If you work in the early years, you have probably heard of Montessori and Bronfenbrenner - but have you heard of Bavolek or Fisher? Contemporary theorists and theories of early childhood learning have much to teach us. It is often forgotten that this learning is still evolving and that new voices are joining the discussion every year. This book introduces early years practitioners to some contemporary theorists and explores their work alongside more well-known thinkers. It demonstrates how these theories relate (...) to everyday practice in the early years and that discussion of them can support ongoing professional learning. (shrink)

Many have argued that individuals should receive income in proportion to their contribution to society. Others have believed that it would be fairer if people received income in proportion to the effort they expend in so contributing, since people have much greater control over their level of effort than their productivity. I argue that those who believe this are normally also committed, despite appearances, to increasing the social product — which undermines any sharp distinction between effort- and productivity-based distributive proposals. (...) However, effort-based proposals do emphasise more the importance of people having control over factors affecting their income. The second set of problems I consider is how to implement policies which hold true to this emphasis. I show that there are major problems with the accuracy of using any objective criteria to measure the level of effort a person is expending. Moreover, once any such criteria are employed the problem of ‘moral hazard’arises because people modify their behaviour in such a way as to maximise their income while minimising their effort. This violates the original motivation for using effort. Because of this and other empirical considerations, I argue that productivity may well be a better criterion on which to distribute income even if one is motivated by the same concerns which have prompted effort-based proposals. (shrink)

Matt Zwolinski argues that libertarians “should see the Basic Income Guarantee (BIG)—a guarantee that all members will receive income regardless of why they need it—as an essential part of an ideally just libertarian system.” He regards the satisfaction of a Lockean proviso—a stipulation that individuals may not be rendered relevantly worse off by the uses and appropriations of private property—as a necessary condition for a private property system’s being just. BIG is to be justified precisely because it prevents proviso violations. (...) We deem Zwolinski’s argument a “Direct Proviso-Based Argument” for BIG. We argue that because this sort of argument for the BIG is in tension with other principles libertarians within the Lockean tradition hold dear, specifically prohibitions on seizing legitimately held property and forcing individuals to labor, the Direct Proviso-Based Argument fails. (shrink)

" Biosemantics " was the title of a paper on mental representation originally printed in The Journal of Philosophy in 1989. It contained a much abbreviated version of the work on mental representation in Language Thought and Other Biological Categories. There I had presented a naturalist theory of intentional signs generally, including linguistic representations, graphs, charts and diagrams, road sign symbols, animal communications, the "chemical signals" that regulate the function of glands, and so forth. But the term " biosemantics " (...) has usually been applied only to the theory of mental representation. Let me first characterize a more general class of theories called "teleological theories of mental content" of which biosemantics is an example. Then I will discuss the details that distinguish biosemantics from other naturalistic teleological theories. (shrink)

Epistemological differences fuel continuous and frequently divisive debates in the social sciences and the humanities. Sociologists have yet to consider how such differences affect peer evaluation. The empirical literature has studied distributive fairness, but neglected how epistemological differences affect perception of fairness in decision making. The normative literature suggests that evaluators should overcome their epistemological differences by ‘‘translating’’ their preferred standards into general criteria of evaluation. However, little is known about how procedural fairness actually operates. Drawing on eighty-one interviews with (...) panelists serving on five multidisciplinary fellowship competitions in the social sciences and the humanities, we show that Evaluators generally draw on four epistemological styles to make arguments in favor of and against proposals. These are the constructivist, comprehensive, positivist, and utilitarian styles; and Peer reviewers define a fair decision-making process as one in which panelists engage in ‘‘cognitive contextualization,’’ that is, use epistemological styles most appropriate to the field or discipline of the proposal under review. (shrink)

During the eukaryotic cell cycle, chromosomes undergo large structural transitions and spatial rearrangements that are associated with the major cell functions of genome replication, transcription and chromosome condensation to metaphase chromosomes. Eukaryotic cells have evolved cell cycle dependent processes that modulate histone:DNA interactions in chromosomes. These are; (i) acetylations of lysines; (ii) phosphorylations of serines and threonines and (iii) ubiquitinations of lysines. All of these reversible modifications are contained in the well‐defined very basic N‐ and C‐ terminal domains of histones. (...) Acetylations and phosphorylations markedly affect the charge densities of these domains whereas ubiquitination adds a bulky globular protein, ubiquitin, to lysines in the C‐terminal tails of H2A and H2B. Histone acetylations are strictly associated with genome replication and transcription; histone H1 and H3 phosphorylations correlate with the process of chromosome condensation. The subunits of histone H1 kinase have now been shown to be cyclins and the p34CDC2 kinase product of the cell cycle control gene CDC2. It is probable that all of the processes that control chromosome structure:function relationships are also involved in the control of the cell cycle. (shrink)

This paper describes the experience of an academic institution, the Queensland University of Technology (QUT), developing training courses about research integrity practices in authorship, publication, and Journal Peer Review. The importance of providing research integrity training in these areas is now widely accepted; however, it remains an open question how best to conduct this training. For this reason, it is vital for institutions, journals, and peak bodies to share learnings.We describe how we have collaborated across our institution to develop training (...) that supports QUT’s principles and which is in line with insights from contemporary research on best practices in learning design, universal design, and faculty involvement. We also discuss how we have refined these courses iteratively over time, and consider potential mechanisms for evaluating the effectiveness of the courses more formally. (shrink)

In this paper I shall explain what I take to be the nature of justice; and the method which I shall follow is that of attempting to infer the essential nature of justice from an examination of its actual practical operation. Perhaps the reader will be able to follow the drift of the argument more easily, and be more on his guard against possible misstatements of fact or erroneous inferences, if I mention at the outset the main conclusions to which (...) I hope to lead him. (shrink)

Aims:The aim of this narrative synthesis was to explore the necessary and sufficient conditions required to define moral distress.Background:Moral distress is said to occur when one has made a moral judgement but is unable to act upon it. However, problems with this narrow conception have led to multiple redefinitions in the empirical and conceptual literature. As a consequence, much of the research exploring moral distress has lacked conceptual clarity, complicating attempts to study the phenomenon.Design:Systematic literature review and narrative synthesis (November (...) 2015–March 2016).Data sources:Ovid MEDLINE®In-Process & Other Non-Indexed Citations 1946–Present, PsycINFO®1967–Present, CINAHL®Plus 1937–Present, EMBASE 1974–24 February 2016, British Nursing Index 1994–Present, Social Care Online, Social Policy and Practice Database (1890–Present), ERIC (EBSCO) 1966–Present and Education Abstracts.Review methods:Literature relating to moral distress was systematically retrieved and subjected to relevance assessment. Narrative synthesis was the overarching framework that guided quality assessment, data analysis and synthesis.Results:In all, 152 papers underwent initial data extraction and 34 were chosen for inclusion in the narrative synthesis based on both quality and relevance. Analysis revealed different proposed conditions for the occurrence of moral distress: moral judgement, psychological and physical effects, moral dilemmas, moral uncertainty, external and internal constraints and threats to moral integrity.Conclusion:We suggest the combination of (1) the experience of a moral event, (2) the experience of ‘psychological distress’ and (3) a direct causal relation between (1) and (2) together are necessary and sufficient conditions for moral distress. (shrink)

Given the growing centrality of interdisciplinarity to scientific research, gaining a better understanding of successful interdisciplinary collaborations has become imperative. Drawing on extensive case studies of nine research networks in the social, natural, and computational sciences, we propose a construct that captures the multidimensional character of such collaborations, that of a shared cognitive–emotional–interactional platform. We demonstrate its value as an integrative lens to examine markers of and conditions for successful interdisciplinary collaborations as defined by researchers involved in these groups. We (...) show that markers and conditions embody three different dimensions: cognitive, emotional, and interactional; these dimensions are present in all networks, albeit to different degrees; the dimensions are intertwined and mutually constitutive; and they operate in conjunction with institutional conditions created by funders. We compare the SCEI platforms to available frameworks for successful interdisciplinary work. (shrink)

In liberal political theory, meaningful work is conceptualised as a preference in the market. Although this strategy avoids transgressing liberal neutrality, the subsequent constraint upon state intervention aimed at promoting the social and economic conditions for widespread meaningful work is normatively unsatisfactory. Instead, meaningful work can be understood to be a fundamental human need, which all persons require in order to satisfy their inescapable interests in freedom, autonomy, and dignity. To overcome the inadequate treatment of meaningful work by liberal political (...) theory, I situate the good of meaningful work within a liberal perfectionist framework, from which standpoint I develop a normative justification for making meaningful work the object of political action. To understand the content of meaningful work, I make use of Susan Wolf’s distinct value of meaningfulness, in which she brings together the dimensions of objectivity and subjectivity into the ‘bipartite value’ of meaningfulness (BVM) (Wolf, Meaning in life and why it matters, 2010). However, in order to be able to incorporate the BVM into our lives, we must become valuers, that is, co-creators of values and meanings. This demands that we acquire the relevant capabilities and status as co-authorities in the realm of value. I conclude that meaningful work is of first importance because it is a fundamental human need, and that society ought to be arranged to allow as many people as possible to experience their work as meaningful through the development of the relevant capabilities. (shrink)

BackgroundThe phenomenon of ‘moral distress’ has continued to be a popular topic for nursing research. However, much of the scholarship has lacked conceptual clarity, and there is debate about what it means to experience moral distress. Moral distress remains an obscure concept to many clinical nurses, especially those outside of North America, and there is a lack of empirical research regarding its impact on nurses in the United Kingdom and its relevance to clinical practice.Research aimTo explore the concept of moral (...) distress in nursing both empirically and conceptually.MethodologyFeminist interpretive phenomenology was used to explore and analyse the experiences of critical care nurses at two acute care trauma hospitals in the United Kingdom. Empirical data were analysed using Van Manen’s six steps for data analysis.Ethical considerationsThe study was approved locally by the university ethics review committee and nationally by the Health Research Authority in the United Kingdom.FindingsThe empirical findings suggest that psychological distress can occur in response to a variety of moral events. The moral events identified as causing psychological distress in the participants’ narratives were moral tension, moral uncertainty, moral constraint, moral conflict and moral dilemmas.DiscussionWe suggest a new definition of moral distress which captures this broader range of moral events as legitimate causes of distress. We also suggest that moral distress can be sub-categroised according to the source of distress, for example, ‘moral-uncertainty distress’. We argue that this could aid in the development of interventions which attempt to address and mitigate moral distress.ConclusionThe empirical findings support the notion that narrow conceptions of moral distress fail to capture the real-life experiences of this group of critical care nurses. If these experiences resonate with other nurses and healthcare professionals, then it is likely that the definition needs to be broadened to recognise these experiences as ‘moral distress’. (shrink)

1. Aim and Scope of this Paper.—In this paper I shall try to show that “duty” derives its significance from its relation to “interest,” and that the former concept cannot be understood when taken apart from its relation to the latter. Such a doctrine is, I am aware, rejected by some contemporary philosophers; and I shall, I trust, make it sufficiently clear in the sequel why I am unable to accept their view.I am not, however, concerned primarily with criticism of (...) other theories. This paper represents an attempt to interpret a particular province of “the common moral consciousness” and to elicit the principles there implied. I begin by accepting the view that, like natural science, ethics has its data, and that it is the business of ethics to interpret these data which are the contents of the “moral consciousness.” In Section A I discuss various methods which may be used for the discovery of the relevant data, and suggest that initial enquiries can most fruitfully be pursued in the field of law and custom. In Section B I undertake an analysis of the principles of the law relating to promise-keeping. As a result of what is there found, it becomes necessary, in Section C, to discuss the nature of rights and their relation to interests, and, in Section D, the nature of duties and their relation to rights. (shrink)

“Nation” and “nationalism” are not easily defined; mainly, perhaps, because these words, as popularly used, do not have precise meanings. A nation may mean: A people living under a common government,—as when we speak of British or French “nationals"; or A people with a common racial inheritance—the Jews; or A people, inhabiting a certain tract of the earth's surface, with generally common sentiments and habits of thinking, though possibly of mixed race, and part of a wider political society—the English, as (...) distinguished from the Scottish, or Irish, nation. (shrink)

Philosophy is very largely concerned with speculation upon problems of a highly abstract character, but some of the questions with which it deals have important practical aspects; and I think that social philosophy occupies—and rightly occupies—a dominant place in contemporary thought. If post-war policies are to render more secure the lives, the liberties and the happiness of mankind, they must be based upon sound principles; and it is with the intention of throwing certain of these principles into bold relief that (...) I have ventured to choose the realm of politics and culture as the subject of these reflections. (shrink)

There has been increasing debate in recent years about the conceptualization of moral distress. Broadly speaking, two groups of scholars have emerged: those who agree with Jameton’s ‘narrow definition’ that focuses on constraint and those who argue that Jameton’s definition is insufficient and needs to be broadened. Using feminist empirical bioethics, we interviewed critical care nurses in the United Kingdom about their experiences and conceptualizations of moral distress. We provide our broader definition of moral distress and examples of data that (...) both challenge and support our conceptualization. We pre‐empt and overcome three key challenges that could be levelled at our account and argue that there are good reasons to adopt our broader definition of moral distress when exploring prevalence of, and management strategies for, moral distress. (shrink)

Charles Taylor is one of the most influential and prolific philosophers in the English-speaking world today. The breadth of his writings is unique, ranging from reflections on artificial intelligence to analyses of contemporary multicultural societies. This thought-provoking introduction to Taylor's work outlines his ideas in a coherent and accessible way without reducing their richness and depth. His contribution to many of the enduring debates within Western philosophy is examined and the arguments of his critics assessed. Taylor's reflections on the topics (...) of moral theory, selfhood, political theory and epistemology form the core chapters within the book. Ruth Abbey engages with the secondary literature on Taylor's work and suggests that some criticisms by contemporaries have been based on misinterpretations and suggests ways in which a better understanding of Taylor's work leads to different criticisms of it. The book serves as an ideal companion to Taylor's ideas for students of philosophy and political theory, and will be welcomed by the non-specialist looking for an authoritative guide to Taylor's large and challenging body of work. (shrink)

The author draws on the policy analysis literature to delineate the linkage between conceptualization of risk and the formulation and proposed solution of risk-related policy problems. Two concepts of risk are identified: a concept of risk as a physically given attribute of hazardous technologies and a concept of risk as a socially constructed attribute. The argument is advanced that the social construction of risk provides a firm, theoretical basis for the design of policy. The discussion links the perception, manage ment, (...) and communication of risk to the more fundamental issue of the nature and role of science and technology. (shrink)

Gordon Barnes accuses Robert Nozick and Eric Mack of neglecting, in two ways, the practical, empirical questions relevant to justice in the real world.1 He thinks these omissions show that the argument behind the Wilt Chamberlain example—which Nozick famously made in his seminal Anarchy, State, and Utopia—fails. As a result, he suggests that libertarians should concede that this argument fails. In this article, we show that Barnes’s key arguments hinge on misunderstandings of, or failures to notice, key aspects of the (...) entitlement theory that undergirds Nozick’s and Mack’s work. Once the theory is properly understood, Barnes’s challenges fail to undermine the Chamberlain example, in particular, and the entitlement theory, in general. (shrink)

A leading scholar in the psychology of thinking and reasoning argues that the counterfactual imagination—the creation of "if only" alternatives to ...

Jennifer Bird-Pollan has recently argued that Nozickians are wrong to oppose the estate tax. Promising to argue from within the Nozickian framework, she presses the fundamental point that the estate tax does not violate anyone’s rights: neither the deceased nor their would-be heirs can claim a right to any holdings subject to the estate tax. This paper shows that Bird-Pollan’s discussion fails on three fronts. First, she frequently misinterprets Nozick, and thus does not defend the estate tax from a Nozickian (...) perspective. Second, even if Bird-Pollan is correct in denying that the deceased and their potential heirs have a right to the holdings in question, it does not follow that the estate tax is licit, because Nozickians can oppose it on other grounds. For example, Nozickians may hold that the enforcement of the estate tax will violate other rights people have. The government’s preemptive claims to holdings subject to estate taxes, along with the force required to enforce those claims, are unjustified. The crucial premise motivating these conclusions is the Nozickian denial that our current state possesses the authority to enforce the estate tax. This is the third front on which Bird-Pollan’s argument fails: she must show that Nozickians ought to believe government has the moral authority to enforce the estate tax, yet she makes no effort to do so. (shrink)

Robert Alexy develops his influential theory of legal reasoning exploring the nature of legal argumentation and its relation to practical reasoning. In doing so he sheds light on fundamental questions of law and rationality, which are as crucial to practising lawyers and law students as they are to scholars of legal theory.

Austerity, by its very nature, imposes constraints by limiting the options for action available to us because certain courses of action are too costly or insufficiently cost effective. In the context of healthcare, the constraints imposed by austerity come in various forms; ranging from the availability of certain treatments being reduced or withdrawn completely, to reductions in staffing that mean healthcare professionals must ration the time they make available to each patient. As austerity has taken hold, across the United Kingdom (...) and Europe, it is important to consider the wider effects of the constraints that it imposes in healthcare. Within this paper, we focus specifically on one theorised effect—moral distress. We differentiate between avoidable and unavoidable ethical challenges within healthcare and argue that austerity creates additional avoidable ethical problems that exacerbate clinicians’ moral distress. We suggest that moral resilience is a suitable response to clinician moral distress caused by unavoidable ethical challenges but additional responses are required to address those that are created due to austerity. We encourage clinicians to engage in critical resilience and activism to address problems created by austerity and we highlight the responsibility of institutions to support healthcare professionals in such challenging times. (shrink)

: This article considers what contribution the work of John Rawls can make to questions about animal ethics. It argues that there are more normative resources in A Theory of Justice for a concern with animal welfare than some of Rawls's critics acknowledge. However, the move from A Theory of Justice to Political Liberalism sees a depletion of normative resources in Rawlsian thought for addressing animal ethics. The article concludes by endorsing the implication of A Theory of Justice that we (...) look for ways other than rights discourse to respect and protect the well-being of animals. (shrink)

In this article, the author diagnoses the cause of Rand's problematic position on intellectual property. He argues that Rand treats credit as a very thick concept. Rand sees crediting a person with inventing something as granting that person a right to the money embodied in the invention, its sale, and the profits related to licensing reproduction. The author shows that this thick notion of credit leads Rand to make several questionable claims in her arguments for intellectual property rights.

Marxists claim capitalists unjustly exploit workers, and this exploitation is to show that workers ought to hold more than they do. This paper presents two accounts of exploitation. The Theft Account claims that capitalists steal some of the value to which workers are entitled. The Underpayment Account holds that capitalists are not entitled to pay workers as little as they do, even if the workers are not entitled to the full value they produce. This paper argues that only the Theft (...) Account can explain why workers ought to hold more than they do. The Underpayment Account cannot yield this conclusion. The Theft Account is superior to the Underpayment Account insofar as exploitation is to be an injustice—a wrong that requires the exploited party to hold more. (shrink)

Luck egalitarianism is a fairly prominent theory of justice. While there are many versions of LE, they all agree that, at least to some extent, it is unjust for individuals to lose the opportunity for welfare at least when that loss occurs through no fault of the individual’s own. Many writers take LE to have direct political implications; they write as if the truth of LE entails that resources should be taken from some – perhaps those who enjoy lots of (...) unearned welfare – and delivered to those who suffer through no fault of their own. I argue that luck egalitarians should refocus their thinking on what I call a “Systemic Model” of compensation. This model holds that what matters most to offsetting bad brute luck is that individuals have opportunities to make up for losses of welfare and political systems should be designed to prevent some individuals from capturing resources in a manner that frustrates the ability of others to offset their own losses due to unearned bad luck and political systems should aim to maximize the opportunities individuals have to make up for their own bad luck. (shrink)

Eric Mack defends a version of John Locke’s proviso. Mack applies his proviso to original appropriations, uses, and systems of private property. His proviso precludes severely disabling the world-interactive powers of others. Mack specifically warns against using concrete features of the natural world as a baseline for determine whether the proviso has been violated. While his proviso is plausible, I argue that he cannot. eschew employing the receptivity of the natural, unowned world to the extent that he suggests. We cannot (...) determine whether one’s powers are disabled or diminished without knowing how receptive the world would be to those powers had a system of private property not arisen. The upshot of this paper is that the requirements of a well-formulated proviso is an empirical matter. (shrink)

: Fabian Wendt proposes combining libertarian foundations with a proviso that requires a just system of private property to ensure that everyone has a sufficient amount of resources to pursue projects. He calls this proviso a sufficiency proviso. This proviso is said to have advantages over all rival provisos “because it better coheres with the […].

Karl Widerquist has recently argued that libertarians face two dilemmas. The first dilemma arises because, contrary to what Widerquist takes libertarians to suggest, there is no conceptual link between robust property rights and the libertarian state. Private property rights can legitimately yield non-libertarian states. Libertarians must thus remain committed either to robust property rights or the libertarian state. I call this the ‘Conceptual Dilemma’. The second dilemma is empirical in nature. Libertarians can try to undermine state property rights by showing (...) that the means by which all present states came to have their property was unjust. However, doing so would presumably undermine almost all the property claims of private individuals. So the dilemma is that libertarians can undermine state property rights only by undermining individual property rights, on the one hand. On the other, libertarians can vindicate private property rights of individuals only by vindicating state property rights. I call this the ‘Empirical Dilemma’. I attempt to defuse both of these dilemmas here. I argue that the Conceptual Dilemma relies on a misunderstanding of the libertarian’s commitments. In particular, I show that libertarians need not think robust property rights can yield states more extensive than Nozick’s minimal state. I then argue that Widerquist ignores libertarian scholarship aimed at meeting the Empirical Dilemma. Many libertarians have attempted to demonstrate that there are legitimate private property rights which are illegitimately disregarded by current states. The upshot of this discussion is that there are no genuine dilemmas posed by Widerquist’s ‘A Dilemma for Libertarians’. (shrink)

While it is uncontroversial to point to the liberal roots of feminism, a major issue in English-language feminist political thought over the last few decades has been whether feminism's association with liberalism should be relegated to the past. Can liberalism continue to serve feminist purposes? This book examines the positions of three contemporary feminists - Martha Nussbaum, Susan Moller Okin and Jean Hampton - who, notwithstanding decades of feminist critique, are unwilling to give up on liberalism. This book examines why, (...) and in what ways, each of these theorists believes that liberalism offers the normative and political resources for the improvement of women's situations. It also brings out and tries to explain and evaluate the differences among them, notwithstanding their shared allegiance to liberalism. In so doing, the books goes to the heart of recent debates in feminist and political theory. (shrink)

This volume of seminal and recent articles by philosophers in the distributive justice debate covers a range of representative positions, including libertarian, egalitarian, desert and welfare theories. The introduction and articles are designed to allow students and professionals to see some of the most influential pieces that have shaped the field, as well as some key critics of these positions. The articles intersect in such a way as to develop an appreciation of the types of theories and the central issues (...) addressed by theories of distributive justice. (shrink)