Many people object to genetically engineerehd (GE) food because they believe that it is unnatural or that its creation amounts to playing God. These objections are often referred to as intrinsic objections, and they have been widely criticized in the agricultural bioethics literature as being unsound, incompatible with modern science, religious, inchoate, and based on emotion instead of reason. Many of their critics also argue that even if these objections did have some merit as ethicalobjections, their quasi-religious nature means that (...) they are entirely irrelevant when interpreted aspolitical objections regarding what public policy ought to be. In this paper, we argue that this widespread view is false. Intrinsic objections have much more political import than has previously been recognized, and indeed the requirements of political liberalism and its associated idea of liberal neutrality, once properly understood, protect intrinsic objections from many of the most common objections. That is, policy-makers may not legitimately base public policy on grounds that are inconsistent with intrinsic objections, even when they believe those objections to be flawed in the ways mentioned above. This means that in the context of a political debate about GE food, the discussion should not center on the substantive merits of the intrinsic objections themselves but rather on the appropriate political norms for achieving democratically legitimate policy on issues that touch people’s deepest religious and moral beliefs. (shrink)

Health inequalities are of concern both becausestudying them may help one learn how to improvehealth and because health inequalities may beunjust. This paper argues that attending tothese reasons why health inequalities may beimportant undercuts the claims of researchersat the World Health Organization in favor offocusing on individual health variation ratherthan on social group health differences. Inequalities in individual health are of littleinterest unless one goes on to study how theyare related to other factors.

Just because an angel is better than a stone, it does not follow that two angels are better than one angel and one stone. So said Aquinas (Summa contra Gentiles III, 71), and the sentiment was echoed by Leibniz. In section 118 of the Theodicy he wrote: "No substance is either absolutely precious or absolutely contemptible in the sight of God. It is certain that God attaches more importance to a man than to a lion, but I do not know (...) that we can bc sure that he prefers one man to an entire species of lions." Even Kant was bitten by this bug. In one of his pre-Critical works he was moved to say, à propos of lice, that even though they “may in our eyes be as worthless as you like, nevertheless it is of more consequence to Nature to conserve this species as a whole than to conserve a small number of members of a superior species." In these passages Aquinas, Leibniz, and Kant gave expression to a distinctive and interesting view about the value of animal species and animal populations. At its simplest, this is the view that there is a special value in the existence of animal species or in the existence of a wide variety of different animal species. But the view also goes deeper than this. An animal species, after all, is nothing over and above the individual animals which make it up, and the value which it contributes to the world must therefore be some function of the values contributed by those individual animals. At the deepest level, what the view expressed by Aquinas, Leibniz, and Kant holds is that the value which an individual animal contributes to thc world is not constant but varies with the number.. (shrink)

The Pleadings Game is a normative formalization and computational model of civil pleading, founded in Roberty Alexy''s discourse theory of legal argumentation. The consequences of arguments and counterarguments are modelled using Geffner and Pearl''s nonmonotonic logic,conditional entailment. Discourse in focussed using the concepts of issue and relevance. Conflicts between arguments can be resolved by arguing about the validity and priority of rules, at any level. The computational model is fully implemented and has been tested using examples from Article Nine of (...) the Uniform Commercial Code. (shrink)

Philosophers and theologians acknowledge that "fideism" is difficult to define but rarely agree on what the best characterization of the term is. In this article, I investigate the history of use of "fideism" to explore why its meaning has been so contested and thus why it has not always been helpful for resolving philosophical problems. I trace the use of the term from its origins in French theology to its current uses in philosophy and theology, concluding that "fideism" is helpful (...) in resolving philosophical problems only when philosophers scrupulously acknowledge the tradition of use that informs their understanding of the word. (shrink)

Donaldson argues that major changes are necessary in the decision-making process as well as in the conduct of multinational corporations in order to exercise moral obligations and meet culture-specific needs of host countries.

The public interest statement contained in the PRSA Code of Professional Standards is unduly vague and provides neither a working definition of public interest nor any guidance for the performance of what most professions consider to be a primary value. This paper addresses the question of what might constitute public relations service in the public interest, and calls for more stringent guidelines to be developed whereby the profession may advance its service goals more clearly.

This paper examines several issues regarding deception in advertising. Some generally accepted definitions are considered and found to be inadequate. An alternative definition is proposed for legal/regulatory purposes and is related to a suggested definition of the term deception as it is used in everyday language. Based upon these definitions, suggestions are offered for detecting and regulating deception in advertising. This paper additionally considers the grounds for the generally held but largely unquestioned assumption that deceptive advertising is unethical. It is (...) argued that deceptive advertising can be shown to be morally objectionable, on the weak assumption that it is prima facie wrong to harm others. Finally, the implications of this analysis with respect to current regulation of deceptive advertising by the FTC are considered. (shrink)

Arguably, every new technology creates hidden ejfects in its environment, rearranging the social order it penetrates. Many ofthese effects are inextricably linked to ethical issues. Some are eternal issues such as censorship andfree speech, but others have new names and dimensions, and may even be new issues. Forty of these issues pertaining to the new communication technologies of the 1990s and next millennium are catalogued here. The author argues that each new communication technology either retrieves, amplifies, transforms, obsolesces, or mixes (...) ethical issues from the past or creates new issues for the future. However, as in the Ross Hume Hall (1974) effect, it is also likely there are issues yet unknown due to untested eflects of combining new technologies. (shrink)

Although many challenges remain, business ethics is flourishing in North America. Prominent organizations give annual business ethics awards, investments in socially screened mutual funds are increasing, ethics officers and corporate ombudspersons are more common and more influential, and new ideas are being tested in practice. On the academic side, two major journals specializing in business ethics are well-established and other major journals often include articles on business ethics and new organizations emphasizing ethics have been initiated. Within business schools, the number (...) of endowed chairs is growing and the ethics curriculum is expanding. Canada is a major player in the business ethics discipline while business ethics in Mexico is just beginning to emerge as a focus of interest in both the business and academic communities. (shrink)

This paper has two distinct objectives. (1) I defend an analysis of the concept of a conflict of interest. On my analysis the concept of a conflict of interest is broader than is generally supposed. I argue that a very large class of cases not ordinarily regarded as conflicts of interest should be so regarded. Conflicts of interest are an integral feature of many professional relationships and do not (as is often supposed) require the existence of external financial or personal (...) relationships. (2) I defend and explain the commonsense view that conflicts of interest areprima facie wrong and argue that in ordinary cases it is wrong, all things considered, to allow an avoidable conflict of interest to occur. I attempt to establish these claims on the basis of weak and relatively noncontroversial assumptions. (shrink)

Nietzsche is generally regarded as a severe critic of historical method and scholarship; this view has influenced much of contemporary discussions about the role and nature of historical scholarship. In this article I argue that this view is seriously mistaken . I do so by examining what he actually says about understanding history and historical method, as well as his relation to the founders of modern German historiography . I show, contrary to most expectations, that Nietzsche knew these historians well (...) and that he fundamentally affirmed their view of historical method. What he primarily objected to among his contemporaries was that historical scholarship was often regarded as a goal in itself, rather than as a means, and consequently that history was placed above philosophy. In fact, a historical approach was essential for Nietzsche’s whole understanding of philosophy, and his own philosophical project. (shrink)

There seems to be a prevailing belief among public relations professionals that ethical problems can easily be solved by either reference to a simplified code or citation of a few well-worn platitudes. However, the route to a more complete understanding of questions of ethics is circuitous and often painstaking. By applying a number of ethical theories to a public relations problem, both the skilled public relations technician and the public relations professional may arrive at similar conclusions concerning moral obligations; however, (...) the professional is in the most favorable position to effect change. (shrink)

It is shown (in ZF) that every hereditarily countable set has rank less than ω 2 , and that if ℵ 1 is singular then there are hereditarily countable sets of all ranks less than ω 2.

Industrial interventions in the landscape leave their imprint in a permanent way, but there remain options on how to deal with land even at that point in time. In this essay, three alternatives are considered: leaving such sites as they are, restoring them to a condition resembling their original state, or transforming them into artworks. The author focuses in particular on the third option in order to determine to what degree it is possible for artistic reclamation to redeem such blights (...) in the landscape. the work of art is beautiful to the degree that it opposes its own order to that of reality . Herbert Marcuse, 1978, p. 64. (shrink)

An important test of any moral theory is whether it can give a satisfactory account of moral prohibitions such as those against promise breaking and lying. Act-utilitarianism (hereafter utilitarianism) implies that any act can be justified if it results in the best consequences. Utilitarianism implies that it is sometimes morally right to break promises and tell lies. Few people find this result to be counterintuitive and very few are persuaded by Kant’s arguments that attempt to show that lying is always (...) wrong, even if it is necessary to save someone’s life. One thing that makes Kant’s view about lying so implausible is that he is committed to the view that the duty not to lie is always more important than any conflicting duties. Even if we agree with utilitarianism that lying and promise breaking are sometimes morally permissible, we may still be inclined to think that utilitarianism is too permissive about lying and promise breaking. Ross gives the definitive statement of this criticism. He holds that there is a strong, but overrridable, moral presumption against telling lies and breaking promises that is independent of utilitarian considerations. Almost all utilitarians claim that there is a strong moral presumption against telling lies and breaking promises on account of the direct and indirect bad consequences of those actions. However, utilitarians cannot say that there is any moral presumption against lying and promise breaking that is independent of their bad consequences. Many philosophers think that Ross’s theory constitutes a kind of reasonable middle ground in ethics between Kant’s absolutism and utilitarianism. Ross’s theory is arguably the major ethical theory that is closest to most people’s commonsense moral beliefs. It is noteworthy that the two most important defenders of rule-utilitarianism/rule-consequentialism. (shrink)

This essay analyzes the ways in which, in his Nova de Universis Philosophia, Francesco Patrizi uses, adopts, and, in some cases, rejects the Stoic philosophical tradition. Although, at first glance, most of Patrizi’s remarks on Stoicism and Stoic understanding of nature are critical – as this article demonstrates – he widely relied on Stoic teaching that he sought to combine with Neoplatonism and the prisca theologia doctrine.

This essay considers the recuperation of beauty as a productive critical strategy in discussions of African American dance. I argue that black performance in general, and African American concert dance in particular, seeks to create aesthetic sites that allow black Americans to participate in discourses of recognition and appreciation to include concepts of beauty. In this, I suggest that beauty may indeed produce social change for its attendant audiences. I also propose that interrogating the notion of beauty may allow for (...) social change among audiences that include dance theorists and philosophers. Through a case-study consideration of work by three African American choreographers, Donald Byrd (b. 1949), Ulysses Dove (1947 – 1996), and Abdel Salaam (b. 1949), I ultimately hope to suggest critical possibilities aligning dance performance with particular aesthetic theory relevant to its documentation and interpretation. (shrink)

Edward Said’s concept of Orientalism portrays the high tide of nineteenth-century imperialism as the defining moment in the establishment of a global discursive hegemony, in which European attitudes and concepts gained a universal validity. The idea of “religion” was central to the civilizing mission of imperialism, and was shaped by the interests of a number of colonial actors in a way that remains visibly relevant today. In East and Southeast Asia, however, many of the concerns that statecraft, law, scholarship, and (...) conversion had for religion transcended the European impact. Both before and after the period of European imperialism, states used religion to engineer social ethics and legitimate rule, scholars elaborated and enforced state theologies, and the missionary faithful voiced the need for and nature of religious conversion. The real impact of this period was to integrate pre-existing concerns into larger discourses, transforming them in the process. The ideals of national citizenship and of legal and scholarly impartiality recast the state and its institutions with a modernist sacrality, which had the effect of banishing the religious from the public space. At the same time, the missionary discourse of transformative conversion located it in the very personal realm of sincerity and belief. The evolution of colonial-era discourses of religion and society in Asia since the departure of European imperial power demonstrates both their lasting power and the degree of agency that remains implicit in the idea of hegemony. (shrink)

Charles Peirce was one of those rare individuals, an expert logician who is at the same time an experienced practical scientist. His logical acumen was apparent even to his contemporaries; while an early training in chemistry, astronomy, geodesy and optics, left him, as he declares, “saturated through and through with the spirit of the physical sciences.“ One is therefore hardly surprised to discover that he was deeply interested in scientific methodology—particularly in the logic of induction. Indeed, it would not be (...) an exaggeration to say that some of his most significant contributions to philosophy were made in precisely this field. No apology is thus required for devoting attention to them. In the present paper I want to sketch his treatment of induction very briefly, and attempt a tentative estimate of its validity. (shrink)

Networked computer systems simultaneously destroy and build up old and new kinds of global and local jobs. Digitally networked ultra-modern structures in work, company and administration bring us turbulent times. This development is analyzed from an ethical, technological and economical point of view and illustrated by empirical data. The main emphasis of this article is placed on considerations, from the point of view of business ethics, of the conception of workplaces – in the office, at home and abroad (mobile work) (...) – equipped for computer-supported information exchange. In order to make better use of these new technologies, ethical, action-oriented guidelines should be considered. (shrink)

Let ZFB be ZF + "every set is the same size as a wellfounded set". Then the following are true. Every sentence true in every (Rieger-Bernays) permutation model of a model of ZF is a theorem of ZFB. (i.e.. ZFB is the theory of Rieger-Bernays permutation models of models of ZF) ZF and ZFAFA are both extensions of ZFB conservative for stratified formulæ. The class of models of ZFB is closed under creation of Rieger-Bernays permutation models.

Although Kant’s final work in moral philosophy,Die Metaphysik der Sitten, currently attracts much scholarly attention, there is still a lot to explore. This article is an attempt to get to grips with a particular, often neglected passage of theRechtslehre, namely §35. Here Kant defends the view that not only can a person’s good reputation can be tarnished after his death, but also that this constitutes a violation of this dead person’s property. Here I will not be able to fully clarify (...) what Kant means when he holds that persons can be harmed after their death, but I will put Kant’s view in a few perspectives. (shrink)

A new story is abroad that plato possessed two redundant devices in the "phaedo" to explain why some sensible "f" (a drift of snow, say) is "g" but never not-"g" (cold, say): (i) "f" participates in a special way in the (upper world) forms "f" and "g"; (ii) "f" is essentially "g" in its own (lower world) right. Were there such genuinely redundant devices, this would tidily explain both plato's coming to reject essential properties for sensibles in the "republic" and (...) aristotle's coming to reject forms for sensibles in the "categories". Now it is true in the "phaedo" that sensible "f" particulars can indeed by "g" and never not-"g", yet no redundant "essentialist" doctrine occurs there. Plato's reasoning is through and through form-ist: an "f" particular has a "participation" relation to the form "f", which form "f" has an "invariable accompaniment" relation to the form "g", which form "g" can never itself be not-"g"; the form "g"'s own never-not-"g" constraints thence get percolated back down the line of these canonical two worlds relations, by a still little-noticed "back-passing principle.". (shrink)

Donaldson argues that agreeing with Hardin to banish deontological justifications from international discussion amounts to abandoning the power of deontology to interpret political intent and to establish hard limits on political behavior.

Appeals to nationalism based on a common sociocultural, geographic, and linguistic heritage are reactions against expansions of trade, information, and power - and anomie and xenophobia can be countered by giving substatal ethnicities, minorities and political parties a voice and a vote.

It seems impossible to completely cover the field indicated by the title of this report because of the many contributions of individual physicians and non-physicians to problems of the philosophy of medicine in Austria, and to their solution. The main trends are rooted in historic developments and in the current problems of medicine and health care, which are similar world-wide. In Austria famous names like empress Maria Theresia or the physician Ignaz Semmelweis have to be mentioned in connection with the (...) development of the ideas of a philosophy of medicine. In recent times again influential and well-known persons in related fields of medicine and health care are Austrians. However, the main line of new developments goes mostly unseen by the public: activities in medical ethics with the goal to humanize health care, carried on by groups of young physicians, biomedical engineers and students. (shrink)

(2005). Was Pierre Duhem a Precursor of Postmodernism? Angelaki: Vol. 10, continental philosophy and the sciences the french tradition issue editor: andrew aitken, pp. 27-38.

This essay considers Brian Leiter’s arguments for ‘replacement naturalism’ in the domain of adjudication, his thesis being that we should reject as plausible the ‘normative theory of adjudication’ and replace it witha posterioritheory which best explains the causes of judicial decisions. My central claim is that his ‘naturalizing’ argument is incomplete in the following way: it is against a bad kind of philosophical theory and leaves scope for a better, non-naturalistic, account. Both Leiter’s original arguments for the position and his (...) more recent suggestions in response to critics are considered. (shrink)

This book tells the story of seven new letters from Sir Thomas More to Frans van Cranevelt that were discovered among a bundle of letters that were auctioned in London in 1989, part of the private archive of Cranevelt. The letters span the years 1519–1522.