In natural language processing (NLP), named entity recognition (NER) and semantic classification are essential tasks. NER is a fundamental task, that identify named entities in text such as people, organizations, and locations. In Legal domain, NER is particularly important due to the variety of named entities that appear in legal documents and are important for legal analysis whereas Semantic classification is the process of giving each sentence in a text a semantic label, such as ”fact,””arguments,” or”judgement”. Both NER and Semantic (...) classi- fication are critical component of many NLP applications such as Knowledge base construction and semantic search. Semantic searching of legal documents is a powerful technique that can be used to quickly find the information that you need. By combining NER and semantic classification, one can identify the key elements of a legal document and search for documents that are related to a particular topic or contain a particular type of information. This paper proposes a novel approach to NER and Semantic classification in legal domain using Long short-term memory (LSTM) model. The proposed approach is evaluated on a corpus of legal text and the result of this study suggest that LSTM models are a promising approach for NER and Semantic classification in legal domain and can be used to improve the performance of semantic searching of legal documents. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Nāgārjuna's Affective Account of MisknowingRoshni PatelIt is maintained that all beings and (their) qualitiesAre the fuel for the fire of awareness.Having been incinerated by brilliantTrue analysis, they are (all) pacified.—Ratnāvalī (RV)1.971In Nāgārjuna's formulation, ignorance about the nature of existents is scorching and thereby needs the alleviation that true analysis offers. This article explores what ignorance feels like from the subjective side of a knower in the Madhyamaka Buddhist tradition (...) through an analysis of epistemic affect. I borrow two affective concepts—"epistemic emotion" and "epistemic feeling"—from theorists in Anglo-American analytic epistemology to discuss affectively charged misknowing.2 In this literature, epistemic emotions are affective experiences that participate in a knower's epistemic activity in positive or negative ways, but are not necessary for that activity to proceed. In contrast, epistemic feelings are affectively qualitative experiences that are integral to a knower's activity. With a focus on texts by Nāgārjuna, I present fear as a paradoxical epistemic emotion that correlates with a similarly pathogenic and instigative function in Buddhist moral psychology. I then present determinacy as a more subtly operating epistemic feeling in reificatory ignorance. In addition to expanding epistemologically oriented discussions within Buddhist philosophy, this article also contributes to scholarly discussion of epistemic affect by introducing determinacy as a new epistemic feeling. [End Page 44]Diffuse and Complex IgnoranceThe central role of ignorance in formulating the problem of suffering and its cessation implies that in many ways all of Buddhism is interested in how we know and understand. This centrality is evident in the Avijja Sutta when the Buddha states:Bhikkhus, ignorance is the forerunner in the entry upon unwholesome states, with shamelessness and fearlessness of wrongdoing following along. For an unwise person immersed in ignorance, wrong view springs up. For one of wrong view, wrong intention springs up. For one of wrong intention, wrong speech springs up. For one of wrong speech, wrong action springs up. For one of wrong action, wrong livelihood springs up. For one of wrong livelihood, wrong effort springs up. For one of wrong effort, wrong mindfulness springs up. For one of wrong mindfulness, wrong concentration springs up.(Saṃyutta Nikāya (SN) 45.1)Here we see that avijjā, or ignorance, impedes the path of removing suffering. Similarly, in the twelve links of dependent origination, ignorance is at the start of the chain conditioning the other links that culminate in suffering (SN 12.2). Nāgārjuna also positions ignorance as a potential gatekeeper when he says that ignorance (ajñāna) causes some people to be intolerant of the wisdom of the Mahāyāna path taught by the Buddhas (RV 4.83).3 While we have ample exposition on the role of ignorance in various causal chains, what remains elusive is how to recognize our own ignorance as such in the experiential folds of seeing, feeling, and knowing. This is especially the case in the early works of the critical project of Madhyamaka ("Middle Way") philosophy by Nāgārjuna. The bulk of these works presents arguments against any ignorant metaphysics that essentializes existents in efforts to claim epistemic access to an objective ultimate reality. This article argues that through a certain way of reading Madhyamaka philosophical texts, we find helpful information for recognizing what ignorance feels like. I develop the phenomenology of epistemic emotions and feelings that coincide with the ignorant practices centrally targeted by Madhyamaka critical analysis.The encompassing scope of ignorance motivates us to conceive of it as entangled with a range of elements, including the affective components of knowing. While the terms avijjā or avidyā, are most often translated as "ignorance" this term can be problematically imprecise in philosophical contexts. In the subfield of ignorance studies within current Western philosophy, ignorance is often classified according to the object of which a subject lacks knowledge. By this paradigm, ignorance can be (1) factual in [End Page 45] the case of not knowing a particular fact, (2) erotetic when a subject does not know the answer to a question, or (3) practical when a subject does... (shrink)

"Aptavani 5" is the fifth in a series of spiritual books titled "Aptavani". In this series, Gnani Purush (embodiment of Self knowledge) Dada Bhagwan addresses age-old unanswered questions of spiritual seekers. Dadashri offers in-depth answers to questions such as: "What is the meaning of karma?", "How can I master the law of karma?", "Who am I, and who is the 'Doer' (ego definition)?", and "What is prakruti (non-self complex)?"Dadashri also provides spiritual explanation on the topics of: "To attain the Self, (...) must one control the five sense organs?", "How does one define penance?", and "What would be the definition of repentance?For those wondering how to become more spiritual, Dadashri explains that the knowledge of Self is the beginning of true spirituality. With such spiritual development, and from understanding the law of karma, one can learn how to interact peacefully in worldly life. (shrink)

For those wondering how to become more spiritual, or how to lead a spiritual life, Pure Love emerges as an essential value. Naturally one begins inquiring into the ultimate meaning of love - what is love, what is true love, and what is unconditional love? Other questions may also arise, such as: To cultivate unconditional love, is forgiveness required? If so, how can I learn to practice forgiveness prayer? Does unconditional positive regard evolve into unconditional love? In the context of (...) unconditional love, what is marriage? Can a husband and wife relationship transform into living for love, and ultimately become an example of love supreme? In the book “Pure Love”, Gnani Purush (embodiment of Self knowledge) Dada Bhagwan offers a profound explanation of unconditional love meaning, and describes how Pure Love grows naturally with spiritual development. Dadashri explains that the knowledge of Self the beginning of spiritual awakening, and that the blossoming of Pure Love is one of the signs of spiritual awakening. Among the many spiritual books available today, this resource on the topic of Pure Love will prove invaluable. (shrink)

The Lord of the Fourteen worlds is manifest here. Questioner: For whom is the title 'Dada Bhagwan' used? Dadashri: For 'Dada Bhagwan.' Not for me. I am a 'Gnani Purush A. M. Patel.' 'Dada Bhagwan' is the Lord of the fourteen worlds. He dwells within you also, but He has not awakened yet, he remains unmanifested. Here within me, He is fully awakened and manifest. He is capable of awakening the Lord within you.

Prior research suggests that the media plays an important information intermediary role in capital markets. We investigate the role of the media in influencing firms’ engagement in corporate social responsibility activities. Using a large sample of 4396 unique firms from 42 countries over the period 2003–2012, we find strong evidence that firms engage in more CSR activities if located in countries where the media has more freedom. This relation is robust to using various proxies for media freedom, an alternative source (...) of CSR data, and to applying the instrumental variables approach to address endogeneity. In additional analyses, we find that the positive relation between media freedom and CSR engagement is stronger for better governed firms and for larger firms. Since the media have the ability to impact reputational capital, we conclude that media freedom affects firms’ incentives to engage in costly CSR activities. (shrink)

The popularity of ‘food sovereignty’ to cover a range of positions, interventions, and struggles within the food system is testament, above all, to the term’s adaptability. Food sovereignty is centrally, though not exclusively, about groups of people making their own decisions about the food system—it is a way of talking about a theoretically-informed food systems practice. Since people are different, we should expect decisions about food sovereignty to be different in different contexts, albeit consonant with a core set of principles (...) (including women’s rights, a shared opposition to genetically modified crops, and a demand for agriculture to be removed from current international trade agreements). In this paper we look at the analytical points of friction in applying ideas of food sovereignty within the context of Indigenous struggles in North America. This, we argue, helps to clarify one of the central themes in food sovereignty: that it is a continuation of anti-colonial struggles, even in post-colonial contexts. Such an examination has dividends both for scholars of food sovereignty and for those of Indigenous politics: by helping to problematize notions of food sovereignty and postcoloniality, but also by posing pointed questions around gender for Indigenous struggles. (shrink)

Femicide is an ongoing public health and human rights crisis of global proportions. Currently, however, there is a relative vacuum of ethics theory and discussion about femicide amongst the health professions. This article draws from three illustrative case examples along the continuum of femicide to explore contemporary ethical concerns relevant to addressing gender-based violence and death through clinical medicine and public health. Using an epistemic justice framework, we analyze the relative invisibility of femicide in public health discourse today, and renew (...) a conversation about ethical issues inherent to health interventions and policy-making around femicide. (shrink)

This study examines the endogenous relation between corporate social responsibility and tax avoidance by focusing on a common strategy of corporate tax avoidance, i.e., establishing entities in offshore tax havens. Using hand-collected data on a sample of U.S. firms, we find that firms’ CSR ratings increase substantially in the two years after they first open tax haven affiliates. We provide evidence by using the controlled foreign corporations look-through rule enacted by Congress in 2006 that facilitates offshore profit shifting. We find (...) that firms that are affected by the CFC legislation increase their CSR practices in response. Overall, our results are consistent with the risk management theory, which argues that firms hedge against the potential negative consequences of aggressive tax avoidance practices through an increase in positive CSR activities. (shrink)

This article describes a representation-based framework of distributed cognition. This framework considers distributed cognition as a cognitive system whose structures and processes are distributed between internal and external representations, across a group of individuals, and across space and time. The major issue for distributed research, under this framework, are the distribution, transformation, and propagation of information across the components of the distributed cognitive system and how they affect the performance of the system as a whole. To demonstrate the value of (...) this representation-based approach, the framework was used to describe and explain an important, challenging, and controversial issue — the concept of affordance. (shrink)

We contribute to the literature on intentions to report wrongdoing by examining whether Chinese internal auditors make consistent judgments when an ethical dilemma is presented in English and when the same dilemma is presented in Chinese. We invoke cultural frame switching theory, and our findings, which are based on a randomized experiment using between-subjects and within-subject mixed design, support the hypothesis that Chinese internal auditors are more likely to report wrongdoing when the ethical dilemma is presented in English than when (...) it is presented in Chinese. Our results, which demonstrate that internal auditors make inconsistent ethical judgments in English and Chinese, point to language-triggered cognitive bias resulting from cultural mindsets. We suggest practical interventions and language strategies to improve audit quality. (shrink)

Recent media articles have stirred controversy over anecdotal reports of medical students practising educational pelvic examinations on women under anaesthesia without explicit consent. The understandable public outrage that followed merits a substantive response from the medical community. As medical students, we offer a unique perspective on consent for trainee involvement informed by the transitional stage we occupy between patient and physician. We start by contextualising the role of educational pelvic examinations under anaesthesia (EUAs) within general clinical skill development in medical (...) education. Then we analyse two main barriers to achieving explicit consent for educational pelvic EUAs: ambiguity within professional guidelines on how to operationalize ‘explicit consent’ and divergent patient and physician perspectives on harm which prevent physicians from understanding what a reasonable patient would want to know before a procedure. To overcome these barriers, we advocate for more research on patient perspectives to empower the reasonable patient standard. Next, we call for minimum disclosure standards informed by this research and created in conjunction with students, physicians and patients to improve the informed consent process and relieve medical student moral injury caused by performing ‘unconsented’ educational pelvic exams. (shrink)

This paper examines the role of mutual funds in corporate social responsibility. Using a fund-level, holdings-based CSR score, we find that CSR-friendly mutual funds improve firms’ CSR standings. This effect is more pronounced for firms with higher mutual fund ownership and stronger corporate governance. We further show that while CSR-friendly mutual funds have influence on almost all CSR categories, they focus on increasing CSR strengths rather than reducing CSR concerns. We also discover that CSR-friendly funds are more likely to vote (...) in favor of CSR proposals, and that firms owned by CSR-friendly funds are more likely to link their CEO compensation to CSR outcomes. These results suggest that actively managed mutual funds, which were previously thought to be indifferent to social and ethical issues, play a significant role in corporate social outcomes of the firms they invest in. (shrink)

ABSTRACTThis article introduces the challenges of providing psychological assessments of people seeking asylum in the wake of their reported torture. These challenges invite professionals to consider ontology and epistemology. Critical realism is well-positioned to underlabour for the process of understanding a human rights violation, in which the complainant is both the key, and often sole, witness and claimed victim. For instance, the layered reality of critical realism allows practitioners to use retroduction to describe deeper structures and mechanisms of torture. The (...) judgemental rationality of critical realism allows practitioners to distinguish between competing interpretations of the evidence. Critical realism also avoids both the positivistic assumption that assessors can be value-free; and the relativist social constructionist position that, because assessors cannot av... (shrink)

In this chapter, we consider a posthumanist critique of international law in relation to the material world. Our perspective on posthumanism and international law is framed by a monument of Edward Gibbon Wakefield, the so-called ‘founding father’ of the colony of South Australia. Centering the monument in our dialogue, we discuss two types of materialism: New materialism and historical materialism. We argue that an engagement with new and old materialism opens possibilities for a critical engagement with posthumanism. Central to this (...) critical engagement are themes of materiality, settler colonialism, agency, and exploitation – themes that are key for understanding the operation of international law. By identifying where the materialist theories differ, and also where they converge, we ultimately seek to identify the utility of a posthumanist critique for destabilising international law’s imperialist, capitalist, racialized and patriarchal structures. (shrink)

This article describes a representation-based framework of distributed cognition. This framework considers distributed cognition as a cognitive system whose structures and processes are distributed between internal and external representations, across a group of individuals, and across space and time. The major issue for distributed research, under this framework, are the distribution, transformation, and propagation of information across the components of the distributed cognitive system and how they affect the performance of the system as a whole. To demonstrate the value of (...) this representation-based approach, the framework was used to describe and explain an important, challenging, and controversial issue — the concept of affordance. (shrink)

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to report on empirical work conducted to open up algorithmic interpretability and transparency. In recent years, significant concerns have arisen regarding the increasing pervasiveness of algorithms and the impact of automated decision-making in our lives. Particularly problematic is the lack of transparency surrounding the development of these algorithmic systems and their use. It is often suggested that to make algorithms more fair, they should be made more transparent, but exactly how this can be (...) achieved remains unclear. Design/methodology/approach An empirical study was conducted to begin unpacking issues around algorithmic interpretability and transparency. The study involved discussion-based experiments centred around a limited resource allocation scenario which required participants to select their most and least preferred algorithms in a particular context. In addition to collecting quantitative data about preferences, qualitative data captured participants’ expressed reasoning behind their selections. Findings Even when provided with the same information about the scenario, participants made different algorithm preference selections and rationalised their selections differently. The study results revealed diversity in participant responses but consistency in the emphasis they placed on normative concerns and the importance of context when accounting for their selections. The issues raised by participants as important to their selections resonate closely with values that have come to the fore in current debates over algorithm prevalence. Originality/value This work developed a novel empirical approach that demonstrates the value in pursuing algorithmic interpretability and transparency while also highlighting the complexities surrounding their accomplishment. (shrink)

BackgroundIt is widely acknowledged that there is a global divide on health care and health research known as the 10/90 divide.MethodsA retrospective survey of articles published in the BMJ, Lancet, NEJM, Annals of Internal Medicine & JAMA in a calendar year to examine the contribution of the developing world to medical literature. We categorized countries into four regions: UK, USA, Other Euro-American countries (OEAC) and (RoW). OEAC were European countries other than the UK but including Australia, New Zealand and Canada. (...) RoW comprised all other countries.ResultsThe average contribution of the RoW to the research literature in the five journals was 6.5%. In the two British journals 7.6% of the articles were from the RoW; in the three American journals 4.8% of articles were from RoW. The highest proportion of papers from the RoW was in the Lancet (12%). An analysis of the authorship of 151 articles from RoW showed that 104 (68.9%) involved authorship with developed countries in Europe or North America. There were 15 original papers in these journals with data from RoW but without any authors from RoW.ConclusionsThere is a marked under-representation of countries in high-impact general medical journals. The ethical implications of this inequity and ways of reducing it are discussed. (shrink)

As a neo-liberal economy, India has become one of the new health tourism destinations, with commercial gestational surrogacy as an expanding market. Yet the Indian Assisted Reproductive Technology Bill has been pending for five years, and the guidelines issued by the Indian Council of Medical Research are somewhat vague and contradictory, resulting in self-regulated practices of fertility clinics. This paper broadly looks at clinical ethics in reproduction in the practice of surrogacy and decision-making in various procedures. Through empirical research in (...) New Delhi, the capital of India, from December 2011 to November 2012, issues of decision-making on embryo transfer, fetal reduction, and mode of delivery were identified. Interviews were carried out with doctors in eighteen ART clinics, agents from four agencies, and fourteen surrogates. In aiming to fulfil the commissioning parents’ demands, doctors were willing to go to the greatest extent possible in their medical practice. Autonomy and decision-making regarding choice of the number of embryos to transfer and the mode of delivery lay neither with commissioning parents nor surrogate mothers but mostly with doctors. In order to ensure higher success rates, surrogates faced the risk of multiple pregnancy and fetal reduction with little information regarding the risks involved. In the globalized market of commercial surrogacy in India, and with clinics compromising on ethics, there is an urgent need for formulation of regulative law for the clinical practice and maintenance of principles of reproductive ethics in order to ensure that the interests of surrogate mothers are safeguarded. (shrink)

_Decolonizing Educational Research_ examines the ways through which coloniality manifests in contexts of knowledge and meaning making, specifically within educational research and formal schooling. Purposefully situated beyond popular deconstructionist theory and anthropocentric perspectives, the book investigates the longstanding traditions of oppression, racism, and white supremacy that are systemically reseated and reinforced by learning and social interaction. Through these meaningful explorations into the unfixed and often interrupted narratives of culture, history, place, and identity, a bold, timely, and hopeful vision emerges to (...) conceive of how research in secondary and higher education institutions might break free of colonial genealogies and their widespread complicities. (shrink)

Answering important public health questions often requires collection of sensitive information about individuals. For example, our understanding of how HIV is transmitted and how to prevent it only came about with people's willingness to share information about their sexual and drug-using behaviors. Given the scientific need for sensitive, personal information, researchers have a corresponding ethical and legal obligation to maintain the confidentiality of data they collect and typically promise in consent forms to restrict access to it and not to publish (...) identifying data.The interests of others, however, can threaten researchers' promises of confidentiality when legal demands are made to access research data. In some cases, the subject of the litigation is tightly connected to the research questions, and litigants' interest in the data is not surprising. Researchers conducting studies on tobacco or occupational or other chemical exposures, for example, are relatively frequent targets of subpoenas. (shrink)

Corporate sustainability can be defined as organizations’ commitment to profitability, environment, and social well-being. This study uses a transactional culture analysis of CS reporting practices to explain why some Indian organizations conform to voluntary CS reporting guidelines and others do not. The literature contains two different perspectives on culture, defined broadly as a set of values that guide people’s behavior at a given time. Most past studies typically use national culture to explain differences in CS practices across nations. This concept (...) embeds corporate cultures within the larger national culture, neglecting intranation diversity. Conversely, according to the transactional culture approach used in this study, cultures are plural and independent of geoethnic boundaries, and emerge through social transactions. TCA encourages multilevel explorations of complex social phenomena. Since CS reporting preferences are the outcome of ongoing transactions among organizational stakeholders across different levels, TCA is more appropriate for this study. Since this application requires an understanding of social accountability, the authors use Mary Douglas’s Cultural Framework, a transactional framework of social accountability. A qualitative exploration of six Indian organizations using DCF reveals different dominant forms of social accountability in these organizations: either alone or as paired hybrids. Consequently, each organization prioritizes different stakeholders and reacts differently to voluntary CS reporting guidelines. Identifying the dominant form or forms of social accountability in their organizations and understanding their underlying reasons for resisting voluntary CS guidelines enables managers to secure better collaboration for their CS initiatives. (shrink)

The online processing of both music and language involves making predictions about upcoming material, but the relationship between prediction in these two domains is not well understood. Electrophysiological methods for studying individual differences in prediction in language processing have opened the door to new questions. Specifically, we ask whether individuals with musical training predict upcoming linguistic material more strongly and/or more accurately than non-musicians. We propose two reasons why prediction in these two domains might be linked: Musicians may have greater (...) verbal short-term/working memory; music may specifically reward predictions based on hierarchical structure. We provide suggestions as to how to expand upon recent work on individual differences in language processing to test these hypotheses. (shrink)

The effects of climate change are far reaching and widespread. As the issue continues to batter the world, the call for mitigation initiatives is becoming louder. In responding to this call we take a multidisciplinary approach to examining board diversity as an innovative solution in tackling climate change. Utilizing data from 69 fossil fuel organizations, our findings suggest that increasing female representation and foreign culture representation on the board can effectively reduce greenhouse gas emissions, the main contributor to climate change. (...) In part, this is achieved through responsible leadership and innovation. Our contributions reach beyond traditional board diversity literature, where the benefits of diversity are confined primarily to a discussion of corporate social responsibilities. Instead, we depict the benefits of board diversity as a direct lever in mitigating climate change. We propose that this is through the diversified board's enhanced ability to identify stakeholder needs and, subsequently, conceive of more effective and responsibly innovative solutions. (shrink)

ABSTRACT Setting specific, challenging goals motivates employees to exert greater effort in their jobs. However, goal-setting may have unintended consequences of also motivating unethical behavior. The present study explores these consequences in the context of other features of goal-setting in organizations, how goals are framed and rewarded, to determine the tradeoff between performance and ethical behavior. Undergraduate students were incentivized to complete math problems using different outcome frames and incentive structures and were also provided an opportunity to cheat. Findings demonstrate (...) that when goals rewarded with piece-rate incentives are framed as a loss, performance increased, though cheating behavior increased as well. (shrink)

We argue that formal linguistic theory, properly extended, can provide a unifying framework for diverse phenomena beyond traditional linguistic objects. We display applications to pictorial meanings, visual narratives, music, dance, animal communication, and, more abstractly, to logical and non-logical concepts in the ‘language of thought’ and reasoning. In many of these cases, a careful analysis reveals that classic linguistic notions are pervasive across these domains, such as for instance the constituency (or grouping) core principle of syntax, the use of logical (...) variables (for object tracking), or the variety of inference types investigated in semantics/pragmatics. The aim of this overview is to show how the application of formal linguistic concepts and methodology to non-linguistic objects yields non-trivial insights, thus opening the possibility of a general, precise theory of signs. (An appendix, found in the online supplements to this article, surveys applications of Super Linguistics to animal communication.). (shrink)

There are a number of conflicting accounts of thought insertion, the delusion that the thoughts of another are inserted into one’s own mind. These accounts share the common assumption of realism: that the subject of thought insertion has a thought corresponding to the description of her thought insertion episode. I challenge the assumption by arguing for an anti-realist treatment of first-person reports of thought insertion. I then offer an alternative account, simulationism, according to which sufferers merely simulate having a thought (...) inserted into their heads. By rejecting realism, the paper undermines a widespread explanatory framework that unites otherwise competing cognitive models of thought insertion. (shrink)

We examine the role of socio-demographic factors on consumers’ pro-environmental behavior (PEB)–a subset of ethical behavior and analyze its implications in an emerging market, with a sample study from India. Multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA) was performed as research method. Results show that males display higher PEB than their female counterparts. Married consumers score more on PEB than single. Mid-age consumers (36–50) also score high on PEB than young and old-age consumers. Furthermore, highly educated consumers are more pro-environmentalist than graduates (...) and post-graduates. The novelty of this study is that centers on the use of demographic variables interactively in order to form microsegments. For instance, married men score more on PEB scale than unmarried men and women and prefer green channels even more (i.e., public transportation). On the contrary, unmarried women display no hesitation in paying more for energy-efficient goods compared to married men and unmarried men. Marketers may aim in setting such PEBs as the moral standards among consumers being an easily identifiable segment as their prime target. (shrink)

Stanford argues that cooperators achieve and maintain correlated interaction through the objectification of moral norms. We first challenge the moral/non-moral distinction that frames Stanford's discussion. We then argue that to the extent that norms are objectified (and we hold that they are at most objectified in a very thin sense), it is not for the sake of achieving correlated interaction.

In this conceptual article, we look at the impact of culture on ethical decision making from a Douglasian Cultural Theory (CT) perspective. We aim to show how CT can be used to explain the diversity and dynamicity of ethical beliefs and behaviours found in every social system, be it a corporation, a nation or even an individual. We introduce CT in the context of ethical decision making and then use it to discuss examples of business ethics in the Indian business (...) context. We argue that the use of CT allows for a theoretically more sophisticated treatment of culture in ethical decision making and thus the avoidance of some common problems with existing cross-cultural studies of business ethics. In our discussion, we raise questions about the compatibility between management systems and processes created in one context and ethical behaviours in another. (shrink)

The last decades have seen major advances in the study of gestures both in humans and non-human primates. In this paper, we seriously examine the idea that there may be gestural form types that are shared across great ape species, including humans, which may underlie gestural universals, both in form and meaning. We focus on one case study, the hand fling gesture common to chimpanzees and humans, and provide a semantic analysis of this gesture.

The book called "Philosophy of the Gita," by Prof. Ramesh N. Patel, is a striking philosophical study of the celebrated Sanskrit text called the Bhagavad-gita which is known simply as the Gita. Patel's book proposes and develops a new hermeneutic called archaic coherentism and applies it to the Gita to distill and decode a comprehensive metaphysic and philosophy of action embedded in the text. A new conceptual translation of the Sanskrit text brings out this philosophy in clear detail. (...) Philosophical essays preceding the translation include analysis of the often-neglected background of war and morality, discussion of action, freedom and self-identity, delineation of a new synoptic philosophy of Hinduism, and unearthing of a strikingly original and innovative metaphysics of existence, energy and triple individuation. The translation of the Gita is followed by two critical essays called "Emerging Philosophy" and "Coherence and Exegesis." Patel's translation focuses on the conceptual rendering of every term, with no Sanskrit word left untranslated, even including the tough ones like guna and Brahman. The essay called "Emerging Philosophy" does away with all Sanskrit terms, to facilitate the understanding of the newly decoded Gita's philosophy as a whole. The essay called "Coherence and Exegesis" critically examines several scholarly standpoints on the Gita with Patel's sound philosophical reasoning. The innovative philosophy of the Gita that emerges through the book's analysis includes an original theory of individuation revealing a Platonic-type Form of individuation evolving at three levels: essential, actional and physical. The book is written for professional philosophers and Sanskritist Indologists. It generally assumes familiarity with logical problems of philosophy and with Sanskrit terms in Indian philosophy. The author has a rare dual training in Sanskrit and philosophy. He skillfully exploits both in this book to achieve an unusual outcome that should be of great interest and challenge to both professional philosophers as well as scholars of Indology. (shrink)

A deficit in the number of organs available for transplantation persists even with an increase in donation rates. One possible choice of donor for organs that appears under-referred and/or unaccepted is patients with primary brain tumours. In spite of advances in the treatment of high-grade primary central nervous system (CNS) tumours, the prognosis remains dire. A working group on organs from donors with primary CNS tumours showed that the risk of transmission is small and outweighs the benefits of waiting for (...) a normal donor, in survival and organ life-years, with caveats. This paper explores the possibility that, if information on organ donation were made available to patients and their families with knowledge of their inevitable fate, perhaps some will choose to donate. It would be explained that to achieve this, elective ventilation would be performed in their final moments. This would obviate the consent question because of an advance statement. It is accepted that these are sensitive matters and there will be logistic issues. This will need discussion with the public and other professionals, but it could increase the number of donors and can be extrapolated to encompass other primary CNS tumours. (shrink)

The reproduction of cultural systems in cases where cultural group selection may occur is typically incomplete, with only certain cultural traits being adopted by less successful cultural groups. Why a particular trait and not another is transmitted might not be explained by cultural group selection. We explore this issue through the case of religious syncretism.