The Public Relations Society of America's Member Code of Ethics 2000 assumes professional standing for PRSA members, emphasizes public relations' advocacy role, and stresses education rather than enforcement as key to improving industry standards. Code development involved more than 2 years of research and writing and the counsel of outside ethics experts. In this article I review the code development process, providing an insider's perspective on the ethics initiative.

The Public Relations Society of America adopted its first code of ethics in 1950, 2 years after PRSA was formed. During the next 50 years, the code was revised and updated several times to keep pace with industry practices and increased expectations for ethical performance. In 2000 a new code was adopted to heighten awareness of ethical issues and address concerns regarding code enforcement. In this article I trace the 50-year evolution of PRSA's codes of ethics and related code-enforcement activities.

Reports of ethical lapses in the business world have been numerous and widespread. Ethical awareness in business education has received a great deal of attention because of the number and severity of business scandals. Given Sarbanes-Oxley legislation and recent Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business International’s (AACSBI) recommendations, this study examined respective websites of Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) regulated public companies and AACSBI-accredited business schools for ethical policy statement content. The analysis was accomplished by classifying ethical expressions into (...) a framework consisting of the attributes of thematic content and focus/themes partially based on the 2004 research of Gaumnitz and Lere. Findings indicate that public companies have been diligent in presenting website ethical content that closely follows authoritative recommendations. Business schools appear not to have prioritized such disclosure to the extent done so by public companies. Although there was improvement between two samples taken in 2005 and 2007, this study provides evidence that many accredited business schools have little or no disclosed ethical expectations in their mission, vision, goals, or other similar types of statements on their websites. Additional findings provide several opportunities for future research. (shrink)

What is the future of Philosophy of education? Or as many of scholars and thinkers in this final ‘future-focused’ collective piece from the philosophy of education in a new key Series put it, what are the futures—plural and multiple—of the intersections of ‘philosophy’ and ‘education?’ What is ‘Philosophy’; and what is ‘Education’, and what role may ‘enquiry’ play? Is the future of education and philosophy embracing—or at least taking seriously—and thinking with Indigenous ethicoontoepistemologies? And, perhaps most importantly, what is that (...) ‘Future’? These debates have been located in the work of diverse scholars: from the West, from Global South, from indigenous thinkers. In this collective piece, we purposefully juxtapose diverse takes on the future of these intersections. We have given up the urge to organise, place together, separate with subheadings or connect the paragraphs that follow. Instead, we let these philosophers of education and thinkers who use philosophical texts and ideas to sit together in one long read as potentially ‘strange and unusual bedfellows’. This text urges us to understand how these scholars and thinkers perceive our educational philosophical futures, and how the work and thinking they have done on thinking about what the future of that new key in philosophy of education may look like is embedded in a much deeper and richer literature, and personal experience. (shrink)

KJORVEN M, RUSH K and HOLE R. Nursing Inquiry 2011; 18: 325–335 A discursive exploration of the practices that shape and discipline nurses’ responses to postoperative deliriumAlthough delirium is classified as a medical emergency, it is often not treated as such by health care providers. The aim of this study was to critically examine, through a poststructural, Foucauldian concept of discourse, the language practices and discourses that shape and discipline nurses' care of older adults with postoperative delirium (POD) with a (...) purpose to question accepted nursing practice. The study was based on data collected from face‐to‐face, in‐depth, personal interviews with six nurses who work on an acute postoperative patient care unit. Five analytic readings of the data identified two prominent discourses at work in nursing practice which influenced the care of patients with POD. These were identified as discourses of legitimacy/illegitimacy and discourses of nursing work. Through the process of poststructural analysis it became evident that one overriding discourse – the biomedical/scientific discourse – served to direct, legitimize and govern all other discourses. The findings of this study have implications for nursing knowledge and practice, length of hospital stay and improved patient outcomes. This study builds on previous work and is the first study to conduct a discourse analysis illuminating nurses’ responses to POD through comparison with other acute medical emergencies from a poststructural perspective. (shrink)

In questo articolo rifletto sulla nascita della grammatica araba e il suo sviluppo come fonte dell’esegesi coranica dall’VIII al XIV secolo. Il legame tra esegesi e grammatica è stato oggetto di diversi studi che esaminano le origini delle categorie grammaticali. Sebbene non ci sia evidenza di uno spiccato interesse per la grammatica da parte degli esegeti coranici, essi hanno comunque dovuto adoperarla per spiegare i significati del testo sacro. In particolare, nei commentari classici è data particolare attenzione alla lessicografia e (...) meno alla struttura grammaticale. A ogni modo, in alcuni passaggi, anche se sporadici, le categorie grammaticali stesse fungono da spiegazione, essendo portatrici di significati. Questo si evince dalla letteratura sufi dove le terminologie della grammatica araba sono simboli delle stazioni dell’anima nel cammino spirituale, come nella _Grammatica dei cuori_ di al-Qushayrī. In questo articolo, analizzo il ruolo della grammatica nelle Scienze Coraniche secondo il teologo al-Ghazālī e dopo una panoramica della storia della disciplina nel periodo classico della storia islamica, e evidenzio il modo in cui le terminologie grammaticali servono per la comprensione profonda del significato nella Sūra al-Fātiha nel commentario sunnita di Ibn Kathīr. In this article I reflect on the emergence of Arabic grammar and its development as a source for Qur’ān exegesis from VIII to XIV century. The connection between exegesis and grammar has been the subject of several studies examining the origin of grammatical categories. Although there is no evidence of a clear interest for grammar by Qur’ān exegetes, they necessarily used it to explain the meanings of the sacred text. In particular, in the classical commentaries there is a particular attention to lexicography and less to the grammatical structure. However, in some passages, even if sporadic, the grammatical categories themselves perform an explanatory function, being bearers of meanings. This is manifest in Sufi literature where Arabic grammar terminologies are symbols of the stations of souls in the spiritual path, like in the _Grammar of the heart_ by al-Qushayrī. In this article, I analyse the status of grammar in Quranic Sciences according to the theologian al-Ghazālī and after an overview on the history of the discipline in the classical period of Islamic History, and I highlight the way grammar terminologies serve as a key to understand profound meaning in sura al-Fātiha in Ibn Kathīr’s sunni commentary. (shrink)

This book is divided into three parts: in Part I, R. M. Hare offers a justification for the use of philosophy of language in the treatment of moral questions, together with an overview of his moral philosophy of ‘universal prescriptivism’. The second part, and the core of the book, consists of five chapters originally presented as a lecture series under the title ‘A Taxonomy of Ethical Theories’. Hare identifies descriptivism and non‐descriptivism as the two main positions in modern moral philosophy. (...) The former he divides into Naturalism and Intuitionism, and the latter into Emotivism and Rationalism. Hare argues that all forms of descriptivism tend to lead to Relativism because the truth conditions of moral statements are culturally variant. Of the positions discussed, only Hare's own position, a form of Rationalism, which he calls Universal Prescriptivism, meets all of the requirements that an adequate ethical theory should meet. Part III consists of Hare's previously published essay ‘Could Kant have been a Utilitarian?’ (Utilitas 5, 1993). Here, Hare puts forward the controversial thesis that Kant's moral philosophy is, in its basic principles, compatible with utilitarianism. (shrink)

I think "schizo-culture" here is being used rather in a special sense. Not referring to clinical schizophrenia, but to the fact that the culture is divided up into all sorts of classes and groups, etc., and that some of the old lines are breaking down. And that this is a healthy sign. -- William Burroughs, from _Schizo-Culture_ The legendary 1975 "Schizo-Culture" conference, conceived by the early Semiotext collective, began as an attempt to introduce the then-unknown radical philosophies of post-'68 France (...) to the American avant-garde. The event featured a series of seminal papers, from Deleuze's first presentation of the concept of the "rhizome" to Foucault's introduction of his _History of Sexuality_ project. The conference was equally important on a political level, and brought together a diverse group of activists, thinkers, patients, and ex-cons in order to address the challenge of penal and psychiatric institutions. The combination proved to be explosive, but amid the fighting and confusion "Schizo-Culture" revealed deep ruptures in left politics, French thought, and American culture. The "Schizo-Culture" issue of the Semiotext journal came three years later. Designed by a group of artists and filmmakers including Kathryn Bigelow and Denise Green, it documented the chaotic creativity of an emerging downtown New York scene, and offered interviews with artists, theorists, writers, and No Wave and pre-punk musicians together with new texts from Deleuze, Foucault, R. D. Laing, and other conference participants. This slip-cased edition includes _The Book: 1978_, a facsimile reproduction of the original Schizo-Culture publication; and _The Event: 1975_, a previously unpublished and comprehensive record of the conference that set it all off. It assembles many previously unpublished texts, including a detailed selection of interviews reconstructing the events, and features Félix Guattari, William Burroughs, Kathy Acker, Michel Foucault, Sylvère Lotringer, Guy Hocquenghem, Gilles Deleuze, John Rajchman, Robert Wilson, Joel Kovel, Jack Smith, Jean-François Lyotard, Ti-Grace Atkinson, François Peraldi, and John Cage. (shrink)

THE PARADOXES OF CONFIRMATION ARE CONSTITUTED BY THE CONTRADICTIONS ARISING FROM THE CONJUNCTION OF THREE PRINCIPLES OF CONFIRMATION - NICOD’S CRITERION, THE EQUIVALENCE CONDITION, AND WHAT THE PAPER CALLS THE SCIENTIFIC LAWS CONDITION. THE PAPER DISCUSSES IN DETAIL THE VARIOUS SOLUTIONS PROVIDED BY ABANDONING ONE OF THE PRINCIPLES. IN THE END IT FINDS NICOD’S CRITERION FALSE, BUT FINDS THE EXPLANATIONS GIVEN BY H.G. ALEXANDER AND OTHERS OF WHY NICOD’S CRITERION IS FALSE THEMSELVES UNSATISFACTORY. IT THEN PROVIDES A MORE ADEQUATE ACCOUNT (...) OF THE CIRCUMSTANCES IN WHICH "RA.BA" CONFIRMS "ALL R’S ARE B". (shrink)

This reply to an ongoing debate between conspiracy theory researchers from different disciplines exposes the conceptual confusions that underlie some of the disagreements in conspiracy theory research. Reconciling these conceptual confusions is important because conspiracy theories are a multidisciplinary topic and a profound understanding of them requires integrative insights from different fields. Specifically, we distinguish research focussing on conspiracy *theories* (and theorizing) from research of conspiracy *belief* (and mindset, theorists) and explain how particularism with regards to conspiracy theories does not (...) mean we cannot define a problematic subclass of conspiracy beliefs, while avoiding the problems of generalism. We hope this reply helps conspiracy theory researchers recognize the differences between studying conspiracy theories and conspiracy beliefs and appreciate the possibilities for fruitful, integrative, and interdisciplinary research. (shrink)

_Humanizing Education_ offers historic examples of humanizing educational spaces, practices, and movements that embody a spirit of hope and change. From Dayton, Ohio, to Barcelona, Spain, this collection of essays from the _Harvard Educational Review_ carries readers to places where people have first imagined—and then organized—their own educational responses to dehumanizing practices and conditions. Contributors include Montse Sánchez Aroca, William Ayers, Kathy Boudin, Fernando Cardenal, Jeffrey M. R. Duncan-Andrade, Marco Garrido, Jay Gillen, Maxine Greene, Kathe Jervis, Nancy Uhlar Murray, (...) Valerie Miller, Wendy Ormiston, Ana Y. Ramos-Zayas, Vanessa Siddle Walker, Arthur E. Thomas, and Travis Wright. (shrink)

R.I.G. Hughes presents a series of eight philosophical essays on the theoretical practices of physics. The first two essays examine these practices as they appear in physicists' treatises and journal articles. By treating these publications as texts, Hughes casts the philosopher of science in the role of critic. This premise guides the following six essays which deal with various concerns of philosophy and physics such as laws, disunities, models and representation, computer simulation, explanation, and the discourse of physics.

BLWith new text and full apparatus criticus The Eudemian Ethics was one of two ethical treatises which Aristotle wrote on the subject of ethica or `matters to do with character'. Although the two works cover much the same ground, the Nicomachean Ethics is better known; the poor manuscript tradition of the Eudemian Ethics has made correct translation and interpretation of the text extremely difficult. The subject of the work is the choice of a certain means of conduct, made by a (...) `man of practical wisdom', between two extremes of behaviour: asceticism and yielding to uncontrolled impulses. Aristotle also stresses the notion of moral intention and the importance of virtue of character. This new Oxford Classical Text of the Eudemian Ethics is the result of many years of work. After Sir David Ross's death, his original text was substantially reworked and revised by his friend and colleague R. R. Walzer, who was aided in the revision by his former pupil Mrs Jean Mingay, who continued his work after his death in 1974. Mrs Mingay was fortunate in being able to make use of previously unpublished contributions from D. J. Allan after his death in the late seventies, and more recently has been helped in her work by the suggestions of Professor D. A. Russell, David Robinson, and Christopher Rowe. (shrink)

Reasons and Recognition brings together fourteen new papers on an array of topics from the many areas to which Scanlon has made path-breaking contributions, ...

What kind of knowledge is medical knowledge? Can medicine be explained scientifically? Is disease a scientific concept, or do explanations of disease depend on values? What is ‘evidence-based’ medicine? Are advances in neuroscience bringing us closer to a scientific understanding of the mind? The nature of medicine raises fundamental questions about explanation, causation, knowledge and ontology – questions that are central to philosophy as well as medicine. In this book Paul R. Thompson and Ross E. G. Upshur introduce the fundamental (...) issues in philosophy of medicine for those coming to the subject for the first time. They introduce and explain the following key topics: Understanding the physician-patient relationship: the phenomenology of the medical encounter. Models and theories in biology and medicine: what role do theories play in medicine? Are they similar to scientific theories? Randomised controlled trials: can scientific experiments be replicated in clinical medicine? What are the philosophical criticisms levelled at RCTs? The concept of evidence in medical research: what do we mean by ‘Evidence-based medicine?’ Should all medicine be based on evidence? Causation in medicine What do advances in neuroscience reveal about the relationship between mind and body? Defining health and disease: are explanations of disease objective or do they depend on values? Evolutionary medicine: what is the role of evolutionary biology in understanding medicine? Is it relevant? Extensive use of empirical examples and case studies is made throughout the book. These include debates about smoking and cancer, the use of placebos in randomised controlled trials and controversies about research into the causes of HIV and autism. This is an indispendable introduction to those teaching philosophy of medicine and philosophy of science. (shrink)

INTRODUCTION! In almost every area of contemporary philosophy the impact of Franz Brentano or his pupils can be detected. ...

This classic biography of Nietzsche, first published in the 1960s, was enthusiastically reviewed at the time. The biography is now reissued with its text updated in the light of recent research. Hollingdale's biography remains the single best account of the life and works for the student or non-specialist. The biography chronicles Nietzsche's intellectual evolution and discusses his friendship and breach with Wagner, his attitude towards Schopenhauer, and his indebtedness to Darwin and the Greeks. It follows the years of his maturity (...) and his mental collapse in 1889. The final part of the book considers the development of the Nietzsche legend during his years of madness. R. J. Hollingdale, one of the preeminent translators of Nietzsche, allows Nietzsche to speak for himself in a translation that transmits the vividness and virtuosity of Nietzsche's many styles. This is the ideal book for anyone interested in Nietzsche's life and work to learn why he is such a significant figure for the development of modern thought. (shrink)

The most glamorous and even glorious moments in a legal system come when a high court recognizes an abstract principle involving, for example, human liberty or equality. Indeed, Americans, and not a few non-Americans, have been greatly stirred--and divided--by the opinions of the Supreme Court, especially in the area of race relations, where the Court has tried to revolutionize American society. But these stirring decisions are aberrations, says Cass R. Sunstein, and perhaps thankfully so. In Legal Reasoning and Political Conflict, (...) Sunstein, one of America's best known commentators on our legal system, offers a bold, new thesis about how the law should work in America, arguing that the courts best enable people to live together, despite their diversity, by resolving particular cases without taking sides in broader, more abstract conflicts. Sunstein offers a close analysis of the way the law can mediate disputes in a diverse society, examining how the law works in practical terms, and showing that, to arrive at workable, practical solutions, judges must avoid broad, abstract reasoning. Why? For one thing, critics and adversaries who would never agree on fundamental ideals are often willing to accept the concrete details of a particular decision. Likewise, a plea bargain for someone caught exceeding the speed limit need not--indeed, must not--delve into sweeping issues of government regulation and personal liberty. Thus judges purposely limit the scope of their decisions to avoid reopening large-scale controversies. Sunstein calls such actions incompletely theorized agreements. In identifying them as the core feature of legal reasoning--and as a central part of constitutional thinking in America, South Africa, and Eastern Europe-- he takes issue with advocates of comprehensive theories and systemization, from Robert Bork to Jeremy Bentham, the father of utilitarianism, and Ronald Dworkin, who defends an ambitious role for courts in the elaboration of rights. Equally important, Sunstein goes on to argue that it is the living practice of the nation's citizens that truly makes law. For example, he cites Griswold v. Connecticut, a groundbreaking case in which the Supreme Court struck down Connecticut's restrictions on the use of contraceptives by married couples--a law that was no longer enforced by prosecutors. In overturning the legislation, the Court invoked the abstract right of privacy; the author asserts that the justices should have appealed to the narrower principle that citizens need not comply with laws that lack real enforcement. By avoiding large-scale issues and values, such a decision could have led to a different outcome in Bowers v. Hardwick, the decision that upheld Georgia's rarely prosecuted ban on sodomy. And by pointing to the need for flexibility over time and circumstances, Sunstein offers a novel understanding of the old ideal of the rule of law. Legal reasoning can seem impenetrable, mysterious, baroque. This book helps dissolve the mystery. Whether discussing the interpretation of the Constitution or the spell cast by the revolutionary Warren Court, Cass Sunstein writes with grace and power, offering a striking and original vision of the role of the law in a diverse society. In his flexible, practical approach to legal reasoning, he moves the debate over fundamental values and principles out of the courts and back to its rightful place in a democratic state: the legislatures elected by the people. (shrink)

Reasons are facts, i.e., they are constituted by facts. Given a popular view that conceives of facts as thin abstract rather than thick concrete entities, the dichotomy between agent-neutral and agent-relative reasons is not particularly problematic. It is argued that it would be preferable if we could understand the dichotomy even if we had a thick noton of fact in mind. It would be preferable because it is better if our notion of a reason is consistent with a wider rather (...) than narrower set of plausible metaphysical views. But, more importantly, it would also be preferable because the thin approach trivializes an interesting issue among practical philosophers. Moreover, as an additional drawback, the thin account is in one respect less appealing than its thick cousin. The latter is not flawless, though. Some major objections to the thick notion is discussed. (shrink)

This article situates the work of Edmund Burke, principally his writings on the French Revolution, in an enlightenment debate about sociability, monarchy and mixed government. It shows how his conception of manners in general, and honour in particular, relates to similar preoccupations in Montesquieu, Voltaire, Smith and Millar, and how that conception has consequences for his theory of authority and moderation in politics.

An intelligently and originally organized survey, which cites with brief abstracts and some appraisals studies of Plato that appeared during the period 1950-1957. The range of coverage is almost exhaustive and is carefully cross-referenced. The citation of material in Dutch, Portuguese, and Norwegian, supplementing complete coverage of English, French, German, and Italian books and articles, should prove of value in revealing common interests and furthering international communication among scholars. Philological and analytic approaches are usually commended, but dialectical treatments which fit (...) neither category usually elicit an unjustified negative appraisal. An indispensable book for the general practitioner in philosophy as well as for the specialist. --R. S. B. (shrink)

pt. 1. De dicto: Necessary and contingent truths, by G. W. Leibniz. New essays concerning human understanding, by G. W. Leibniz. Introduction to the critique of pure reason, by Immanuel Kant. On the nature of mathematical truth, C. G. Hempel. Two dogmas of empiricism, by W. V. O. Quine. In defense of a dogma, by H. P. Grace and P. F. Strawson. The a priori and the analytic, by A. Quinton. The truths of reason, by R. Chisholm.--pt. 2. De re: (...) Reference and modality, by W. V. O. Quine. De re et de dicto, by A. Plantinga. World and essence, by A. Plantinga.--Bibliography (p. 200-202). (shrink)

This volume showcases cutting-edge scholarship from The Big Questions in Free Will project, funded by a grant from the John Templeton Foundation and directed by Alfred R. Mele. It explores the subject of free will from the perspectives of neuroscience; social, cognitive, and developmental psychology; and philosophy. The volume consists of fourteen new articles and an introduction from top-ranked contributors, all of whom bring fresh perspectives to the question of free will. They investigate questions such as: How do children conceive (...) of free will and how does their concept of free will develop? How does lowered or raised confidence in the existence of free will affect our behavior? What modifies our power to resist temptation? What do lay folk mean by free will? What brain processes underlie decisions? How does the conscious experience of voluntary action contribute to the neural control of behavior? What are the neural differences between deliberate choosing and arbitrary picking? How do neuroscientific studies of decision making in monkeys bear on human free will? Is determinism compatible with free will? What can a proper understanding of causation tell us about free will? What is moral responsibility? Readers interested in the current and future direction of scholarship on free will find this volume essential reading. (shrink)