Die Frage, wie sich Aussagen uber Fahigkeiten von Personen zu Aussagen uber Moglichkeiten von Zustanden in der Welt verhalten, ist fur unser menschliches Selbstverstandnis zentral. Der vorliegende Band versammelt unter dieser Frage durchweg Originalbeitrage in historisch-systematischer Absicht; sie behandeln die Geschichte der Metaphysik und Ontologie von Parmenides bis Heidegger.INHALT: VORWORT - Klaus Jacobi: Das Konnen und die Moglichkeiten. Potentialitat und Possibilitat - Mischa von Perger: Moglichkeit, Parmenideisch - Ulrich Nortmann: 'Das Saatkorn ist dem Vermogen nach eine Pflanze'. Uber ontologische und (...) logische Aspekte Aristotelischer Moglichkeitssatze - Sang-Jin Kang: Anselm und die modallogische Betrachtung der gottlichen Notwendigkeit - Michael Astroh: Petrus Abaelardus on Modalities de re and de dicto - Christopher Martin: Peter Abaelard on Modality. Some Possibilities and Some Puzzles - Allan Back: Avicenna and Averroes: Modality and Theology - Seung-Chan (Elias) Park: Die Differenz von personlicher und unpersonlicher Moglichkeit bei Thomas von Aquin - Charles Lohr: 'Art' and Possibility: The Rule Concerning Possibility in the Ars lulliana - Peter King: Duns Scotus on Possibilities, Powers, and the Possible - Matthias Kaufmann: Gottes Allmacht und die Wahrheit modaler Satze. Potentialitat und Possibilitat bei Wilhelm von Ockham - Simo Knuuttila: On the History of Theory of Modality as Alternativeness - Stephan Meier-Oeser: Potentia versus Possibilitas? Posse! Zur cusanischen Konzeption der Moglichkeit - Dominik Perler: Cartesische Moglichkeiten - Hans Poser: Leibniz'sche Handlungsmodi zwischen Ontologie und Deontologie - Wilhelm Metz: Der transzendentale Moglichkeitsbegriff bei Kant und Fichte - Rainer Marten: Heidegger: Die eigenste eigentliche Moglichkeit - Tilman Borsche: Moglichkeiten des Seins, Moglichkeiten des Denkens - Thomas Buchheim: Zwischen Antinomie und Kompatibilitat: Versuch uber die naturliche Einbettung unserer Handlungsfreiheit - Kuno Lorenz: Dynamis und Energeia. Zur Aktualitat eines begrifflichen Werkzeugs von Aristoteles. (shrink)

Was Natur für uns ist und welche Bereiche unserer Umwelt als natürlich erfahren werden, scheint sich einer prinzipiellen Bestimmung zu entziehen. Auch ist weitgehend unklar, worauf sich der verantwortliche Umgang "des" Menschen mit "der" Natur beziehen soll? Etwa auf die Erhaltung des Status quo der Natur oder auf die maßvolle Steuerung des Wandels der Natur? Ist in den gegenwärtigen umweltpolitischen und den Naturschutz betreffenden Überlegungen tatsächlich "die" Natur der Referenzrahmen verantwortlichen Handelns oder geht es uns vor allem um die Erhaltung (...) eines nützlichen Zustands für uns und nachfolgende Generationen? Die Autorinnen und Autoren des Bandes ziehen die Gewissheiten unseres theoretischen und praktischen Umgangs mit der Natur in Frage und suchen nach neuen Perspektiven. -/- Unter den Stichworten Objektive Natur (I.), Natur als Resonanzraum (II.), Natur als Ressource und Wert (III.), Natur als natürliche Umwelt (IV.), Künstliche Natur (V.), Vergesellschaftete Natur (VI.) und Verantwortete Natur (VII.) sind Beiträge der Philosophinnen Heike Baranzke und Christine Zunke sowie der Philosophen Michael Großheim, Michael Hauskeller, Kristian Köchy, Ulrich Krohs und Gregor Schiemann versammelt. Interdisziplinäre Herausforderungen zur Thematik werden in den Studien von Jörn Ahrens (Kultursoziologie), Karl-Werner Brand (Umwelt- und Nachhaltigkeitsforschung), Hans Diefenbacher (Wirtschaftswissenschaften), Thomas Fuchs (Psychiatrie), Ulrich Gebhard (Erziehungswissenschaften), Thomas Kirchhoff (Ökologie), Dörte Martens/ Nicole Bauer (Umweltpsychologie), Hartmut Rosa (Soziologie), Heinrich Spanier (Umweltschutz), Vera Tekken/ Josef Settele (Umweltforschung), Frank Uekötter (Umweltgeschichte) und Michael Wink (Biologie) deutlich herausgearbeitet. Die Beiträge der Theologen Dirk Evers und Thorsten Moos runden den Band ab. (shrink)

At the same time as the modern idea of the state was taking shape, Hugo Grotius , Thomas Hobbes and Samuel Pufendorf formulated three distinctive foundational approaches to international order and law beyond the state. They differed in their views of obligation in the state of nature , in the extent to which they regarded these sovereign states as analogous to individuals in the state of nature, and in the effects they attributed to commerce as a driver of sociability (...) and of norm-structured interactions not dependent on an overarching state. Each built on shared Roman and sixteenth-century foundations . Section II argues: 1) that Grotius's natural law was not simply an anti-skeptical construction based on self-preservation , but continued a Roman legal tradition; 2) that Hobbes's account of natural law beyond the state was essentially prudential, not moral ; and 3) that commerce as a driver of social and moral order had a substantial and under-appreciated impact on international legal order. Each contributed to the thought of later writers such as Emer de Vattel , David Hume , and Adam Smith , and eventually to the empirical legal methodologies of Jeremy Bentham and Georg Friedrich von Martens. (shrink)

0. Philippe Huneman and Charles T. Wolfe: Introduction 1. Tobias Cheung, “What is an ‘organism’? On the occurrence of a new term and its conceptual transformations 1680-1850” 2. Charles T. Wolfe, “Do organisms have an ontological status?” 3. John Symons, “The individuality of artifacts and organisms” 4. Thomas Pradeu, “What is an organism? An immunological answer” 5. Matteo Mossio & Alvaro Moreno, “Organisational closure in biological organisms” 6. Laura Nuño de la Rosa, “Becoming organisms. The organisation of development and (...) the development of organisation” 7. Denis Walsh, “Two Neo-Darwinisms” 8. Philippe Huneman, “Assessing the prospects for a return of organisms in evolutionary biology” 9. Johannes Martens, “Organisms in evolution” 10. Susan Oyama, “Biologists behaving badly: Vitalism and the language of language” . (shrink)

Nicht erst seit dem Erscheinen der Schwarzen Hefte wird Martin Heideggers personliche wie denkerische Verstrickung in den Nationalsozialismus diskutiert. Die Debatte, ob er sich aus dieser Verstrickung jemals entschieden gelost hat, begleitet die Auseinandersetzung mit Heideggers Denken seit Jahrzehnten. Die Tagung Heideggers Schwarze Hefte. Ideologieanfalligkeit der Intellektuellen, die im Dezember 2015 an der Universitat Freiburg i.Br. stattfand, wendete sich im Blick auf Heidegger und daruber hinaus der Frage zu, wie es dazu kommen konnte, dass sich Intellektuelle in der Weimarer Republik (...) wenigstens zeitweise fur die NS-Bewegung begeisterten. Immanent-kritisches Weiterdenken mit Heidegger gegen Heidegger (NZZ) zeichnet die aus Anlass der Tagung gehaltenen Vortrage in ihrer Gesamtheit aus. Der Band enthalt die Beitrage von Wolfgang Essbach, Andreas Urs Sommer, Claus Arnold, Lore Huhn, Christian Bermes, Jeff Malpas, Emil Angehrn, Peter Trawny, Christoph Demmerling, Oliver Muller, Georg Essen, Rainer Marten und Dieter Thoma. (shrink)

Kierkegaard’s Concepts is a comprehensive, multi-volume survey of the key concepts and categories that inform Kierkegaard’s writings. Each article is a substantial, original piece of scholarship, which discusses the etymology and lexical meaning of the relevant Danish term, traces the development of the concept over the course of the authorship, and explains how it functions in the wider context of Kierkegaard’s thought. Concepts have been selected on the basis of their importance for Kierkegaard’s contributions to philosophy, theology, the social sciences, (...) literature and aesthetics, thereby making this volume an ideal reference work for students and scholars in a wide range of disciplines. -/- Contents: Envy, Janne Kylliäinen; Epic, Nassim Bravo Jordán; Epigram, David R. Law; Ethics, Azucena Palavicini Sánchez; Evil, Azucena Palavicini Sánchez and William McDonald; Exception/Universal, Geoffrey Dargan; Existence/Existential, Min-Ho Lee; Experience, Jakub Marek; Fairytale, Nathaniel Kramer; Faith, William McDonald; Finitude/Infinity, Erik M. Hanson; Forgiveness, John Lippitt; Freedom, Diego Giordano; Genius, Steven M. Emmanuel; God, Paul Martens and Daniel Marrs; Good, Azucena Palavicini Sánchez; Governance/Providence, Jack Mulder, Jr.; Grace, Derek R. Nelson; Gratitude, Corey Benjamin Tutewiler; Guilt, Erik M. Hanson; Happiness, Benjamin Miguel Olivares Bøgeskov; Hero, Sean Anthony Turchin; History, Sean Anthony Turchin; Holy Spirit, Leo Stan; Hope, William McDonald; Humility, Robert B. Puchniak; Humor, Alejandro González; Hypocrisy, Thomas Martin Fauth Hansen; Identity/Difference, Claudine Davidshofer; Imagination, Frances Maughan-Brown; Imitation, Leo Stan; Immanence/Transcendence, Leo Stan; Immediacy/Reflection, Zizhen Liu; Immortality, Lee C. Barrett; Incognito, Martijn Boven. (shrink)

Die sog. "Schwarzen Hefte" haben umfassender und deutlicher als je zuvor die Verbindungen zwischen Philosophie und Politik bei Heidegger sichtbar werden lassen und damit eine neue Debatte uber den Rang dieses Denkens entfacht. DEnn die dort enthaltenen Texte demonstrieren, dass Philosophie, Metapolitik und Politik bei Heidegger eine Einheit bilden, zu der die Befurwortung des Nationalsozialismus und der Antisemitismus gehoren. INs Zentrum der kritischen Revision ruckt das erste Hauptwerk von 1927, "Sein und Zeit", das nahezu unangefochten als epochaler Beitrag zur Philosophie (...) des 20. JAhrhunderts gilt. DIe "Schwarzen Hefte" fordern eine "Destruktion" dieses Werks auch insofern heraus, als die dort prasentierten Selbstinterpretationen das philosophische Profil dieses Denkens scharfen und neue Gesichtspunkte fur die Diskussion seiner Substanz im philosophischen und ideologischen Kontext des 20. JAhrhunderts eroffnen. 90 Jahre nach seinem Erscheinen stellt sich der philosophischen Forschung die kritische Auseinandersetzung mit "Sein und Zeit" als unabweisbare Aufgabe. IM Vordergrund stehen hierbei zwei Fragen: Wie ist das Unternehmen einer in der "Fundamentalontologie" des Daseins begrundeten temporalen Ontologie der systematischen Intention und Durchfuhrung fachphilosophisch zu beurteilen? Beinhalten die ausgearbeiteten Teile bereits gedankliche Prafigurationen oder Grundlagen fur Heideggers Antisemitismus und Nationalsozialismus? Der Band behandelt diese Problemstellungen aus unterschiedlichen philosophischen, aber auch disziplinaren Perspektiven; er enthalt Beitrage von Charles Bambach, William Blattner, Christoph Demmerling, Emmanuel Faye, Anton M. FIscher, Johannes Fritsche, Hassan Givsan, Marion Heinz, Christoph Jamme, Sidonie Kellerer, Rainer Marten, Daniel Meyer, Livia Profeti, Tom Rockmore und Dieter Thoma. (shrink)

Thomas Sattig develops a comprehensive framework for doing philosophy of time, and offers an original three-dimensionalist picture of the material world. He brings together a variety of different perspectives, linking our ordinary conception of time with the physicist's conception, and linking metaphysical questions about time with questions in the philosophy of language.

Thomas Sattig develops a novel philosophical picture of ordinary objects such as persons, tables, and trees. He carves a middle way between classical mereology and Aristotelian hylomorphism, and argues that objects lead double lives. They are compounds of matter and form, and each object's matter and form have different qualitative profiles.

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)

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)

Thomas Wheatland examines the influence of the Frankfurt School, or Horkheimer Circle, and how they influenced American social thought and postwar German sociology.

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

In this paper, we explore and describe what is needed to allow connected and automated vehicles to break traffic rules in order to minimise road safety risk and to operate with appropriate transparency. Reviewing current traffic rules with particular reference to two driving situations, we illustrate why current traffic rules are not suitable for CAVs and why making new traffic rules specifically for CAVs would be inappropriate. In defining an alternative approach to achieving safe CAV driving behaviours, we describe the (...) use of ethical goal functions as part of hybrid AI systems, suggesting that functions should be defined by governmental bodies with input from citizens and stakeholders. Ethical goal functions for CAVs would enable developers to optimise driving behaviours for safety under conditions of uncertainty whilst allowing for differentiation of products according to brand values. Such functions can differ between regions according to preferences for safety behaviours within that region and can be updated over time, responding to continual socio-technological feedback loops. We conclude that defining ethical goal functions is an urgent and necessary step from governmental bodies to enable the safe and transparent operation of CAVs and accelerate the reduction in road casualties they promise to achieve. (shrink)

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 validity of the conclusion to the nonlocality of quantum mechanics, accepted widely today as the only reasonable solution to the EPR and Bell issues, is questioned and criticized. Arguments are presented which remove the compelling character of this conclusion and make clear that it is not the most obvious solution. Alternative solutions are developed which are free of the contradictions related with the nonlocality conclusion. Firstly, the dependence on the adopted interpretation is shown, with the conclusion that the alleged (...) nonlocality property of the quantum formalism may have been reached on the basis of an interpretation that is unnecessarily restrictive. Secondly, by extending the conventional quantum formalism along the lines of Ludwig and Davies it is shown that the Bell problem may be related to complementarity rather than to nonlocality. Finally, the dependence on counterfactual reasoning is critically examined. It appears that locality on the quantum level may still be retained provided one accepts a newly proposed principle of nonreproducibility at the individual quantum level as an alternative of quantum nonlocality. It is concluded that the locality principle can retain its general validity, in full conformity with all experimental data. (shrink)

Purpose – To review and discuss Luciano Floridi’s 2019 book The Logic of Information: A Theory of Philosophy as Conceptual Design, the latest instalment in his philosophy of information (PI) tetralogy, particularly with respect to its implications for library and information studies (LIS). Design/methodology/approach – Nine scholars with research interests in philosophy and LIS read and responded to the book, raising critical and heuristic questions in the spirit of scholarly dialogue. Floridi responded to these questions. Findings – Floridi’s PI, including (...) this latest publication, is of interest to LIS scholars, and much insight can be gained by exploring this connection. It seems also that LIS has the potential to contribute to PI’s further development in some respects. Research implications – Floridi’s PI work is technical philosophy for which many LIS scholars do not have the training or patience to engage with, yet doing so is rewarding. This suggests a role for translational work between philosophy and LIS. Originality/value – The book symposium format, not yet seen in LIS, provides forum for sustained, multifaceted and generative dialogue around ideas. (shrink)

Thomas Williams presents the most extensive collection of John Duns Scotus's work on ethics and moral psychology available in English. This accessible and philosophically informed translation includes extended discussions on divine and human freedom, the moral attributes of God, and the relationship between will and intellect.

This article argues that Carol Gilligan's research in moral development psychology, work which claims that women speak about ethics in a "different voice" than men do, is applicable to business ethics. This essay claims that Gilligan's "ethic of care" provides a plausible explanation for the results of two studies that found men and women handling ethical dilemmas in business differently. This paper also speculates briefly about the management implications of Gilligan's ideas.

The goal of this article is to deepen the concept of emerging urban mobility technology. Drawing on philosophical everyday and urban aesthetics, as well as the postphenomenological strand in the philosophy of technology, we explicate the relation between everyday aesthetic experience and urban mobility commoning. Thus, we shed light on the central role of aesthetics for providing depth to the important experiential and value-driven meaning of contemporary urban mobility. We use the example of self-driving vehicle (SDV), as potentially mundane, public, (...) dynamic, and social urban robots, for expanding the range of perspectives relevant for our relations to urban mobility technology. We present the range of existing SDV conceptualizations and contrast them with experiential and aesthetic understanding of urban mobility. In conclusion, we reflect on the potential undesired consequences from the depolitization of technological development, and potential new pathways for speculative thinking concerning urban mobility futures in responsible innovation processes. (shrink)

Thomas Murray's graceful and humane book illuminates one of the most morally complex areas of everyday life: the relationship between parents and children. What do children mean to their parents, and how far do parental obligations go? What, from the beginning of life to its end, is the worth of a child? Ethicist Murray leaves the rarefied air of abstract moral philosophy in order to reflect on the moral perplexities of ordinary life and ordinary people. Observing that abstract moral (...) terms such as altruism and selfishness can be buried in the everyday doings of families, he maintains that ethical theory needs a richer description than it now has of the moral life of parents and children. How far should adults go in their quest for children? What options are available to women who do not want to bear a child now? Should couples be allowed to reject a child because of genetic disability or "wrong" gender? How can we weigh the competing claims of the genetic and the rearing parents to a particular child? _The Worth of a Child_ couples impressive learning with a conversational style. Only by getting down to cases, Murray insists, can we reach moral conclusions that are unsentimental, farsighted, and just. In an era of intense public and private acrimony about the place and meaning of "family values," his practical wisdom about extraordinary difficult moral issues offers compelling reading for both experienced and prospective parents, as well as for ethicists, social and behavioral scientists, and legal theorists. (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)

This paper considers Aquinas's accounts of the end of human action and the structure of human action, examines the debate between intellectualist and voluntarist interpretations of Aquinas, and corrects mistaken accounts of Aquinas's views on freedom, necessitation, and causation.

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)

The cross-fruition between analytical philosophy and continental philosophical traditions has stimulated a wide-ranging debate about the role of philosophy and the use of argument and reason in culture. Through a discussion of salient themes in the analytical tradition, in the work of the later Wittgenstein, and in critical theory,Transformative Philosophy articulates a novel conception of philosophy as a transformative care for self and others.

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)

BackgroundIn gender-affirming medical care (GAMC), ethical challenges in decision-making are ubiquitous. These challenges are becoming more pressing due to exponentially increasing referrals, politico-legal contestation, and divergent normative views regarding decisional roles and models. Little is known, however, about what ethical challenges related to decision-making healthcare professionals (HCPs) themselves face in their daily work in GAMC and how these relate to, for example, the subjective nature of Gender Incongruence (GI), the multidisciplinary character of GAMC and the role HCPs play in assessing (...) GI and eligibility for interventions. Given the relevance and urgency of these questions, we conducted a qualitative study among HCPs providing GAMC to transgender adults in the Netherlands.MethodsIn this qualitative research, we conducted 11 semi-structured interviews between May 2020 and February 2021 with HCPs (six mental health professionals, two HCPs in endocrinology, two in plastic surgery, and one in nursing) working in two distinct GAMC settings. We purposively sampled for professional background and years of experience in GAMC. We analyzed our interview data using thematic analysis. As some respondents were more inclined to speak about what should or ought to be done to arrive at good or right decision-making, we identified both ethical challenges and norms. Furthermore, in our analysis, we differentiated between respondents’ explicit and implicit ethical challenges and norms and ascertained the specific context in which these challenges emerged.ResultsRespondents’ ethical challenges and norms centered on (1) dividing and defining decisional roles and bounds, (2) negotiating decision-making in a (multidisciplinary) team, and (3) navigating various decision-making temporalities. These themes arose in the context of uncertainties regarding (1) GAMC’s guidelines, evidence, and outcomes, as well as (2) the boundaries and assessment of GI.ConclusionsThis interview study provides detailed empirical insight into both the explicit and implicit ethical challenges that HCPs experience and their ethical norms regarding decision-making. It also describes how uncertainties and (implicit) normativities concerning GAMC and GI pre-structure the moral environment in which these challenges and norms manifest. We provide normative reflections and recommendations on handling these ethical challenges in a way that is sensitive to the context in which they arise. (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)

Ideological indoctrination is explicit and pervasive in China, with the school curriculum used to mould the spirit and character of adolescents, fulfilling ideological and political purposes. But the exact content varies over time. Comparing two versions of textbooks published in 1997 and 2005, this paper depicts the continuities and change in the curricular discourses centred on the notion of ‘good citizen’. While keeping the official status of socialism and the Party leadership untouched, the new textbooks soften the presentation and packaging (...) of the ideological content, very much in tandem with the soft authoritarianism practised since the post‐Deng era when China has been deeply involved in the processes of marketisation, liberalisation and globalisation. The new textbooks also adopt a stance of greater reconciliation with human rights and global citizenship. While being granted more autonomy and rights, young citizens are still expected to shoulder the mission of national revival and socialist modernisation—very much derived from official policies. (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)