Since the inception of recorded music there has been a need for standards and reliability across sound formats and listening environments. The role of the audio mastering engineer is prestigious and akin to a craft expert combining scientific knowledge, musical learning, manual precision and skill, and an awareness of cultural fashions and creative labour. With the advent of algorithms, big data and machine learning, loosely termed artificial intelligence in this creative sector, there is now the possibility of automating human audio (...) mastering processes and radically disrupting mastering careers. The emergence of dedicated products and services in artificial intelligence-driven audio mastering poses profound questions for the future of the music industry, already having faced significant challenges due to the digitalization of music over the past decades. The research reports on qualitative and ethnographic inquiry with audio mastering engineers on the automation of their expertise and the potential for artificial intelligence to augment or replace aspects of their workflows. Investigating audio mastering engineers' awareness of artificial intelligence, the research probes the importance of criticality in their labour. The research identifies intuitive performance and critical listening as areas where human ingenuity and communication pose problems for simulation. Affective labour disrupts speculation of algorithmic domination by highlighting the pragmatic strategies available for humans to adapt and augment digital technologies. (shrink)

Crutchfield and Redinger argue that consciousness-altering chemical restraints are less “liberty-intrusive” (or as we will sometimes put it, just less “intrusive”) than physical restraints. Physica...

Widespread tax evasion and avoidance have recently led to both significant reforms of international tax governance and increased attention from theorists of global tax justice. Against the background of an analysis of the double challenge of effectiveness and distribution facing the taxation of multinational enterprises, this paper puts forward a taxonomy of recent contributions of the tax justice literature. This taxonomy not only opens up an original angle of interpretation on global tax justice, but also provides a vantage point from (...) which to evaluate recent reforms by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development. (shrink)

Many formerly incarcerated people have civil legal needs that can imperil their successful re-entry to society and, consequently, their health. We categorize these needs and assess their association with cardiovascular disease risk factors in a sample of recently released people. We find that having legal needs related to debt, public benefits, housing, or healthcare access is associated with psychosocial stress, but not uncontrolled high blood pressure or high cholesterol, in the first three months after release.

Industrial emissions of greenhouse gases are significant contributors to climate change, which poses a grave threat to social and economic systems. Our understanding of what might drive firms to reduce their emissions of these gases, however, is incomplete, and it is not clear that the knowledge gained from other environmental issues will readily apply to these emissions. We argue and find that indicators of environmental injustice previously shown to relate to toxic pollutants, for example, are poor predictors of greenhouse gas (...) emissions. Instead, we show that the degree of belief in and concern about climate change in a local community is a significant predictor of the facility’s rate of emission improvements. Furthermore, we find that beliefs at both the facility and headquarter communities influence emission reduction, and that those effects are substitutes for each other. (shrink)

Since the 19th century, innocence has been a hallmark of childhood. The innocence of children is seen as both a sanctity worth defending and a feature that excuses the unavoidable mistakes of adolescence. While beneficial in many settings, notions of childhood innocence are often entangled with values judgements. Inherent in innocence is the notion that that which we are innocent of is undesirable. Further, attributing innocence to some implies the tolerability of blame for others. This has unique implications in a (...) medical setting. This essay explores the implications of espousing the innocence of paediatric patients. Ultimately, because attribution of innocence is both prone to bias and rooted in the same framework as blame, it degrades patient-centred care and compromises the patient–provider relationship. I argue that avoiding such characterisations may allow providers to more effectively promote paediatric health. (shrink)

This article describes the development, implementation, and evaluation of a complex methotrexate ethics case used in teaching a Pharmacy Law and Ethics course. Qualitative analysis of student reflective writings provided useful insight into the students’ experience and comfort level with the final ethics case in the course. These data demonstrate a greater student appreciation of different perspectives, the potential for conflict in communicating about such cases, and the importance of patient autonomy. Faculty lessons learned are also described, facilitating adoption of (...) this methotrexate ethics case by other healthcare profession educators. (shrink)

David Hilbert sought to secure the epistemic foundations of mathematics by providing consistency proofs of axiomatized mathematical theories from within the finite standpoint. This standpoint requires concrete constructions without reference to completed infinities. In 1938, Gerhardt Gentzen proved the consistency of first-order Peano Arithmetic relying on the well-ordering of certain ordinal notations. This was thought by Gentzen and Paul Bernays to be finitistically acceptable. However, a finitistically acceptable proof of the relevant well-ordering was not available until Gaisi Takeuti’s proof in (...) 1978. Beginning with the proposition that Takeuti’s proof conforms to the finite standpoint, this chapter explores the limits of a finitism based on the methods of Gentzen and Takeuti. It is argued that the upper limit is the Feferman-Schütte ordinal, and thus that finitism may be extended to strong subsystems of second-order arithmetic-systems strong enough to provide a theory of the ordinals for which Gentzen employed notations. (shrink)

Abstract:This essay explores key values of John Lachs's work, especially freedom, diversity, and human flourishing, when applied to the history of the philosophy of education as well as to the practical problems of policy and implementation today in American schools. I consider the importance and tensions involved in these values in the thinking of Plato, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, and John Dewey. Next, I examine necessary and then avoidable challenges of operationalizing freedom and diversity in schools, especially in tensions with recent policy (...) initiatives that threaten freedom and diversity for human flourishing. The aim here is to note the central importance of the values that Lachs has long championed, while attending also to the risks and dangers that misunderstanding and narrow thinking pose about them when applied to American public schools. Ultimately, I argue that while advocacy for liberty sometimes raises profound problems in the sphere of public education, democratic education is enriched immeasurably when it enables and empowers freedom to pursue diverse forms of flourishing. (shrink)

The essays in this book began as a contributions to a Summer Workshop arranged by the Calgary Institute for the Humanities, and haled at the University of Calgary from July 7 to 14, 1978. The Institute, which was founded by the University in 1976 for the encouragement of humanistic studies, has held such conferences each summer as a part of its programme of research.

Der Gedanke, der sich in der modernen Idee der Autonomie verdichtet, ist ein doppelter: Die Figur der Autonomie enthält zugleich eine neue Auffassung von Normativität und eine eigene Konzeption von Freiheit. Dem Gedanken der Autonomie zufolge ist ein Gesetz, das wahrhaft normativ ist, eines, als dessen Urheber wir uns selbst betrachten können; und eine Freiheit, die im vollen Sinne wirklich ist, drückt sich in Gestalt eben solcher selbstgegebener Gesetze aus. Die Idee der Autonomie artikuliert so die Einsicht, dass man Freiheit (...) und Gesetz nicht durch ihre Entgegensetzung bestimmen kann, sondern durcheinander erläutern muss. Wirkliche Freiheit ist nicht Freiheit von Gesetzen, sondern Freiheit in Gesetzen; verbindliche Normen sind nicht das, was Freiheit äußerlich beschränkt, sondern das, was Freiheit innerlich verwirklicht. Die Idee der Autonomie, die für die moderne praktische Philosophie seit Rousseau und Kant grundlegend ist, zielt so darauf, Freiheit und Verbindlichkeit in einem Zuge zu artikulieren: durch die Form selbstgegebener Gesetze. Mit Beiträgen von Robert Brandom, Judith Butler, Thomas Khurana, Christoph Menke, Terry Pinkard und Sebastian Rödl. (shrink)

Today there is a thriving 'emotions industry' to which philosophers, psychologists and neuroscientists are contributing. Yet until two centuries ago 'the emotions' did not exist. In this path-breaking study Thomas Dixon shows how, during the nineteenth century, the emotions came into being as a distinct psychological category, replacing existing categories such as appetites, passions, sentiments and affections. By examining medieval and eighteenth-century theological psychologies and placing Charles Darwin and William James within a broader and more complex nineteenth-century setting, (...) class='Hi'>Thomas Dixon argues that this domination by one single descriptive category is not healthy. Overinclusivity of 'the emotions' hampers attempts to argue with any subtlety about the enormous range of mental states and stances of which humans are capable. This book is an important contribution to the debate about emotion and rationality which has preoccupied western thinkers throughout the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries and has implications for contemporary debates. (shrink)

This edited collection includes contributions from expert philosophers of law and considers the work of one of the most important legal philosophers of our time, Professor Gerald J Postema. The chapters dig deep into important camps of Postema's rich theoretical project including: - the value of the rule of law; - the ideal of integrity in adjudication; - his works on analogical reasoning; - the methodology of jurisprudence; - dialogues with Ronald Dworkin, Joseph Raz, Frederick Schauer and HLA Hart. It (...) includes an original article by Professor Postema, in which he develops his conception of the rule of law and replies to some objections to previous works, and an interview in which he provides a fascinating and unique insight into his philosophy of law. (shrink)

Our minds have physical effects. This happens, for instance, when we move our bodies when we act. How is this possible? Thomas Kroedel defends an account of mental causation in terms of difference-making: if our minds had been different, the physical world would have been different; therefore, the mind causes events in the physical world. His account not only explains how the mind has physical effects at all, but solves the exclusion problem - the problem of how those effects (...) can have both mental and physical causes. It is also unprecedented in scope, because it is available to dualists about the mind as well as physicalists, drawing on traditional views of causation as well as on the latest developments in the field of causal modelling. It will be of interest to a range of readers in philosophy of mind and philosophy of science. This book is also available as Open Access. (shrink)

When do people say that they are moved, and does this experience constitute a unique emotion? We review theory and empirical research on being moved across psychology and philosophy. We examine feeling labels, elicitors, valence, bodily sensations, and motivations. We find that the English lexeme being moved typically (but not always) refers to a distinct and potent emotion that results in social bonding; often includes tears, piloerection, chills, or a warm feeling in the chest; and is often described as pleasurable, (...) though sometimes as a mixed emotion. While we conclude that it is a distinct emotion, we also recommend studying it in a more comprehensive emotion framework, instead of using the ambiguous vernacular term being moved as a scientific term. (shrink)

Thomas Alexander shows that the primary, guiding concern of Dewey's philosophy is his theory of aesthetic experience.

Codes of ethics exist in many, if not the majority, of all large U.S. companies today. But how the impact of these written codes affect managerial attitudes and behavior is still not clearly documented or explained. This study takes a step in that direction by proposing that attention should shift from the codes themselves as the sources of ethical behavior to the persons whose behavior is the focus of these codes. In particular, this study investigates the role of code familiarity (...) as a factor impacting the influence of an ethics code on manager behavior. Data collected from 286 executives from companies in the direct selling industry are used to test hypotheses (1) that the perceived usefulness of ethics codes is positively related to the degree of familiarity with the code, and (2) that ethical climate as assessed by managers is positively related to the code''s perceived usefulness. Both hypotheses are supported, and their implications and further research directions are discussed. (shrink)

The rhetoric of Principia Ethica, as of not a few philosophy books, is that of the clean break. Moore claims that the vast majority of previous writing on ethics has been misguided and that an entirely new start is needed. In its time, however, the book’s claims to novelty were widely disputed. Reviews in Mind, Ethics, and The Journal of Philosophy applauded the clarity of Moore’s criticisms of Mill, Spencer, and others, but said they were “not altogether original,” had for (...) the most part “already been brought out by other critics,” and were even “the standard criticisms.”1 To the Mind reviewer, “The book indicates throughout how strongly the author has been affected by Sidgwick’s views.”2 Hastings Rashdall rejected as historically inaccurate Moore’s claim that only Sidgwick before him had recognized that “good” is indefinable: “To say nothing of writers who (like Mr. Moore and myself) learned the doctrine largely from Sidgwick, I should contend that it was taught with sufficient distinctness by Plato ..., Aristotle, and a host of other writers who have studied in their school.”3 Rashdall also described Moore’s principle of organic unities as just “a new and striking way of stating a very old truth.”4 Some recent commentators have taken a similar line. Bernard Williams has said that much of Principia Ethica comes from Sidgwick,5 while Thomas Baldwin, discussing the book’s substantive values, has said the principle of organic unities “was expressly stated by Bradley,” while “McTaggart had for some years extolled the value of love, and the value of art is a central theme of romanticism.”. (shrink)

Der Gedanke, der sich in der modernen Idee der Autonomie verdichtet, ist ein doppelter: Die Figur der Autonomie enthält zugleich eine neue Auffassung von Normativität und eine eigene Konzeption von Freiheit. Dem Gedanken der Autonomie zufolge ist ein Gesetz, das wahrhaft normativ ist, eines, als dessen Urheber wir uns selbst betrachten können; und eine Freiheit, die im vollen Sinne wirklich ist, drückt sich in Gestalt eben solcher selbstgegebener Gesetze aus. Die Idee der Autonomie artikuliert so die Einsicht, dass man Freiheit (...) und Gesetz nicht durch ihre Entgegensetzung bestimmen kann, sondern durcheinander erläutern muss. Wirkliche Freiheit ist nicht Freiheit von Gesetzen, sondern Freiheit in Gesetzen; verbindliche Normen sind nicht das, was Freiheit äußerlich beschränkt, sondern das, was Freiheit innerlich verwirklicht. Die Idee der Autonomie, die für die moderne praktische Philosophie seit Rousseau und Kant grundlegend ist, zielt so darauf, Freiheit und Verbindlichkeit in einem Zuge zu artikulieren: durch die Form selbstgegebener Gesetze. -/- Mit Beiträgen von Robert Brandom, Judith Butler, Thomas Khurana, Christoph Menke, Terry Pinkard und Sebastian Rödl. (shrink)

Der Begriff der Regierung, den Foucault vor allem in den weitgehend unveroffentlichten Vorlesungen der Jahre 1978 und 1979 am College de France entwickelt hat, liefert den Schlussel zum Verstandnis seines Spatwerks. NIcht mehr Recht und Krieg, sondern Fuhrung und Hegemonie bilden die zentralen Bezugspunkte. FOucault vertritt die These, daSS die "Genealogie des modernen Staates" und die "Genealogie des modernen Subjekts" zusammengehoren. FOucaults Analyse der modernen Gouvernementmentalitat darf gerade heute Aktualitat beanspruchen. ANhand des liberalen Denkens zeigt er, wie die Selbstregulationsfahigkeit von (...) Individuen und Gruppen mit okonomischer Profitmaximierung und gesellschaftspolitischen Zielen verknupft werden. DAmit kann er die Beziehungen zwischen "Bio-Politik" und Rassismus, Freiheit und Sicherheit, dem Abbau sozialstaatlicher Leistungen und dem zunehmenden Appell an "Eigenverantwortung" und "Selbstsorge" aufzeigen. Der Neoliberalismus ist demnach eine Rationalitat, die nicht nur eine neue Form des Sozialen "erfindet", sondern auch eine neue Subjektivitat. IN ihr sind wirtschaftlicher Wohlstand und personliches Wohlsein miteinander gekoppelt, wobei nicht nur der individuelle Korper, sondern auch der Staat als politischer Korper "schlank" und "fit" sein muSS. THomas Lemkes Studie, die auf umfangreichen Recherchen und bislang unbekanntem Archivmaterial basiert, betritt Neuland in der Foucault-Rezeption. DAruber hinaus enthalt sie die umfassendste Bibliographie der politisch und sozialwissenschaftlich relevanten Arbeiten Foucaults und eine Vielzahl von deutschen Erstubersetzungen seiner Texte. SIe zeigt aber auch, wie von SchulerInnen und KollegInnen Foucaults die "Regierungs"-.PErspektive aufgenommen wurde und sich in Forschungsarbeiten konkretisieren. SIe bietet nicht nur eine Interpretation, sondern wird selbst zum Werkzeug fur eine Kritik der politischen Vernunft. (shrink)

The fourteenth-century thinker Thomas Bradwardine is well known in both the history of science and the history of theology. The first of the Merton Calculators (mathematical physicists) and passionate defender of the Augustinian doctrine of salvation through grace alone, he was briefly archbishop of Canterbury before succumbing to the Black Death in 1349. This new edition of his Insolubilia, made from all thirteen known manuscripts, shows that he was also a logician of the first rank. The edition is accompanied (...) by a full English translation. In the treatise, Bradwardine considers and rejects the theories of his contemporaries about the logical puzzles known as 'insolubles,' and sets out his own solution at length and in detail. In a substantial introduction, Stephen Read describes Bradwardine's analysis, compares it with other more recent theories, and places it in its historical context. The text is accompanied by three appendices, the first of which is an extra chapter found in two manuscripts (and partly in a third) that appears to contain further thoughts by Bradwardine himself. The second contains an extract from Ralph Strode's Insolubilia, composed in the 1360s, repeating and enlarging on Bradwardine's text; and the third consists of an anonymous text that applies Bradwardine's solution to a succession of different insolubles"--P. [4] of cover. (shrink)

"We must turn to the Euthydemus if we are to understand both Plato's earlier and his more mature work. Thomas Chance's book is an indispensible tool for penetrating to the sources of Plato's thinking on the nature of philosophy. This is the most impressive treatment of the dialogue so far available to scholars, and the interpretations offered will surely be the starting point for all future discussions."--G. B. Kerferd, Emeritus, University of Manchester "A sensitive and well-informed study of an (...) important and much neglected dialogue."--R. E. Allen, Northwestern University "A sensitive and well-informed study of an important and much neglected dialogue."--R. E. Allen "Chance's book [will be] an indispensable tool for penetrating to the sources of Plato's thinking.... The interpretations offered will surely be the starting point for all future discussions."--George Kerferd. (shrink)

Rhetoric is widely regarded by both its detractors and advocates as a kind of antithesis to reason. In this book Thomas B. Farrell restores rhetoric as an art of practical reason and enlightened civic participation, grounding it in its classical tradition—particularly in the rhetoric of Aristotle. And, because prevailing modernist world views bear principal responsibility for the disparagement of rhetorical tradition, Farrell also offers a critique of the dominant currents of modern humanist thought. Farrell argues that rhetoric is not (...) antithetical to reason but is a manner of posing and answering questions that is distinct from the approaches of analytic and dialectical reason. He develops this position in a number of ways: through a series of bold reinterpretations of Aristotle's _Rhetoric_; through a detailed appraisal of traditional rhetorical concepts as seen in modern texts from the Army-McCarthy hearings to Edward Kennedy's memorial for his brother, Mario Cuomo's address on abortion, Betty Friedan's _Feminine Mystique_, and Vaclav Havel's inaugural address; and through a fresh appraisal of theories on the character of language and discourse found in contemporary philosophy, literary criticism, anthropology, deconstructionism, Marxism, and especially in Habermas's critical theory of communicative action. (shrink)

Sartre and Foucault were two of the most prominent and at times mutually antagonistic philosophical figures of the twentieth century. And nowhere are the antithetical natures of their existentialist and poststructuralist philosophies more apparent than in their disparate approaches to historical understanding. A history, thought Foucault, should be a kind of map, a comparative charting of structural transformations and displacements. But for Sartre, authentic historical understanding demanded a much more personal and committed narrative, a kind of interpretive diary of moral (...) choices and risks compelled by critical necessity and an exacting reality. Sartre's history, a rational history of individual lives and their intrinsic social worlds, was in essence immersed in biography. In Volume One of this authoritative two-volume work, Thomas R. Flynn conducts a pivotal and comprehensive reconstruction of Sartrean historical theory, and provocatively anticipates the Foucauldian counterpoint to come in Volume Two. (shrink)

The major point of contention among the philosophers and mathematicians who have written about the independence results for the continuum hypothesis (CH) and related questions in set theory has been the question of whether these results give reason to doubt that the independent statements have definite truth values. This paper concerns the views of G. Kreisel, who gives arguments based on second order logic that the CH does have a truth value. The view defended here is that although Kreisel's conclusion (...) is correct, his arguments are unsatisfactory. Later sections of the paper advance a different argument that the independence results do not show lack of truth values. (shrink)

When making decisions, humans can observe many kinds of information about others' activities, but their effects on performance are not well understood. We investigated social learning strategies using a simple problem-solving task in which participants search a complex space, and each can view and imitate others' solutions. Results showed that participants combined multiple sources of information to guide learning, including payoffs of peers' solutions, popularity of solution elements among peers, similarity of peers' solutions to their own, and relative payoffs from (...) individual exploration. Furthermore, performance was positively associated with imitation rates at both the individual and group levels. When peers' payoffs were hidden, popularity and similarity biases reversed, participants searched more broadly and randomly, and both quality and equity of exploration suffered. We conclude that when peers' solutions can be effectively compared, imitation does not simply permit scrounging, but it can also facilitate propagation of good solutions for further cumulative exploration. (shrink)

Thomas Erne entfaltet im Anschluss an Schleiermachers Ästhetik das Verhältnis von Kunst und Religion. Dabei nimmt er über Schleiermacher hinaus auch die moderne, autonome Kunst in Blick. Im Dialog mit exemplarischen Kunstwerken der Gegenwart fragt er nach Transzendenzerfahrungen in der Gegenwartskunst, in der die Kunstwerke selbst zu,,autonomen Sinndomänen" werden. Der Band dokumentiert die Schleiermacher-Lecture 2019 an der Theologischen Fakultät der Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin. Im Rahmen dieser Reihe sollen ausgewählte Aspekte von Schleiermachers Werk mit Fragen und Problemkonstellationen der Gegenwart in (...) Beziehung gesetzt werden. (shrink)

'Altruism' was coined by the French sociologist Auguste Comte in the early 1850s as a theoretical term in his 'cerebral theory' and as the central ideal of his atheistic 'Religion of Humanity'. In The Invention of Altruism, Thomas Dixon traces this new language of 'altruism' as it spread through British culture between the 1850s and the 1900s, and in doing so provides a new portrait of Victorian moral thought. Drawing attention to the importance of Comtean positivism in setting the (...) agenda for debates about science and religion, this volume challenges received ideas about both Charles Darwin and Herbert Spencer as moral philosophers. Darwin saw sympathy and love, not only selfishness and competition, throughout the natural world. Spencer was the instigator of an Anti-Aggression League and an advocate of greater altruism in Britain's dealings with the 'lower races'. It also sheds light on the rise of popular socialism in the 1880s, on the creation of the idealist 'altruist' in novels of the 1890s, and on the individualistic philosophies of Friedrich Nietzsche, Oscar Wilde, and G. E. Moore - authors considered by some to be representative of fin de siècle 'egomania.' This wide-ranging study in the history of ideas is highly relevant to contemporary debates about altruism, evolution, religion, and ethics. (shrink)

Back to Kant is a study of the rise of the neo-Kantian movement from its origins in the 1850s to its academic preeminence in the years before World War I. Thomas E. Willey describes early neo-Kantianism as a reaction of scientists and scientific philosophers against both the then discredited Hegelianism and Naturphilosophie of the preceding era and the simplistic and deterministic scientific materialism of the 1850s. "Back to Kant" was the slogan of a revolt against theories of knowledge which (...) seemed inadequate to recent discoveries in thermodynamics, physiology, optics and other fields. Because Immanuel Kant was the philosopher who placed Newtonian physics on new epistemological foundations and demonstrated the possibility of universal scientific truth, he was the right thinker for a generation of scholars living through a new scientific revolution in Germany and dissatisfied with both speculative idealism and crude materialism. The second wave of neo-Kantians continued to discuss problems of scientific epistemology in the 1880s and after, but they also showed a keen interest in political and social matters, attempting to bridge liberalism and socialism with Kantian ethics. Neo-Kantians had to face questions of socialism, the place of the working class in society, the phenomenon of social welfare, the challenge of political democracy. Willey uses the biographical approach to develop the relationship between unity and diversity in the movement, and to underscore the importance of personality in history. While individual dissertations and monographs have been written on various thinkers and schools within neo-Kantianism, this is the first wide-ranging history of the entire phenomenon. Willey observes that the movement did succeed in reasserting ethical values and in separating humanistic studies from the methods of physical science. He also discusses the possibility that a wider acceptance of neo-Kantian ideals among bourgeois intellectuals and socialist leaders might have reduced class antagonisms and sustained a stronger feeling of community between Germany and the West. (shrink)

This volume contains selected essays in moral and political philosophy by Thomas Hurka. The essays address a wide variety of topics, from the well-rounded life and the value of playing games to proportionality in war and the ethics of nationalism. They also share a common aim: to illuminate the surprising richness and subtlety of our everyday moral thought by revealing its underlying structure, which they often do by representing that structure on graphs. More specifically, the essays all give what (...) the first in the volume calls "structural" as against "foundational" analyses of moral views. Eschewing the grander ambition of grounding our ideas about, say, virtue or desert in claims that use different concepts and concern some other, allegedly more fundamental topic, they examine these ideas in their own right and with close attention to their details. As well as illuminating their individual topics, the essays illustrate the insights this structural method can yield. (shrink)

The technical results presented here on continuity and approximate implication are obviously incomplete. In particular, a syntactic characterization of approximate implication is highly desirable. Nevertheless, I believe the results above do show that the theory has considerable promise for application to the areas mentioned at the top of the paper.Formulation and defense of realist interpretations of science, for example, require approximate truth because we hardly ever have evidence that a particular scientific theory corresponds perfectly with a portion of the real (...) world. Realists need to assert, then, that evidence for a theory is evidence for its approximate truth, not its truth (see [3] and [18]). Approximate truth is, however, a vague notion, and specification of quantity terms and of a sense of approximation are needed to make precise applications of it. Suitability of both vocabulary and sense of approximation depend on the subject matter, and their selection is a partly empirical matter that raises complex issues. In light of the number of common inferences which are not continuous, realists also need to be concerned about indiscriminate use of deductive logic to derive consequences from approximately true theories. These issues will be considered further in a future paper.Approximate truth also has potential application in areas of artificial intelligence that require inference from inaccurate data. In the ‘qualitative’ physical theories of de Kleer and Brown [6], for example, ‘qualitative’ values are derived by partitioning the real numbers into regions. Inferences leading from inside to outside a region must be identified and avoided, and approximate implication and continuity may prove useful in doing this. More generally, growing use of predicate logic as a programming language invites application of the theory of approximate truth as a symbolic substitute for numerical evaluation of computation errors. This too will be the subject of a future paper. (shrink)

Because wicked problems are beyond the scope of normal, industrial-age engineering science, sustainability problems will require reform of current engineering science and technology practices. We assert that, while pluralism concerning use of the term sustainability is likely to persist, universities should continue to cultivate research and education programs specifically devoted to sustainable engineering science, an enterprise that is formally demarcated from business-as-usual and systems optimization approaches. Advancing sustainable engineering science requires a shift in orientation away from reductionism and intellectual specialization (...) towards integrative approaches to science, education, and technology that: draw upon an ethical awareness that extends beyond the usual bounds of professional ethics or responsible conduct of research to include macroethics, adopt anticipatory and adaptive approaches to unintended consequences resulting from technological innovation that result in more resilient systems, and cultivate interactional expertise to facilitate cross-disciplinary exchange. Unfortunately, existing education and research training programs are ill-equipped to prepare scientists and engineers to operate effectively in a wicked problems milieu. Therefore, it is essential to create new programs of graduate education that will train scientists and engineers to become sustainable engineering science experts equipped to recognize and grapple with the macro-ethical, adaptive, and cross-disciplinary challenges embedded in their technical research and development programs. Content Type Journal Article Category Articles Pages 1-18 DOI 10.1007/s10806-011-9342-2 Authors Thomas Seager, School of Sustainability and The Built Environment, Arizona State University, Phoenix Metropolitan Area, AZ, USA Evan Selinger, Department of Philosophy, Rochester Institute of Technology, Henrietta, NY, USA Arnim Wiek, School of Sustainability, Arizona State University, Phoenix Metropolitan Area, AZ, USA Journal Journal of Agricultural and Environmental Ethics Online ISSN 1573-322X Print ISSN 1187-7863. (shrink)

After setting out in part 1 Scotus's libertarian account of the will, I shall discuss two of the most important implications Scotus understood his account to have. First, according to Scotus, the Thomist understanding of the will as intellective appetite is inadequate to provide a libertarian account of freedom. Scotus therefore rejects that understanding and offers an alternative moral psychology. In part 2 of the paper I therefore draw attention to the passages in which Scotus offers his reasons for rejecting (...) Aquinas's account in order to show that they arise directly out of the libertarian account of the will I stated in part 1. I then ask whether Scotus is in fact justified in supposing that Aquinas's conception of will is incompatible with freedom as Scotus understood it. In parts 3 and 4 of the paper I shall argue that he is, since Aquinas's conception of possibility at best allows him to make room for diachronic alternatives, whereas Scotus insists on synchronic alternatives. -/- The second implication of Scotus's libertarian understanding of freedom is his distinctive conception of choice and of rationality in action. In part 5 of the paper I explain this conception and show why Scotus associates it with a libertarian understanding of freedom. (shrink)

Background Community advisory boards have expanded beyond high-income countries and play an increasing role in low- and middle-income country research. Much research has examined CABs in HICs, but less is known about CABs in LMICs. The purposes of this scoping review are to examine the creation and implementation of CABs in LMICs, including identifying frequently reported challenges, and to discuss implications for research ethics. Methods We searched five databases for publications describing or evaluating CABs in LMICs. Two researchers independently reviewed (...) articles for inclusion. Data related to the following aspects of CABs were extracted from included publications: time, country, financial support, research focus, responsibilities, and challenges. Thematic analyses were used to summarize textual data describing challenges. Results Our search yielded 2005 citations, 83 of which were deemed eligible for inclusion. Most studies were published between 2010 and 2017. Upper-middle-income countries were more likely to have studies describing CABs, with South Africa, China, and Thailand having the greatest numbers. The United States National Institutes of Health was the main source of financial support for CABs. Many CABs focused on HIV research. Thirty-four studies reported how CABs influenced the informed consent process for clinical trials or other aspects of research ethics. CAB responsibilities were related to clinical trials, including reviewing study protocols, educating local communities about research activities, and promoting the ethical conduct of research. Challenges faced by CABs included the following: incomplete ethical regulations and guidance; limited knowledge of science among members of communities and CABs; unstable and unbalanced power relationships between researchers and local communities; poor CAB management, including lack of formal participation structures and absence of CAB leadership; competing demands for time that limited participation in CAB activities; and language barriers between research staff and community members. Several challenges reflected shortcomings within the research team. Conclusions Our findings examine the formation and implementation of CABs in LMICs and identify several ethical challenges. These findings suggest the need for further ethics training among CAB members and researchers in LMICs. (shrink)

In “Getting that Model T Back on the Road: Thomas Flint on Incarnation and Mereology,” William Hasker contends that the reasons I offered for being dissatisfied with Model T, a mereological model of the incarnation, are insufficient. I argue, though, that Hasker’s defense of Model T is inadequate; though Christians may not want to consign it to the junkyard, they should at least be open to trading it in for a better model.

Abstract Advances in technology now make it possible to monitor the activity of the human brain in action, however crudely. As this emerging science continues to offer correlations between neural activity and mental functions, mind and brain may eventually prove to be one. If so, such a full comprehension of the electrochemical bases of mind may render current concepts of ethics, law, and even free will irrelevant. Content Type Journal Article Category Original Paper Pages 1-5 DOI 10.1007/s11948-012-9351-1 Authors Thomas (...) R. Scott, San Diego State University, San Diego, California, USA Journal Science and Engineering Ethics Online ISSN 1471-5546 Print ISSN 1353-3452. (shrink)