolerables. Non! Le populisme n'est pas une illusion qui se dissipera d'elle-meme avec un peu de pedagogie et de (...) bonne volonte. Non! La politique internationale n'obeit pas aux chartes du droit international. Il faut denoncer la tyrannie des bons sentiments, la politique de l'emotion et de la compassion. Non que la bienveillance soit un sentiment indigne, mais nous devons cesser de croire qu'on peut batir sur elle une communaute politique. (shrink)

Microbiota-gut-brain research is a fast-growing field of inquiry with important implications for how human brain function and behaviour are understood. Researchers manipulate gut microbes to reveal connections between intestinal microbiota and normal brain functions or pathological states. Many claims are made about causal relationships between gut microbiota and human behaviour. By uncovering these relationships, MGB research aims to offer new explanations of mental health and potential avenues of treatment. So far, limited evaluation has been made of MGB's methods and its (...) core experimental findings, many of which are extensively reiterated in copious reviews of the field. These factors, plus the self-help potential of MGB, have combined to encourage uncritical public uptake of MGB discoveries. Both social and professional media focus on the potential for dietary intervention in mental health, and causal relationships are assumed to be established. Our target article has two main aims. One is to examine critically the core practices and findings of experimental MGB research and to raise questions about them for brain and behavioural scientists who may not be familiar with the field. The other is to challenge the way in which MGB findings are presented. Our positive goal is to suggest how current problems and weaknesses may be addressed, in order for both scientific and public audiences to gain a clearer picture of MGB research and its strengths and limitations. (shrink)

Liberal democracy is often considered to be unstable, consisting of two markedly different ideals that remain in tension. Yet the thesis regarding the alleged insta...

All the authors who have contributed to Looking Back to See the Future have taken up the challenge to inter-disciplinarily investigate the ambiguous concepts of sins, vices and virtues. Their illuminating chapters test the definitions and applications of these religio-cultural categories in the contexts of the distant past as well as our contemporary, globalised, consumerist present; but they all do it for the sake of catching a glimpse of their and our future. By looking into religious and philosophical treatises, paraliterary (...) and literary texts as well as everyday practices, the authors prove that the interpretations of what constitutes sin, vice and virtue are becoming more and more difficult in the twenty-first century. (shrink)

Avec trois entretiens de Jean-Luc Nancy Cosa volante : l'art n'est ni un objet, ni un ensemble de composantes formelles, encore moins schème et substance. L'art les arts plutôt, dans leur pluralité différentielle élève la question d'une forme en formation. Cette forma formans traverse de part en part la pensée des arts de Jean-Luc Nancy où importe surtout l'approche de ce qui, dans l'art, fait sens (sensibilité, intelligence, sensation, sensualité). A travers touches, intensités, vibrations, timbres, tonalités, colorations, grains, résonances, rythmes, (...) il s'agit de voir comment les arts donnent forme au monde. Cet ouvrage explore plusieurs motifs du travail de Nancy : sa réflexion sur l'iconologie "chrétienne" au sein de sa "déconstruction du christianisme", la question de ses "étranges corps étrangers", les modalités de ses ekphraseis, sa poétique cinétique, entre autres. Trois entretiens avec le philosophe constituent des moments privilégiés de cet échange autour de la question de l'art. (shrink)

"La poétique de Celan- a profondément incisé la réflexion de Derrida, lui devenant indispensable pour repenser les questions de la date, de la crypte et du secret. De Schibboleth à Béliers et à son dernier séminaire, La bête et le souverain, Derrida s'est aussi intéressé au poème celanien comme lieu d'une souveraine solitude, d'une souveraineté autre, peut-être, quand il parle de lui-même. Cet essai tente d'analyser la portée du deuil et de la dette contractée par le philosophe à l'endroit du (...) poète. De la rencontre entre Celan et Derrida, nulle archive ne saura témoigner. Le verbe "témoigner" évoque une sorte de mot de passe secret entre eux : "Niemand/ zeugt für den/ Zeugen" et "Die Welt ist fort, ich muss dicte tragen". Ces deux vers, Jacques Derrida incitait ses lecteurs à les apprendre par coeur pour deux raisons : d'abord, pour méditer sans fin le rapport à la langue, à l'idiome plutôt, de Celan, creusant, enibuissant, retournant sa langue dans la langue allemande ; ensuite, pour mesurer relever, dit Derrida la nécessaire et impossible épreuve de la traduction, cette question qui est non seulement l'un des enjeux les plus importants de la "déconstruction" mais aussi le foyer d'une éthique de la lecture."--Page 4 of cover. (shrink)

This book is about meaning - not the meaning of certain concepts such as the meaning of life or the meaning of freedom but about what it means for linguistic expressions to mean something. It is also a book about meaning for humans. The qualification 'human meaning' is not yet common in linguistics book titles but it is increasingly important to add it. We are already experiencing fundamental differences in how, and what kind of, meaning is approached in computational linguistics (...) and computer science in general on the one hand, and in philosophy of language or sociopragmatics on the other. (shrink)

Conducting phenomenological research for dissertations can be an involved and challenging process, and writing it up is often the most challenging part. How to Write a Phenomenological Dissertation gives students practical, applied advice on how to structure and develop each chapter of the dissertation specifically for phenomenological research. Phenomenology is about personal experience and personal experience varies from researcher to researcher. However, this variation is a big source of confusion for new researchers in the social, behavioral, or health sciences. This (...) brief text is written in a simple, step-by-step fashion to account for this flexibility and variation while also providing structure necessary for a successful dissertation. Broken up into chapters that follow each chapter of the dissertation, this text logically addresses the various parts of phenomenological research, starting with ensuring phenomenology is the right method for your research, writing the literature review, going through methods and results sections to analysis and discussion. The author, using experience gleaned from supervising phenomenological dissertations for many years, gives time-tested advice on how structure the dissertation to fit into more common frameworks, using checklists and tables throughout. Each chapter includes a list of helpful resources for students to use alongside this book with specific information on methods and research. Unique to this text is a chapter on creating your own phenomenological method which allows students to expand their viewpoints and experiment in future studies after the dissertation. (shrink)

This book is about beliefs, language, communication and cognition. It deals with the fundamental issue of the interpretation of the speaker's utterance expressing a belief and reporting on beliefs of other people in the form of oratio obliqua. The main aim of the book is to present a new account of the problem of interpreting utterances expressing beliefs and belief reports in terms of an approach called Default Semantics.

This chapter contains sections titled: Nice Tattoo What is Art? Art World Theory: Art is Participation in the Art World Formalism: Art is the Result of Formal Properties Working Together Expressionism: Art Elicits an Emotional Response from the Viewer What Do These Theories Accomplish for Tattoos? Tattoos as Performance Art The Human Canvas Tattoos, Mortality, and Deep Meaning.

Focusing on the analysis of Athens' relations with both Greeks and non-Greeks as recorded in extant fourth-century decrees, this paper challenges the applicability of the notion of Greek/barbarian antithesis to the interpretation of formal diplomatic exchanges between Athens and the non-Greek states. A comparison of the types of decrees and honors reveals a remarkable uniformity in the forms of Athens' foreign relations irrespective of the ethnicity of honorands. The distribution of honors among individuals and groups of recipients within single decrees (...) further demonstrates that the Athenian honorific system typically elevated individuals over communities they represented, suggesting that political differences between Athens and non-Greek states did not adversely influence the methods of exchanges between them. Apart from the provisions contained in the decrees, this paper also considers their function within the city as monuments that attest to the important place of philobarbaric discourse and practice in fourth-century Athens. (shrink)

This chapter focuses on one of the common fallacies in Western philosophy: appeal to tradition (ATT). ATT means to ignore the evidence that we should change because we have been doing something for a long time. ATTs are tremendously useful fallacies. ATTs hinge on sentimental tendencies and unwillingness to change, and are particularly dangerous when they prevents change. ATT seems to suggest that there is something good about tradition that trumps any other concerns. The problem is that since tradition has (...) nothing to do with morality, it is really easy for ATT to be used to justify anything, from continuing to tell children that Santa exists to preventing an oppressed group of people from voting. Perhaps at the core of ATT is belief that family and cultural traditions are important. In some ways, ATT is a popular fallacy of grandmothers all over the world. (shrink)

John C. Altmann decides whether Dracula can really be blamed for his crimes, since it's his nature as a vampire to behave a certain way. Robert Arp argues that Dracula's addiction to live human blood dooms him to perpetual frustration and misery. John V. Karavitis sees Dracula as a Randian individual pitted against the Marxist collective. Greg Littmann maintains that if we disapprove of Dracula's behavior, we ought to be vegetarians. James Edwin Mahon uses the example of Dracula to resolve (...) nagging problems about the desirability of immortality. Adam Barkman and Michael Versteeg ponder what it would really feel like to be Dracula, and thereby shed some light on the nature of consciousness. Robert Vuckovich looks at the sexual morality of Dracula and other characters in the Dracula saga. Ariane de Waal explains that "Dragula" is scary because every time this being appears, it causes "gender trouble." And Cari Callis demonstrates that the Count is really the Jungian Shadow archetype--with added Shapeshifter elements--in the journey of Mina Harker, heroine/victim of Stoker's novel, from silly girl to empowered woman. (shrink)

Jar Jar Binks might be the most hated individual in the Star Wars universe. He should feel a great deal of guilt over his actions in the Senate, though well meaning, because they caused so much strife. This chapter considers how Darth Vader would reflect on his own actions: it is unlikely that he feels particularly good about inadvertently provoking Leia's confession of love. The chapter now talks about Immanuel Kant. Kant's ethics are focused on intentions, the reasons why people (...) choose to act as they do. Jar Jar was, like most of the Senate, a victim of Palpatine's deceptions. The author highlights that it is fair to say that Jar Jar did not make the choice to grant Palpatine emergency powers because he could not do otherwise. So, even though the consequences were grave, and Jar Jar's decision hasty, he can be absolved for what he did. (shrink)

Lois is so easily deceived by Clark’s glasses and mild‐mannered demeanor because identity isn’t nearly as clear as we’d like to believe. In fact, may be there is a strong sense in which Clark Kent and Superman really are two different people. Memory isn't the right place to look for identity, unless we want to agree that Superman losing his memory would mean that he was, in effect, dead. If we look at personal identity as something we just kind of (...) make up about ourselves and others, basically as just using names to avoid confusion and complexity, then we can start to give Lois some slack for never realizing that Superman and Clark aren't the same person. When we name things, we give them a common‐sense version of identity, and Superman and Clark are given two different identities by society and even themselves. (shrink)

In this paper the authors address the issue of investments made by family businesses. Their study attempted to verify the level of investments made by Polish family businesses in comparison with the level of investments made by Polish non-family businesses. The study focused on the analysis of investment flows of Polish listed companies included in the WIG index for the years 2006-2018. A total of 233 companies were analyzed, including 177 non-family businesses and 56 family businesses. The results corroborated the (...) argument that Polish listed non-family businesses invest much more money than family businesses. It was also observed that only a small percentage of companies in both groups invest their finances in research and development. (shrink)

In this book, Katarzyna Kremplewska offers a thorough analysis of Santayana's conception of human self, viewed as part of his larger philosophy of life. Santayana emerges as an author of a provocative philosophy of drama, in which human life is acted out. Kremplewska demonstrates how his thought addresses the dynamics of human self in this context and the possibility of sustaining self-integrity while coping with the limitations of finite life. Focusing on particular aspects of Santayana's thought such as his (...) conception of the tragic aspect of existence, and the role of the doctrine of spirit in his philosophical anthropology and critique of culture, this book also sets Santayana's thought in substantial dialogue with other thinkers such as Heidegger, Bergson, and Nietzsche. Like Santayana's philosophy, this book seeks to build passages between theoretical reflection and practical life with the possibility of a good life in view. (shrink)

The paper focuses on the issue of truth-telling in non-fictional narratives of (in)justice. Based on examples of rape narratives, domestic abuse narratives, human trafficking narratives and asylum seeker narratives, I examine the various difficulties in telling the truth in such stories, particularly those related to various culturally conditioned ideas of how the world works, which at the same time form the basis of, among other things, legal discourse and officials’ decision-making processes. I will also demonstrate that such culturally conditioned ideas, (...) which are the basis of official discourse, can be considered within the category of both the social imaginary of the just world in the Taylorian sense of the term, and the social master narrative, which in the case of stories of (in)justice is often based on the just world hypothesis. (shrink)

People differ in the extent to which they express a need for sense-making, and these individual differences are important to understand in light of meaning-making processes. To quantify this important variable, we originally proposed a need for sense-making scale. We now propose a refined, similarly reliable short version of the scale. The 7-item NSM-SF was validated across a series of four studies. NSM-SF showed psychometric properties and correlations consistent with its longer forerunner. Additionally, results indicated that the need for sense-making (...) was moderately positively related to the satisfaction of basic psychological needs, and it related negatively to the frustration of these needs. The research offers a useful, brief tool for assessing the NSM construct and broadens our understanding of basic psychological motivations. (shrink)

Personality Dimensions and Nicotine Dependence and Withdrawal Symptoms: the Mediating Role of Self-Directness We analyzed the relationship between personality traits and smoking status and nicotine withdrawal symptoms using two comprehensive models of personality: the Five-Factor Model and the Cloninger's Temperament and Character Inventory. In total 295 people were examined, 149 smokers and 146 who have never smoked. To measure the severity of the nicotine dependence we used the Fagerstroem Tolerance Questionnaire and the DSM-IV criteria of nicotine dependence and to measure (...) the nicotine withdrawal symptoms the Nicotine Dependence History. The results showed significant differences between the groups in particular dimensions: Neuroticism, Agreeableness and Conscientiousness. The analyse of the TCI demonstrate, that smokers are higher in Novelty Seeking and lower in Reward Dependence than never smokers and show less Self-Directness and Cooperativeness. The mediation analyses showed that Self-Directness is the significant mediator between Extra-Introversion and nicotine withdrawal symptoms measured by NDHIS and between Neuroticism and DSM-IV criteria of nicotine dependence. (shrink)

Literatura odgrywa niekwestionowaną rolę w tworzeniu definicji medycyny, oferując różnorodność obrazów, które w swym metaforycznym wymiarze odnoszą się do ludzkiego życia. Fakt, iż medycyna stanowi gałąź sztuki, w bezmiarze której przesłanie wynikające z bogactwa prozy i poezji znajduje swój wyraz, podkreśla, iż owe dwa, pozornie niezwiązane ze sobą światy przenikają się wzajemnie, nadając sens własnej egzystencji. Literatura, która nie może odwołać się do medycznej rzeczywistości, nie może bowiem dotrzeć do duszy czytelnikai wpłynąć na jego wewnętrzną hierarchię wartości, podczas gdy medycyna, (...) obdarta z wielowymiarowości literackich symboli, staje się przestrzenią pozbawioną duchowości. (shrink)

The paper investigates the various factors from a socio-cultural perspective that have a bearing on the intercultural couple’s marital satisfaction in Westerner and non-Westerner relationships, and how cultural differences may potentially amplify the difficulties, which non-intercultural couples themselves are already likely to face. These factors include acculturation, language and communication, attitudes toward marriage, individual traits and behaviours, support of the family, societal views, gender roles, managing of the household finances and child rearing. Certain theories are also highlighted in an attempt (...) to explain why these cultural differences have such a profound effect on the marital satisfaction of intercultural couples. (shrink)