Cunha and Caldieraro (2009) investigated whether sunk-cost effects, which are well documented in hypothetical situations involving monetary investments, also occur in choice situations with purely behavioral investments. Their results suggest that decision makers indeed fall prey to behavioral sunk-cost effects under certain circumstances. I have been unable to replicate their pattern of results in three separate investigations. In these studies, I attempted to recover the effect using two other behavioral effort manipulations in addition to the manipulation used by Cunha and (...) Caldieraro. This failure to replicate the pattern of results calls into question the robustness of the initial findings. (shrink)

Aesthetic value is included in virtually all accounts of the values of biodiversity, but this value is still incompletely understood. Here I offer an account of the aesthetics of biodiversity based on the understanding of aesthetics developed by Immanuel Kant. The claim of this analysis is that while individual organisms may be considered beautiful, biodiversity as a whole is sublime. This distinction poses challenges and opportunities for those who manage lands for biodiversity value. Comparison to managing art museums and wine (...) cellars and a new vision for the role of systematics and taxonomy offer some insight into the management of the sublime aspects of biodiversity. (shrink)

Name der Zeitschrift: Semiotica Jahrgang: 2014 Heft: 202 Seiten: 41-79.

Physicians treating newly incapacitated patients often must navigate surrogate decision-makers through a difficult course of treatment decisions. Such a process can be complex. Physicians must not only explain the medical facts and prognosis to the surrogate, but also attempt to ensure that the surrogate arrives at decisions that are consistent with the patient's own values and wishes. Where these values and wishes are unknown, physicians must help surrogates make decisions that reflect the patient's best interests.

The use of human fetal tissue for scientific research has enormous potential but is subject to government legislation. In the United Kingdom the Polkinghorne Committee's guidelines were accepted by the Department of Health in 1990. These guidelines set out to protect women undergoing termination of pregnancy from exploitation but in so doing may significantly restrict potential research. Although the committee took evidence from a wide variety of experts they did not seek the views of the general public. We asked 108 (...) women about to have a therapeutic abortion; 167 women who had had a pregnancy terminated in the past, and 419 women who had never had an abortion, their views on research using human fetal tissue. Regardless of their past experiences the women were overwhelmingly in favour of research using fetal tissue (94 per cent). They made little distinction between basic research and research with obvious clinical relevance and supported the concept of using transplanted fetal tissue for the treatment of adult disease such as Parkinsonism. Women about to undergo an abortion were significantly more likely (p < 0.001) to approve of all types of research including that aimed at improving methods of abortion and research using live fetuses in utero. (shrink)

Physicians treating newly incapacitated patients often must navigate surrogate decision-makers through a difficult course of treatment decisions. Such a process can be complex. Physicians must not only explain the medical facts and prognosis to the surrogate, but also attempt to ensure that the surrogate arrives at decisions that are consistent with the patient's own values and wishes. Where these values and wishes are unknown, physicians must help surrogates make decisions that reflect the patient's best interests.

This analysis examines whistleblowing within the context of organizational culture. Several factors which have provided impetus for organizations to emphasize ethical conduct and to encourage internal, rather than external, whistleblowing are identified. Inadequate protection for whistleblowers and statutory enticement for them to report ethical violations externally are discussed. Sundstrand's successful model for cultural change and encouragement of internal whistleblowing is analyzed to show how their model of demonstrating management's commitment to ethical conduct, establishing ethical expectations of employees, training to ensure (...) that employees understand the concepts and expectations, promoting of employee ownership of the program, making the program visible, protecting the whistleblower and undertaking periodic reviews of the program's success may serve as a model for other organizations. (shrink)

Nation and Identity provides a concise and comprehensive account of the place of national identity in modern life. Ross Poole argues that the nation became a fundamental organising principle of social, political and moral life during the period of early modernity and that is has provided the organising principle of much liberal, republican and democratic thought. Ross Poole offers us a new and urgently needed analysis of the concept of identity, arguing that we are now in a position (...) to envisage the end of nationalism. We see that the impact of issues like multiculturalism, republicanism, and indigenous rights have made it very difficult to see how the possibility of a postnational cosmopolitanism could not degenerate into a nihilistic moral universe. Nation and Identity will be a fascinating read for all those interested in issues of national identity, both politically and philosophically. (shrink)

This paper explores moral sensitivity in a learning perspective, and a framework is developed for the understanding of how moral sensitivity can be developed through reiterative problem solving in the face of diverse ethical problems. Factors that may inhibit the individual's ability to conceive of moral issues are discussed, and perspectives from moral psychology are integrated with theory on problem formulation. It is argued that (1) the individual's moral sensitivity is pivotal for ethical problem solving, because problem formulation is paramount (...) for further reflection and behaviour; (2) ethical behaviour must be understood both (a) in terms of the individual's psychological make‐up that determines psychological response to moral features and (b) in terms of external constraints on the individual's moral sensitivity; and (3) the development of moral sensitivity can be promoted by actively and consciously pursuing disciplined imagination in multi‐perspective formulations of problems. (shrink)

As false information may spread rapidly on social media, a profound understanding of how it can be debunked is required. This study offers empirical insights into the development of rumors after they are debunked, the various user groups who are involved in the process, and their network structures. As crisis situations are highly sensitive to the spread of rumors, Twitter posts from during the 2017 G20 summit are examined. Tweets regarding five rumors that were debunked during this event were manually (...) coded into the following categories: rumor, debunking message, uncertainty about rumor, uncertainty about debunking message, and others. Our findings show that rumors which are debunked early and vehemently by official sources are the most likely to be stopped. When individuals participate in the process, they typically do so by sharing uncommented media content, as opposed to contributing user-generated content. Depending on the conditions in which a rumor arises, different network structures can be found. Since some rumors are easier for individuals to verify than others, our results have implications for the priorities of journalists and official sources. (shrink)

The Liberating art of philosophy: a foundational anthology provides students with seminal texts and articles that pique their philosophical curiosity, encourage critical thought, and invite questioning.

Guided by the concept of bullshit, broadly defined as a deceptive form of rhetoric intended to distract and/or persuade, we examine how fabrications and false statements— when crafted and distributed by the president of the United States—impact not only foreign policy making and implementation but also erode democratic norms. Unconstrained by reality, and seemingly driven more by celebrity and showmanship than a genuine desire to govern, we argue that President Trump’s penchant for bullshit is part of a concerted strategy to (...) sideline critics while simultaneously undermining the ongoing investigations into the Trump campaign’s alleged collusion with the Russian government. (shrink)

The essays in this collection step back to ask: Do the complex components of Dennett's work on intentionality, consciousness, evolution, and ethics themselves ...

According to color subjectivism, colors are mental properties, processes, or events of visual experiences of color. I first lay out an argument for subjectivism founded on claims from visual science and show that it also relies on a philosophical assumption. I then argue that subjectivism is untenable because this view cannot provide a plausible account of color perception. I describe three versions of subjectivism, each of which combines subjectivism with a theory of perception, namely sense datum theory, adverbialism, and the (...) virtual color proposal, and argue that each version faces serious objections. Considering these three theories of perception to be exhaustive of those available to the subjectivist, I conclude that subjectivism is untenable and that the scientifically motivated argument for this view is unsound. I then offer the diagnosis that the philosophical assumption on which this argument relies is mistaken. (shrink)

This work is a step toward the development of a logic for types and computation that includes not only the usual spaces of mathematics and constructions, but also spaces from logic and domain theory. Using realizability, we investigate a configuration of three toposes that we regard as describing a notion of relative computability. Attention is focussed on a certain local map of toposes, which we first study axiomatically, and then by deriving a modal calculus as its internal logic. The resulting (...) framework is intended as a setting for the logical and categorical study of relative computability. (shrink)

This literature review describes the current state of research on the Greek sophists. It draws on recent work on the beginnings of rhetoric, overviews of sophistic thought and case studies on Protagoras, Gorgias, Antiphon and Prodicus. It is shown that the traditional notion of a sophistic antithesis to philosophy has lost further ground: While earlier »rehabilitations« of sophistic thought still use the dichotomous distinction of philosophy und sophistic, now any generic talk of »the sophist« should better be regarded as misleading.

The classical forms of both modified realizability and relative realizability are naturally described in terms of the Sierpinski topos. The paper puts these two observations together and explains abstractly the existence of the geometric morphisms and logical functors connecting the various toposes at issue. This is done by advancing the theory of triposes over internal partial combinatory algebras and by employing a novel notion of elementary map.

Rawlsian ideal theory is meant to perform various roles in non-ideal theory. In this paper, I distinguish between three roles, and I consider the extent to which we can expect ideal theory to perform them. It is meant to serve as a target to guide non-ideal theorising in the long-term. It is also supposed to provide a way of comparing different injustices to tell us which is worst and therefore in most urgent need of a remedy. Finally, ideal theory is (...) the basis for a model of fairness that restricts the set of morally permissible measures in non-ideal theory. I show how the first two roles—the target and urgency roles—are less plausible than the fairness role. (shrink)

This paper examines the relationship between identities and the bicycle as portrayed in films. The analysis finds that taking the viewpoint of the bicycle emancipates the bicycle from being subjected to closure, as the constructionists would have it, and thus articulates the differences with which the bicycle can communicate to its rider. The paper examines the bicycle as depicted in three films: Premium Rush, A Sunday in Hell and Life on Earth. It engages with the concept of ‘interpretative flexibility’ and (...) the development of the bicycle, as examined by Wiebe Bijker and others, and argues that the interpretative flexibility of bicycles does not cease just because the high-wheeler was abandoned and the ‘safety’ bicycle was universally accepted. The fight for the role of the bicycle continues and the bicycle is subject to constant transformations in order to reconstruct it according to human needs. Andrew Feenberg’s modified constructivism is applied to re-examine the technical development of the bicycle, claiming that technology is dependent on specific social structures as well as human agency. The paper argues that just as social structures are negotiable and unfixed at any point in time, the bicycle too is never neutral but remains negotiable and unfixed. Consequently, since the bicycle constantly ‘speaks’ back to the user, there is never closure in the technical development of the bicycle. Drawing on the writings of Bruno Latour and the Deleuzian idea of assemblages, the bicycle and its rider are considered as an organic entity that is constantly forged and un-forged. Understanding the rhetoric of the bicycle machine helps the convergence of a bicycle becoming with becoming a rider, marking the bicycle as equal to its rider. Viewed in this way, the hierarchy of agency collapses and a crystallization emerges out of the rider and bicycle entwinement. (shrink)

Written by renowned Aristotle scholar Sir David Ross, this study has long been established as one of the foremost surveys of Aristotle's life, work and philosophy. With John L. Ackrill's introduction and updated bibliography, created for the sixth edition, the book continues to serve as a standard guide, both for the student of ancient history and the general reader.

There has been some recent optimism that addressing the question of how we distinguish sensory modalities will help us consider whether there are limits on a scientific understanding of perceptual states. For example, Block has suggested that the way we distinguish sensory modalities indicates that perceptual states have qualia which at least resist scientific characterization. At another extreme, Keeley argues that our common-sense way of distinguishing the senses in terms of qualitative properties is misguided, and offers a scientific eliminativism about (...) common-sense modalities which avoids appeal to qualitative properties altogether. I’ll argue contrary to Keeley that qualitative properties are necessary for distinguishing senses, and contrary to Block that our common-sense distinction doesn’t indicate that perceptual states have qualia. A non-qualitative characterization of perceptual states isn’t needed to avoid the potential limit on scientific understanding imposed by qualia. (shrink)

This article examines Millett's condemnation of Ruskin in Sexual Politics to demonstrate that Ruskin's views on women are the product of a specific mode of experience—one that precludes his views being representative of traditional Victorian patriarchy. The article uses Oakeshott's philosophical framework of different modes of experience to illustrate that Millett narrowly interprets Ruskin's statements on women from her own modal perspective without considering his broader belief in the imaginative over the rational faculty.

The problem of the nature of color is typically put in terms of the following question about the intentional content of visual experiences: what’s the nature of the property we attribute to physical objects in virtue of our visual experiences of color? This problem has proven to be tenacious largely because it’s not clear what the constraints are for an answer. With no clarity about constraints, the proposed solutions range widely, the most common dividing into subjectivist views which hold that (...) attributed colors are mental properties or mental events} and a variety of realist views, which hold that colors are properties of physical objects. These realist views, in turn, divide into views that hold that attributed colors are dispositions of physical objects to produce color experiences (dispositionalism),° nondispositional relations between objects and perceivers (the relational view)," physical properties of physical objects (physicalism),‘ or sui generis properties of physical objects (primitivism and impressionism).‘ I’ll examine a proposed constraint which Mark Johnston (1992) calls Revelation. According to Revelation, the appearance of color in our ordinary visual experience provides us with unqualified access to the nature of color. While every proposal about the nature of color must take a stand on how the.. (shrink)

I examine a dispute about the nature of practical reason, and in particular moral reason, generated by Thomas Nagel's proposal of an internalist rationalism which claims we can explain motivation in terms of reason and belief alone. In opposition, Humeans contend that such explanations must also appeal to further desires. Arguments on either side of this debate typically assume that a rationalist or Humean conclusion can be reached independently of a claim about the nature of moral judgment. I'll maintain, to (...) the contrary, that a resolution of this dispute can only be achieved on the basis of such a claim. (shrink)