The fallacy of ignoring qualifications, or secundum quid et simpliciter, is a deceptive strategy that is pervasive in argumentative dialogues, discourses, and discussions. It consists in misrepresenting an utterance so that its meaning is broadened, narrowed, or simply modified to pursue different goals, such as drawing a specific conclusion, attacking the interlocutor, or generating humorous reactions. The “secundum quid” was described by Aristotle as an interpretative manipulative strategy, based on the contrast between the “proper” sense of a statement (...) and its meaning taken absolutely or in a certain respect. However, how can an “unqualified” statement have a proper meaning different from the qualified one, and vice versa? This “linguistic” fallacy brings to light a complex relationship between pragmatics, argumentation, and interpretation. The secundum quid is described in this paper as a manipulative argument, whose deceptive effect lies in its pragmatic dimension. This fallacy is analyzed as a strategy of decontextualization lying at the interface between pragmatics and argumentation and consisting of the unwarranted passage from an ut-terance to its semantic representation. By ignoring the available evidence and the presumptive interpretation of a statement, the speaker places it in a different context or suppresses textual and contextual evidence to infer a specific meaning different from the presumable one. (shrink)

The article analyzes one of the fundamental rights – the right to maintenance, which proper implementation ensures normal development of the child. This right matches with the duty of parents to maintain their minor children. Paragraph 6 of Article 38 of the Constitution of the Republic of Lithuania states that parents have a duty to educate their children to be honest people and loyal citizens, supporting them until adulthood. The obligation to maintain children is established in the first 3.192 Article (...) paragraph of the Civil Code of the Republic of Lithuania, and the responsibility for avoiding to maintain a child is provided in Article 164 of the Criminal Code. The article discusses the fact that the analysis of criminal law rate is not precise enough. Article 164 of the Criminal Code does not match with the child maintenance methods specified in the CC Article 3.196 paragraph 1. Since criminal liability is only for judgment in default in civil cases, a person shall only be liable for breaking the right to maintain a child, provided in the CC 3.196 paragraph 1. This article deeply analyzes the problematic qualification aspects of the avoidance to maintain a child. Some alternative ways of child maintenance are mentioned, as can be chosen from other law instruments (bailiffs, Guarantee child support fund) and it leads to the ultima ratio principle. On the other hand, it is not required to seek alternative remedies for affected interests, and it is possible to initiate a pre-trial investigation. Therefore, this article seeks to identify specific civil and criminal law rules delimitation. Avoidance of child maintenance is an ongoing crime. The main problem in legal practice is to determine an end of this ongoing criminal conduct. The practice of the Supreme Court of Lithuania is not unanimous. In some cases, the end of this ongoing conduct is considered to be a moment when the past judgment has entered into force, in other cases – the moment of indictment. These positions are criticized by many authors and it is suggested to follow the Supreme Court’s practice, according to which the moment when a judgment of conviction for the criminal act is passed should be considered as an end of an ongoing criminal conduct. (shrink)

Ethical cultures, corporate social responsibility (CSR), and sustainability strategies are increasingly being addressed through formal organisational policies and structures. This is evidenced by codes of ethics, conduct, whistle-blowing reporting lines, anti-bribery and corruption policies, and broader stakeholder and environmental engagement strategies. In the United States, corporate ethics managers are responsible for these functions, supported by specific professional and university-level qualifications. However, this is not the case in Australia and Asia where the role appears delegated to human resource personnel (...) in organisations. Human resource management (HRM) is increasingly advanced as a formal profession, yet whether corporate ethics content features as a significant component of the HRM profession is unclear. Expert knowledge is a foundation of a profession along with the duty to act within the limits of that knowledge and expertise. This paper scopes what constitutes professional expert knowledge. It examines corporate ethics expertise and HRM within this context. Major Australian and Asian organisations are examined to verify that HRM Departments, and thus HRM practitioners, are responsible for managing corporate ethics. Given the seniority and strategic importance of this function, the content of selected Masters in HRM and related fields are examined to identify the extent of ethics content. This is considered in the light of the expertise required to manage corporate ethics, and conclusions are drawn whether the HRM discipline is appropriately qualified to manage this function. Finally, recommendations and further research towards advancing the role and function of corporate ethics managers in general are proposed. (shrink)

The notion of causal evidence in medicine has been the subject of wide philosophical debate in recent years. The notion of evidence has been discussed mostly in connection with Evidence Based Medicine and, more in general, with the assessment of causal nexus in medical, and especially research contexts. “Manipulative evidence” is one of the notions of causal evidence that has stimulated much debate. It has been defined in slightly different ways, attributed different relevance, and recently placed at the core of (...) Gillies’ “action-related theory of causality”, a view specifically meant to address causation in medicine. While in general sympathetic to Gillies’ account, and totally convinced of the relevance of manipulative evidence and different sorts of interventions in the biomedical sciences, we believe that some further qualifications are needed to allow the notion of manipulative evidence to better express features of medical practice. In particular, we provide some qualification of the role of “interventional evidence” proposed by Gillies, suggesting a distinction between “interventional evidence” and “evidence for interventions”. A case study from research on rare diseases is analyzed in depth and a multifaceted notion of manipulative evidence put forward that allows better understanding of what manipulations in medical contexts amount to and what their targets are. (shrink)

Agonistic recognition in education has three interlinked modes of aesthetic experience and self-presentation where one is related to actions in the public realm; one is related to plurality in the way in which it comes into existence in confrontation with others; and one is related to the subject-self, disclosed by ‘thinking. Arendt’s conception of ‘thinking’ is a way of getting to grips with aesthetic self-presentation in education. By action, i.e., by disclosing oneself and by taking initiatives, students and teachers constitute (...) their being. The way Arendt theorizes action (vita activa) makes it essentially unpredictable and destabilizing, which does not seem to fit into what should be expected from education. In the article I will argue that it should have a place by virtue of the debate, challenge and contest it offers. But education should also be defined from a specific kind of contemplation called ‘thinking’ to become the cultivation of a faculty of judgment in education—thinking (vita contemplativa) as a common virtue in education. Arendt’s demarcation between truth and meaning does from the point of view of agonistic recognition in education call for ‘thinking’ as a qualification of political and moral meaning–the ‘taste’ to be established in the individual, by individual judgements but always judged in relation to members of a community. (shrink)

Knowing the theory of gender that a court is using to understand and assess the issues in a case is vital to ensuring that women are afforded their full rights under the law. Unfortunately, courts often do not explicitly state what understanding of gender is informing their decisions. An exception is found in employment law: specifically, the bona fide occupational qualification (BFOQ) exception to Title VII of the Civil Rights Act, which allows employers to engage in sex-based discrimination in those (...) instances in which the sex of the employee is a reasonably necessary qualification for the job. In these cases, because the court must analyze how “manness” or “womanness” impacts one's qualification to hold certain kinds of employment, the court must articulate its understanding of gender. This paper examines two BFOQ cases in the cross-gender prison guard context, those cases in which an individual of one sex seeks to guard inmates of the opposite sex. In these cases the courts created a theory of gender that posits men and women as different in kind. The theory developed in this line of cases is an attack on Title VII protections and a potential barrier to women's equality under the law. (shrink)

Cet article définit les spécificités de communication des forums de discussion en replaçant cet environnement au sein d’un tableau de qualification reprenant les 9 principaux environnements de production de contenus numériques que sont les blogs, les forums, les réseaux sociaux, les espaces de commentaires, les sms, les messageries instantanées, les chats, les courriers électroniques et les wikis. Ces environnements sont abordés sur base de 4 critères : le but de la communication, les acteurs, l’(a)synchronie et le pseudonymat. Si l’analyse se (...) centre ici sur les forums, le tableau de qualification peut quant à lui servir de base théorique pour de futures analyses conversationnelles et comparatives des contenus numériques et des nouvelles possibilités d’interaction nées du Web 2.0. (shrink)

The professional training of pastoral therapists has been a topic of controversy for many years in South Africa. Up to date, the training of pastoral workers has been limited to the study of ministry and as such is limited by the primary aims and outcomes of this curriculum. In a post-apartheid, post-colonial South Africa, the need for pastoral workers is intensified by the needs of community- and faith-based organisations for trained and registered therapists to alleviate the counselling needs of their (...) beneficiaries on all social levels. This article discusses the current state of affairs of the training and curriculum related to the profession of pastoral therapy in the context of South Africa, the various sociopolitical and religious needs that are still left unanswered in the field, and makes recommendations for the registration and accreditation of the profession with a specific curriculum focused on multicultural, multi-spiritual and post-modern nuances. The author argues that such a curriculum, accredited by a statutory body, can operate as a national health resource, will be more cost-effective than other related health services and may transform the social justice landscape related to both the providers and beneficiaries of this type of care. (shrink)

The interventionist account provides us with several notions permitting the qualification of causal relationships. In recent years, there has been a push toward formalizing these notions using information theory. In this paper, I discuss one of them, namely causal specificity. The notion of causal specificity is ambiguous as it can refer to at least two different concepts. After having presented these, I show that current attempts to formalize causal specificity in information theoretic terms have mostly focused on one of these (...) two concepts. I then propose and apply a new information-theoretic measure which captures the other concept. (shrink)

The interventionist account provides us with several notions permitting the qualification of causal relationships. In recent years, there has been a push toward formalizing these notions using information theory. In this paper, I discuss one of them, namely causal specificity. The notion of causal specificity is ambiguous as it can refer to at least two different concepts. After having presented these, I show that current attempts to formalize causal specificity in information theoretic terms have mostly focused on one of these (...) two concepts. I then propose and apply a new information-theoretic measure which captures the other concept. (shrink)

Ijtihad is the mujtahid's putting forward all his efforts on a fiqh issue within the framework of methodological principles. Fatwa, on the other hand, are the explanations made regarding the questions asked in fiqh issues. Therefore, although there are similarities between fatwa and ijtihad in terms of declaring a fiqh knowledge, there are also some differences that distinguish both scientific activities from each other. Because of this difference, not every ijtihad qualifies as a fatwa that a Muslim can apply in (...) his life. A jurist who does not have the qualifications for ijtihad has to pay attention to when giving a fatwa by making use of the classical period ijtihad. The most important thing to consider when benefiting from the ijtihads that have been put forward is to correctly distinguish between the ijtihads that are historical and those that will always be used. In the fiqh books, there are many issues that can be described as historical ijtihad, in the context of their own time and conditions. Since it is not possible to present all such ijtihads within the framework of an article, in this study, the subject is discussed within the framework of ijtihads selected from fiqh books. From international relations to family law, there are many historically qualified ijtihads in the fields of fiqh, especially in the field of transactions. Today, international relations are quite different. It is of great importance to redefine the world and present fiqh rules accordingly. In the changing social structure, a new perspective is needed in the determination of the muruet. In the process of women's social position and participation in social life, great changes have been experienced all over the world and women have started to take part in many areas of life. In terms of the minimum age limit for marriage, it has become natural to marry at an older age than in the past. It has become almost impossible to act with the approach that those who have the same belief will obtain citizenship without other terms and conditions. It has become necessary to consider the views of jurists regarding the rights of non-Muslim citizens from a new perspective in the globalizing world structure. The implementation of views that give authority to private property owners regarding mineral ownership may be harmful to the security of the state and the public interest. There has been a need to look again at the legal provisions regarding the treasures under the ground in terms of public interest. In the article, it is stated why the ijtihads on the aforementioned issues have a historical character and in which framework the issue should be handled today. (shrink)

Recent initiatives to enhance retention and widen participation ensure it is crucial to understand the factors that predict students' performance during their undergraduate degree. The present research used Structural Equation Modeling to test three separate models that examined the extent to which British Psychology students' A‐level entry qualifications predicted: their performance in years 1–3 of their Psychology degree, and their overall degree performance. Students' overall A‐level entry qualifications positively predicted performance during their first year and overall degree performance, (...) but negatively predicted their performance during their third year. Additionally, and more specifically, students' A‐level entry qualifications in Psychology positively predicted performance in the first year only. Such findings have implications for admissions tutors, as well as for students who have not studied Psychology before but who are considering applying to do so at university. (shrink)

'Religion and Ethics for OCR' is an indeal guide for students taking either the new AS level or A level qualifications offered by OCR. Drawing on insights gained over years of teaching and following the OCR course outlines closely, Mark Coffey and Dennis Brown's landmark book includes: up-to-date discussions of key debates in religion and ethics; ethical theories set in their historical context; discussion of contemporary developments in science, technology and society; helpful guidance on writing the perfect exam answer; (...) and, detailed guidance on OCR's assessment criteria and how best to meet them. (shrink)

Many recent theories of coercion broaden the scope of the concept coercion by encompassing interactions in which one agent pressures another to act, subject to some further qualifications. I have argued previously that this way of conceptualizing coercion undermines its suitability for theoretical use in politics and ethics. I have also explicated a narrower, more traditional approach—“the enforcement approach to coercion”—and argued for its superiority. In this essay, I consider the prospects for broadening this more traditional approach to cover (...) some cases that don’t seem to fit this approach, but nonetheless seem coercive, such as the demands routinely made on people by credit card companies, demands on students by higher educational institutions, and demands made by European financial institutions on the government of Greece. I analyze the similarities and differences of these compared to more central cases of coercion, discussing what lessons can be drawn from this analysis. (shrink)

We will need to consider some general questions pertaining to teacher education as well as to the specifics of preparation to be a professional in the sense developed so far in this book. We will consider: the selection of potential teachers, different models of initial teacher education, early career qualification and career professional development. In the course of doing so, we will look at some of the contemporary debates concerning teacher education that are relevant to this question.

The 1951 Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees and the 1967 Protocol Relating to the Status of Refugees embody fundamental provisions of refugee law. However, since the adoption of these documents the world has changed dramatically and the laws are not developing fast enough in order to catch up with dynamically changing contemporary situations. The application and interpretation of definition of a refugee was developed through traditional practice of Western states, which was influenced by two world wars and the (...) Cold War, when refugees from Africa or Asia were uncommon. The Qualification Directive specifically aims at ensuring that the member states apply common qualification criteria for persons who need international protection in line with the 1951 Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees. The author supports the statement that the Qualification Directive in principle aims at bringing back under the definition of refugee those, who have been left outside of its scope during the last decades as a result of the restrictive interpretation and application of the definition of refugee. (shrink)

Recently, there has been a significant upsurge of interest in what has come to be known as the 'Adoption Problem', first developed by Saul Kripke in 1974. The problem purports to raise a difficulty for Quine’s anti-exceptionalist conception of logic. In what follows, we first offer a statement of the problem and argue that, so understood, it depends upon natural but resistible assumptions. We then use that discussion as a springboard for developing a different adoption problem, arguing that, for a (...) significant class of basic logical principles, there is indeed a difficulty in seeing how they might be ‘freely adopted,’ thereby vindicating something close to the spirit of Kripke’s original claim. This first part of our argument will enforce a significant qualification of Quine’s claim that basic logical principles can be empirically confirmed. In the concluding sections of the paper, we turn to the question, specifically, of the empirical revisability of logic, arguing that when proper attention is paid to the role of reasoning in theory revision, it does indeed emerge that anti-exceptionalism, in full generality, is untenable. (shrink)

The “social-political-hierarchical” qualifications have long been identified as the essential features of the Confucian golden rule. This essay challenges this prevailing characterization by revealing the relation and differences between Confucius’ original shu 恕 and a series of post-Confucius reformulations in ancient Confucianism. Specifically, the premise of equality, which underlies Confucius’ formulation of shu in correlation with ren 仁, rendered shu incompatible with asymmetrical relationships. Besides the advantage of overcoming this limitation by adapting the golden rule structure of shu to (...) specified asymmetrical relationships, the post-Confucius formula, especially “the measuring square” in the Great Learning, was devised to guide one to infer universalizable rules of conduct for various roles in diverse relationships. On this basis, I demonstrate a pivotal shift in the golden rule practice of ancient Confucianism—a shift of focus from its correlation with ren to its conformity with li 禮 as the system of rules of conduct and the principle of “discriminations.”. (shrink)

In § 37 of his "Elements of First Practical Philosophy", Baumgarten provides important qualifications to the controversial notion of ‘objective morality’, which had long been at the centre of the dispute between realists like Wolff and his adversaries. The chapter shall examine how he construes his view of morality in §§ 36-38 with a specific focus on the central § 37. I shall analyse that section, first considering how Baumgarten understands the key notion of ‘objective morality’ and how (...) he argues for it, focusing both on its relational character and its connection with God’s will. Then I will examine the last, and arguably most surprising of the implications that he draws per negativum from the main claim, namely that affirming objective morality does not amount to rule out what Baumgarten calls ‘subjective morality’. Finally, I will briefly consider how Baumgarten’s distinctive way to take side in the Wolffian camp in that dispute reflects, through the close dialogue with the "Elements" in Kant’s private notes and lectures, on the development of Kant’s own views in practical philosophy. (shrink)

This article raises the question of whether bioethics qualifies as a discipline. According to a standard definition of discipline as “a field of study following specific and well-established methodological rules” bioethics is not a specific discipline as there are no explicit “well-established methodological rules.” The article investigates whether the methodological rules can be implicit, and whether bioethics can follow specific methodological rules within subdisciplines or for specific tasks. As this does not appear to be the case, (...) the article examines whether bioethics’ adherence to specific quality criteria (instead of methodological rules) or pursuing of a common goal can make it qualify as a discipline. Unfortunately, the result is negative. Then, the article scrutinizes whether referring to bioethics institutions and professional qualifications can ascertain bioethics as a discipline. However, this makes the definition of bioethics circular. The article ends by admitting that bioethics can qualify as a discipline according to broader definitions of discipline, for example, as an “area of knowledge, research and education.” However, this would reduce bioethics’ potential for demarcation and identity-building. Thus, to consolidate the discipline of bioethics and increase its impact, we should explicate and elaborate on its methodology. (shrink)

This chapter first argues against the widely accepted “mentalist” interpretation of Aristotle’s conception of the perception of external objects. On that view, the perception of objects results from an act of synthesis of the diverse perceptual input provided by the different sense modalities. I argue that Aristotle’s conception of perception does not require such mental “construction” of external objects. For him, we unfailingly perceive external objects by way of modally specific perception: perception without qualification is primarily of external 3-D (...) objects, while modally specific perception is of perceptual qualities. As the special senses cannot operate in isolation from the perceptual system as a whole, it follows that we see colors, hear sounds, etc., and thereby perceive the objects whose colors and sounds they are. The second part offers a causal interpretation of Aristotle’s definition of perception as “reception of the form without the matter,” according to which the causal history of sensory affection fixes the content of the resulting act of perception: perception is cognitive in virtue of being the matterless presence of external things’ qualities in the perceiver. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Kant's Critique of Berkeley HENRY E. ALLISON THE CLAIMTHAT KANT'S IDEALISM,or at least certain strands of it, is essentially identical to that of Berkeley has a long and distinguished history. It was first voiced by several of Kant's contemporaries such as Mendelssohn, Herder, Hamann, Pistorius and Eberhard who attacked the alleged subjectivism of the Critique of Pure Reason. 1 This viewpoint found its sharpest contemporary expression in the notorious (...) Garve-Feder review to which Kant responded at length in the Prolegomena. In subsequent times it has been championed by Schopenhauer, and most nineteenth century German commentators on the relation between the two philosophers. 2 In addition, it has been, and continues to be, the prevailing view of the vast majority of British writers on Kant, including, with significant qualifications, Norman Kemp Smith. 3 This tradition continues despite the fact that Kant specifically, and in no uncertain terms, repudiated this identification in the Prolegomena and the second edition of the Critique. In both works he responds to the charges of subjectivism, and in so doing distinguishes his position from that of Berkeley, who in the eighteenth century was commonly regarded as a solipsist and denier of the "external world." 4 In contra-distinction to Kant's own critical or transcendental idealism, which explains the possibility of synthetic a priori knowledge within the realm of possible experience, Berkeley is characterized as a "dogmatic" or "visionary idealist." He is judged guilty of "degrading bodies to mere illusion" (B69), of regarding things in space as "merely imaginary entities" (B274), and of holding with all "genuine idealists" that: "all knowledge through the senses and experience is i Cf. Hans Vaihinger, Commentar zu Kant's Kritik der Reinen Vernunft (Stuttgart, Berlin, Leipzig, 1892), II, 494-505. Cf. Friederich Fredericks, Der Phainomenale Idealisraus Berkeley's und Kant's (Berlin, 1871); Robert Zimmerman, "Ober Kant's Widerlegung des Idealismus yon Berkeley" (Sitzungsberichte der Akademie der Wissenschaften, Vienna, Philox.-hist. Kl.), LXVIII (1871); Gustav Dieckert, tiber dos Verhiiltnis des Berkeleyschen ldealismus zu Kantischen Vernun]tkritik (Konitz, 1888). Tiffs is a consequence of the general British tendency to view Kant in phenomenalist terms. A typical recent example is found in P. F. Strawson, The Bounds of Sense (London, 1966). Kemp Smith in his Commentary to Kant's Critique o[ Pure Reason (2nd ed., rev., 1923) takes greaZ pains to distinguish between the subjectivist strand in Kant's thought, which is essentially identical to Berkeley's position, and the genuine critical doctrine which stands side by side with it in the text. 9 Cf. I-I.M. Bracken, The Early Reception of Berkeley's Materialism 1710-1733, rev. ed. (The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff, 1965). [43] 44 HISTORY OF PHILOSOPHY nothing but sheer illusion, and only in the ideas of pure understanding is there truth" (374). 5 One of the chief reasons for the continuation of the Kant-Berkeley tradition is that these, and similar statements about Berkeley, which we find in these works and in Kant's correspondenc e with Beck, have not been taken very seriously by Kant's critics. They are usually dismissed as obvious misinterpretations, due to Kant's ignorance of Berkeley's actual writings, and of his reliance upon distorted second and third hand accounts of Berkeley's thought such as is to be found in Beattie. Furthermore, this view is often supported by the philological reflection that Kant did not read English, and that Berkeley's writings were not yet available in German translation. 6 The philological argument, however, loses much of its force when we consider that there was indeed a German translation of Berkeley's Dialogues, which although apparently unknown to nineteenth century scholars, was readily accessible to Kant. This is to be found, together with a translation of Collier's Clavis Universalis and critical analyses, in a work by the professor of philosophy at Rostock, Johann Christian Eschenbach, entitled: Samlung der vornehmsten Schri[tsteller die die tFirklichkeit ihres eignen K~rpers und der ganzen Ki~rperwelt leugnen (Rostock, 1756). Furthermore, in addition to this work, which was probably known to Kant, there is Berkeley's important Latin work, De Motu (1721), as well as French translations of many of... (shrink)

The value of rational choice theory for the social sciences has long been contested. It is argued here that, in the debate over its role, it is necessary to distinguish between claims that people maximise manifest payoffs, and claims that people maximise their utility. The former version has been falsified. The latter is unfalsifiable, because utility cannot be observed. In principle, utility maximisation can be adapted to fit any form of behaviour, including the behaviour of non-human organisms. Allegedly 'inconsistent' behaviour (...) is also impossible to establish without qualification. This utility-maximising version of rational choice theory has the character of a universal 'explanation' that can be made to 'fit' any set of events. This is a sign of weakness rather than strength. In its excessive quest for generality, utility-maximising rational choice theory fails to focus on the historically and geographically specific features of socio-economic systems. As long as such theory is confined to ahistorical generalities, then it will remain highly limited in dealing with the real world. Instead we have to consider the real social and psychological determinants of human behaviour. (shrink)

The book is an analysis of Kant’s uses and definitions of the three concepts ‘transcendental philosophy’, ‘ontology’ and ‘logic’. It first focuses on Kant’s definitions of ‘transcendental’ in the Critique of Pure Reason, where the term is used for the very first time with a programmatic meaning, as the qualification of Kant’s specific philosophical standpoint. Secondly, it reconstructs Kant’s position towards metaphysics and ontology in his pre-critical and critical writings, as well as its premises in the Leibnizian and Wolffian (...) metaphysics. It last examines the meaning of the concept of logic in Kant's philosophy. All this shows that a new conception of metaphysics emerges from Kant’s critique and within the critical period. (shrink)

In the present paper we model the Navya-Nyāya analysis of Vedic and secular injunctions and prohibitions by means of Giordani’s and Canavotto’s system ADL of dynamic deontic logic. Navya-Naiyāyikas analyze the meaning of injunctions and prohibitions by reducing them to plain indicative statements about certain properties whose presence or absence in the enjoined or prohibited action serves as a criterion for the truth or falsity of the “inducing” or “restraining knowledge”, a kind of qualificative cognition instilled in the recipient of (...) an injunction or prohibition. Thus, Navya-Naiyāyikas have found their own way to solve Jørgensen’s Puzzle concerning the very idea of a deontic logic as a tool to analyze arguments based on sentences which do not seem to be truth-apt. The teleological aspect of the Navya-Nyāya characterization of an enjoined or prohibited action can also give a clue to solutions of other puzzles and paradoxes which have beset the development of deontic logic in the West. A specific contrary-to-duty puzzle from the Indian tradition is related to the śyena, a malefic sacrifice meant for harming one’s enemy. The Vedic injunction to perform such a sacrifice runs counter to a religious practitioner’s duty not to harm a living being. In the present paper we examine the cogency of the very different solutions to this dilemma suggested by the Mīmāṃsaka Prabhākara on the one hand and the Navya-Naiyāyika Gaṅgeśa on the other hand. (shrink)

Abstract:Philosophical pragmatists rarely receive credit for their contribution to virtue ethics. But perhaps they should. How did America’s philosopher of democracy, John Dewey, and one of its most famous elder statesmen, Benjamin Franklin, advise troubled souls in search of moral improvement? According to James Campbell, Dewey and Franklin recommended the cultivation of inquiry-specific virtues, specifically imagination and fallibilism, thereby transforming the moral agent into a more effective ethical problem solver. For Gregory Pappas, open-mindedness and courage resemble Deweyan virtues, since (...) both are integral to the pragmatist’s ideal of a balanced character. However, Pappas contends that Dewey would reject any procedure whereby the virtues are isolated and cultivated individually—a qualification that if applied to Franklin’s virtue project undermines his entire method of moral development. Cultivating virtue, on Pappas’ reading of Dewey’s ethics, must contribute to the integrated whole of a person’s character. The implication of the imperfect Dewey-Franklin comparison is that Dewey is not a strict virtue ethicist. Nevertheless, Dewey’s and Franklin’s respective models of moral improvement offer valuable insight and assistance to the moral agent wanting to cultivate a good character—or so I argue. (shrink)

Self-ascriptions of one's current mental states often seem authoritative. It is sometimes thought that the authority of such self-ascriptions is, in part, a matter of their indubitability. However, they do not seem to be universally indubitable. How, then, should claims about self-ascriptive indubitability be qualified? Here I consider several such qualifications from the literature. Finding many of them wanting, I nevertheless settle on multiple specifications of the thesis that self-ascriptions are authoritatively indubitable. Some of these specifications concern how other (...) agents ought to treat one's self-ascriptions, while a final specification concerns how one is entitled to respond to others’ doubts about one's self-ascriptions. The result is a pluralistic view of self-ascriptive indubitability: different types of mental state self-ascriptions are indubitable in different ways, and for different people. (shrink)

Organizational culture paves the way for employees, shows how one should function in a given organization – it aims to keep it together by adhering to similar values. Thanks to conditions prevailing there, specific rules employees know how they can perform their duties, properly cooperate with others and also how looks like the possibility of professional development, which is very important in the development of human capital. Human capital is people, their skills, creativity and qualifications. Development of capital (...) through competence development has a positive impact on further functioning of the organization, but also on the satisfaction of employees themselves. In the case of retired officers of the Polish Army, who acquired specialized knowledge and valuable skills during their service, it is important to use their capital after the end of service. They can be supplemented with additional courses, training that will enrich their existing potential, and also enable them to find work in the civilian market. A survey was conducted among retired Army officers and employers/supervisors hiring retired officers from 2019 to 2021. The snowball method was used. A qualitative method was used – a survey questionnaire. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:A Response to Charles AltieriRobert B. PippinIam very grateful to Charles Altieri for his attentive reading of and thoughtful critique of Philosophy by Other Means: The Arts in Philosophy and Philosophy in the Arts.1 Let me proceed immediately to his main and quite important criticism of the approach defended there. It is this: "My one huge problem with Pippin's perspective is that I cannot accept his insistence that the (...) distinctive form of thinking elicited by works of art is best treated as a mode of knowledge." And he offers a contrasting perspective: "Instead I propose that art should matter to society primarily as the achievement of constructed, specific, individual experiences that embody resonance and authority. Then we can claim that their capacities to engage audiences in particular imaginative situations dramatically stage responses to the historical conditions on which Pippin dwells." This is a densely stated alternative, and I am not sure I fully understand it or why stating it this way thereby shows why art "should matter to society" (art may do this, but why is that important?), but I have much to say by way of clarification before getting to the alternative.First, I meant the title to be as dialectical and so as paradoxical as it sounds. If the means are "other," then we have left philosophy altogether; if the other means are still philosophical, then they can't count as "other." By dialectical I mean simply the avoidance of such dualisms, while not collapsing distinctions through some sort of resolutive reductionism. The idea is to avoid two terrible examples of philosophical approaches to the arts that putatively avoid such dualisms: either provocative or illustrative. The former sees literature especially as embodying issues like moral dilemmas that can be understood to pose, to provoke, philosophical [End Page 249] questions that traditional philosophy should then take up and discuss on its own. (Examples are the way Samuel Beckett's plays, or Albert Camus's The Stranger, are sometimes taught.) The latter, the illustrative, sees literature, again paradigmatically, as providing something like the flesh and blood of abstract philosophical issues, instantiating and illustrating a particular philosophical approach, like moral sentimentalism. (Charles Dickens is often cited.)These are surely examples of what Altieri cites as, and quite rightly rejects, as "appropriating those [aesthetic] experiences for philosophical explanation." I want to reject such "appropriationism" too. In my first chapter, on philosophical criticism of the arts, the idea I defended was that attention to the philosophical value of literature (I will stay with this art form for a while) is attention to literature as a form of reflective thinking itself, in no need of appropriation by philosophy—even though, I claim, there can be a form of philosophical criticism. The point of such criticism is to illuminate that dimension of the work itself, something philosophically significant that the work can do but traditional philosophy cannot.This is couched within several qualifications. Such attentiveness can be valuable, but not for just any work of great literature. Some literature is great without being concerned with any aesthetic modality of "thinking." One can surely admire Samuel Richardson or Anthony Trollope or William Makepeace Thackeray and admit that their value stems from other qualities in the prose, plotting, and psychologically astute portrayal of characters. And for many other reasons, any of the arts can be said to be valuable even if a case can also be made for their bearing on philosophy.And finally, the concept of "philosophical knowledge" is quite complicated. Surely some philosophers, like G. W. F. Hegel, believe in such a thing, but I don't. As Altieri rightly points out, no Absolute exists. What interests me is the relevance of Hegel's claim that a sensible and affective modality of collective self-knowledge can be embodied in many great works. But the collective self-knowledge embodied in fiction is not like discursive or analytic or even speculative knowledge. I see no strict distinction between the object of interrogation and the interrogation itself. That is, the "self" in question (e.g., who have we become?) is what it is by virtue of its own self-interpretation. Self-knowledge in... (shrink)

A frequently advanced claim in contemporary science policy is that interdisciplinarity is especially well suited for being ‘transformative’ and for bringing about ‘major breakthroughs’. Thus, it is expected that, in contemporary science, major progress will come primarily from interdisciplinary research (IDR). Often in this dis-course, interdisciplinarity is also expected to integrate the involved disciplines or specialties. This chapter will provide a philosophical qualification of this political discourse by examining how interdisciplinary progress can be characterised. I shall argue that in addition (...) to the categories of incremental and transformative progress that are well known from mono-disciplinary science, IDR can sometimes also offer another category of progress that I shall call quasi-transformative. In examining these three kinds of interdisciplinary progresses I shall argue, first, that interdisciplinary progress does not necessarily require a specific type of integration between the involved disciplines or specialties, second, that social relations between scientists with different areas of expertise may play a crucial role in especially transformative progress, and third, that different disciplinary perspectives on what constitutes progress can draw wedges between scientists from different disciplines. (shrink)

The passionate and staunch defence of logic of the controversial thinker Ibn Ḥazm, Abū Muḥammad ʿAlī b. Aḥmad b. Saʿīd of Córdoba (384-456/994-1064), had lasting consequences in the Islamic world. Indeed, his book Facilitating the Understanding of the Rules of Logic and Introduction Thereto, with Common Expressions and Juristic Examples (Kitāb al-Taqrīb li-ḥadd al-manṭiq wa-l-mudkhal ilayhi bi-l-alfāẓ al-ʿāmmiyya wa-l-amthila al-fiqhiyya), composed in 1025-1029, was well known and discussed during and after his time; and it paved the way for the studies (...) of his compatriots Ibn Bājjah (d. 1138), Ibn Ṭufayl (1185), and Ibn Rushd (1198), who each gave demonstrative reasoning a privileged place within the methods of attaining knowledge. Unfortunately, as too often in the history of science, Ibn Ḥazm’s innovative perspectives and contributions in logic have been overlooked or considered with an attitude of contempt. On the one hand, his work has been seen, at best, as promulgating the benefits of studying Aristotle’s logic, so that his contribution is assessed as more didactical than conceptual. And on the other hand, those who do examine his innovations often consider them to be mistaken. As indicated by Chejne (1984, p. 2) contempt towards the logical work of Ibn Ḥazm was also present in its reception by the Eastern philosophers who accused him of deviating from Aristotelian logic and of dabbling in things beyond his capability. However, a reassessment of his work on logic has since begun, by delving into the ways the thinker of Córdoba studied the links between deontic and modal qualification of propositions. In this context Lameer’s (2013) paper on the logical sources of Ibn Ḥazm is worth mentioning; the author (p. 417, footnote 1) observes that, although, strictly speaking, it was al-Fārābī who first drew the parallelism between deontic and modal concepts, it was Ibn Ḥazm who developed it and worked it out in a more precise manner. A primary aim of this paper is to help fill some of these gaps by stressing the role of the work of Ibn Ḥazm in developing a notion of deontic necessity deeply rooted in legal normativity, and in explicitly discussing the transference between deontic and modal concepts. According to our view; the basic units of Islamic deontic logic are what we might call, indulging in terminological anachronism, heteronomous imperatives. As it turns out, the heteronomy of imperatives within Islamic legal systems contrasts with those of the purely moral realm, which seem to be closer to an autonomous conception of moral law. There it concurs again with Leibniz’s proposal to define obligatory as “what is necessary for a good person to do”. In the present paper, we will focus on the heteronomous imperatives of legal systems rather than on the imperatives of the purely moral realm. In this context, the work of Ibn Ḥazm extends the parallelism between the necessity of events and that of human actions stressed by his predecessors. According to our understanding, Ibn Ḥazm’s parallelism can be rendered explicit formally by means of a conditional (or hypothetical) structure shared by both deontic and modal propositions. Moreover, this structure makes apparent that this parallelism displays an underlying system of “degrees”. Indeed, while in the domain of events, given some conditions, it makes sense to distinguish between an event that is more likely to happen than another. Ibn Ḥazm speaks of near and distant possibility (such as the higher degree of likelihood of rain, given the condensation of clouds in December, and its lower degree, when the condensation occurs in summer); and, in the domain of actions, the Islamic notion of weighting actions determines degrees of virtue (or of legal and moral value). So whereas the degree of virtue of performing a forbidden act as determined by the distribution of sanction and reward is 0, we obtain the same value by pondering the likelihood of an impossible event to take place. Furthermore, as discussed in section II.3.2, the system of values at work in the parallelism can be seen as opening the way to a more direct correspondence. Thus, while in the realm of nature, likelihood of occurrence of an event is dependent upon the conditions specific to the occurrence of that event; while, in the realm of jurisprudence, likelihood of performing an action is dependent upon the distribution of reward and sanction specific to that action (being that, given the choice to perform or not perform a given action, those that will be rewarded are more likely to be performed than those that are not). According to this perspective, the point of the parallelism is that both deontic and modal qualifications measure the degree of an action or event to become actual; that is – indulging once more in anachronism (but this time from the Leibnizian background) – the degree measures how feasible (facile) an action or event may be. This suggests that Ibn Ḥazm’s perspectives already herald the links to probability and possibility explored by Leibniz six centuries later – see for example Leibniz’s (1671, A VI, I, p. 424-26) use of probability in the context of conditional right. Nevertheless, it also shows a crucial difference to the approach developed in the Elementa Jura Naturalis: whereas Leibniz’s studies seek to define what is to be just or virtuous, the logical system of deontic imperatives within Islamic jurisprudence presupposes that what is to be virtuous has already been settled. Determining what is to be virtuous is not achieved by logical reasoning within the system of legal jurisprudence, but by delving into the higher objectives of the Sharīʿa. While developing our point, we will delve into the logical structure of the heteronomous imperatives. This distinguishes our contribution from the existing literature, such as the papers of Chejne (1984), Lameer (2014), and Guerrero (1997, 2010, 2014), which do not provide a logical analysis of the deontic concepts put into work by Ibn Ḥazm. The true antecedent to the present paper is the work of Farid Zidani (2007, 2015), who, so far as we know, was the first to undertake such a task. Some of our own developments and general epistemological thoughts go beyond Ibn Ḥazm’s framework and motivations; mainly those contained in sections II.3.2 and IV. However, according to our view, these reflections suggest that Ibn Ḥazm’s approach has the substance for a broader and deeper exploration of the logic of norms. The paper is structured as follows:I.Ibn Ḥazm’s Logic of Heteronomous Imperatives. After presenting some extracts of the relevant text, we proceed by providing a formal reconstruction of the five forms of deontic modalities. II. A Landmark in the History of the Logical Analysis of Norms. Duties and Modalities. In this section, we study the transferences from deontic to modal necessity and possibility. We briefly compare the deontic system of Islamic Jurisprudence with that of Leibniz.III. Leibniz and Hypothetical Imperatives in Law.IV. Beyond Ibn Ḥazm: Conclusions and the Work Ahead. We will conclude the paper by discussing briefly some conceptual points that distinguish the logic of heteronomous imperatives from contemporary deontic logic. Our final words will discuss deontic-modal parallelism in the context of Ibn Ḥazm’s rejection of reasoning by conjecture and what we call “the internalization of nature.”. (shrink)

As biobank research has become increasingly widespread within biomedical research, study-specific consent to each study, a model derived from research involving traditional interventions on human subjects, has for the sake of feasibility gradually given way to alternative consent models which do not require consent for every new study. Besides broad consent these models include tiered, dynamic, and meta-consent. However, critics have pointed out that it is normally not known at the time of enrolment in what ways samples deposited in (...) a biobank may be used in future research and that, for a consent to be informed, exactly this kind of knowledge is required. Therefore, there is an ongoing debate about the ethical acceptability of going for less than study-specific consent. In light of this debate we address the question of how to best protect participants against relevant risks and violations of autonomy. We apply the central aims of the informed consent process to the unique circumstances of biobank research where samples and data in many cases are stored for long periods of time and reused in subsequent studies. Thereby we are able to formulate a set of criteria focusing both on the risk of informational harm and the potential violation of participants’ values. We compare existing models of consent based on their ability to satisfy the criteria, and we find that the broad consent model offers the best level of protection for participants, although, it suffers from a few important deficiencies with regards to protection against participant value violations and long-term protection of autonomy, if it is applied without qualifications. For this reason, we propose modifications to the current broad consent model, in order to ensure that it provides protection of autonomy and participant values through strong ethical review and continuous communication. We conclude that a modified form of broad consent is ethically superior in biobank research, not only because it is most feasible but primarily because it offers the best available protection against the hazards facing research subjects in this form of research. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Aristotle on Thought and Feeling by Paula GottliebCorinne GartnerPaula Gottlieb. Aristotle on Thought and Feeling. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2021. Pp. 173. Hardback, $99.99.Paula Gottlieb's recent book is an illuminating, synoptic study of Aristotle's theory of human motivation, according to which his innovative notion of prohairesis (choice)—specifically, the virtuous agent's prohairesis—is the cornerstone. She argues against both Kantian-flavored readings, which prioritize reason's role in motivating ethical action, and (...) Humean-flavored readings, which emphasize the virtuous agent's well-habituated feelings. Gottlieb's account explains how the virtuous agent's prohairesis incorporates his or her feelings, desires, and thoughts, building in the motivational contributions of both the rational and nonrational parts of the psyche. The resulting treatment does justice to Aristotle's prima facie incongruous characterizations of prohairesis: on the one hand, it is the conclusion of deliberation, an explicitly rational process; on the other, it is an expression of character virtue.Although prohairesis is the unifying focus of the book, Gottlieb's project touches on a number of related controversies concerning Aristotle's ethics, including the process of moral habituation, the thorny phenomenon of akrasia, the relationship between contemplation and practically virtuous activity, and how to conceive of the connection between the aesthetic and ethical sides of to kalon (the fine). And it does so in a way that is attuned to ongoing scholarly debates without getting bogged down in them. Similarly, while she primarily concerns herself with the Nicomachean Ethics, Gottlieb helpfully draws upon material from other parts of the corpus—for example, she invokes, with appropriate caveats, Aristotle's discussion of feelings in the Rhetoric as well as De Anima. Lastly, some interesting subsidiary motifs animate the book, perhaps the most novel and provocative of which is the through line that connects her insightful understanding of eleos—which she translates, with helpful qualifications, as "sympathy" rather than "pity" (31)—with learning to be virtuous, as her fresh reading of Aristotle's Neoptolemus case exemplifies (98–102, 134–35). According to Gottlieb's hybridized picture of the good person's motivation, in the rational part of the soul the agent's wish is channeled via deliberation, which itself involves situation-specific information from the feelings, into the agent's prohairesis. In the nonrational part of the soul, the agent experiences a feeling that, strictly speaking, includes (a) a physiological component; (b) an impression of the circumstances, itself partly shaped by the agent's thought; and (c) a specific desire (chapter 2). The virtuous agent's nonrational desire will always correspond to—indeed, it, too, is channeled into—his or her prohairesis (79), the unified desiderative thought or thoughtful desire (NE VI.2, 1139b4–5), from which he or she then acts (chapter 4). The virtuous agent never experiences even mild psychic conflict, having a fully integrated soul whose two parts are in perfect harmony.At some points of Gottlieb's discussion, it seems as if all of these psychic components involved in the production of an action actually constitute the agent's prohairesis, while in other places it seems as though prohairesis is the discrete desiderative product. If one adopts the former conception, it is difficult to make sense of Aristotle's claim that the choice of the akratic agent, who acts on his or her errant nonrational desire, is correct. It turns out that the akratic agent's choice is correct because he or she has rightly judged what he or she should do, but it is distinct in composition from the good person's choice, since it does not [End Page 703] include his or her nonrational desire. One consequence of Gottlieb's view is thus that, as she indicates, the good person's prohairesis is sui generis. Another consequence is that, within the nonrational part of the soul, there may be physiological responses plus accompanying impressions (phantasiai) that, it seems, contain "motivational oomph" (40) but do not get channeled into desires. While her view avoids conflating the virtuous agent and the enkratic agent (who, despite acting correctly, experiences an occurrent nonrational desire to the contrary), there may be cases in which the virtuous... (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Legitimacy, Performance, and Political Realism:Response to Ben CrossJiwei Ci (bio)Ben Cross raises important issues in his article and provides a much appreciated occasion for me to join the discussion. He targets his trenchant critique at what he calls Weberian sources of legitimacy, treating my view as a distinctive variation on the Weberian account. I am not sure that the issues on which we differ are most economically framed by (...) drawing Weber so prominently into the debate. Since Cross has already framed the issues in this way, however, I think I can best contribute to the exchange by accepting his terms of reference wherever appropriate and trying to work as fruitfully as possible within them. I will respectfully not take up any of the issues raised in the fourth section of the article, because Cross's use of the notion of civic agency there is so far removed from mine as to leave little room for productive engagement.As Cross notes, Weber identifies three distinct sources of legitimacy (or three types of authority): legality, the traditional, and the charismatic. This, however, is only a typology of specific sources and an incomplete one at that, for it does not cover the two sources that I happen to find most relevant in Democracy in China.1 The teleological legitimacy much discussed in chapter 1 of my book does not come under any of Weber's ideal types and seems to constitute another, distinct ideal type. Nor is the democratic legitimacy based on popular sovereignty that is proposed in chapter 3 as an alternative to teleological legitimacy quite the same as legal authority. It is thus easy to see that—and why—I do not avail myself of what Cross calls the Weberian sources of legitimacy. As a matter of fact, I do not [End Page 149] regard Weber's tripartite classification, regardless of whether it is exhaustive, as the conceptual core of his idea of legitimacy.Cross moves closer to that core when he notes the difference between the type of motive (i.e., non-expedient) that the three Weberian sources of legitimacy are supposed to have in common and the motive of pure expediency. This difference is important because, as Weber puts it in a well-known statement quoted by Cross, "Purely material interests and calculations of advantages as the basis of solidarity between the chief and his administrative staff result, in this as in other connexions, in a relatively unstable situation." Based on Weber's concern with the lack of stability characteristic of relations of pure expediency, Cross is then able to speak of a "Weber-inspired rejection of performance legitimacy." This conclusion, if not exactly mistaken, is nevertheless reached without adequately bringing out the issues involved.Take a close look at the passage in Economy and Society from which the above quote is taken:Purely material interests and calculations of advantages as the basis of solidarity between the chief and his administrative staff result, in this as in other connexions, in a relatively unstable situation. Normally other elements, affectual and ideal, supplement such interests. In certain exceptional cases the former alone may be decisive. In everyday life these relationships, like others, are governed by custom and material calculation of advantage. But custom, personal advantage, and purely affectual or ideal motives of solidarity do not form a sufficiently reliable basis for a given domination. In addition there is normally a further element, the belief in legitimacy.2Here it becomes clear that Weber, even in emphasizing the indispensable role of belief in legitimacy, argues his case much more cautiously and subtly than Cross gives one to understand. To begin with we see Weber take the trouble to stress "purely." We then find three qualifications in a row before Weber allows himself to conclude, as an empirical observation, that "custom, personal advantage, purely affectual or ideal motives of solidarity, do not form a sufficiently reliable basis for a given domination," from which he is apparently compelled to draw the inference that "there is normally a further element, the belief in legitimacy." In an earlier section of Economy and Society Weber makes similar allowances for the empirical proximity of motives... (shrink)

To be an effective teacher, a combination of specific professional skills and psychological attributes are required. With increasingly fluid employment conditions, particularly in the international context, recruiters and schools are under considerable pressure to quickly differentiate candidates and make successful placements, which involves more than just determining if a candidate holds an appropriate qualification. Therefore, the aim of this cross-sectional study was to measure theoretically and empirically valuable psychological attributes in an international sample of schoolteachers to determine the most (...) valuable correlates of satisfaction and position duration. An international sample (N= 335) of elementary, middle and high school teachers completed an online survey to capture their workplace satisfaction, position duration and measure 15 psychological attributes using validated instruments. Linear associations were estimated using hierarchical regression with this analysis complemented and compared with follow-up non-linear neural network models. Using regression, lower agreeableness (less people-oriented) emerged as the strongest correlate of longer position duration throughout the cohort. In elementary school teachers, lower impulsivity and higher organizational commitment emerged as the strongest correlates of longer position duration. In high school teachers, better stress tolerance and higher organizational commitment emerged as the strongest correlates of longer position duration. Using neural networks to suggest predictive models, low levels of neuroticism and impulsivity were the strongest predictors of longer position duration in elementary school teachers. High stress tolerance also predicted high work satisfaction in elementary teachers, whereas it was lower impulsivity that most strongly predicted higher work satisfaction in high school teachers. Innovation tendencies, perhaps surprisingly, appeared as a consistent predictor of lower levels of workplace satisfaction across teaching levels. Honesty-humility also emerged as a predictor of shorter position duration, particularly for primary/elementary teachers scoring above the mean. Taken together the results suggest an interesting balancing act that needs to be struck between hiring people-oriented and innovative teachers who may be more effective and adaptable but also at greater risk of changing position, possibly due to an increased interest and ability to transition into new social environments. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Scientism, Certitude, and the Recovery of PoliticsChristopher Justin Brophy O.P.In Natural Law and Human Rights, Pierre Manent begins his analysis of the contemporary political situation by discussing the intractable tension between the relativism surrounding moral action and the absolutism surrounding "human rights." Later, drawing heavily from Aristotle's Politics, Manent discusses the necessity of a command-obey structure to resolve the tension such that human beings can fruitfully engage in political (...) life. These two claims, one about the tension between relativism and absolutism and the other about the command-obey structure, are closely linked. If it is true that human beings have an innate need for authority, then it is also the case that the extreme abuses of that need, as they manifest themselves in the political realm, will be either wholesale embrace of such authority (absolutism) or wholesale rejection (relativism). We should be clear that the authority Manent discusses is not arbitrary or autocratic exercise of power, but a legitimate authority towards which citizens can offer rational assent. But any human need or desire can be abused and knowledge of the abuses is necessary to understand the proper object.It is the contention of this piece that Manent, in his explication of command-obey, wrote better than he knew. Manent authored his text before the COVID-19 pandemic. Yet, his analysis provides some of the best explanatory power for understanding the politics surrounding COVID. This politics has significance that transcends the particular crisis of the pandemic and merits serious attention. Specifically, Manent's analysis of the human need for a command-obey structure both offers an explanation for the concurrent tension between relativism and absolutism, at least as it pertains to the relationship between science and politics, and gives explanatory [End Page 239] power for the rise of scientism in contemporary society. The widespread conception that the natural sciences have the potential to answer questions that reside out of their proper purviews leads to abuses of authority in both directions, by both sides—the political left and political right. I will flesh out my argument first by showing the usefulness of Manent's analysis for explaining how easily so many in the United States fall prey to a false conception of "science" that undermines a healthy politics and reveals, at root, a dangerous aversion to ambiguity. I will then explain the implications of the elevation of scientism for the relationship between politics and Christianity. I will conclude with some reflections on the common good and the future of politics in the United States given Manent's important observations. I anticipate that a common criticism of Manent's book will be that it lacks clear prescriptions for the political problems that ail us. I will argue that clear prescriptions cannot follow from the logic of Manent's argument, and ultimately that the lack of prescription is one of the strengths of the book.Before I begin, I wish to make two qualifications. First, Manent's argument ultimately is about the (un)tenability of liberalism without some common conception of the good. He treats several moral and political problems in his book that fall outside of the scope of this short paper. I am not attempting in the analysis that follows to reduce the moral scope of Manent's claims or even to take up the mantle of his argument. I simply wish to show how his analysis is helpful in explaining a contemporary political problem and how the implications of this analysis should affect the way Christians think about political practice in the United States. Second, I want to make clear at the outset that I positively wish to avoid a discussion about the various policies enacted as responses to COVID-19. I also want to avoid any cavalier political discussion of COVID that does not sufficiently respect the over one million persons (given the latest CDC tally) who have lost their lives in this country and the hardships that many more have endured due to the pandemic. It is essential for our purposes here though to treat the political significance of the pandemic. I will attempt to do that now.The Appeal of ScientismNumerous thinkers... (shrink)

The pseudonymous works Kierkegaard wrote during the period 1843–46 have been responsible for establishing his reputation as an important philosophical thinker, but for Kierkegaard himself, they were merely preparatory for what he saw as the primary task of his authorship: to elucidate the meaning of what it is to live as a Christian and thus to show his readers how they could become truly Christian. The more overtly religious and specifically Christian works Kierkegaard produced in the period 1847–51 were devoted (...) to this task. In this book Sylvia Walsh focuses on the writings of this later period and locates the key to Kierkegaard’s understanding of Christianity in the “inverse dialectic” that is involved in “living Christianly.” In the book’s four main chapters, Walsh examines in detail how this inverse dialectic operates in the complementary relationship of the negative qualifications of Christian existence—sin, the possibility of offense, self-denial, and suffering—to the positive qualifications—faith, forgiveness, new life/love/hope, and joy and consolation. It was Kierkegaard’s aim, she argues, “to bring the negative qualifications, which he believed had been virtually eliminated in Christendom, once again into view, to provide them with conceptual clarity, and to show their essential relation to, and necessity in, securing a correct understanding and expression of the positive qualifications of Christian existence.”. (shrink)

Biesta distinguishes three functions of education: qualification, socialization and subjectification. We focus on subjectification. When first addressing this concept, Biesta referred to action as defined by Arendt, thereby stressing the importance of ‘the question of freedom’. More recently, the question of freedom is replaced by ‘the question of responsibility’. For Levinas responsibility is related to irreplaceability. While the concept of responsibility is valuable, we question the call upon irreplaceability in education. Actively taking responsibility where irreplaceability might not be either present (...) or felt should be central to education. Unlike the morally clear examples invoked by Biesta, complex societal issues like the climate and refugee crisis are not accessible as an immediate appeal to a specific subject. Therefore, we propose a return to Arendt and her concept of action. Action allows and requires students to create the world anew, to take a position without pretending that the outcome can be controlled. Biesta refers to this as the impossibility of education. However, rather than repeating the theme of impossibility, we focus on the possibilities of education: there are several ways to create the world anew. (shrink)

Ewa Domańska, Professor at the Adam Mickiewicz University in Poznań (Poland) and Stanford University (USA), historian of historiography and methodologist of history, formulated interesting comments about the state of humanities and social sciences. The development of interdisciplinary research causes the interpenetration of different disciplines. Although this kind of research is promising, inspiring as well as influencing the development of science, careless research may cause some threats in the longer term. According to Domańska, the lack of qualifications and reliability in (...) this area (especially in the area of theory and methodology) undermines the authonomy of the main disciplines and decline in the professionalism of research. This led the author to create the project, which aims to defend the independence of the threatened disciplines as well as their ‘re-professionalisation’. It can be achieved by strongly emphasizing the role of theory in science; a strong embeddement of a discipline in the theory. Domańska’s concept can be a recipe, which is a dichotomic project. Firstly, it supposes a ‘practical methodology’, which is a constructing of the theory thanks to empirical research material. Secondly, it supposes a ‘virtue epistemology’, which is the ethical aspect of the researcher’s attitude and his work. The aim of the paper is to discuss Domańska’s project and underline the originality of her concept in the context of economic and social sciences. The economic history is a specific discipline which develops at the crossroad of history and economics. It lets me put forward the thesis that Domańska’s suggestions are relevant to the research of economic history. I will show what cognitive chances are the result of the ontology of economic history. I will question what the possible threats are for the main disciplines (history and economics) as a result of the lack of professionalism in the interdisciplinary research of the economic past, and ask if Domańska’s project is attractive for the economic history research thanks to the strong setting in the ‘practical methodology’ in the theory. I also ask what the role of new theoretical approaches in that area is, and whether it is possible to formulate innovatory conceptions in the economic history. Finally, I question the role of ‘virtue epistemology’ or the ethical aspect of an economic historian’s work. (shrink)

In a healthcare setting, a multitude of ethical and moral challenges are often present when patients and families direct uncivil behavior toward clinicians and staff. These negative interactions may elicit strong social and emotional reactions among staff, other patients, and visitors; and they may impede the normal functioning of an institution. Ethics Committees and Clinical Ethics Consultation Services (CECSs) can meaningfully contribute to organizational efforts to effectively manage incivility through two distinct, yet inter-related channels. First, given their responsibility to promote (...) a humane, respectful, and professional climate, many CECSs and Ethics Committees may assist institutional leadership in evaluating and monitoring incivility policies and procedures. Second, when confronted with individual incidents of patient/family incivility, Ethics Consultants can and often do work with all stakeholders to address and mitigate potentially deleterious impacts. This manuscript presents an overview of the multifaceted ethical implications of incivility in the healthcare environment, discusses the inherent qualifications of Ethics Consultants for assisting in the management of incivility, and proposes specific mitigating actions within the purview of CECSs and Ethics Committees. We also invite healthcare organizations to harness the skills and reputation of their CECSs and Ethics Committees in confronting incivility through comprehensive policies, procedures, and training. (shrink)

This paper is an evaluation and expansion of William Hasker’s transcendental argument against determinism. Hasker’s argument attempts to show that determinism is logically incompatible with rationality and justified belief. Hasker claims this argument to be conclusive given two independent qualifications: first that the argument only applies to a specific form of determinism, and second that the argument rests on a specific conception of rationality. My aim in this paper will be to modify and expand Hasker’s argument such (...) that it (1) applies to the more general deterministic thesis (as defined below), and (2), rests on a modified epistemic conception of rationally unaffirmable beliefs. I will attempt to do (2) by modeling Hasker’s argument after one of Alvin Plantinga’s epistemological arguments against naturalism, and hope to show that such an argumentative model is superior for the conclusion Hasker wishes to bring out. I will begin by explicating Hasker’s argument, and then I will move to the modification and expansion of the argument. (shrink)

Focusing on one of the most studied dimensions of Social Psychology, i.e., intergroup relations, this study analyzes its discursive accomplishment in a specific group-based intervention, i.e., the talk and work of an Italian group home, i.e., a small alternative care facility hosting a group of out-of-home children. Particularly, we focused on the fictionally called “Nuns’ Home,” a group home previously investigated for its ethnocentric bias, and its intergroup relations with “inside” and “outside” groups, such as schools, biological families, and (...) social services. By combining a qualitative and quantitative approach in analyzing one audio-recorded ethnographic interview with the whole team of professionals, we aimed at accounting for the multitude of internal and external stakeholders that participants refer to, analyzing the discursive accomplishment of ingroup and outgroup in talk-in-interaction and investigating ingroup bias and group qualification. To do so, we detected social categorization markers and qualifying devices that participants rely on when referring to groups. Results show that, among the numerous groups recognized, participants co-construct intergroup relations and ingroup bias implying negative assessment over external groups. Being different from traditional laboratory studies illustrating substantial contraposition between ingroup and outgroup, our qualitative analysis reveals the multitude of groups by which the ingroup is formed and their internal fragmentation. To conclude, we discussed the implications of qualitatively studying intergroup relations in group homes and indicated future lines of research. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Black Health: The Social, Political, and Cultural Determinants of Black People's Health by Keisha RayChioma Dibia (bio)Black Health: The Social, Political, and Cultural Determinants of Black People's Health by Keisha Ray New York: Oxford University Press, 2023Prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, bioethics had engaged only sparingly with the concept of racism. In 2016, Danis and colleagues published an article exhorting bioethicists to engage more meaningfully with the concept (...) of racism—given its impact on health and well being—and to consider strategies for combating it within and outside clinical settings (Danis et al. 2016, 5). While this paper generated considerable debate regarding how far bioethics ought to go in its engagement with racism (Baker 2016, 16; Weddle 2016, 32; Fuller 2016, 29), the focus of the field of bioethics quickly turned to more traditional subjects of bioethical inquiry, including ethical issues arising in doctor-patient relationships and new reproductive technologies. However, since the COVID-19 pandemic and the murder of George Floyd during that time, racism has received greater attention in the bioethics literature and Keisha Ray's Black Health arrives just in time to urge us to ensure that the current focus on the impact of racism on the health of racially minoritized people is not short-lived (Ray 2023, 21; BBC News 2020).The overarching argument in Ray's Black Health is that Black people's poor health does not arise from innate biological deficiencies but stems from their experience of racism at the structural, institutional, and interpersonal levels. Ray stresses that far from being solely a feature of America's past, racism [End Page 105] continues to taint Black people's relationship with the healthcare system and other societal institutions. In each chapter, Ray focuses on a specific racial disparity in health to illustrate how racism limits Black people's access to the social determinants of health and thereby contributes to their poor health. To set the context for this discussion, Ray provides an introductory chapter where she unpacks key terms including "racism," "racial disparities," and "the social determinants of health." In this chapter, Ray also clearly outlines the structure of the text and provides a summary of each chapter. This chapter provides the blueprint for the rest of the book, as in it, Ray provides a clear statement of the style, content, and purpose of Black Health.The first racial disparity that Ray considers is Black birthing mortality, and in chapter 1, Ray traces this to the history of slavery and eugenic policies which have shaped the relationship between physicians and Black women. As Ray explains, since Black people were forcibly brought to the United States, the government has sought to control Black women's reproductive lives and has often relied on physicians to effect control. She demonstrates how harmful stereotypes about Black women, including their so-called hardiness, originated in medical literature and have been used to deny pregnant Black women humane care. According to Ray, "[c]linicians' attitude and behaviors towards Black pregnant people still reflect an enslaved and slave-owner mentality, and this has great consequences for the survival of Black pregnant people." (32) By highlighting the birthing experiences of Serena Williams and Shalon Irving, Ray dispels the assumption that wealth or academic qualifications are a panacea for Black birthing mortality and shows how racism can be deadly for all Black pregnant women, irrespective of socioeconomic status. Ray also considers how income and housing inequities affect Black pregnant women and the cumulative effect of weathering on their health as well as that of their unborn children. This chapter most clearly shows how interpersonal, institutional, and structural racism operate and intersect to render pregnancy and childbirth a potentially dangerous experience for Black women.Next, Ray turns to racial disparities in clinical pain management and continues to explore the impact of historically racist beliefs and false stereotypes on the care of Black people. However, in this second chapter, Ray delves more deeply into the role of medical literature—both historical and contemporary sources—in perpetuating false assumptions about the Black body. She demonstrates how the historical portrayal of the Black body as not only less than human... (shrink)

Foucault characterizes ethics as “the reflexive practice of freedom”. He does not have the ambitions of the usual moral philosopher. Foucault develops a robust conceptual apparatus appropriate to the ethical domain, but he does not seek an exhaustive stipulation of its invariant features. Instead, he explores and elucidates the problematics of the reflexive practice of freedom that genealogically connect an extended family of ethical systems. His exploration is increasingly confined within the boundaries of what the author identifies as an analytical (...) triangle that connects self‐care, the governance of others, and parrhesia. The triangle coalesces first in the third volume of The History of Sexuality and specifically in Foucault's treatment of gnothi seauton – the Pythian imperative to “know thyself.” It is the most effective frame through which to assess both the content and the limits of what with qualification can be cast as Foucault's ontology and epistemology of ethics. (shrink)

The article presents the results of a study aimed at forming a general model of sprinter strength training, taking into account modern trends and scientific achievements, presented in the form of technology and combined techniques aimed at developing the physical quality under study. The general model was based on an approach based on the concentration of a given focus at specific stages of sports training, which determined the requirements for the distribution of the volume of training load while maintaining (...) the optimal integration into a holistic system that takes into account the qualifications of athletes. According to the results of the pedagogical experiment analysis, interpretation, and statistical processing of the obtained data, it was concluded about the importance of strength training sprinters in the system of sports training of athletes specializing in short distances, as well as the positive impact of the structural-functional model of strength training, which indicates the possibility of its application in modern practice, the coaches. (shrink)

The pseudonymous works Kierkegaard wrote during the period 1843–46 have been responsible for establishing his reputation as an important philosophical thinker, but for Kierkegaard himself, they were merely preparatory for what he saw as the primary task of his authorship: to elucidate the meaning of what it is to live as a Christian and thus to show his readers how they could become truly Christian. The more overtly religious and specifically Christian works Kierkegaard produced in the period 1847–51 were devoted (...) to this task. In this book Sylvia Walsh focuses on the writings of this later period and locates the key to Kierkegaard’s understanding of Christianity in the “inverse dialectic” that is involved in “living Christianly.” In the book’s four main chapters, Walsh examines in detail how this inverse dialectic operates in the complementary relationship of the negative qualifications of Christian existence—sin, the possibility of offense, self-denial, and suffering—to the positive qualifications—faith, forgiveness, new life/love/hope, and joy and consolation. It was Kierkegaard’s aim, she argues, “to bring the negative qualifications, which he believed had been virtually eliminated in Christendom, once again into view, to provide them with conceptual clarity, and to show their essential relation to, and necessity in, securing a correct understanding and expression of the positive qualifications of Christian existence.”. (shrink)

This article examines interpreters’ embodied displays of trouble in hospital encounters in Norway. In these meetings, participants speak different languages, and the interpreters, that is multilinguals with interpreter education and other formal qualifications, produce utterances in either of the languages in question. As such, the specific interaction in which these embodied displays of trouble occur is mediated in two ways, it is both interpreter-mediated and video-mediated. Video-recordings of hospital settings where the interpreting is carried out through use of (...) video-technology are analyzed using multimodal conversation analysis. The interpreters’ embodied displays of trouble are found resemble recruitmens and are found to initiate repair. The article shows that while the embodied display of trouble might be a versatile device to initiate repair within the video-mediated environment, the video-mediated environment provides a complex interactional space for the perception of the embodied action. (shrink)

Clinical neuropsychologists have been working in Germany since the 1980s, and specific training in the discipline has been available since 1993. The qualification currently requires 3 years of practical training, 400 h of theoretical learning, 100 h of supervision, five reports on patients and an oral examination. After its completion, neuropsychologists can work as employees in clinical settings. For a substantial period of time, neuropsychologists working in their own practices faced complex challenges in working with outpatients, whose health insurers (...) did not cover the cost of this treatment. State approval of neuropsychological diagnostic procedures and therapy was achieved in 2011, on the basis of evidence showing the method’s high effectiveness; statutory health insurers therefore now pay out for delivery of these services on an outpatient basis, too. In Germany, neuropsychologists work in all areas of the diagnosis of functional disorders, with children, adolescents, adults and older adults, and carry out treatment. Clinical neuropsychologists provide patients with individualized tools for managing their brain damage, supply exercises and tasks for them to undertake at home, and give input on administrative matters, such as determining the degree of a patient’s disability. Treatment takes place in close collaboration with members of related professions, such as physiotherapists, occupational therapists and speech therapists. Neuropsychologists also work as assessors, investigating, for example, the extent of a patient’s ability to work after sustaining CNS damage or the need for medical retirement. The earnings of clinical neuropsychologists vary widely, currently averaging between €3,000 and €4,000 gross per month for employed neuropsychologists; self-employed neuropsychologists in their own practices can currently bill statutory health insurers for around €100.00 per hour. Despite the generally good working conditions in this discipline, Germany is suffering from a shortage of clinical neuropsychologists. An approximate total of 800 psychologists have completed training in this field, while around 50,000 patients could benefit from neuropsychological treatment every year. (shrink)

This article sets out to describe and solve two puzzles that emerge in segregated labour markets (e.g. the USA or Sweden). First, in many hiring contexts people profess to adhere to egalitarian norms, and specifically to a qualification norm according to which job qualification should be the basis of employment. Still there is evidence of frequent norm violations (discrimination). Surprisingly, the norm persists and people do not frequently protest against such norm violations. The second puzzle is that people are suspicious (...) of the hiring of minorities, perceiving such hirings as evidence that a ‘political correctness’ norm has replaced the qualification norm. The article proposes that both puzzles can be solved within a game-theoretical model of social norm-following, where implicit bias is introduced into an ‘employment game’. Within this model, implicit bias plays a double role. First, it interferes with employers' hiring decisions regarding ethnic majority and minority members, respectively. This is the standard way of understanding the effects of implicit bias. Second, implicit bias interferes with bystander evaluations of hired candidates' qualifications. This is a hitherto overlooked effect of implicit bias. The article concludes that once we understand the double role of implicit bias, the two puzzles are resolved. (shrink)

This article explores how legal treatises (rasāʾil) were essential sites for the development and expansion of Islamic legal schools’ (madhāhib) positions. The rasāʾil, along with legal dicta (fatāwā)—besides legal commentaries (shurūḥ) and manuals (mutūn)—were among the prime loci where jurists contended with rapid social, political, and economic changes. Although these legal treatises were written to address specific sociolegal issues, I argue that the treatise—as a separate genre—provided a creative space for jurists to reaffirm, restate, or advance a new opinion (...) in the school. These legal treatises were carefully considered and extensively referenced in the authoritative works of the school for their updated legal positions, practical utility for judges in courts, and relevance for official policy purposes. To demonstrate this dynamic, I present a close reading of two legal treatises by Maḥmūd Efendī al-Ḥamzāwī (d. 1887), a key Ḥanafī authority and judge, and the muftī of Damascus (1867–1887). The first covers the issue of criminal law procedures in Islamic/Ottoman courts and the second addresses the topic of hunting with rifles. Both treatises expanded the legal positions of the Ḥanafī school by incorporating new justifications, qualifications, and information. They offer an essential perspective on the status of this genre of legal writing through an exposition of a range of emerging issues in the late nineteenth century. (shrink)