Der Herausgeber dieses Jahrbuchs hat geglaubt, mit derVerof- 5 fentlichung der seit dem Erscheinen des ersten Bandes eingelaufenen und zum Teil schon im Herbst 1913 in den Druck gegebenen Arbei­ ten nieht Hinger zogern zu diirfen. So viele geistige Krafte dieser unheilvolle Krieg fesselt und leider auch zerstort, wirklich unterbin­ den kann und wird er das deutsche Geistesleben nieht. Nach wie vor 10 ist es beseelt von der ererbten Liebe zu den Ewigkeitswerten der Kultur, und immerfort wirkt es sich (...) aus in treuer Arbeit an ihren groBen Aufgaben. 1m besonderen unsere phanomenologische Philo­ sophie hat nicht geruht, auch ist ihr unverkennbar das warme Inter­ esse wissenschaftlicher Kreise erhalten geblieben. So diirften die bei- 15 den Bande, in die wir die bereitliegenden Arbeiten verteilt haben, nieht unwillkommen geheiBen werden. Die neuen Jahrbuchsarbeiten unterscheiden sieh ganz so wie die des ersten Bandes nieht nur durch ihre Themen, sondern auch durch die merklich nuancierten Auffas­ sungen, die sieh ihre Verfasser iiber Ziele, Methoden und mancherlei 20 Einzelfragen der phlinomenologisehen Forsehung gebildet haben. Es brauchte eigentlich nieht gesagt zu werden und muG es doeh ange­ siehts vorgekommener MiBverstlindnisse, daB der Herausgeber nur fiir seine eigenen Arbeiten die Verantwortung iibernimmt so wie jeder Mitarbeiter fiir die seinen. Sieherlieh ist die innere Gemein- 25 samkeit der "Phanomenologen" darum doch keine geringere, ja eher eine groBere als innerlhalb irgendwelcher sonstigen Forschungs- [VI] gemeinschaften, z. B. der der Experimental-Psychologen. (shrink)

The coronavirus disease-2019 (COVID-19) has caused shortages of life-sustaining medical resources, and future waves of the virus may cause further scarcity. The Yale New Haven Health System developed a triage protocol to allocate scarce medical resources during the COVID-19 pandemic, with the primary goal of saving the most lives possible, and a secondary goal of making triage assessments and decisions consistent, transparent, and fair. We outline the process of developing the protocol, summarize the protocol, and discuss the major ethical challenges (...) encountered, along with our answers to the challenges. These challenges include (1) the role of age and chronic comorbidities; (2) evaluating children and pregnant patients; (3) racial, ethnic, and socioeconomic disparities in health; (4) prioritization of healthcare workers; and (5) balancing clinical judgment versus protocolized assessments.We conclude with a review of the limitations of our protocol and the lessons learned. We hope that a robust public discussion of such protocols and the ethical challenges they raise will result in the fairest possible processes, less need for triage, and more lives saved during future waves of the pandemic and similar public health emergencies. (shrink)

In an influential paper, L. A. Paul argues that one cannot rationally decide whether to have children. In particular, she argues that such a decision is intractable for standard decision theory. Paul's central argument in this paper rests on the claim that becoming a parent is ``epistemically transformative''---prior to becoming a parent, it is impossible to know what being a parent is like. Paul argues that because parenting is epistemically transformative, one cannot estimate the values of the various outcomes of (...) a decision whether to become a parent. In response, we argue that it is possible to estimate the value of epistemically transformative experiences. Therefore, there is no special difficulty involved in deciding whether to undergo epistemically transformative experiences. Insofar as major life decisions do pose a challenge to decision theory, we suggest that this is because they often involve separate, familiar problems. (shrink)

Reporting peers’ counterproductive work behaviors (CWBs) is important for maintaining an ethical organization, but is a significant and potentially risky action. In Bandura’s Theory of Moral Thought and Action (Bandura, 1991) he states that such acts require significant moral agency, which is generated when an individual possesses adequate moral self-regulatory capacities to address the issue and is in a context that activates and reinforces those capacities. Guided by this theory, we assess moral potency (i.e., moral courage, moral efficacy, and moral (...) ownership) as key capacities predicting peer reporting intentions and assess three contextual factors influencing the generation and effects of moral potency: whether a potential informant (1) works for an ethical leader, (2) is embedded in a psychologically safe climate promoting interpersonal risk-taking, and (3) operates in a more normal or extreme context. We assess the proposed model across three field studies entailing both normal and extreme (i.e., firefighting units) contexts. Results show that ethical leaders raise employees’ moral potency, promoting greater willingness to report their peers’ CWBs. In normal work contexts, psychological safety positively moderated both the relationship between ethical leadership and moral potency and between moral potency and peer reporting intentions. However, psychological safety had the opposite effects in more extreme work contexts. Whereas psychological safety strengthens the positive association between moral potency and peer reporting intentions in normal work contexts, in contexts where individuals are more frequently exposed to extreme events, psychological safety weakens this relationship, thus highlighting the unforeseen downsides of psychological safety in extreme contexts. (shrink)

Le contenu et la portée de l'ouvrage se déploient sur trois plans. Alliant outils d'histoire intellectuelle et approche philosophique, cet ouvrage jette tout d'abord un éclairage nouveau sur le problème de l'historicisme du point de vue de sa dimension pratique et de son rapport avec la philosophie politique au cours des années 1930 de même que durant la période de l'après-guerre. L'approche novatrice du livre conjugue épistémologie de l'histoire et théorie politique et permet de mettre en contexte la mobilisation politique (...) et idéologique du concept d'historicisme et ses corollaires, le relativisme et le nihilisme. La seconde partie du manuscrit traite plus directement d'une question centrale en philosophie politique, celle des fondements de la rationalité politique. À partir d'une réflexion sur la réception de la philosophie des valeurs de Max Weber, l'ouvrage aborde la question des possibilités et limites du jugement politique en temps de crise. Ensuite, cet ouvrage examine une dimension peu étudiée des oeuvres respectives de Leo Strauss et Raymond Aron. D'un point de vue historiographique, le livre montre que la reconstruction du dialogue amorcé entre les deux penseurs (à partir de sources d'archives incluant correspondances, transcriptions de séminaires et textes inédits) permet de jeter une lumière nouvelle sur la façon dont on peut conceptualiser l'utilité de l'histoire pour la philosophie politique. Finalement, dans le champ disciplinaire de la philosophie politique contemporaine, la figure de Raymond Aron est souvent peu considérée. L'une des visées de ce manuscrit est de montrer la pertinence de la philosophie aronienne du jugement et de la responsabilité politique. (shrink)

La délicate mise en rapport de la philosophie nietzschéenne et de l’économie est d’une pratique récente. Dans ce contexte, cet article est motivé par l’introduction du traitement nietzschéen de la « destruction créatrice » en économie et la manière de justifier philosophiquement cette référence. Pour cela, nous mettons en concurrence les interprétations évolutionnistes et nietzschéennes de la destruction créatrice. Ces deux métaphores nous semblent difficilement conciliables et nous avançons des arguments en faveur de la volonté de puissance, contre la lutte (...) pour la vie, pour mieux interpréter le mécanisme de destruction créatrice. (shrink)

Cet article s’inscrit dans la lignée de précédents travaux visant à rapprocher l’entrepreneur schumpétérien et le surhumain nietzschéen. Les deux partagent une créativité pouvant s’interpréter comme l’extériorisation d’un surcroît de force qui, dans l’optique nietzschéenne, s’assimile à la source extra-morale de l’accroissement de la vie. Reste à savoir si le cadre dans lequel ils évoluent est le même. Au-delà d’une approche historique du cycle de la conjoncture, notre hypothèse est que l’approche philosophique d’un cycle du devenir s’avère être féconde pour (...) une interprétation enrichie du cycle de la conjoncture, complétant et prolongeant ainsi notre interprétation du surhumain et de l’entrepreneur. (shrink)

Whilst previous studies indicate perceived company ethicality as a driver of job seekers’ job-pursuit intentions, it is poorly understood how and why ethical market signals actually affect their application decisions. Perceptions of company ethicality result from market signals that are either within the control of the company and from market signals that are beyond the company’s control. Building on communication and information processing theories, this study therefore considers both types of ethical market signals, and examines the psychological mechanisms through which (...) they affect job seekers’ intention to apply for a job. The results from a controlled online experiment show that both types of ethical market signals increase job seekers’ job-pursuit intentions. These relationships are mediated by applicants’ attitude towards the job advertisement, their perceptions of corporate employment image and self-referencing. Consequently, the present study alerts practitioners to consider the effects of company-controlled and non-company-controlled ethical market signals, particularly when aiming to recruit highly-qualified millennial candidates. (shrink)

This special issue addresses the debate on personal identity from a phenomenological viewpoint, especially contemporary phenomenological research on selfhood. In the introduction, we first offer a brief survey of the various classic questions related to personal identity according to Locke’s initial proposal and sketch out key concepts and distinctions of the debate that came after Locke. We then characterize the types of approach represented by post-Hegelian, German and French philosophies of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. We argue that whereas the (...) Anglophone debates on personal identity were initially formed by the persistence question and the characterization question, the “Continental” tradition included remarkably intense debates on the individual or the self as being unique or “concrete,” deeply temporal and—as claimed by some philosophers, like Sartre and Foucault—unable to have any identity, if not one externally imposed. We describe the Continental line of thinking about the “self” as a reply and an adjustment to the post-Lockean “personal identity” question. These observations constitute the backdrop for our presentation of phenomenological approaches to personal identity. These approaches run along three lines: debates on the layers of the self, starting from embodiment and the minimal self and running all the way to the full-fledged concept of person; questions of temporal becoming, change and stability, as illustrated, for instance, by aging or transformative life-experiences; and the constitution of identity in the social, institutional, and normative space. The introduction thus establishes a structure for locating and connecting the different contributions in our special issue, which, as an ensemble, represent a strong and differentiated contribution to the debate on personal identity from a phenomenological perspective. (shrink)

Life has evolved; and so must have consciousness, or subjective experience, as found in living beings, Eva Jablonka and Simona Ginsburg contend. In their target article, which summarises the main theses of their seminal book The Evolution of the Sensitive Soul, the authors put forward an evolutionary account of consciousness that builds upon the intimate connection between consciousness and life without, however, equating the two. Instead, according to Jablonka & Ginsburg, there was life before there was consciousness, and there are (...) still living beings without consciousness. Here I offer some metaphysical considerations in favour of a more inclusive notion of consciousness than Jablonka & Ginsburg’s. These considerations turn on the role played by metabolism and agency in the processual constitution of living beings as well as on the continuum between sensation and perception. Rather than postulating a mindless inwardness in presumably non-conscious organisms, we ought to recognise the constitutive experiential nature of life, rooted in its intrinsic purposiveness. (shrink)

Health, ethics and COP27 On the 20 November 2022, the United Nations Climate Change COP27 announced a breakthrough agreement to provide ‘loss and damage’ funding for resource-poor countries seriously affected by climate change. 1 The establishment of the funding stream acknowledges, and attempts to address, one of many thorny ethical issues driven by climate change – to what extent countries that have benefited economically from past emissions of greenhouse gases owe reparative obligations to countries who have contributed minimally to climate (...) change but are most at risk of its harms? One of the many reasons why this is such an important breakthrough is that it brings into the centre of climate policy-making questions of global – and intergenerational – justice and fairness. It acknowledges the critical importance of ethics in climate change deliberations. It is probably fair to say that climate change policy has been dominated to... (shrink)

On 8 October 2020, the British Medical Association published the results of its survey of BMA members on physician-assisted dying. With 28 986 respondents, this was one of the largest surveys of medical opinion on this topic ever carried out. This represents 19.35% of those who received an invitation to participate and the respondents were broadly representative of the BMA’s overall membership. The BMA was clear throughout this process that the results of the survey would not determine its policy. Its (...) current policy of opposition to all forms of physician-assisted dying would remain unless and until the Representative Body, which makes BMA policy, decided otherwise. The survey results would, however, inform a future debate on policy, currently scheduled to take place in June 2021. When asked what the BMA’s position should be on whether there should be a change in the law to allow doctors to prescribe drugs for an eligible patient to self-administer to end their own life, 40% said the BMA should be supportive, 33% opposed, 21% thought the BMA should be neutral and 6% were undecided. In relation to their own personal views, 50% were supportive, 39% opposed and 11% undecided. When asked whether they would be willing to participate in some way in the process, if it were to be legalised, 36% said yes, 45% said no and 19% were undecided. The same three questions were asked about a change in the law to allow doctors to administer drugs to end the life of an eligible patient. In response, 40% thought the BMA should oppose such a change, 30% thought the BMA should be supportive and 23% thought the BMA should be neutral; 7% of members responding were undecided on this question. In …. (shrink)

In December 2022, the Office of the National Data Guardian (NDG)1 for health and social care in England published new guidance: What do we mean by public benefit? Evaluating public benefit when health and adult social care data is used for purposes beyond individual care.2 Research in the UK consistently demonstrates that for the public to consider a secondary use3 of health and care data appropriate and acceptable, it must deliver a benefit back to the public.4 The aim of the (...) guidance is to help organisations to interpret and demonstrate the public good from their work more comprehensively, accurately, and consistently. The guidance defines and standardises the concept of public benefit to enable clearer interpretation and understanding. It aims to support better public benefit evaluations by: As the guidance is underpinned by a detailed dialogue with the public on what counts as a public benefit, it is hoped that following it will …. (shrink)

Hope, gratitude, fear, and disgust may all be key to encouraging preventative action in the context of COVID-19. We pre-registered a longitudinal experiment, which involved monthly data collections from September 2020 to September 2021 and a six-month follow-up. We predicted that a hope recall task would reduce negative emotions and elicit higher intentions to engage in COVID-19 preventative behaviours. At the first time point, participants were randomly allocated to a recall task condition (gratitude, hope, or control). At each time point, (...) we measured willingness to engage in COVID-19 preventative behaviours, as well as experienced hope, gratitude, fear, and disgust. We then conducted a separate, follow-up study in February 2022, to see if the effects replicated when COVID-19 restrictions were relaxed in the UK. In the main study, contrary to our pre-registered hypothesis, we found that a gratitude recall task elicited more willingness to engage in COVID-19 preventative behaviours in comparison to the neutral recall task. We also found that experienced gratitude, hope, and fear were positively related to preventative action, while disgust was negatively related. These results present advancement of knowledge of the role of specific emotions in the COVID-19 pandemic. (shrink)

In times of crisis and social turbulence, the mass media play a crucial role. This becomes particularly evident in economic crises within the European Union. The (biased) way the crisis is reported shapes people’s understanding of the crisis and the parties involved. In this study, the coverage of the Greek sovereign debt crisis in the German newspapersBILD,Die Welt,Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung,Süddeutsche Zeitung,tageszeitungandDer Spiegel (online)is examined for the quality criteria relevance, neutrality, balance, and analytical quality. The results show that the reporting is (...) appropriate to the relevance of the topic, but shows deficits in the criteria of balance, neutrality, and analytical quality. During the study period, coverage focuses on a small number of topics, journalists include their value judgments in news and reports. Overall, there is an obvious media bias against the Greek government’s position. (shrink)

Cultural heritage can offer tangible and intangible traces of the past. A past that shapes cultural identity, but also a past from which one sometimes wishes to detach oneself and which nevertheless needs to be remembered, even commemorated. These themes of memory, history and oblivion are examined by the philosopher Paul Ricoeur in his work La mémoire, l’histoire, l’oubli. Inspired by these ideas, this paper analyses how they are closely linked to cultural heritage. Heritage serves as a support for memory, (...) even if it can be mishandled, which in turn can affect heritage policies. Memory and heritage can be abused as a result of wounds from the past or for reasons of ideological manipulation or because of a political will to force people to remember. Furthermore, heritage, as a vehicule of memory, contributes to historical knowledge, but can remain marked by a certain form of subjectivism during the heritage and conservation operation, for which heritage professionals are responsible. Yet, the responsibility for conserving cultural heritage also implies the need to avoid any loss of heritage, and to fight against oblivion. Nonetheless, this struggle cannot become totalitarian, nor can it deprive the community of a sometimes salutary oblivion to its own identity construction. These theoretical and philosophical concepts shall be examined in the light of legal discourse, and in particular in Belgian legislation regarding cultural heritage. It is clear that the shift from monument to heritage broadens the legal scope and consequently raises the question of who gets to decide what is considered heritage according to the law, and whether there is something such as a collective human right to cultural heritage. Nonetheless, this broadening of the legislation extends the State intervention into cultural heritage, which in turn entails certain risks, as will be analysed with Belgium’s colonial heritage. (shrink)

L’origine d’un « besoin de croire » mérite une recherche en particulier dans les profondeurs psychiques archaïques dont on peut retrouver trace en certains phénomènes comme le « sentiment océanique ». Freud, Winnicott, Meltzer et d’autres auteurs après Romain Rolland, inspirés par les pathologies précoces apparentées à l’autisme permettent un aperçu des liens entre ces expériences vécues et un mode psychique premier du « croire » marqué par son absence de limites.

Context can determine whether a given gene acts as an oncogene or a tumor suppressor. Deubiquitinating enzymes (DUBs) regulate the stability of many components of the pathways dictating cell fate so it would be expected that alterations in the levels or activity of these enzymes may have oncogenic or tumor suppressive consequences. In the current review we survey publications reporting that genes encoding DUBs are oncogenes or tumor suppressors. For many DUBs both claims have been made. For such “double agents,” (...) the effects of gain or loss of function will depend on the overall status of a complex of molecular signaling networks subject to extensive crosstalk. As the TGF‐β paradox makes clear context is critical in cell fate decisions, and the disconnect between experimental findings and patient survival outcomes can in part be attributed to disparities between culture conditions and the microenvironment in vivo. Convincing claims for oncogene or tumor suppressor roles require the documentation of gene alterations in patient samples; survival curves are alone inadequate. (shrink)

This article examines the term “Radical Enlightenment” as a historiographical category through the lens of the philosophical work of Dorothea Christiane Erxleben (1715–1762), a keen advocate for women’s education and the first female medical doctor in Germany. The aim of the article is to develop a methodological framework that makes it possible to critically assess the radicalism of Erxleben’s philosophical position as it is presented in her highly systematic work Rigorous Investigation (1742). In the first part of the article, the (...) term “Radical Enlightenment” is briefly discussed in the German context. The second part is dedicated to articulating two methodological problems concerning the use of the term “radical” with regards to early feminist writings of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. The aim of this section is to develop a new approach to the classification of radical thinkers of this period. In the remaining three parts, this methodological approach is applied to the analysis of Erxleben’s views on equality and education, focusing on her call for women’s active participation in society. Finally, it is concluded that there is sufficient evidence to categorize vital parts of Erxleben’s philosophy as radical. (shrink)

In December, the National Data Guardian 1 for health and care in England, Dame Fiona Caldicott, published the outcomes of a public consultation about the Caldicott Principles and the role of Caldicott Guardians.1 The Caldicott Principles are good practice guidelines which have been used by health and social care organisations in the UK since 1997 to ensure that people’s data are kept safe and used in an ethical way.2 The role of the Caldicott Guardian is well-established in the UK. Caldicott (...) Guardians are senior people which support the upholding of the Caldicott Principles within organisations. In response to views expressed during the consultation the NDG has added an eighth Caldicott Principle to the existing seven and will use her statutory powers to issue guidance about the appointment of Caldicott Guardians for health and adult social care organisations. The new eighth Caldicott Principle is: ‘Inform patients and service users about how their confidential information is used’. It provides that: > A range of steps should be taken to ensure no surprises for patients and service users, so they can have clear expectations about how and why their confidential information is used, and what choices they have about this. These steps will vary depending on the use: as a minimum, this should include providing accessible, relevant and appropriate information - in some cases, greater engagement will be required. The NDG explains that the introduction of the new principle was prompted by consideration of the role that the legal concept of ‘reasonable expectations’ should play in shaping the circumstances under which health and care data may be legitimately shared. The NDG does not envisage that this principle will establish reasonable expectations as a legal basis in its own right …. (shrink)

The ethical behavior prevalent in an organization often determines business success or failure. Much research in the business context has scrutinized ethical behavior, but there are still few insights into its roots; this study furthers this line of inquiry. In line with identity work theory, we examine how employees’ identification with a family business shapes internal ethical decision-making processes. Because it is individuals who engage in decision-making—be it ethical or not—our research perspective centers on the individual level. We followed an (...) inductive, qualitative approach and conducted interviews with 19 employees in seven family businesses. We found that individuals engage in identity work when they identify as individual family firm employees and when they identify with the perceived characteristics of the family firm. These processes of identification, in turn, influence how employees cope with ethical situations. Our findings contribute to ethics and family business research, as well as to identity theory. (shrink)

Freges Werk gilt heute als Klassiker der Philosophie und Philosophiegeschichte. Dessen Einfluss auf unterschiedlichste Bereiche der Philosophie, von der Logik und Mathematik bis hin zur Ontologie, Epistemologie und Sprachphilosophie, ist unbestritten. Vor diesem Hintergrund scheint die Annahme naheliegend, dass Freges Wirkungsgeschichte umfassend erforscht ist. Tatsächlich gilt dies nicht für die komplexe Rezeptionsgeschichte Freges, auch wenn es dazu durchaus eine Reihe von neuen, lehrreichen und detaillierten Studien gibt. 1 Der vorliegende Beitrag befasst sich mit zwei bisher kaum bekannten und unbeachtet gebliebenen (...) Frege-Rezeptionen aus den 30er und 40er Jahren des 20. Jahrhunderts. Es handelt sich dabei zum einen um Wilma Papsts Studie Gottlob Frege als Philosoph (1932), zum anderen um Editha Krenzs Doktorarbeit Der Zahlbegriff bei Frege (1942). In der Literatur werden die Namen der Autorinnen zwar wiederholt in Fußnoten oder im Literaturverzeichnis genannt, doch bis auf wenige Ausnahmen nicht diskutiert. Im Folgenden soll anhand einer problemgeschichtlichen Kontextualisierung gezeigt werden, dass beide Arbeiten interessante Aspekte zu Frege und seiner Rezeption beleuchten. (shrink)

Introduction: People with Spinal Cord Injury are at risk of feeling socially disconnected. Competitive esports present an opportunity for people with SCI to remotely engage in a community. The aim of this study is to discuss barriers to esports participation for people with SCI, present adaptive solutions to these problems, and analyze self-reported changes in social connection.Materials and Methods: We presented a descriptive data collected in the process of a quality improvement initiative at Mount Sinai Hospital. In 2019, seven individuals (...) with cervical SCI and quadriplegia participated in a special interest group on esports. Group scores were then analyzed for evidence of between subjects variability using a single sample t-test. A Pearson's correlation was conducted to determine the relationship between social connectedness and demographic data.Results: All players experienced functional limitations as a result of their injury but managed to design personalized gaming setups with adaptive equipment that allowed them to successfully compete in esports. All players reported a positive change in perceived social connectedness after participating in the special interest group. Score on Social Connectedness Scale negatively correlated with Time since injury.Discussion: It is feasible to create adaptive gaming setups that can be used by people with differing degrees and severity of SCI in a competitive esports environment. Technology and adaptive competitive esports have a potential to improve social connectedness and inclusion in people with quadriplegia. Further research on efficacy and effectiveness of these inclusive environments and their effects on quality of life, activity, and participation is warranted. (shrink)

The conventional view of Hobbes’s commonwealth is that it was inspired by contemporary theories of tyranny. This article explores the idea that a paradigm for Hobbes’s state could in fact be found in early modern readings of Aristotle on democracy, as found in Book Three of the Politics. It argues that by the late sixteenth century, these meditations on the democratic body politic had developed claims about unity, mythology, and personation that would become central to Hobbes’s own theory of the (...) commonwealth. Tracing the history of commentary on the relevant passages in Aristotle reveals new perspectives not only on the political theories of both Aristotle and Hobbes but also introduces modern readers to the richness of early modern commentaries on classical political texts. The article ends with some thoughts on why attention to traditions of commentary might be valuable for political theorists today. (shrink)

According to a grand narrative that long ago ceased to be told, there was a seventeenth century Scientific Revolution, during which a few heroes conquered nature thanks to mathematics. When this grand narrative was brought into question, our perspectives on the question of mathematization should have changed. It seems, however, that they were instead set aside, both because of a general distrust towards sweeping narratives that are always subject to the suspicion that they overlook the unyielding complexity of real history, (...) and because of a shift in our interests. The more obscure and idiosyncratic they are, an alchemist, a patron of the sciences or a lunatic collector is nowadays honored in journals of the history of sciences. As for the general issues involved in the question of mathematization, they are rejected as obsolete, or reserved for specialized journals in the history of mathematics. The article « Forms of mathematization » examines in general the notion of mathematization, distinguishes different forms of mathematization and defends a renewed study of the forms of mathematization in the history of the early sciences. (shrink)

Many views rely on the idea that it can never be rational to have high confidence in something like, “P, but my evidence doesn’t support P.” Call this idea the “Non-Akrasia Constraint”. Just as an akratic agent acts in a way she believes she ought not act, an epistemically akratic agent believes something that she believes is unsupported by her evidence. The Non-Akrasia Constraint says that ideally rational agents will never be epistemically akratic. In a number of recent papers, the (...) Non-Akrasia Constraint has been called into question. The goal of this paper is to defend it... for the most part. (shrink)

Believing rationally is epistemically valuable, or so we tend to think. It’s something we strive for in our own beliefs, and we criticize others for falling short of it. We theorize about rationality, in part, because we want to be rational. But why? I argue that how we answer this question depends on how permissive our theory of rationality is. Impermissive and extremely permissive views can give good answers; moderately permissive views cannot.

In the wake of the Supreme Court Decision, Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization, Minkoff, Vullikanti, and Marshall (2024) argue that the unraveling of the constitutional right to abortion t...

Epiphanies is a philosophical exploration of epiphanies, peak experiences, 'wow moments', or ecstasies as they are sometimes called. What are epiphanies, and why do so many people so frequently experience them? Are they just transient phenomena in our brains, or are they the revelations of objective value that they very often seem to be? What do they tell us about the world, and about ourselves? How, if at all, do epiphanies fit in with our moral systems and our theories of (...) how to live? And how do epiphanic experiences fit in with the rest of our lives? These are Sophie Grace Chappell's questions in this ground-breaking new study of an area of inquiry that has always been right under our noses, but remains surprisingly under-explored in contemporary philosophy. (shrink)

In their target article, Doernberg and Truog (2023) correctly recognize that the doctor-patient relationship is considered a “fiduciary” relationship (i.e., other-regarding rather than self-interes...

Philosophical discussion on control has largely centred around control over our actions and beliefs. Yet this overlooks the question of whether we also have control over the reasons for which we act and believe. To date, the overriding assumption appears to be that we do not, and with seemingly good reason. We cannot choose to act for a reason and acting-for-a-reason is not itself something we do. While some have challenged this in the case of reasons for action, these claims (...) seem especially untenable regarding believing for a reason. And extending the scope of control in this way also faces the threat of regress. In the face of this orthodoxy, the present paper argues that we do in fact have control over both believing and acting for a particular reason. It also starts to develop an account of the way in which this would be possible. Given the broad importance of understanding control and agency, this paper bears on a number of topics in epistemology, the philosophy of mind, and ethics. (shrink)

. Over the last three decades, physicists have engaged in, sometimes heated, debates about relative merits and prospects of string theory as a viable research program and even about its status as a science. The aim of this paper is to provide a deeper understanding of this controversy as a particular form of boundary discourse. Drawing on the sociological work of Thomas Gieryn and Lawrence Prelli, we bring to light the way in which protagonists appeal to, and rhetorically construct, different (...) views about the scientific method and the scientific ethos, in an effort to legitimize or delegitimize string theory. (shrink)

Cet ouvrage collectif porte sur la place qu’occupent les femmes dans différentes parties de l’Empire romain d’Orient hellénophone. Il résulte de trois rencontres scientifiques organisées dans le cadre du programme GRECS d’ANIHMA entre 2012 et 2014. Comme l’explique Sophie Lalanne dans son introduction, le volume ne reflète que partiellement le contenu de ces rencontres ; l’éditrice formule d’ailleurs des réflexions intéressantes sur la place de l’histoire des femmes et du genre dans le domain...

While scientific pluralism enjoys widespread popularity within the philosophy of science, a related position, epistemic relativism, does not have much traction. Defenders of scientific pluralism, however, dread the question of whether scientific pluralism entails epistemic relativism. It is often argued that if a scientific pluralist accepts epistemic relativism, she will be unable to pass judgment because she believes that “anything goes”. In this article, I will show this concern to be unnecessary. I will also argue that common strategies to differentiate (...) relativism and pluralism fail. Building upon this analysis, I will propose a new way of looking at both positions’ relations. This article aims to understand what explains the friction between scientific pluralism and epistemic relativism. I will demonstrate that conceptualizing both epistemic relativism and scientific pluralism as “stances” sheds better light on their relation and demonstrates that it is, in principle, possible to support both positions at the same time. Preferred policies and levels of analysis, however, cause friction in practice. (shrink)

Should citizens have equal say regarding the running of society? Following the principles of democracy, and most of political philosophy: yes (at least at a fundamental level, thus allowing for representatives and the like). Indeed, comparing the main alternative seemingly supports this intuition. Epistocracy would instead give power just to the most epistemically competent. Yet testing citizens’ political and economic knowledge looks apt to disproportionately disempower marginalised groups, making the position seem like a nonstarter and democracy the clear winner. Nevertheless, (...) this paper argues against giving citizens equal say, or at least, it offers the strongest possible motivation for this position. In particular, I introduce the progressive case for epistocracy, and what I term standpoint epistocracy. This account refigures the relevant notion of political competence such that it is not the most privileged classes who would most likely constitute our epistocracy, but rather, the least. The resulting picture considerably improves on traditional versions of epistocracy and also democracy. (shrink)

A rich literature has discussed what it is to respond to a reason, e.g., to believe or act on the basis of some consideration or another. In comparison, what it would be to respond to a second-order reason has been underexplored. Yet formulating an account of this is vital for maintaining the existence of second-order reasons in both the practical and epistemic domains. And indeed, there are reasons to doubt this is possible. For example, responding to second-order reasons is meant (...) to be different from simply coming to believe or act for a more richly described first-order reason but it's not clear what this would look like. This paper introduces an account of the second-order basing relation which meets these concerns. It therefore both develops our picture of second-order reasons and helps to defend their existence. (shrink)

This paper introduces the reconstitutor as a comprehensive unit of heredity within the context of evolutionary research. A reconstitutor is the structure resulting from a set of relationships between different elements or processes that are actively involved in the recreation of a specific phenotypic variant in each generation regardless of the biomolecular basis of the elements or whether they stand in a continuous line of ancestry. Firstly, we justify the necessity of introducing the reconstitutor by showing the limitations of other (...) evolutionary conceptions of the unit of heredity, such as the replicator, the reproducer, and the Darwinian individual. We argue that these conceptions are based on the requirement of lineage formation, which we argue to be unnecessary for the existence of evolutionary heredity. In the second part, we introduce the reconstitutor, which we base on the concept of Stability of Traits, and illustrate how it covers cases of hereditary phenomena not covered by the previous accounts. Secondly, we illustrate how the reconstitutor could serve as a platform to rethink ecological inheritance and other forms of inheritance that have been recently introduced under the song/singer model of evolution. (shrink)

In his insightful review, Eugene V. Koonin discusses various aspects of CRISPR-Cas systems with a strong focus on their qualities as "adaptive immune systems". The CRISPR-Cas system is most famous for its application as a gene-editing tool. Koonin provides a deeper insight into its biological function in bacteria, which is to immunize the cell against parasite DNA. I shall comment on one issue discussed in the text, in two steps. First, I shall elaborate on CRISPR-Cas systems and their supposed Lamarckian (...) character. Criteria for calling biological phenomena genuinely Lamarckian will be narrowed down and then applied to the CRISPR-Cas system, considering interference-driven spacer acquisition as an instantiation of a truly Lamarckian paradigm. Second, I shall consider whether Lamarckian and "canonical" instances of inheritance are a case of theoretical pluralism, being two non-reducible, yet interconnected paradigms. (shrink)

Preterm birth is defined as delivery occurring before 37 weeks gestation.1 Infants born prematurely have increased risks of morbidity and mortality throughout life, especially during the first year. These risks increase as the gestational age at birth decreases.2 Additionally, there are significant racial and ethnic differences in preterm birth rates. In 2022, the rate of preterm birth among non-Hispanic black women was approximately 50% higher than that observed in non-Hispanic white women.1 The outcomes for these infants are also disparate–preterm birth (...) and low birth weight are the second-leading causes of infant mortality (deaths before 1 year of age). Notably, among preterm neonates, infants born to non-Hispanic black women have a mortality rate more than double that of infants born to non-Hispanic white mothers.3 Importantly, there is a small but significant group of neonates that can be classified as severely premature (those born <28 weeks). Infants born before 28 weeks have varied and uncertain outcomes. While this group accounts for only 0.4% of preterm births, it also accounts for 40% of deaths among preterm neonates.4 As noted by Romanis and Adkins, the advent of artificial amnion and placenta technology (AAPT) holds promise for its potential to address the physiologic complications and mortality risks of extreme prematurity by introducing amniotic substitutes that mimic in vivo placental oxygenation and substrate delivery. In contrast …. (shrink)