Adolescence has been linked to an enhanced tolerance of uncertainty and risky behavior and is possibly connected to an increased response toward rewards. However, previous research has produced inconsistent findings. To investigate whether these findings are due to different reward probabilities used in the experimental design, we extended a monetary incentive delay task by including three different reward probabilities. Using functional magnetic resonance imaging, 25 healthy adolescents and 22 adults were studied during anticipation of rewards in the VS. Differently colored (...) cue stimuli indicated either a monetary or verbal trial and symbolized different reward probabilities, to which the participants were blinded. Results demonstrated faster reaction times for lower reward probabilities in both age groups. Adolescents were slower through all conditions and had less activation on a neural level. Imaging results showed a three-way interaction between age group x condition x reward probability with differences in percent signal change between adolescents and adults for the high reward probabilities while adolescents demonstrated differences for the lowest. Therefore, previous inconsistent findings could be due to different reward probabilities, which makes examining these crucial for a better understanding of adolescent and adult behavior. (shrink)

Nicht erst die moderne Philosophie hat die fundamentale Doppelnatur des Körperlichen erkannt, das einerseits diejenigen Gegenstände auszeichnet, die wir mit größtmöglicher Distanz und Objektivität wissenschaftlich untersuchen, das sich uns andererseits und zuallererst aber auch in der Form des jeweils eigenen, in seiner Integrität stets bedrohten und letztlich dem Zerfall ausgelieferten Körpers aufdrängt als Bedingung, an der unsere eigene Existenz durch und durch hängt. Schon die Denker der Antike arbeiten sich an dieser Problematik ab; und es gilt, die gedanklichen Ressourcen nutzbar (...) zu machen, die sie für uns bereithalten. Die in diesem Band versammelten Beiträge spiegeln die antike Auseinandersetzung um den Körper und das Körperliche in all ihren Dimensionen und Schattierungen wieder. Gleichzeitig machen sie deutlich, dass diese Auseinandersetzungen nur geführt werden konnten vor dem Hintergrund einer althergebrachten und für lange Zeit sehr wirkmächtigen Tendenz, Organismen wie die Menschen als paradigmatische körperliche Wesen aufzufassen und dieses Paradigma zum Ausgangspunkt für Reflexionen über das Körperliche als solches zu nehmen. Im ersten Teil des Bandes geht es um das antike Nachdenken über den lebendigen, insbesondere menschlichen Körper. Im Mittelpunkt steht weniger die wissenschaftliche Beschäftigung mit diesem Körper als vielmehr die existenzielle Situation, in der sich der Mensch als ein körperliches Wesen befindet. Der zweite und dritte Teil behandeln die Frage nach den Möglichkeiten, Bedingungen und Grenzen der wissenschaftlichen Beschreibung von Körpern und ihrem Verhalten bei Platon und in der platonischen Tradition sowie bei Aristoteles und in der aristotelischen Tradition. (shrink)

Based on brain imaging findings, we present a model according to which addiction emerges as an imbalance in the information processing and integration among various brain circuits and functions. The dysfunctions reflect (a) decreased sensitivity of reward circuits, (b) enhanced sensitivity of memory circuits to conditioned expectations to drugs and drug cues, stress reactivity, and (c) negative mood, and a weakened control circuit. Although initial experimentation with a drug of abuse is largely a voluntary behavior, continued drug use can eventually (...) impair neuronal circuits in the brain that are involved in free will, turning drug use into an automatic compulsive behavior. The ability of addictive drugs to co‐opt neurotransmitter signals between neurons (including dopamine, glutamate, and GABA) modifies the function of different neuronal circuits, which begin to falter at different stages of an addiction trajectory. Upon exposure to the drug, drug cues or stress this results in unrestrained hyperactivation of the motivation/drive circuit that results in the compulsive drug intake that characterizes addiction. (shrink)

The increasing use of cluster randomised trials in low-resource settings raises unique ethical issues. The Ottawa Statement on the Ethical Design and Conduct of Cluster Randomised Trials is the first international ethical guidance document specific to cluster trials, but it is unknown if it adequately addresses issues in low-resource settings. In this paper, we seek to identify any gaps in the Ottawa Statement relevant to cluster trials conducted in low-resource settings. Our method is to analyse a prototypical cluster trial conducted (...) in a low-resource setting with the Ottawa Statement; to identify ethical issues in the design or conduct of the trial not captured adequately and to make recommendations for issues needing attention in forthcoming revisions to the Ottawa Statement. Our analysis identified six ethical aspects of cluster randomised trials in low-resource settings that require further guidance. The forthcoming revision of the Ottawa Statement should provide additional guidance on these issues: streamlining research ethics committee review for collaborating investigators who are affiliated with other institutions; the classification of lay health workers who deliver study interventions as health providers or research participants; the dilemma experienced by investigators when national standards seem to prohibit waivers of consent; the timing of gatekeeper engagement, particularly when researchers face funding constraints; providing ancillary care in health services or implementation trials when a routine care control arm is known to fall below national standards and defining vulnerable participants needing protection in low-resource settings. (shrink)

Desde un enfoque estructural e interdisciplinario, el artículo ofrece un pano-rama de uno de los fenómenos filosóficos más relevantes en América Latina: la Filosofía de la Liberación, enfatizando especialmente los momentos emblemáticos de su génesis y la necesidad de revaluar su potencial crítico en la sociedad contemporánea. La estructura temática del texto expone: a) un acercamiento a la definición del término Filosofía de la Liberación; b) un perfil de las principales características de este filosofar con-cretamente en su etapa inicial; c) (...) una reflexión sobre el paradigma neoliberal predominante; d) y diversos aportes de este filosofar ante los desafíos contemporáneos, que le brindan la oportunidad de redimensionar sus posibilidades críticas, a favor de los pobres, grupos oprimi-dos, pueblos periféricos o excluidos de los beneficios del sistema socio-económico y político vigente. El artículo brinda un repertorio del tema sin pretender lógicamente agotarlo, con el fin de indagar sobre la composición de la Filosofía de la Liberación, la diversidad de su desarrollo y al mismo tiempo sobre su importancia o vigencia en la actualidad. (shrink)

Survivors of childhood brain tumors face many obstacles to living independently as adults. Causes for lack of independence are multifactorial and generally are investigated in terms of physical, cognitive, and psychosocial treatment–related sequelae. Little is known, however, about the role of expectation for survivors’ function. From a mixed–methods study including qualitative interviews and quantitative measures from 40 caregiver–survivor dyads, we compared the data within and across dyads, identifying four distinct narrative profiles: (A) convergent expectations about an optimistic future, (B) convergent (...) expectations about a less optimistic future, (C) non–convergent expectations about a less optimistic future, and (D) non–convergent expectations about an unclear future. Dyads both do well and/or struggle in systematically different manners in each profile. These profiles may inform the design of interventions to be tested in future research and help clinicians to assist families in defining, (re–)negotiating, and reaching their expectations of function and independence. (shrink)

Hostile epistemology is the study of how environmental features exploit our cognitive vulnerabilities. I am particularly interested in those vulnerabilities arise from the basic character of our epistemic lives. We are finite beings with limited cognitive resources, perpetually forced to reasoning a rush. I focus on two sources of unavoidable vulnerability. First, we need to use cognitive shortcuts and heuristics to manage our limited time and attention. But hostile forces can always game the gap between the heuristic and the ideal. (...) Second, we need to trust others, and trust makes us vulnerable. In particular, we need to trust experts whose expertise lies beyond our individual ability to vet. So we must rely on various imperfect signals and proxies, like institutional affiliation, to manage our trust. We are forced to use these imperfect and exploitable forms of reasoning, in order to cope with a cognitively overwhelming world. I present the hostile epistemology framework as a counterbalance to vice epistemology, which tends to locate responsibility for bad beliefs in the character of the believer. I draw two conclusions from my analysis. First: suppose we accept that that only communities and institutions can know about the world. This deeply social approach doesn’t solve the problem of expert identification. The individual still faces a problem: given their incomplete understanding, how should the individual pick which group to trust? Second: we might have hoped to get some kind of static picture of the right principles of reasoning — but hostile epistemology presents a different picture. We have to use risky heuristics and shortcuts, which hostile forces can game and exploit. We can respond by shifting to a different set of heuristics, but this simply shifts the location of our vulnerabilities. These new heuristics are also exploitable. There is no end to this, only a constant struggle to adapt. Limited beings in a hostile epistemic environment are locked in an unending epistemic arms race. (shrink)

Games occupy a unique and valuable place in our lives. Game designers do not simply create worlds; they design temporary selves. Game designers set what our motivations are in the game and what our abilities will be. Thus: games are the art form of agency. By working in the artistic medium of agency, games can offer a distinctive aesthetic value. They support aesthetic experiences of deciding and doing. -/- And the fact that we play games shows something remarkable about us. (...) Our agency is more fluid than we might have thought. In playing a game, we take on temporary ends; we submerge ourselves temporarily in an alternate agency. Games turn out to be a vessel for communicating different modes of agency, for writing them down and storing them. Games create an archive of agencies. And playing games is how we familiarize ourselves with different modes of agency, which helps us develop our capacity to fluidly change our own style of agency. (shrink)

De uma perspectiva comportamentalista radical, o eu é um repertório verbal complexo, que, como tal, tem uma gênese social. O reconhecimento da origem social do “eu” abre caminho para uma análise política, incluindo uma discussão do pa- pel das relações de poder na constituição do eu. Entretanto, uma concepção radicalmente social do “eu”, como a proposta pelo comportamentalismo, suscita um problema político: se o eu é integralmente produto do ambiente social, de onde viria uma eventual “vontade” de romper com esse (...) sistema? Parece que para reconhecer a possibilidade de ação política transformadora seria preciso preservar uma noção descontextualizada de “eu”. Considerando essa dificuldade, o objetivo deste artigo é propor uma interpretação política da constituição do “eu” no âmbito do comportamentalismo radical, mantendo no horizonte a possibilidade de uma ação política transformadora. Para tanto, destacamos como “eus” oprimidos são tornados submissos, mas também como de certas contingências podem emergir “eus” subversivos, que se opõem a um sistema social opressivo. Esse “eu” subversivo é caracterizado por um repertório de autoconhecimento mais amplo, que inclui a discriminação do papel das relações de poder e do controle promovido por instituições. Concluímos, com isso, que um “eu” socialmente constituído pode ser politicamente ativo. (shrink)

I propose an account of aesthetic value, where aesthetic value lies in the process of aesthetic engagement: in our activity of perceiving, guiding our attention, interpreting, and otherwise wrestling with aesthetic objects. It also includes our social activities of engagement: arguing with each other, writing criticism, making top-ten lists. (This is a short summary of a view developed in greater detail elsewhere.).

I explore the view that the imago Dei is essential to us as humans but accidental to us as persons. To image God is to resemble God, and resemblance comes in degrees. This has the straightforward—and perhaps disturbing—implication that we can be more or less human, and possibly cease to be human entirely. Hence, I call it the spectrum view. I argue that the spectrum view is complementary to the Biblical data, helps explain the empirical reality of horrendous evil, and (...) offers an elegant rapprochement between the traditional view of hell and its rivals. (shrink)

I argue that Social Trinitarians can and should conceive of God as a group person. They can by drawing on recent theories of group agency realism that show how groups can be not just agents but persons distinct from their members – albeit, I argue, persons of a different kind. They should because the resultant novel view of the Trinity – that God is three ‘intrinsicist’ persons in one ‘functional’ person – is theologically sound, effectively counters the most trenchant criticisms (...) of Social Trinitarianism, and enjoys independent theological support from the biblical notion of ‘corporate personality’. (shrink)

Philosophers now treat the relationship between Classical Mendelian Genetics and molecular biology as a paradigm of nonreduction and this example is playing an increasingly prominent role in debates about the reducibility of theories ranging from macrosocial science to folk psychology. Patricia Churchland (1986), for example, draws an analogy between the alleged elimination of the “causal mainstay” of classical genetics and her view that today’s psychological theory will be eliminated by neuroscience. Patricia Kitcher takes an autonomous rather than eliminativist view of (...) the reported nonreduction in genetics and reasons that psychology will retain a similar autonomy from lower level sciences (1980 and 1982). Although Churchland and Kitcher offer different interpretations of the apparent failure of molecular biology to reduce classical genetics, they agree that this failure will help illuminate theoretical relations between psychology and lower level sciences. The appearance of the Mendelian example along side the usual ones from physics and chemistry marks a turning point in philosophy of science. (shrink)

A scholium in codex Vaticanus graecus 156 provides evidence that Cassius Dio's Roman History once contained an explicit reference to the ludi saeculares of a.d. 204, something that has been denied in recent scholarship.