Within any organization (e.g. a hospital or clinic) the perception of the way things operate may vary dramatically as a function of one’s location in the organizational hierarchy as well as one’s professional discipline. Interorganizational variability depends on organizational coherence, safety, and stability. In this four-nation (Canada, Ireland, Australia, and Korea) qualitative study of 42 nurses, we explored their perception of how ethical decisions are made, the nurses’ hospital role, and the extent to which their voices were heard. These nurses (...) suggested that their voices were silenced (often voluntarily) or were not expressed in terms of ethical decision making. Finally, they perceived that their approach to ethical decision making differed from physicians. (shrink)

This article focuses on efforts by indigenous activists to oppose a mega-development in the middle of the Two Rivers Urban Park (TRUP) at the River Club site in Observatory, Cape Town. In the article we argue that, even though the mega-development ultimately went ahead, intense contestation surrounding Khoi cultural heritage contributed towards opening up the ‘black box’ of urban development in Cape Town, as well as pressuring the developers to accommodate some of the demands of indigenous activists and environmentalists. We (...) also examine why and on what terms it was even possible for a small group of indigenous activists to temporarily halt a mega-development driven by powerful actors, including Amazon, the City of Cape Town and private developers. Drawing inspiration from Bruno Latour's notion of the black box, we show how these anti-development activists were able to interrupt the construction process and create the conditions for opening up to public and legal scrutiny opaque urban development processes. (shrink)

Can nature be reconstituted, recreated or rehabilitated? And would the goal of doing so be a desirable one? There again, is wild nature intrinsically valuable, or are parks, gardens and farms sometimes preferable or of greater value? This cluster of questions arises from recent debates about preservation, restoration, wilderness and sustainable development. In discussing them I hope to throw some light on both the concept and the value of nature, and in due course on the attitudes which people should (...) have towards it, the policies which should guide their practice, and thus on the proper role of humanity with regard to the natural world. (shrink)

This volume celebrates the various facets of Alan Turing (1912–1954), the British mathematician and computing pioneer, widely considered as the father of computer science. It is aimed at the general reader, with additional notes and references for those who wish to explore the life and work of Turing more deeply. -/- The book is divided into eight parts, covering different aspects of Turing’s life and work. -/- Part I presents various biographical aspects of Turing, some from a personal point of (...) view. -/- Part II presents Turing’s universal machine (now known as a Turing machine), which provides a theoretical framework for reasoning about computation. His 1936 paper on this subject is widely seen as providing the starting point for the field of theoretical computer science. -/- Part III presents Turing’s working on codebreaking during World War II. While the War was a disastrous interlude for many, for Turing it provided a nationally important outlet for his creative genius. It is not an overstatement to say that without Turing, the War would probably have lasted longer, and may even have been lost by the Allies. The sensitive nature of Turning’s wartime work meant that much of this has been revealed only relatively recently. -/- Part IV presents Turing’s post-War work on computing, both at the National Physical Laboratory and at the University of Manchester. He made contributions to both hardware design, through the ACE computer at the NPL, and software, especially at Manchester. Part V covers Turing’s contribution to machine intelligence (now known as Artificial Intelligence or AI). Although Turing did not coin the term, he can be considered a founder of this field which is still active today, authoring a seminal paper in 1950. -/- Part VI covers morphogenesis, Turing’s last major scientific contribution, on the generation of seemingly random patterns in biology and on the mathematics behind such patterns. Interest in this area has increased rapidly in recent times in the field of bioinformatics, with Turing’s 1952 paper on this subject being frequently cited. -/- Part VII presents some of Turing’s mathematical influences and achievements. Turing was remarkably free of external influences, with few co-authors – Max Newman was an exception and acted as a mathematical mentor in both Cambridge and Manchester. -/- Part VIII considers Turing in a wider context, including his influence and legacy to science and in the public consciousness. -/- Reflecting Turing’s wide influence, the book includes contributions by authors from a wide variety of backgrounds. Contemporaries provide reminiscences, while there are perspectives by philosophers, mathematicians, computer scientists, historians of science, and museum curators. Some of the contributors gave presentations at Turing Centenary meetings in 2012 in Bletchley Park, King’s College Cambridge, and Oxford University, and several of the chapters in this volume are based on those presentations – some through transcription of the original talks, especially for Turing’s contemporaries, now aged in their 90s. Sadly, some contributors died before the publication of this book, hence its dedication to them. -/- For those interested in personal recollections, Chapters 2, 3, 11, 12, 16, 17, and 36 will be of interest. For philosophical aspects of Turing’s work, see Chapters 6, 7, 26–31, and 41. Mathematical perspectives can be found in Chapters 35 and 37–39. Historical perspectives can be found in Chapters 4, 8, 9, 10, 13–15, 18, 19, 21–25, 34, and 40. With respect to Turing’s body of work, the treatment in Parts II–VI is broadly chronological. We have attempted to be comprehensive with respect to all the important aspects of Turing’s achievements, and the book can be read cover to cover, or the chapters can be tackled individually if desired. There are cross-references between chapters where appropriate, and some chapters will inevitably overlap. -/- We hope that you enjoy this volume as part of your library and that you will dip into it whenever you wish to enter the multifaceted world of Alan Turing. (shrink)

Journalists’ and publics’ relationship with truth-telling is so messy because the term “truth” holds multitudes of competing senses that are rarely acknowledged in journalism discourse. People approach contested subjects from many, sometimes incommensurate, senses of truth. When journalists fail to identify the competing senses embedded in varying truth claims, they reproduce confusion as to the validity and verifiability of such claims and contribute to a rolling epistemic crisis in the public sphere. This essay explores six senses of truth – logical, (...) empirical, affective, ideological, authoritarian, and narrative – and discusses their interaction and problematic conflation. (shrink)

This paper treats the political and ethical issues associated with the new caretaking technologies. Given the number of feminists who have raised serious concerns about the future of care work in the United States, and who have been critical of the degree to which society “free rides” on women's caretaking labor, I consider whether technology may provide a solution to this problem. Certainly, if we can create machines and robots to take on particular tasks, we may lighten the care burden (...) that women currently face, much of which is heavy and repetitious, and which results in injury and care “burnout” for many female caretakers. Yet, in some contexts, I argue that high-tech robotic care may undermine social relationships, cutting individuals off from the possibility of social connectedness with others. (shrink)

Critiques of transhumanism from Christian theologians and philosophers often focus on the movement’s disdain for the human body. These criticisms are expressed in a number of different ways. Some argue that the transhumanists’ disdain is a new form of Gnosticism, while others argue that it leads to real violence against real human bodies. When such criticisms turn to identify the particular sin of which transhumanism is guilty, they sometimes identify vainglory as the besetting sin, but more often than not pride (...) is the sin named. After all, what is transhumanism – with its various proposals for bringing about the posthuman, which is some future being with capabilities so far beyond the human so as to border on godlike – but the latest iteration of the primal sin of humans wanting to become God on their own terms? -/- While such criticisms are valid, they do not capture the depth of transhumanism’s offense from a Christian perspective. Pride and vanity are indeed two of the deadly sins of transhumanism, but there are others at play as well. Moreover, pride is the root of all sin, so saying that pride is the problem is not necessarily helpful. We must find the particular ways in which pride manifests itself. I will argue that the sin of acedia (sometimes spelled accidie), found in ancient lists of the deadly sins, is a primary sin of transhumanism. In so doing, I hope to contribute to a more complete diagnosis of the transhumanist project from a Christian perspective, and I hope to further show why transhumanism is at odds with Christianity, contra the claims of the Christian Transhumanist Association. It should also be stated up front that this article may raise more questions than it answers. Accordingly, it should be seen as an invitation for further research, not as a definitive assessment of acedia in transhumanism. (shrink)

In this study we examine college cheating behaviors of business students compared to non-business students, and investigate possible antecedents to cheating in an effort to better understand why and when students cheat. We specifically examine power values; we found that they were positively related to academic cheating in our sample, and that choice of major (business or non-business) partially mediated the relationship between power values and cheating. We also considered the extent to which students provide justifications for their cheating, and (...) found that business students were more likely to justify (rationalize) their cheating behaviors. Finally, we update the literature in terms of the ways students cheat. We assess newer forms of academic cheating, as increased accessibility to information via the Internet and smartphones may have changed the ways and ease with which students cheat – a particularly relevant topic currently, as many classes have moved online during the COVID-19 pandemic. In our study, cheating was especially prevalent when taking quizzes or tests or completing homework online. We found that only 10% of participants reported never engaging in any of the cheating behaviors we examined. (shrink)

In her provocative discussion of the challenge posed to the traditional impartialist, justice-focused conception of morality by the new-wave care perspective in ethics, Annette Baier calls for ‘a “marriage” of the old male and newly articulated female... moral wisdom,’ to produce a new ‘cooperative’ moral theory that ‘harmonize[s] justice and care.’ I want in this paper to play matchmaker, proposing one possible conjugal bonding: a union of two apparently dissimilar modes of what Nel Noddings calls ‘meeting the other morally,’ a (...) wedding of respect and care. (shrink)

Farmers’ willingness and ability to adapt to climate change are in part influenced by their social networks and sources of information. Drawing on assemblage theory and social network analysis in a novel way, this study explores the influence of Oregonian small farmers’ social and informational networks on their beliefs about and responses to climate change. The use of assemblage theory, which focuses on many disparate elements as they co-function in a space, allows for multiple entities within farmers’ networks and the (...) ways they interact to be examined, while the use of social network analysis highlights broader patterns in the structure and composition of farmers’ networks. Theoretically, this study brings these two distinct yet similar bodies of theory and methodologies together for the first time to expand the utility of both fields and explore farmers’ networks in a novel way. Results indicate that small farmers’ connections to other farmers and media in their networks are influencing their beliefs about climate change, while their responses are influenced by their ties to various agricultural and climatological information sources, as well as other nearby farmers. Finally, while farmers’ ties to other farmers are largely limited to those nearby, certain central individuals and entities, particularly beginning farmers, can act as bridges linking distinct groups of farmers. An understanding of these networks can be used to better disseminate critical information, such as forecasts and adaptation strategies, to help farmers adapt. (shrink)

In this issue, contributors engage Timothy Murphy’s proposal for irreligious bioethics over against religious bioethics. Two essays take opposing sides in the debate, while a third seeks middle ground. Another essay questions the meaning of the words “religion,” “irreligion,” and “secular.” The final essay examines the religious nature of human existence and its implications for the debate.

What responsibility do individuals bear for structural injustice? Iris Marion Young has offered the most fully developed account to date, the Social Connections Model. She argues that we all bear responsibility because we each causally contribute to structural processes that produce injustice. My aim in this article is to motivate and defend an alternative account that improves on Young’s model by addressing five fundamental challenges faced by any such theory. The core idea of what I call the “Role-Ideal Model” is (...) that we are each responsible for structural injustice through and in virtue of our social roles, i.e. our roles as parents, colleagues, employers, citizens, etc., because roles are the site where structure meets agency. In short, the Role-Ideal Model explains how individual action contributes to structural change, justifies demands for action from each particular agent, specifies what kinds of acts should be undertaken, moderates between demanding too much and too little of individual agents, and provides an account of the critical responses appropriate for holding individuals accountable for structural injustice. (shrink)

Science is not a great way to make money, or these days, even a job. But there are great riches in it, and in this book too. Tim Bradford, 'New Scientist'.

Are women's requests for aid in dying honored more often than men's, or less? Feminist arguments can support conclusions either that gendered perceptions of women as self‐sacrificing predispose physicians to accede to women's requests to die — or that cultural understandings of women as not fully rational agents lead physicians to reject their requests as irrational.

The goal of this article is to show that mainstream liberal accounts of civil disobedience fail to fully capture the latter’s specific characteristics as a genuinely political and democratic practice of contestation that is not reducible to an ethical or legal understanding either in terms of individual conscience or of fidelity to the rule of law. In developing this account in more detail, I first define civil disobedience with an aim of spelling out why the standard liberal model, while providing (...) a useful starting point, ultimately leads to an overly constrained, domesticated and sanitized understanding of this complex political practice. Second, I place the political practice of civil disobedience between two opposing poles: symbolic politics and real confrontation. I argue that the irreducible tension between these poles precisely accounts for its politicizing and democratizing potential. Finally, I briefly examine the role of civil disobedience in representative democracies, addressing a series of recent challenges made in response to this radically democratic understanding of disobedience. (shrink)

Robinson argues that by certain threshold criteria, pregnant women qualify for a higher moral status by reason of their pregnancies. While her intention is to make this a status upgrade for women, we worry that it may result in a status downgrade for women as a class, by presupposing and reinforcing women’s value in relation to their reproductive labour. Historically, central to feminist analysis is resistance to reductive accounts of women in relation to their reproductivity. For example, de Beauvoir addressed (...) men’s transcendence and contrasted it with women’s immanence, a status distinction possible because women are mired in expectations that they will marry, produce children and remain in the domestic realm; and for her part, Firestone argued that biological reproduction underlies women’s inferiority to men and that ‘The reproduction of the species by one sex for the benefit of both (should) be replaced by…artificial reproduction’1 2 Her concern was to liberate women from expectations of biological reproduction so their productive value in society is not reduced to their reproductive contributions. A formidable body of analysis in this same vein cautions against collapsing the value of women into their pregnancies, so much so that some commentators even distinguish ‘mothering’ from gestation.3 Robinson’s argument that pregnant women qualify at a higher threshold of personhood emphasises …. (shrink)

Nonfeminist accounts of post-menopausal IVF reject the practice on four main grounds: I) scarcity of resources; 2) fairness; 3) the “inappropriateness” of post-menopausal motherhood; and 4) concerns for orphaned children. I argue that these grounds are insufficient for denying post-menopausal women IVF access. I then suggest that a feminist evaluation of the practice is more compelling; ultimately, however, we have no strong grounds for a policy denying post-menopausal women access to this technology.

2014 Reprint of 1945 Edition. Full facsimile of the original edition, not reproduced with Optical Recognition Software. The first part deals with Greek cosmology and is the longest, the most elaborate and, on the whole, the liveliest part of a book which never deviates into dullness. The dominant thought in Greek cosmology, Collingwood holds, was the microcosm-macrocosm analogy, nature being the substance of something ensouled where "soul" meant the self-moving. Part II is "The Renaissance View of Nature ." Collingwood describes (...) the rise and decline of the deists' view of Nature as a machine designed by the Great Contriver who, having turned it out, watches it go. Part III, "The Modern View of Nature," deals with very recent or contemporary philosophy and science, discerning in it a radical evolutionism first in biology and later in cosmology. Remains to this day a classic text in the history of ideas. (shrink)

Taking a cue from Teilhard de Chardin's Christologically inflected speculation, the key question in this issue is whether the project of transhumanism is compatible with Christianity and the Incarnation of Christ. Two articles focus on theological anthropology and the limits, if any, of human perfection in light of Christ's perfection. Another article examines the ontological claims about human nature in transhumanism and its incompatibility with a Christian ontology. The last two turn from more abstract concerns to consider how the use (...) of technology can inhibit or help human moral and spiritual development. (shrink)

Background While most countries that allow abortion on women’s request also grant physicians a right to conscientious objection (CO), this has proven to constitute a potential barrier to abortion access. Conscientious objection is regarded as an understudied phenomenon the effects of which have not yet been examined in Germany. Based on expert interviews, this study aims to exemplarily reconstruct the processes of abortion in a mid-sized city in Germany, and to identify potential effects of conscientious objection. Methods Five semi-structured interviews (...) with experts from all instances involved have been conducted in April 2020. The experts gave an insight into the medical care structures with regard to abortion procedures, the application and manifestations of conscientious objection in medical practice, and its impact on the care of pregnant women. A content analysis of the transcribed interviews was performed. Results Both the procedural processes and the effects of conscientious objection are reported to differ significantly between early abortions performed before the 12th week of pregnancy and late abortions performed at the second and third trimester. Conscientious objection shows structural consequences as it is experienced to further reduce the number of possible providers, especially for early abortions. On the individual level of the doctor-patient relationship, the experts confirmed the neutrality and patient-orientation of the vast majority of doctors. Still, it is especially late abortions that seem to be vulnerable to barriers imposed by conscientious objection in individual medical encounters. Conclusion Our findings indicate that conscientious objection possibly imposes barriers to both early and late abortion provision and especially in the last procedural steps, which from an ethical point of view is especially problematic. To oblige hospitals to partake in abortion provision in Germany has the potential to prevent negative impacts of conscientious objection on women’s rights on an individual as well as on a structural level. (shrink)

In his posthumously published lectures, Politics in Commercial Society, István Hont argues that Jean-Jacques Rousseau and Adam Smith should be understood as theorists of commercial society. This article challenges Hont’s interpretation of both thinkers and shows that some of his key claims depend on conflating the terms ‘commercial society’ and ‘commercial sociability’. I argue that, for Smith, commercial society should not be defined in terms of the moral psychology of commercial sociability, before questioning Hont’s Epicurean interpretation of Smith’s theory of (...) sociability. I then turn to Rousseau and outline some of the difficulties involved with classifying him as a theorist of commercial society, the most important of which is that he often appeared to be more deeply opposed to commercial progress than Hont suggests. I conclude by highlighting some of the most salient differences between Rousseau’s and Smith’s views of the politics of eighteenth-century Europe. (shrink)

The Oxford Handbook of Evolutionary Psychology is the definitive, comprehensive, and authoritative text on this burgeoning field. With contributions from over fifty experts in the field, the range and depth of coverage is unequalled. It will be an essential resource for students and researchers in psychology.

Radical feminists have argued for both the radical potential of assisted reproductive technology (ART) and its oppressive and damaging effects for women. This paper will address the question of what constitutes a radical feminist position on ART; I will argue that the very debate over whether ART liberates or oppresses women is misguided, and that instead the issue should be understood dialectically. Reproductive technologies are neither inherently liberating nor entirely oppressive: we can only understand the potential and effects by considering (...) how they are actually taken up within a culture. The internal contradictions, tensions, and inconsistencies within ART and the way it is addressed within the law points to a dialectic that resists a simple reductivist understanding. (shrink)

I consider how a feminist account might address the practice of surrogacy in Japan, both domestically and in the transnational context. Japanese culture emphasizes traditional values, family heritage, and the value of reproduction. Japan offers an interesting case study, since surrogacy is currently under review, and the government is in the process of determining its stance on the practice. I will advocate for legal changes to how surrogacy is treated, suggesting that Japan should eliminate the koseki, or the Family Registration (...) Act, which stipulates that only birth parents may register children as their natural children. A principle of respect for women should be explicitly adopted in setting regulations or guidelines surrounding this practice; additionally, attempts should be made to address citizens’ reproductive needs domestically, thus reducing the global demand for these arrangements. (shrink)

This paper considers the issues surrounding women’s bare-breastedness and breastfeeding in public. I argue that women should have equal freedoms with men to bare their breasts in public, but not for the reasons commonly cited Proponents of “the public breast” tend to focus on the similarities between women’s and men’s breasts; I argue that the sameness versus difference debate is unhelpful in resolving this question. As I argue, women’s breasts differ from men’s in significant ways, and by dismissing these differences (...) we dismiss the possibility of women’s authentic breasted experience. Instead, I suggest that women share an equal interest with men in defining their sexuality: When women are denied the right to go topless or breastfeed in public, they are denied their own understandings of their breasts. (shrink)

This article reports some findings from a study of verbal interaction from sittings between members of the public and mediums: people who claim to be able to talk to the dead on behalf of the living. Instead of trying to debunk the ontological status of the mediums' claimed powers and the existence of the afterlife, the article examines mediums' discourse as a form of institutional interaction. It focuses on instances in which mediums report the words of their spirit contacts in (...) their sittings with clients. It is argued that this is a key practice by which mediums establish the basis of a favourable assessment of the authenticity of their powers. The analysis examines the recurrent organizational properties of utterances in which the spirits' words are introduced into the sitting, and describes some of the inferential or rhetorical tasks addressed by these reports. (shrink)

When the social sciences parted company from evolutionary biology almost exactly a century ago, they did so at a time when evolutionary biology was still very much in its infancy and many key issues were unresolved. As a result, the social sciences took away with them an understanding of evolution that was in fact based on 18th- rather than 19th-century biology. I argue that contemporary evolutionary thinking has much more to offer the social sciences than most people have assumed. Contemporary (...) evolutionary research on human behaviour focuses on two main issues at the micro-social scale: understanding the trade-offs in individual decision-making and understanding the cognitive constraints that limit flexibility of decisions. I offer examples of both of these approaches. Finally, I consider the broader question of the macro-social scale. (shrink)

With the godlike powers of modern technology, just one bad actor can unleash hell on Earth. In the face of this threat posed by technology, some have proposed moral bioenhancement as a solution. Although moral bioenhancement may at first seem like something Christian should support, it is my contention in this paper that there is at least one significant reason for Christians to be cautious in their appropriation of moral bioenhancement technology: it can at best give us a false apatheia, (...) which runs the ironic risk of destroying our ability to make moral progress. (shrink)