In this meticulous study, Wouter Hanegraaff examines the structure, themes, and development of Emanuel Swedenborg's massive work _Secrets of Heaven_, published between 1749 and 1756. Written as a work of biblical exegesis, Swedenborg also interpolated material on his visionary experiences, which have long fascinated readers. In the second part of the study, Dr. Hanegraaff examines the contemporary reception of the multi-volume work, particularly the critical reactions of Immanuel Kant and Friedrich Christoph Oetinger. He finds that Swedenborg's biblical exegesis, so (...) important in his divine calling, was largely ignored in favor of the mystical experiences. (shrink)

The innovative field of Regenerative Medicine (RM) is expected to extend the possibilities of prevention or early treatment in healthcare. Increasingly, clinical trials will be developed for people at risk of disease to investigate these RM interventions. These individuals at risk are characterised by their susceptibility for developing clinically manifest disease in future due to the existence of degenerative abnormalities. So far, there has been little debate about the ethical appropriateness of including such individuals at risk in clinical trials. We (...) discuss three main challenges of selecting this participant model for testing RM interventions: the challenge of achieving a proportional risk–benefit balance; complexities in the trial design in terms of follow-up and sample size; and the difficulty of obtaining informed consent due to the many uncertainties. We conclude that selecting the model is not ethically justifiable for first-in-man trials with RM interventions due to the high risks and uncertainties. However, the model can be ethically appropriate for testing the efficacy of RM interventions under the following conditions: interventions should be low risk; the degenerative abnormalities (and other risk factors) should be strongly related with disease within a short time frame; robust preclinical evidence of efficacy needs to be present; and the informed consent procedure should contain extra safeguards with regard to communication on uncertainties. (shrink)

The introduction of novel diagnostic techniques in clinical domains such as genomics and radiology has led to a rich ethical debate on how to handle unsolicited findings that result from these innovations. Yet while unsolicited findings arise in both genomics and radiology, most of the relevant literature to date has tended to focus on only one of these domains. In this article, we synthesize and critically assess similarities and differences between “scanning the body” and “sequencing the genome” from an ethical (...) perspective. After briefly describing the novel diagnostic contexts leading to unsolicited findings, we synthesize and reflect on six core ethical issues that relate to both specialties: terminology; benefits and risks; autonomy; disclosure of unsolicited findings to children; uncertainty; and filters and routine screening. We identify ethical rationales that pertain to both fields and may contribute to more ethically sound policies. Considerations of preserving public trust and ensuring that people perceive healthcare policies as fair also support the need for a combined debate. (shrink)

\noindent\textbf{Introduction} Online interventions hold great potential for Therapeutic Change Process Research (TCPR), a field that aims to relate in-therapeutic change processes to the outcomes of interventions. Online a client is treated essentially through the language their counsellor uses, therefore the verbal interaction contains many important ingredients that bring about change. TCPR faces two challenges: how to derive meaningful change processes from texts, and secondly, how to assess these complex, varied and multi-layered processes? We advocate the use text mining and multi-level (...) models (MLMs): the former offers tools and methods to discovers patterns in texts; the latter can analyse these change processes as outcomes that vary at multiple levels. \noindent\textbf{Method} We (re-)used the data from \cite{Lamers2015} because it includes outcomes and the complete online intervention for clients with mild depressive symptoms. We used text mining to obtain basic text-variables from e-mails, that we analysed through MLMs. \noindent\textbf{Results} We found that we could relate outcomes of interventions to variables containing text-information. We conclude that we can indeed bridge text mining and MLMs for TCPR as it was possible to relate text-information (obtained through text mining) to multi-levelled TCPR outcomes (using a MLM). \noindent\textbf{Discussion} Text mining can be helpful to obtain change processes, which is also the main challenge for TCPR. We showed how MLMs and text mining can be combined, but our proposition leaves open how to obtain the most relevant textual operationalization of TCPR concepts. That requires interdisciplinary collaboration and discussion. The future does look bright: based on our proof-of-concept study we conclude that MLMs and text mining can indeed advance TCPR. (shrink)

Cross‐strand disulphides (CSDs) are unusual bonds that link adjacent strands in the same β‐sheet. Their peculiarity relates to the high potential energy stored in these bonds, both as torsional energy in the highly strained disulphide linkage and as deformation energy stored in the sheet itself. CSDs are relatively rare in protein structures but are conspicuous by their presence in proteins that are involved in cell entry. The finding that entry of botulinum neurotoxin and HIV into mammalian cells involves cleavage of (...) CSDs suggests that the activity of other cell entry proteins may likewise involve cleavage of these bonds. We examine emerging evidence of the involvement of these unusual disulphides in cell entry events. BioEssays 26:73–79, 2004. © 2003 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. (shrink)

In this paper, we introduce the Societal Readiness Thinking Tool to aid researchers and innovators in developing research projects with greater responsiveness to societal values, needs, and expectations. The need for societally-focused approaches to research and innovation—complementary to Technology Readiness frameworks—is presented. Insights from responsible research and innovation concepts and practice, organized across critical stages of project-life cycles are discussed with reference to the development of the SR Thinking Tool. The tool is designed to complement not only shortfalls in TR (...) approaches, but also improve upon other efforts to integrate RRI, sustainability, and design thinking in research and innovation cycles. Operationalization and early-stage user tests of the Tool are reported, along with discussion of potential future iterations and applications. (shrink)

An increasing number of older patients have to decide on a treatment plan for advanced chronic kidney disease, involving dialysis or conservative care. Shared decision-making is recommended as the model for decision-making in such preference-sensitive decisions. The aim of SDM is to come to decisions that are consistent with the patient’s values and preferences and made by the patient and healthcare professional working together. In clinical practice, however, SDM appears to be not yet routine and needs further implementation. A shift (...) from a biomedical to a person-centered conception might help to make the process more shared. Shared should, therefore, be interpreted as two persons bringing two perspectives to the table, that both need to be explored during the decision-making process. Starting from the patient’s perspective will enable to determine the mutual goals of care first and, subsequently, determine the best way for achieving those goals. To perform such SDM, the healthcare professional needs to become a skilled companion, being part of the patient’s relational context, and start asking the right questions about what matters to the patient as person. In this article, we describe the need for a person-centered conception of SDM for the setting of older patients with advanced CKD. (shrink)

The aim of this empirical study is to understand how bachelor students at universities of applied sciences (UAS) use their ethical compasses during internships. Semi-structured interviews were held with 36 fourth-year bachelor students across four UAS and three different programs in the Netherlands: Initial Teacher Education, Business Services, and Information and Communication Technology. To our knowledge, no studies appear to have investigated and compared students from multiple professional fields, nor identified the dynamics and the sequence of the strategies in the (...) decision-making process that students use when faced with ethical dilemmas during internships. We found that students’ ethical dilemmas stemmed from: mentors’ or managers’ behaviours/requests, colleagues’ behaviours, organisations’ morally questionable incentives, pupils’ home situations, and pupils’ behaviours/personal stories. The majority of students used multiple strategies and first investigated the ethical dilemmas they encountered and then avoided, intervened, delegated responsibilities, or adjusted to their environments. Students’ values played an important role in experiencing an ethical dilemma, however, these values were not always acted upon. We identified that rather students’ beliefs about having influence and/or ownership (or not), personal interest(s) and power relations influenced the way how they used their ethical compasses. Thus, instead of navigating on moral standards (of their profession), students reacted on beliefs which reflected the ways in which they constructed their internship contexts, social relationships and their own (and others) needs. As a result, half of the mentioned dilemmas were resolved in a prudent-strategic manner (e.g., by prioritising personal interests), instead of morally. This indicates that students did not always convert (moral) values into moral action and did not use their ethical compasses in the way UAS aspires. Finally, this study found that the ways in which students used their ethical compasses were strongly influenced by their environments. (shrink)

In this empirical study, we investigate _what_ and _how_ teachers in Dutch universities of applied sciences (UAS) think they contribute to the development of students’ ethical compasses. Six focus groups were conducted with teachers across three programmes: Initial Teaching Education, Business Services, and Information and Communication Technology. This study revealed that teachers across the three different professional disciplines shared similar ideas about what should be addressed in the development of students’ ethical compasses. Their contributions were grouped into three core themes: (...) creating students’ moral awareness, developing students’ moral skills and promoting students’ moral professional behaviour. The majority of the teachers used a wide range of planned and unplanned pedagogic–didactic actions (reflecting individual learning and cooperative and group learning) to enhance the development of students’ ethical compasses. However, teachers’ strategies were mostly unstructured and unreflective and depended on the individual teacher’s ability and knowledge to address moral themes. Furthermore, the study revealed two incompatible ideals: as role models, the teachers aimed to exemplify explicitly how to be a professional with an ethical compass. However, they also wanted to adopt a neutral stance because they were afraid to manipulate the students’ ethical compasses. Therefore, they avoided promoting _the_ ethical compass that they believed to be the best. (shrink)

As of October 23, 2020, almost 42 million cases of COVID-19 have been reported globally. Although many different treatments have been applied in infected...

“Esotericism” refers, more or less, to what used to be called “the occult.” It comprises such matters as astrology, alchemy, kabbalism, magic, and theosophy—to name just a few. In other words, it refers to just about everything that came to be marginalized in the modern period as “superstition” and “pseudo-science,” and anathematized by scientists and philosophers. In recent decades, there has been an explosion of scholarly interest in esotericism, partly because of research revealing that many “canonical” scientists and philosophers of (...) the past were strongly interested in these “irrational” currents. The philosophers include Leibniz, Kant, Hegel, Schelling, and Schopenhauer; the scientists include Newton. Such .. (shrink)

In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:Reviewed by:Virtue Ethics for the Real World: Improving Character without Idealization by Howard J. CurzerBenjamin HoleCURZER, Howard J. Virtue Ethics for the Real World: Improving Character without Idealization. New York: Routledge, 2023. 272 pp. Cloth, $160.00The development of virtue ethics has been in a lull. This book is a welcome treatise in theory-building, developing a novel Aristotelian approach to virtue ethics that, first, avoids idealization and, second, provides a (...) method for character improvement. It is divided into two parts reflecting these themes.The front matter before the title page brandishes a "No Don Quixotes" sign, warning the reader the following pages are no place for a misguided idealist. Part 1, "Against Idealization," contains six chapters. Chapter 2 argues that idealization is not a useful guide, but an impediment to virtue, since ideals can be misleading, psychologically damaging, and used for nefarious purposes. Chapters 3 through 7 construct a virtue ethical theory without idealization. Idealization may seem central to a virtue-oriented approach to ethics. For example, Rosalind Hursthouse's famous biconditional claims that an act is right if and only if it is what the virtuous person would characteristically do in the same circumstances. By contrast, chapter 3 provides counterexamples separating virtuous action from what the virtuous person would characteristically do, and separating virtuous action from right action. Sacrificing Hursthouse's biconditional is a fundamental change to the way many conceive of Aristotelian virtue ethics, demanding revisions to the rest of the theory. For instance, to address moral dilemmas, chapter 4 defends two psychological mechanisms under which there are virtuous, morally wrong acts that are admirably immoral, and vicious, morally right acts that leave the agent with dirty hands.Chapter 5 provides the grounding for contemporary Aristotelian virtue ethics without idealization, by answering what makes character traits [End Page 541] virtues and what makes acts virtuous. Two-level eudaimonism involves a thin theory, where virtue consists in responding well to different spheres of human activity, and a thick theory, where responding well contributes to the agent's eudaimonia. Since virtuous people may characteristically perform nonvirtuous actions, virtuous actions are not necessarily what virtuous people characteristically do but actions that are endorsed by virtuous people from the perspective of virtue. The "Perspectives Doctrine" claims that virtuous people decide how to respond from the perspective of different virtues, and those perspectives offer incomplete and sometimes incompatible ways of responding. For instance, a temperate person endorsing an action as temperate from the perspective of temperance makes it temperate, but would not make it courageous, and an endorsement from the perspective of courage would not make her action temperate. Agents determine what is virtuous by asking virtuous people to consider, from the perspective of virtue, what should be done; when virtuous people are unavailable, agents can consult philosophers and social scientists who research the responses of virtuous people. Chapter 6 rejects the "Reciprocity of the Virtue Doctrine," which claims possessing one virtue entails possessing the rest, in favor of the "Unevenly Virtuous People Doctrine," on which people can have some but not all of the virtues; character typically improves at different paces in different areas of life. Chapter 7 rejects Philippa Foot's "Corrective Doctrine" of virtue as implausible idealization in favor of a traditionally Aristotelian "Doctrine of the Mean," and argues that the virtues of integrity, forgiveness, tolerance, open-mindedness, and civility are governed by that doctrine.Although character improvement seems to depend on idealization, by striving to achieve some end, part 2's five chapters paint an alternative picture. Chapter 8 defends a medical analogy over competing models philosophers typically employ to understand character improvement, including skill (Aristotle and Julia Annas), stage or path (Aristotle and Wouter Sanderse), self-cultivation (Mengzi), and self-construction (Xunzi) analogies. To improve character, one must look to a fine-grained list of possible character flaws, diagnose deficits in character, and then heal character flaws by employing targeted strategies, including "inculcation strategies, rehabilitation strategies, and strategies to improve society's ethical climate." Character improvement is complex and becomes more so when considering all of the ways one might err. Chapter 9 introduces an Aristotelian model for moral decision-making within each... (shrink)

Social epistemologists should be well-equipped to explain and evaluate the growing vulnerabilities associated with filter bubbles, echo chambers, and group polarization in social media. However, almost all social epistemology has been built for social contexts that involve merely a speaker-hearer dyad. Filter bubbles, echo chambers, and group polarization all presuppose much larger and more complex network structures. In this paper, we lay the groundwork for a properly social epistemology that gives the role and structure of networks their due. In particular, (...) we formally define epistemic constructs that quantify the structural epistemic position of each node within an interconnected network. We argue for the epistemic value of a structure that we call the (m,k)-observer. We then present empirical evidence that (m,k)-observers are rare in social media discussions of controversial topics, which suggests that people suffer from serious problems of epistemic vulnerability. We conclude by arguing that social epistemologists and computer scientists should work together to develop minimal interventions that improve the structure of epistemic networks. (shrink)

Of all the developments in twentieth century physics, none has given rise to more heated debates than the changes in our understanding of science precipitated by the quantum revolution''. In this revolution, Niels Bohr's dramatically non-classical theory of the atom proved to be the springboard from which the new atomic physics drew it's momentum. Furthermore, Bohr's contribution was crucial not only because his interpretation of quantum mechanics became the most widely accepted view but also because in his role as educator (...) and spokesman for atomic physics Bohr was very much the patron spirit of the entire quantum revolution. The conceptual framework which he proposed to provide a new viewpoint for understanding the quantum theoretical description of atomic systems became for most of this century the dominant outlook of countless productive experimental and theoretical physicists. He called this new framework complementarity''. (shrink)

Trope theory is a leading metaphysical theory in analytic ontology. One of its classic statements is found in the work of Donald C. Williams who argued that tropes qua abstract particulars are the very alphabet of being. The concept of an abstract particular has been repeatedly attacked in the literature. Opponents and proponents of trope theory alike have levelled their criticisms at the abstractness of tropes and the associated act of abstraction. In this paper I defend the concept of a (...) trope qua abstract particular by rejecting arguments that purport to show that tropes should not be understood as abstract and by arguing that the abstractness of tropes plays an indispensable role in one of our more promising trope-theoretic analyses of universals and of concrete objects. (shrink)

In Working Virtue: Virtue Ethics and Contemporary Moral Problems, leading figures in the fields of virtue ethics and ethics come together to present the first ...

v. 1. Nicomachean ethics. Politics. The Athenian Constitution. Rhetoric. On Poetics.--v. 2. Logic.--v. 3. Physics. Metaphysics. On the soul. Short physical treaties.--v. 4. On the heavens. On generation and corruption. Meteorology. Biological treatises.

The concept of instantiation is realized differently across a variety of metaphysical theories. A certain realization of the concept in a given theory depends on what roles are specified and associated with the concept and its corresponding term as well as what entities are suited to fill those roles. In this paper, the classic realization of the concept of instantiation in a one-category ontology of abstract particulars or tropes is articulated in a novel way and defended against unaddressed objections.

In this paper, we explain and showcase the promising methodology of testimonial network analysis and visualization for experimental epistemology, arguing that it can be used to gain insights and answer philosophical questions in social epistemology. Our use case is the epistemic community that discusses vaccine safety primarily in English on Twitter. In two studies, we show, using both statistical analysis and exploratory data visualization, that there is almost no neutral or ambivalent discussion of vaccine safety on Twitter. Roughly half the (...) accounts engaging with this topic are pro-vaccine, while the other half are con-vaccine. We also show that these two camps rarely engage with one another, and that the con-vaccine camp has greater epistemic reach and receptivity than the pro-vaccine camp. In light of these findings, we question whether testimonial networks as they are currently constituted on popular fora such as Twitter are living up to their promise of delivering the wisdom of crowds. We conclude by pointing to directions for further research in digital social epistemology. (shrink)

While the opposing paradigms of globalization and fragmentation compete in often bloody and destructive ways in the world today, this book convincingly reminds us of the importance of finding out more about the complex and changing ways in which we are connected. The authors demonstrate that the more we understand our connectedness and deal with its consequences, the less dependent and helpless we become. The critical, multidisciplinary perspectives they offer cover a wide range of subjects, from the world wide web (...) to medieval poetry, nations and gender, cancer narratives and money, emotion management and the financial markets, and the American civilizing process and the repression of shame. The contributions bear witness to Elias's innovative achievements while the authors continue his stunning explorations, extending them into other areas of the humanities and the sciences, and presenting their own wide-ranging and penetrating insights into our mutual dependence. Contributors are Jorge Arditi, Godfried Van Benthem Van Den Bergh, Reinhard Blomert, Stephen Guy-Bray, Thomas M. Kemple, Hermann Korte, Helmut Kuzmics, Stephen Mennell, Thomas Salumets, Thomas J. Scheff, Ulrich C. Teucher, Annette Treibel, and Cas Wouters. (shrink)

Fifteen essays addressing conceptions of individualism and holism as they emerged in Chinese literature and philosophy from the time of Confucius and Chuang-tzu to the present.

Human languages vary in many ways but also show striking cross-linguistic universals. Why do these universals exist? Recent theoretical results demonstrate that Bayesian learners transmitting language to each other through iterated learning will converge on a distribution of languages that depends only on their prior biases about language and the quantity of data transmitted at each point; the structure of the world being communicated about plays no role (Griffiths & Kalish, , ). We revisit these findings and show that when (...) certain assumptions about the relationship between language and the world are abandoned, learners will converge to languages that depend on the structure of the world as well as their prior biases. These theoretical results are supported with a series of experiments showing that when human learners acquire language through iterated learning, the ultimate structure of those languages is shaped by the structure of the meanings to be communicated. (shrink)

For over 40 years, J. I. Packer's classic has been an important tool to help Christians around the world discover the wonder, the glory and the joy of knowing God. Explaining both who God is and how we can relate to him, this thought-provoking work seeks to transform and enrich the Christian understanding of God.

In management research, theory testing confronts a paradox described by Meehl in which designing studies with greater methodological rigor puts theories at less risk of falsification. This paradox exists because most management theories make predictions that are merely directional, such as stating that two variables will be positively or negatively related. As methodological rigor increases, the probability that an estimated effect will differ from zero likewise increases, and the likelihood of finding support for a directional prediction boils down to a (...) coin toss. This paradox can be resolved by developing theories with greater precision, such that their propositions predict something more meaningful than deviations from zero. This article evaluates the precision of theories in management research, offers guidelines for making theories more precise, and discusses ways to overcome barriers to the pursuit of theoretical precision. (shrink)

Rooted in the field of cathedral studies, this paper draws into dialogue three bodies of knowledge: Edward Bailey’s notion of implicit religion that, among other things, highlights the continuing traction of the Christian tradition and Christian practice within secular societies; David Walker’s notion of the multiple ways through which in secular societies people may relate to the Christian tradition as embodied within the Anglican Church and John Fisher’s notion of spiritual wellbeing as conceptualised in relational terms. Against this conceptual background, (...) this paper draws on data provided by 1234 participants attending one of the Christmas Eve carol services in Liverpool Cathedral to explore the perceived impact of attendance on the spiritual health of people who do not believe in God and yet feel that Liverpool Cathedral is their cathedral, and it is this sense of belonging that brings them back at Christmas time.Contribution: Situated within the science of cathedral studies, this paper links in an original way three fields of discourse: Edward Bailey’s notion of implicit religion, David Walker’s notion of the four ways of belonging to God facilitated by the Anglican Church and John Fisher’s conceptualisation and operationalisation of the notion of spiritual wellbeing. The hypothesis developed from this original integration of theoretical perspectives is then tested empirically on data provided by 404 participants at carol services who do not believe in God. (shrink)

What responsibilities does each of us have to reduce or limit our greenhouse gas emissions? Advocates of individual emissions reductions acknowledge that there are limits to what we can reasonably demand from individuals. Climate ethics has not yet systematically explored those limits. Instead, it has become popular to suggest that such judgements should be ‘context-sensitive’ but this does not tell us what role different contextual factors should play in our moral thinking. The current approach to theory development in climate ethics (...) is not likely to be the most effective way to fill this gap. In existing work, climate ethicists use hypothetical cases to consider what can be reasonably demanded of individuals in particular situations. In contrast, ‘climate ethics with an ethnographic sensibility’ uses qualitative social science methods to collect original data in which real individuals describe their own situations. These real-life cases are more realistic, more detailed and cover a broader range of circumstances than hypothetical cases. Normative analysis of real-life cases can help us to develop a more systematic understanding of the role that different contextual factors should play in determining individual climate responsibilities. It can also help us to avoid the twin dangers of ‘idealization’ and ‘special pleading’. (shrink)

J.L. Ackrill's work on Plato and Aristotle has had a considerable influence upon ancient philosophical studies in the late twentieth century. This volume collects the best of Ackrill's essays on the two greatest philosophers of antiquity. With philosophical acuity and philological expertise he examines a wide range of texts and topics--from ethics and logic to epistemology and metaphysics--that continue to be in the focus of debate.

Semantic Scholar extracted view of "Animal Welfare and Rights: V. Zoos and Zoological Parks" by J. Dunlap et al.

This article has two objectives. First, and in particular, it seeks to reinterpret the ostracism procedure of early democratic Athens. Since Aristotle, this has been understood as a rational, political weapon of collective defense, intended to expel from Athens a disproportionately powerful individual. In this article, by putting emphasis on themateriality, gestures, and location of ostraka-casting, I propose instead that the institution can more fruitfully be understood as a ritual enactment of civic unity. Second, and more generally, I hope to (...) explore the frames within which early Athenian democracy is placed: while Greek kingship and tyranny (i.e. “primitive” polities) have been very successfully explored through anthropological and cross-cultural comparison, Greek democracy for the most part has remained in the domains of the institutional historian and political theorist. Taking a phenomenological and comparative approach, this article asks how the citizens of early democratic Athens experienced and comprehended their new sovereignty and the invented procedures of mass decision-making through which it was expressed. (shrink)