One of the main objections to life extension is that life extension will cause severe overpopulation. This objection presents both moral and demographic issues. To explore the demographic issue, we present an updated and improved version of the formula in chapter six of _New Methuselahs_ for projecting the demographic impact of life extension. The new version includes additional demographical factors such as non-aging related causes of death. According to projections generated with this revised formula, moderate life extension (a life expectancy (...) of 120 years) will not significantly increase population at the fertility rates current in the developed world, but radical life expectancy (halting aging completely, leading to an average life expectancy of 1000 years) can lead to severe overpopulation even at very low fertility rates. This formula also enables us to ascertain what fertility rate and birth spacing will prevent life extension from causing severe overpopulation. The moral issues arise if radical life extension causes overpopulation severe enough to outweigh the benefits it brings. _New Methuselahs_ proposed a reproductive policy for avoiding severe overpopulation by limiting reproduction for those who use life extension. We then consider a moral objection to this policy that was not discussed in _New Methuselahs_: it is not likely that society will succeed in imposing limits to reproduction, therefore, it is likely that radical life extension is morally wrong. We respond to this objection and defend our response against two further objections. (shrink)

The notion of 'freedom' has gained an emblematic character in contemporary political discourse. It is, commonly, viewed as the central value and political goal of modern societies. Similarly, human rights documents conceive of freedom as their founding principle with universal validity. In contradistinction to this prevalent approach to freedom, this paper aims to demonstrate that freedom is, primarily, a political signifier with social-historical variability. One cannot, therefore, simply and uncritically assume that freedom has (or should have) universal validity or transhistorical (...) significance. In the first section of this paper, the structure of the contemporary liberal discourse on freedom is discussed and called into question. In light of Arendt's interpretation of freedom and through her analysis of the public domain, I reflect on the social-historical variability of the meaning of freedom and its inextricable nexus with a particular form of society. In the second section and drawing on Castoriadis, the notion of 'freedom' is approached in view of human signifying practices and imaginary dimension of society. This examination reveals in what way freedom––in the sense of a central social imaginary signification––contributes to the institution of an autonomous mode of society and determines the affective disposition and intentional vector of its inhabitants. (shrink)

From the ancient Egyptian tale of a Shipwrecked Sailor through to Sinbad and Robinson Crusoe, the stranded castaway living and philosophizing alone on a strange, desert island is a theme which has captured the imaginations of writers spanning cultures and millennia. Most familiar to Western literary historians is Daniel Defoe’s Robinson Crusoe, which inspired generations of writers from Jonathan Wyss and William Golding to Michel Tournier and J.M.Coetzee. However, little attention has been paid to Defoe’s antecedents, such as the remarkable (...) HayyIbn Yaqzan by twelfth-century Arab physician and philosopher, Muhammad Ibn Tufayl. Mahmoud Baroud here conducts a detailed comparative textual analysis of Hayy Ibn Yaqzan and Robinson Crusoe, and concludes that Daniel Defoe was likely to have been deeply influenced by Ibn Tufayl’s Arabic text. This book will be of interest to students and scholars of comparative literature, along with medieval Arabic literature, culture, and philosophy. (shrink)

The central motivation behind the scientific realism debate is explaining the impressive success of scientific theories. The debate has been dominated by two rival types of explanations: the first relies on some sort of static, referentially transparent relationship between the theory and the unobservable world, such as truthlikeness, representation, or structural similarity; the second relies on no robust relationship between the theory and unobservable reality at all, and instead draws on predictive similarity and the stringent methodology of science to explain (...) success. I argue that this is a false dichotomy, at least insofar as dynamical theories are concerned. The best explanation of the success of dynamical theories, I argue, must appeal to a robust but referentially opaque theory–world relation. The dynamical notion of ‘tracking’ fulfills this promise. I formulate a modified no miracles argument that is liberated from the false dichotomy and show how tracking responds to the modified argument. (shrink)

Virtually all philosophers of science have construed fundamental theories as descriptions of entities, properties, and/or structures. Call this the “descriptive-ontological” view. I argue that this view is incorrect, at least insofar as physical theories are concerned. I propose a novel construal of theories that I call the “prescriptive-dynamical” view. The central tenet of this view, roughly put, is that the _essential_ content of fundamental physical theories is a _prescription for interfacing with natural systems and translating local data into compact theoretical (...) language_. The descriptive-ontological aspects of theories, if any, are taken as _inessential_ content on this view: they do not contribute to the predictive success of the theory. Rather than describing _what is there_, the essence of a physical theory is to tell us _what to do_ when interfacing with a physical system. (shrink)

The Correspondence Principle of old quantum theory is commonly considered to be the requirement that quantum and classical theories converge in their empirical predictions in the appropriate asymptotic limit. That perception has persisted despite the fact that Bohr and other early proponents of CP clearly did not intend it as a mere requirement, and despite much recent historical work. In this paper, I build on this work by first giving an explicit formulation to the mentioned asymptotic requirement ) and then (...) discussing various possible formulations of CP for emission on the basis of the primary literature as well as general physical and metaphysical considerations. I shall then show that, in all of the most probable interpretations of CP that consider quantum theory as a universal theory, any system incorporating both CR and CP for emission would in fact be inconsistent. Old quantum theory measurably contradicts classical physics in the classical regime. (shrink)

As with terms such as “human rights”, “democracy”, and “equality”, the notion of “freedom” has an emblematic character with highly normative overtones. After the declaration of universal human rights, one might argue that freedom is – at least formally – a universal entitlement belonging to every human being. However, this universalist structure is built upon a conflictual foundation, as the juridico-political meaning of freedom is determined by the boundaries of national citizenship, statehood, and territorial sovereignty. This chapter examines refugeehood as (...) a normal by-product of the post-colonial world order, embodying the counter-history of nation-states whose internal borders, walls, and external fortifications are growingly being militarised and reinforced. Refugeehood represents an anomalous juridico-political condition that cannot be elucidated by colonial-racial binaries such as inclusion versus exclusion or rightlessness versus national citizenship. The central idea of this chapter is that, for refugees, the meaning of freedom and unfreedom are intertwined and should be approached as a dynamic relationship characterising the state of (non)-subjectivity. As political (non)-subjects, refugees call structural determinations of unfreedom into question. Refugees’ freedom is expressed in the act of flight and border crossing, irregular migratory movement, language games of resistance, and other emancipatory signifying practices by which they claim a place of refuge in the world. (shrink)

ABSTRACT The discourse on honesty and dishonesty in academic work has seen considerable growth over the past two decades. This study empirically analyses the shifts in the literature over the past two decades in the research focus and most prolific authors, institutions, countries, and journals. A broad list of terms was employed from the Glossary of Academic Integrity to shortlist journal articles (n = 782) from Scopus. A bibliometric analysis was conducted for each decade and the results were compared. Research (...) outputs and number of clusters were over two-fold in the second compared to the first decade indicating an increase in volume and complexity. The study found a continued focus on plagiarism and academic misconduct research, though academic integrity and contract cheating emerged in the second decade. Shifts were evident in the output signifying a diversification of the research base and perspectives. Further research and action are needed to develop integrity as the broadest defense against dishonesty in all spheres of academia. (shrink)

Self-plagiarism requires clear definition within an environment that places integrity at the heart of the research enterprise. This paper explores the whole notion of self-plagiarism by academics and distinguishes between appropriate and inappropriate textual re-use in academic publications, while considering research on other forms of plagiarism such as student plagiarism. Based on the practical experience of the authors in identifying academics’ self-plagiarism using both electronic detection and manual analysis, a simple model is proposed for identifying self-plagiarism by academics.

This research examines the descriptive and textual contexts of the Rashidun caliphs Hazrat Abu Bakr (d. 13/634), Hazrat Omar (d. 23/644), Hazrat Othman (35/656) and Hazrat Ali (d. 40/661) in the examples of signatures. However, it examines the general contexts of these signatures and aims to relate these detachment examples with their senders who have the qualifications of authority, eloquence and justice. These signature texts must be handled with full grace, awareness, forethought and responsibility, without any additions or reductions to (...) the text by the recipient. The research deals with the production area of signature and examines the forms of expression in terms of the interpretation and testify (istishad) included in these texts. In addition to these features, the research has applied to the texts of signature, which express a certain treatise, in order to express their expressions and to reveal the rhetorical aspects and textual differences they contain. As a result of the research, it has been seen that the Rashidun caliphs wrote the texts of signature with such qualities as wisdom, persuasion, lacotical (îcâz), suggestion, concentration, open-mindedness and avoidance of closedness, and in accordance with a goal. As a result of the research, it was seen that the signatures revolved around a pattern of focusing and concentrating on the meaning, combining the filtered beautiful words and the clarity of the wording and the literary aspect of the meaning. Finally, the caliphs used these signatures in line with a certain goal to solve many political and social issues. (shrink)

Two sample populations, one refugee and one resident, were studied. The frequencies of consanguineous marriages came out to be 49·8% and 55·4%, respectively, for the refugees and the residents. Caste endogamy was dominant both in the residents and the refugees. The mean coefficient of inbreeding was calculated to be 0·0303 for the refugee population and 0·0332 for the resident population samples. First cousin marriage was the dominant type of marriage in both samples; fathers daughter (FBD) marriage was more frequent among (...) the refugees while mothers daughter (MBD) marriage was more frequent among the residents. Education has no decreasing effect on the incidence of consanguineous marriages. A significant difference in the pattern of marriages in the refugees is observed after the Saur Revolution of 1979. (shrink)

The overall oppressive effect on women's rights of religious fundamentalism has been well documented in the literature. When looking at women's resistance to fundamentalism, it is important to examine not only organized efforts but individual women's agency in subverting or co-opting these movements toward their own ends. Using a series of narratives, the authors discuss four strategies used by Iranian women to negotiate the patriarchal practices of Islamic fundamentalism. These women crafted agency by responding to the demands of family and (...) state through collaboration, acquiescence, co-optation, and subversion. Their narratives of agency show how some women negotiated the economic hardship and gender oppression brought on by the Iranian revolution and how these negotiations affected women's options when filtered through the rhetoric of Islamic fundamentalism. The purpose of the article is to contribute further to the feminist discourse that has moved beyond victimization narratives. (shrink)

Background: There is evidence that household point-of-use water treatment products can reduce the enormous burden of water-borne illness. Nevertheless, adoption among the global poor is very low, and little evidence exists on why. Methods: We gave 600 households in poor communities in Dhaka, Bangladesh randomly-ordered two-month free trials of four water treatment products: dilute liquid chlorine, sodium dichloroisocyanurate tablets, a combined flocculant-disinfectant powdered mixture, and a silver-coated ceramic siphon filter. Consumers also received education on the dangers of untreated drinking water. (...) We measured which products consumers used with self-reports, observation, and chlorine tests. We also measured drinking water's contamination with E. coli. Findings: Households reported highest usage of the filter, although no product had even 30% usage. E. coli concentrations in stored drinking water were generally lowest when households had Water Guard. Households that self-reported product usage had large reductions in E. coli concentrations with any product as compared to controls. Conclusion: Traditional arguments for the low adoption of POU products focus on affordability, consumers' lack of information about germs and the dangers of unsafe water, and specific products not meshing with a household's preferences. In this study we provided free trials, repeated informational messages explaining the dangers of untreated water, and a variety of product designs. The low usage of all products despite such efforts makes clear that important barriers exist beyond cost, information, and variation among these four product designs. Without a better understanding of the choices and aspirations of the target end-users, household-based water treatment is unlikely to reduce morbidity and mortality substantially in urban Bangladesh and similar populations. © 2011 Luoto et al. (shrink)

Students’ attitudes towards plagiarism and academic misconduct have been found to vary across national cultures, although the relationship between national culture and students’ perceptions of plagiarism policy remains unexplored. Student survey data (n = 1757) from the UK, Czechia, Poland and Romania were analysed for differences in students’ perceptions of three specific aspects of plagiarism policy – access, support and detail – at their respective universities. Considered through the lens of Hofstede’s cultural dimensions, the study found significant differences between the (...) UK and the three Eastern European countries for all measures except students’ awareness of the penalties applied for plagiarism. Low ‘power distance’ and high ‘individualism’ were related to positive perceptions of plagiarism policy and process. The findings suggest that institutional plagiarism policy and procedures need to be responsive to the unique characteristics of national cultural context. (shrink)

Problems with regard to the analysis of argumentative partly discourse arise from definitorial disconformity. In this article, Informal argument is taken as the primary definition to study the basic structure of argument from a fragment of an Agatha Christie novel. Bilmes' account of the notions of Formulation (F) and Decision (D+/D-) are adapted to describe the relations of opposition which are displayed in informal argument. The minimal structure of argument is represented by the formula F/D-/D-, in which F is a (...) speaker's personal composition of a ‘fact’, the first D- is the disconfirming uptake of it by another speaker and the second D- is the completing disconfirming uptake by the initial speaker. Some of the speaker's possibilities to initiate an argument by expressing a Formulation are explored, as well as the social and cultural norms which play a role in argument-initiation and the concepts of ‘win’ and ‘loss’. (shrink)

Zusammenfassung Demosthenes, Aristoteles und Pausanias berichten von dem Dikasterion in Phreatto, zu dem ein außer Landes gegangener Athener auf einem Boot heranfährt, dieses unmittelbar an der Küste festmacht und sich dann in einem Prozess verteidigt. Er betritt zu keinem Zeitpunkt athenischen Boden, sondern bleibt auf dem Boot und vernimmt dort das Urteil, ob er vorsätzlich getötet hat oder nicht. Diese Verhandlungsform zwischen Land und Meer kann – so aufwendig und eigentümlich sie auch anmutet – durchaus historisch sein, ist aber nur (...) zu begreifen, wenn man von Drakons Gesetz über die Tötung ausgeht. Der Gesetzgeber hat 621/620 v. Chr. den Vollzug der Blutrache unter die Kontrolle der athenischen Gemeinschaft gestellt und damit einen wichtigen Schritt zur Eindämmung von Konflikten in der Polis geleistet. Das Verfahren in Phreatto ist im Kontext dieser Verordnung zu betrachten. (shrink)

This is a compilation of papers presented at the Seventeenth Annual Meeting of the West Coast Conference on Formal Linguistics, held February 20-22, 1998 in Vancouver, Canada, hosted by the University of British Columbia Department of Linguistics. The conference drew a large number of participants, from around the world. The fifty papers in this volume address theoretical issues in Syntax, Phonology, the Syntax-Semantics and Syntax-Phonology interfaces, and Language Acquisition, and provide an exciting view of current theory in these areas.

This article presents the edition of a late 3rd/9th- or early 4th/10th-century search warrant for stolen goods (P.Cair.EgLib.inv. 536v). The scribe reports that two black men (aswadayn) were traveling on two donkeys, one of which was also loaded with a saddlebag of money, jewellery and clothes. Upon reaching the Upper Egyptian village of Saqāwa, the two black men were assaulted and murdered, and the goods and donkeys stolen. This document corroborates descriptions in historical works of frequent rebel attacks in various (...) regions of Egypt in the 3rd/9th and 4rd/10th centuries. (shrink)

Nuclear pore complexes mediate and control transport between the cytosol and the nucleus. They form a highly selective and, thus, tight nuclear barrier between these compartments. The nuclear barrier provides the cell with the opportunity to control access to its DNA, a defining feature of eukaryotes. The tightness of the nuclear barrier is therefore physiologically pivotal and any remarkable change in its structure and permeability can prove pathophysiological, e.g. as a result of viral attack. However, there is accumulating evidence that (...) nuclear barrier structure and permeability are highly responsive to hydrophobic cargos of crucial physiological and therapeutic relevance, glucocorticoids (steroid hormones). The present review highlights the glucocorticoid‐induced effects on the nuclear barrier structure and permeability concluding that they are physiologically essential to mediate glucocorticoid action. BioEssays 28: 935–942, 2006. © 2006 Wiley periodicals, Inc. (shrink)

Students’ attitudes towards plagiarism and academic misconduct have been found to vary across national cultures, although the relationship between national culture and students’ perceptions of plagiarism policy remains unexplored. Student survey data from the UK, Czechia, Poland and Romania were analysed for differences in students’ perceptions of three specific aspects of plagiarism policy – access, support and detail – at their respective universities. Considered through the lens of Hofstede’s cultural dimensions, the study found significant differences between the UK and the (...) three Eastern European countries for all measures except students’ awareness of the penalties applied for plagiarism. Low ‘power distance’ and high ‘individualism’ were related to positive perceptions of plagiarism policy and process. The findings suggest that institutional plagiarism policy and procedures need to be responsive to the unique characteristics of national cultural context. (shrink)

BackgroundAccess to research volunteers may be hampered by low numbers of cases and few eligible participants for rare diseases in clinical settings.MethodsWe recruited volunteers and obtained informed consent by mail from narcolepsy cases in a case-control study, and here in we report feasibility, response rate, timeliness and cost. We invited index cases into the study by mail through their care-giving physicians then mailed study information and consent forms to cases that indicated interest in the study.ResultsOf the 33 index cases invited, (...) 15 expressed interest in the study, and of those, 14 returned their signed informed consents by mail. The median number of days from invitation to consent return was 39, interquartile range = 45, and the cost per consent obtained from the recruited subjects was $ 23.61.ConclusionIn this setting, postal recruitment for biomedical research on rare conditions is feasible and time and cost effective. (shrink)

Key Islamic Political Thinkers offers an examination of some of the leading intellectuals behind the resurgence of political Islam. The essays in this volume cover a selection of thinkers that is representative of the main strands of contemporary Muslim political thought.

This article reports the macro-organizational structure of research articles in mathematics, based on an analysis of 30 published pure and applied mathematics articles. Math RAs eschew the Introduction-Methods-Results-Discussion structure for an Introduction-Results model that enables researchers to present new knowledge as clearly and succinctly as possible. Notable omissions from the mathematics RA structure are Method and Discussion sections, which mathematicians do not need because of the well-established methodology used in the field and the relative absence of extended discussion required to (...) interpret research findings. We contextualize the macrostructure of RAs in mathematics within the discourse conventions and disciplinary assumptions about knowledge in the field to suggest the value of such a strategy to teachers and students of academic writing. (shrink)

There is a limited understanding of the student perspective of integrity in postgraduate research. This is of concern given that ‘research trainees’ may have a vulnerable position in formal investigations of research misconduct. This paper analyses qualitative data drawn from an Australian online academic integrity survey in a mixed methods research study. This analysis complements the quantitative survey data analysed earlier and sought to explore factors contributing to postgraduate research students’ satisfaction with policy and process, the ways institutions can support (...) students’ understandings and practice, suggestions for improving breach processes, and students’ concerns. We found that integrity training and modelling of ethical behaviour by staff were key factors contributing to students’ satisfaction. Students would have liked more ‘hands-on’ integrity training, accompanied by consistent and transparent enforcement of policy. Respondents expressed concern about the credibility of research output and educational standards. We call for recommendations from the extensive literature on academic integrity policy and practice to be extended to the postgraduate research sphere. (shrink)

This article examines the circulation of works produced by Jewish translators and authors whose ideas were based on Averroes’ philosophy during the 13th century. The objective is to determine the general features of Hebraic Averroism and its development in the socio-cultural context of this period. Aristotelianism was initially used to combat and defend against criticisms of «other beliefs» threatening the identity of the Jewish community, and to combat Jewish anti-rationalists. Because of a worsening situation and great social division in Jewish (...) society at the end of the 13th century, Jewish Averroists prioritized the search for a solution that could guarantee unity of the community, that is, making religion and philosophy live together in peace. (shrink)

This article investigates the intellectual production of Jewish authors influenced by Averroes in the 14th and 15th Centuries in northern Spain and southern France. The primary objective is to determine the main features of Jewish Averroism in this period, and to understand it within its socio-historical context. The outcomes suggest that there was a relationship between the new social and political trends toward democratization and reconciliation in the heart of Jewish communities on one hand, and the growing interest in Averroes’ (...) original works on the other. Original here means the works that are not commentaries or summaries of other works. (shrink)

The entrepreneurial element is one of the aspects emphasized in the primary school mathematics education curriculum in Malaysia. However, previous studies have found that application of entrepreneurial elements in mathematics teaching is still lacking. This study was therefore conducted to identify the real challenges that mathematics teachers face in applying the entrepreneurial element in mathematics teaching. This study is qualitative case study which involved six primary school mathematics teachers. Semi-structured interviews, observation, document analysis and field notes were used for the (...) data collection process in this study. The data obtained was analyzed using the constant comparative analysis method to determine themes and sub-themes. The findings were that a teacher’s knowledge, teaching style, limited time of teaching, and attitudes, and in-service courses and training are among the identified challenges in applying entrepreneurial elements in mathematics teaching. This study expands knowledge and the literature on the challenges faced by school mathematics teachers in applying entrepreneurial elements in mathematics teaching. Various initiatives need to be taken to ensure that all the challenges can be overcome, and ultimately enable the entrepreneurial elements to be applied to students more widely. (shrink)