This book brings together international academics from a range of Social Science and Humanities disciplines to reflect on how Deleuze's philosophy is opening up and shaping methodologies and practices of empirical research.

Expressions of emotion pose a serious challenge to the view that we perceive other people’s emotions directly. If we must perceive expressions in order to perceive emotions, then it is only ever the expressions that we are directly aware of, not emotions themselves. This paper develops a new response to this challenge by drawing an analogy between expressions of emotion and perceptual media. It is through illumination and sound, the paradigmatic examples of perceptual media, that we can see and hear (...) objects around us. Instead of screening these objects from view, however, they enable our perception while being transparent to us. With reference to perceptual constancy and transparency, I show how expressions show up in our experience of emotions in a surprisingly similar way. Given this, we can understand expressions as the media _through_ which we perceive emotions and overcome the above challenge to an otherwise attractive view. (shrink)

Professors are increasingly encouraged to adopt multiple role relationships with their students. Regardless of professor intent, these relationships carry risks. Left unexamined is whether student–faculty social multiple relationships impact student in-class behaviors. Provocatively, our exploratory study provides empirical support suggesting that when undergraduate students perceive that their professors engage in the multiple faculty–student relationships of friendships, drinking (alcohol) relationships, and sexual partnerships, students report they are more likely to engage in uncivil behaviors in the professor’s classroom. Accordingly, our study provides (...) a backdrop against which to think more substantively about the professorial role and the boundaries that accompany it. (shrink)

This investigation addresses the hypothesis that negative affect is associated with decreased ability to shift attention to a new focus. Thirty-nine participants completed a covert attentional orienting task and then viewed a distressing film clip. Mood was measured by self-report at the beginning and end of the session. Correlations between attentional orienting performance and self-reported mood indicated that participants with greater response time costs on invalidly cued trials reported more negative affect in response to the film. These results support the (...) hypothesis that negative affect is associated with a slowness to disengage attention. (shrink)

We consider the current debate between bioconservatives and their chief opponents — whom we dub bioliberals — about the moral acceptability of human enhancement and the policy implications of moral debates about enhancement. We argue that this debate has reached an impasse, largely because bioconservatives hold that we should honour intuitions about the special value of being human, even if we cannot identify reasons to ground those intuitions. We argue that although intuitions are often a reliable guide to belief and (...) action, there are circumstances in which they are not reliable. Intuitions — including intuitions about enhancement — are subject to various cognitive biases rendering them unreliable in some circumstances. We argue that many bioconservative intuitions about enhancement are examples of such unreliable intuitions. Given this, it is unrealistic of bioconservatives to expect others to rely on their unexamined intuitions. Furthermore, refusing to engage in debates about the reasons and values that underpin their intuitions about enhancement will have the effect of making bioconservative voices less relevant in policy debates about enhancement than they would otherwise be. (shrink)

I argue that the direct perception of emotion (DP) is best conceived in terms of event perception, rather than fact perception or object perception. On neither of these two traditional models can the perception of emotion be as direct as its counterpart in ordinary perception; the proponent of DP must either drop the ‘direct’ claim or embrace a part-whole model of emotion perception and its problems. But our best account of how we perceive events directly can be applied to emotion (...) perception without any loss in directness. Not only this but there are good reasons to think that such a conception better respects both empirical evidence and the phenomenology of emotion perception. (shrink)

This chapter presents the advantages of the use of functional regions of interest along with its specific concerns, and provides a reference to Karl J. Friston related to the subject. Functionally defined ROI help to test hypotheses about the cognitive functions of particular regions of the brain. fROI are useful for specifying brain locations and investigating separable components of the mind. The chapter provides an overview of the common and uncommon misconceptions about fROI related to assumptions of homogeneity, factorial designs (...) versus independent localizers, a summary measure, and the naming of fROI. (shrink)

This article tells the story of an anthropologist and a research subject who encountered each other in the middle of the 20th century on an island in the southwestern Pacific. In the midst of an intensive spate of evidence gathering for his dissertation, anthropologist Melford Spiro noted that one of his would-be interlocutors, a man named Tarev – notable for failing all of his psychological tests – still managed to contribute a different form of evidence: if his views could not (...) be amalgamated in numbers via test scores, they could still be rendered as a case. Tarev’s personality study, ‘A Psychotic in the South Seas’, counted as one of many cases contributing to a broad, worldwide effort to explore the meaning of suffering – specifically psychological illnesses – in non-Western cultures. This article examines Tarev’s rejected test-response ‘data’ and the ways in which his answers did not fit the epistemological and geopolitical frameworks that provoked them. The encounter between anthropologist and interlocutor, today, allows an investigation into how mid-20th-century scholars amassed ambitious data sets meant to revolutionize the sciences that dealt with human beings as psycho-social entities. What sorts of data made it into their archives and what sorts did not? How was the data of happiness, sadness and other fleeting emotional states collected from whole islands newly under US naval occupation? (shrink)

Realist ideology critique (RIC) is a strand of political realism recently developed in response to concerns that realism is biased toward the status quo. RIC aims to debunk an individual's belief that a social institution is legitimate by revealing that the belief is caused by that very same institution. Despite its growing prominence, RIC has received little critical attention. In this article, I buck this trend. First, I improve on contemporary accounts of RIC by clarifying its status and the role (...) of motivated reasoning. Second, I show that realist ideology critics face a dilemma: either their account makes deeply implausible epistemological assumptions, or they temper its epistemology at the expense of rendering it toothless. I argue for each horn in turn before revealing the dilemma to be a false one by making a novel distinction between varying strengths of RIC based on their underlying epistemological assumptions. I propose Moderate RIC as a solution: upon discovering that one reason for your belief that a social institution is legitimate is likely malignantly epistemically circular, the belief should undergo further epistemic testing. I respond to three potential objections and suggest that Moderate RIC would make a fruitful addition to political theorists' methodological toolkit. (shrink)

The deceased's prior consent to posthumous reproduction is a common requirement in many common law jurisdictions. This paper critically evaluates four arguments advanced to justify the presumption against consent. It is argued that, in situations where death is caused by sudden trauma, not only is there inadequate justification for the presumption against consent, but there are good reasons to reverse the presumption. The article concludes that the precondition of prior consent may be inappropriate in these situations.

Realist ideology critique (RIC) is a strand of political realism recently developed in response to concerns that realism is biased toward the status quo. RIC aims to debunk an individual's belief that a social institution is legitimate by revealing that the belief is caused by that very same institution. Despite its growing prominence, RIC has received little critical attention. In this article, I buck this trend. First, I improve on contemporary accounts of RIC by clarifying its status and the role (...) of motivated reasoning. Second, I show that realist ideology critics face a dilemma: either their account makes deeply implausible epistemological assumptions, or they temper its epistemology at the expense of rendering it toothless. I argue for each horn in turn before revealing the dilemma to be a false one by making a novel distinction between varying strengths of RIC based on their underlying epistemological assumptions. I propose Moder-ate RIC as a solution: upon discovering that one reason for your belief that a social institution is legitimate is likely malignantly epistemically circular, the belief should undergo further epistemic testing. I respond to three potential objections and suggest that Moderate RIC would make a fruitful addition to political theorists' methodological toolkit. (shrink)

Acknowledgements -- Introduction: transformation, potential, futures -- Screening affect : images, representational thinking and the actualization of the virtual -- Bringing the image to life : interactive mirrors and intensive experience -- Becoming different : makeover television, proximity and immediacy -- Immanent measure : interaction, attractors and the multiple temporalities of online dieting -- Pre-empting the future : obesity, prediction and change4life -- Conclusion : transforming images : sociology, the future and the virtual -- Bibliography -- Index.

Defining the capital vice of sloth (acedia) is a difficult business in Thomas Aquinas and in the Christian tradition of thought from which he draws his account. In this article, I will raise three problems for interpreting Aquinas's account of sloth. They are all related, as are the resolutions to them I will offer. The three problems can be framed as questions: How, on Aquinas's account, can sloth consistently be categorized as, first, a capital vice and, second, a spiritual vice? (...) These two questions lead to a third, namely, how is the condition of sloth possible, given Aquinas's moral psychology and the nature of the will? The resolution of these interpretive issues can help do two things. It can help explain the apparent inconsistency between traditional (ancient and medieval) and contemporary conceptions of this vice, and —if Aquinas's account is right— it can help us diagnose contemporary moral and spiritual maladies that may either go unnoticed or be confused with distinctively modern "virtues" like diligence and industriousness. (shrink)

This ground-breaking study conveys the thrill and moral power of the ancient Roman story-world and its ancestral tales of bloody heroism. Its account of 'exemplary ethics' explores how and what Romans learnt from these moral exempla, arguing that they disseminated widely not only core values such as courage and loyalty, but also key ethical debates and controversies which are still relevant for us today. Exemplary ethics encouraged controversial thinking, creative imitation, and a critical perspective on moral issues, and it plays (...) an important role in Western philosophical thought. The model of exemplary ethics developed here is based on a comprehensive survey of Latin literature, and its innovative approach also synthesizes methodologies from disciplines such as contemporary philosophy, educational theory, and cultural memory studies. It offers a new and robust framework for the study of Roman exempla that will also be valuable for the study of moral exempla in other settings. (shrink)

Building on the multivalent meanings of the Arabo- Persian tarjama (‘to interpret’, ‘to translate’, ‘to narrate’), this essay argues for the relevance of Qur’ānic inimitability (i'jāz) to contemporary translation theory. I examine how the translation of Arabic rhetorical theory ('ilm al-balāgha) into Persian inaugurated new trends within the study of literary meaning. Finally, I show how Islamic aesthetics conceptualizes the translatability of literary texts along lines kindred to Walter Benjamin. -/- .

Although many physicians have been using the internet for both clinical and social purposes for years, recently concerns have been raised regarding blurred boundaries of the profession as a whole. In both the news media and medical literature, physicians have noted there are unanswered questions in these areas, and that professional self-regulation is needed. This report discusses the ethical implications of physicians’ nonclinical use of the internet, including the use of social networking sites, blogs, and other means to post content (...) online. It does not address the clinical use of the internet, such as telemedicine, e-prescribing, online clinical consultations, health-related websites, use of electronic media for clinical collaboration, and e-mailing patients (some of which are already covered in the AMA’s Code of Medical Ethics). (shrink)

In this paper, we provide an overview of our ongoing project in the Genetics and Human Agency Initiative sponsored by the John Templeton Foundation. Our project focuses on the ways that lay beliefs about the heritability of virtue influence reasoning about the nature of virtue, parenting behaviors, and the development of virtue in children. First, we provide philosophical perspectives on the nature of virtue and suggest that viewing virtue as a malleable skill may have important advantages. Next, we review theory (...) and research that highlights the ways that lay heritability beliefs potentially undermine conceptualizations of virtue as a malleable skill. Finally, we discuss how lay heritability beliefs might ultimately affect parent–child interactions and child virtue development. The paper thus provides a brief description our project’s theoretical foundation and a general look at the empirical questions it will tackle. (shrink)

The COVID-19 pandemic has foregrounded the significance of time to everyday life, as the routines, pace, and speed of social relations were widely reconfigured. This article uses rhythm as an object and tool of inquiry to make sense of spatio-temporal change. We analyse the Mass Observation (MO) directive we co-commissioned on ‘COVID-19 and Time’, where volunteer writers reflect on whether and how time was made, experienced, and imagined differently during the early stages of the pandemic in the UK. We draw (...) on Henri Lefebvre and Catherine Régulier's ‘rhythmanalysis’, taking up their theorisation of rhythm as linear and cyclical and their concepts of arrhythmia (discordant rhythms) and eurhythmia (harmonious rhythms). Our analysis highlights how MO writers articulate (a) the ruptures to their everyday rhythms across time and space, (b) their experience of ‘blurred’ or ‘merged’ time as everyday rhythms are dissolved and the pace of time is intensified or slowed, and (c) the remaking of rhythms through new practices or devices and attunements to nature. We show how rhythm enables a consideration of the spatio-temporal textures of everyday life, including their unevenness, variation, and difference. The article thus contributes to and expands recent scholarship on the social life of time, rhythm and rhythmanalysis, everyday life, and MO. (shrink)

Philosopher, theologian, philologist, urban sociologist, literary critic, collector, archivist, essayist, memoirist, children's author, allegorist, media theorist, hashish connoisseur, closet surrealist, theorist of fascism, professional melancholic – it is by now habitual to begin any account of Walter Benjamin's work with an inventory of the grafts and incongruities traversing his tangled maze of writings. First known through his rather fraught association with Gershom Scholem and Theodor Adorno (who were effectively responsible for the posthumous dissemination of his corpus); sometime ally and interlocutor (...) of Brecht, Kracauer, Bloch, and Buber; refugee in the Paris of Bataille and company during the 1930s: Benjamin exerts today a fascination all the more striking for its untimeliness. Adopted as spiritual soulmate and precursor of almost every major trend in contemporary Continental thought – from cultural studies to deconstruction, from psychoanalysis to new historicism, from critical theory à la Frankfurt school to poststructural linguistics, from molecular politics to death‐of‐God theology, from radical geography to phantomology, from film theory to Heideggerean hermeneutics, from Foucaultian micrology to cyberpunk aesthetics – he epitomizes that unclassifiable swirl of intellectual impulses we have come to associate with the peregrinations of Weimar culture. (shrink)

Under higher education’s contemporary consumer model, students are treated as customers and professors are encouraged to increase student engagement through more personal out-of-class interactions, often in social settings. In the course of this more personal student-faculty involvement, students inevitably encounter or learn of their professors’ occasional inappropriate or unethical behavior. In the present study, we investigated the impact of 145 American undergraduate Business students’ perceptions of their professors’ inappropriate out-of-class behavior on student beliefs and in-class behavior. Results indicate that student (...) perceptions of professors engaging in inappropriate out-of-class behavior were associated with students viewing these professors as lower in ethical character and reporting a stronger likelihood of attending these professors’ classes under the influence of alcohol and illicit drugs, swearing and using vulgarity in these professors’ class discussions, and showing disregard for these professors’ rules, time, and effort. These relationships held even when student grade satisfaction and professor in-class behavior were accounted for. Our results suggest professors’ behavior outside the classroom may impact students’ behavior inside the classroom, re-igniting dialogue regarding the professorial role and the boundaries on oversight of that role. We offer suggestions as to how higher education may address these concerns without infringing upon professors’ personal freedoms. (shrink)

Argues that many popular approaches to questions of social justice are illiberal and offers an alternative vision for social justice based on liberal principles, adapted from the Wall Street Journal bestseller Cynical Theories.

The case studies compiled in _Another Way: Decentralization, Democratization and the Global Politics of Community-Based Schooling_ offer a comparative look at how the global politics of educational decentralization have influenced the democratic aspirations of diverse community-based schooling initiatives in Europe, Africa, Asia and the Americas.

This article argues that Vico’s theory of history should be construed as an ontological constructionist account as opposed to its usual realist interpretation. In support of this interpretation I draw upon two important concepts issuing from the body of the Scienza nuova: the notion of ‘‘storia’’ and the verum ipsum factum principle. Both concepts are not only consistent with an ontological constructionist interpretation of Vico’s theory of history but function as powerful explanatory devices in the context of such an interpretation. (...) I show the advantage this interpretation holds for overcoming one of the main charges brought against the Scienza nuova when it is interpreted as presenting a realist conception of history. In highlighting the possibility and, indeed, textual advantages of construing Vico’s theory of history as an ontological constructionist account I claim that Vico may have anticipated the constructionist tradition by some 200 years and may be considered as the founder of constructionism in the philosophy of history. (shrink)

In this Introduction to a special section on ‘Visualizing Surfaces, Surfacing Vision’, the authors argue that to conceive vision in the contemporary world it is necessary to examine its embedding within, expression via and organization on the surface. First, they review recent social and cultural theories to demonstrate how and why an attention to surfaces is salient today. Second, they consider how vision may be understood in terms of surfaces, discussing the emergence of the term ‘surface’, and its transhistorical relationship (...) with vision. Third, they introduce the contributions to the special section, which cover written articles and artworks. They make connections between them, including their exploration of reflexivity and recursion, observation, objectivity and agency, ontology and epistemology, relationality, process, and two- and three-dimensionality. Fourth, the authors consider some implications of an understanding of visualizing surfaces/surfacing vision. (shrink)

This essay explores the familiar German ideology according to which a revolution in thought would, in varying proportions, precede, succeed, accommodate, and generally upstage a political revolution whose defining feature was increasingly thought to be its founding violence: the slide from 1789 to 1793. Germany thus sets out to quarantine the political threat of revolution while siphoning off and absorbing the revolution’s intensity and energy for thinking as such. The essay holds that this structure corresponds to the psychoanalytic logic of (...) trauma: the dissolution of the event into a missed event, and the hypertrophic investment in the trivial, the non-event, the negligible remainder. (shrink)

An argument that what is usually dismissed as the “mystical shell” of Hegel's thought—the concept of absolute knowledge—is actually its most “rational kernel.” This book sets out from a counterintuitive premise: the “mystical shell” of Hegel's system proves to be its most “rational kernel.” Hegel's radicalism is located precisely at the point where his thought seems to regress most. Most current readings try to update Hegel's thought by pruning back his grandiose claims to “absolute knowing.” Comay and Ruda invert this (...) deflationary gesture by inflating what seems to be most trivial: the absolute is grasped only in the minutiae of its most mundane appearances. Reading Hegel without presupposition, without eliminating anything in advance or making any decision about what is essential and what is inessential, what is living and what is dead, they explore his presentation of the absolute to the letter. The Dash is organized around a pair of seemingly innocuous details. Hegel punctuates strangely. He ends the Phenomenology of Spirit with a dash, and he begins the Science of Logic with a dash. This distinctive punctuation reveals an ambiguity at the heart of absolute knowing. The dash combines hesitation and acceleration. Its orientation is simultaneously retrospective and prospective. It both holds back and propels. It severs and connects. It demurs and insists. It interrupts and prolongs. It generates nonsequiturs and produces explanations. It leads in all directions: continuation, deviation, meaningless termination. This challenges every cliché about the Hegelian dialectic as a machine of uninterrupted teleological progress. The dialectical movement is, rather, structured by intermittency, interruption, hesitation, blockage, abruption, and random, unpredictable change—a rhythm that displays all the vicissitudes of the Freudian drive. (shrink)